Can We Get An X?

Since I'm way too busy running hysterically about the playground in full liberal rant (still LOL-ing over that one too), I just don't make the time for myself that I know I should for more porn in my life. Damn kids. So tell me, my more porn-active pals, is Sienna Miller's new movie, Factory Girl, now a gen-u-ine porn flick? All I know is I can't wait to see it! Sienna is utterly drop-dead adorable, although I hope she's doing the "real" act with a character who's supposed to be modeled after Bob Dylan and not that creepy Andy Warhol. I don't think anyone of any gender ever really had sex with Warhol. Or maybe they did. Hell if I know, I was, like, 6 at the time, and adults back then were all just really, really strange.

Have A ROFL With Your Morning Coffee

And Chris Hitchens thinks women aren't funny? All that booze has finally gone to his always-dubious sensibilities. Be sure to stay with this until Ellen just loses it! Freakin' hilarious.

Let's Conversation!

Can I Get A Code Red, Brother?

It's just not funny anymore. Traffic conditions in Atlanta are at a crisis point. I'll let Rev. Screed preach it 'cause nobody does a traffic rant better than the Rev. Can a get a prayer cloth to go with that? Unbelievable. There should be a screeching-halt moratorium on EVERYTHING in Atlanta until our leaders come to their traffic-related senses.

Settled For Cluelessness

Linda Hirshman, writing for the Washington Post, implies that most women, particularly married-with-kids ones, are politically clueless. Hell, essentially culturally clueless from what I can tell from this piece.

Way out here in Mommy Land, I can tell you -- she's right. I can't think of but a very few mom-women I know who are "up on" much of anything other than Brangelina, sales, food items, costuming, PTA, vaccinate or not, putting things in cutesy flower pots, American Idol, and whether their kids prefer Beefaroni or sushi. It's pitiful and sad, but true. I can't say I've discussed "what the hell is wrong with McCain" with any other moms. Should I even try? They'll just change the subject to stroller brands, or "have to run go get my kids" all of a sudden.

On the other hand, political astuteness isn't necessarily what I'm seeking from my friendships and alliances with other moms. That's what having super-smart and savvy men-friends is for, right? Here's a taste of what's bound to get any gender going:

A 36-year-old former financial sales executive considers herself an independent, reads only the Style and Weekend sections of The Post and the Marketplace and Personal Journal sections of the Wall Street Journal, and also counts on her husband, a Republican, to tell her what's interesting in the rest of the paper.

A former human rights activist told me that she still reads the New York Times, skims the Economist, and gathers political information from PBS's "News Hour," a local broadcast from the BBC and from her church.

Neither the former teacher nor the retired television reporter read any newspapers at all.

There are some constants. Most of the women read People and Real Simple magazines. They all listen to news on the car radio, mostly National Public Radio. And almost all their full-time working husbands consume immeasurably more political information than they do ("He reads 10 times what I do," one told me), reading news magazines and political Web sites and bringing home political information from their jobs. The women gather little information from their almost exclusively female society of other stay-at-home moms.

Full article here. They oughtta at least make time to scan the SGR, eh? But as one mom told me most gleefully the other day on the playground, as I was no doubt boring her to wandering-eye distraction with my own "something I read on a blog the other day" tales of deadly-boring astuteness (basic response of other moms: "what's a blog?"), "I just learned to cut and paste last week!" I had to turn my face away lest she saw my look of undiluted disgust.

So does this mean that the only reason I absorb politics is because I'm divorced and have no man around the house to tell me how to "feel" about it all? I'm going to go hurl now, because this reminds me of how I loath going out with married couples. (T&C not included!) It's always "we this" and "we that." There simply isn't individual thinking or feeling going on for much of anything - least not publicly, the little liars.

Seeds and Stems

Podcast about SoCon07 here. Registration is now closed for SoCon07 though, but check back as the dates, February 9 & 10th, get closer as space might free-up at the last minute. Press will always be welcomed warmly in regardless of registrant status.

Amber and Rusty are back from BlogSavannah. Check their blogs for info about that un-con as we head to Podcamp Atlanta in March.

Anglicans get to Code Red desperation; use WorldMouth-worship to lure spectators. I went to a U2-crist once. It was kinda cool, but you didn't hear that from me. Brangelina next? Or have they been beamed to World 'O Scientology by now, too? Let's make Mars a Scientology-celebrity dump, eh NASA?

Traffic remains a bit of an issue in metro Atlanta. Money wasted. Lots of it. Exurbanista can't get to faux barns on time.

A fellow vid-questioneer for Arianna Huffington trippin' through Davos was Hue and Cry front man, Pat Kane. They've got a new album out soon.

Our Senator Saxby didn't have no YouTube Q&A. To Saxby: that's soooo lame, dude Senator. It's like 2007 and shit. What the hell are you doing traipsing around Switzerland unless you can show your constituents back home what a clueless old fart you are, like right away on YouTube? And what corporate jet got you to and from Davos, eh?

And that's it for Monday. Brrrrr... it's cold out there in the ATL. Look for more YouTube-ing from me in the coming week. That last one was really fun. Of course Biggy S. cranks out another report from Miami World O'News Headquarters, this time all the latest YouTube news. Gawd, I feel like I personally know whatshisname, Chad, by now as I've watched him via Jeff Jarvis' channel more than I ever really needed to.

Bundle up. This post put together to the same-'ole WABE droid-tunes as spun by Lois Rietzes. She can go to Mars with the Scientologists.

Apres Ski Avec Moi

Arianna Huffington is soliciting v-questions while at Davos. Here's mine:




Technorati tags: davos07, davos

About Time

Earthlink is Wi-Fi-ing Atlanta! Hell yeah. 'Bout time since they are the home team. Then again, as most of us have had to, at some point in time, hoe that same long, grueling City of Atlanta-business-dealings row, I can feel their pain through the line. (Payback is hell.)

So fuck you, AT&T... just wish I could have had a chance to say "fuck you" to Bellsouth a little louder. Saying it to AT&T just doesn't have the same umph. Still, I'll be canceling my now-AT&T DSL line-in as soon as I see a Wi-Fi cell go up near me! Praise Jesus, and a big strong fem Purse Slam to AT&T.

Now if we could just dig-up all that cruddy-ass DSL and get Earthlink to lay us down some good strong fiber optic instead. Sure! When Bellsouth/AT&T just recalls all their lobbyista and hands over the Legislature/Congress back to us, the people, on the silver platter we shareholder (Bellsouth) idiots gave them in the first place. More on that scam here.

I say renew our efforts in Iraq in a big way -- send all lobbyistas and their corporate-plantation masters over there instead of soldiers. We need the soldiers here to protect us from the Psycho Christian Right anyways.

Bloggers Win!!! Again!!!

Reporting live from the bleeding heart of global corporate culture (Davos), Jeff Jarvis notes that Big People say bloggers have won. (Not to be confused with "one" reader of course.) Says a prominent Brit politico, "The age of the smoke-filled room is over." (The dude's obviously never been anywhere near the Gold Dome!)

Does this mean that bloggers can hop a ride on their Gulfstreams now? I've always wanted to learn to ski. Blog and ski at the same time. Lipflap too. Ahhh, so many talents we really do have here in the blogosphere.

I'm placing my order now.

Hillary Is Just Alright By Me

I keep throwing it out and it just keeps coming right back like a mangy pup -- my Hillary-leaning that is. I've always liked her for her ill-concealed conservatism I suppose. Takes one to know one. From The Economist today:

The saner American left is at last waking up to the fact that Hillary was never the radical firebrand of conservative caricature. She has always been pro-business (her much demonised health-care reforms rejected the Canadian single-payer model and enjoyed the support of many businesses that were worried about escalating health care costs). She has always been deeply religious, and even contemplated becoming a Methodist minister. She supported welfare reform. If the right regards her as a Trojan horse for left-wing liberalism, the left regards her as a Trojan horse for corporate Clintonism.

Hillary-hatred is a double problem for the Republicans. It blinds them to Mrs Clinton's strengths: many Republicans live in such a conservative cocoon that they think no sensible American will ever vote for the she-devil. And it brings out everything that is most noxious and misogynistic about the right. Hillary-haters may look forward to reading Jonah Goldberg's forthcoming book, “Liberal Fascism: the Totalitarian Temptation from Mussolini to Hillary Clinton”, but most people just laugh. Hillary-haters may applaud when Jerry Falwell says that a Hillary candidacy would motivate his constituency more than Satan himself. Most people take it as a sign of derangement.

Yepper... or the "Psycho Christian Right", as termed by Peachtree Screed. Full article here. (So Erik at PP, you with me on this one? Heh heh.)

Douglas County Giveth And Douglas County Sure Taketh Away

What's the price of consensual teen sex in Douglas County, Georgia? Is ten years at the Big House enough sin-washin' time for ya? Ten years. That's no joke. That's what high school football star Genarlow Wilson is doing right about now: ten years for getting a blow job from a gal who admitted prompting sex in the first place. From Wright Thompson at ESPN.com:

Once, he (Wilson) was the homecoming king at Douglas County High. Now he's Georgia inmate No. 1187055, convicted of aggravated child molestation. When he was a senior in high school, he received oral sex from a 10th grader. He was 17. She was 15. Everyone, including the girl and the prosecution, agreed she initiated the act. But because of an archaic Georgia law, it was a misdemeanor for teenagers less than three years apart to have sexual intercourse, but a felony for the same kids to have oral sex.

But hey, if Genarlow had just copped a plea deal ("taken his medicine") instead of insisting on a jury trial so he might somehow, someway not be branded a "child molester," he'd have had to serve only FIVE years! (And of course those upright, Bible-lovin' Douglas County prosecutors won't be ever labled "soft" on pervs that way either. Just kinda semi-limp. Makes you wonder what happens to their puffed-up little lawyerin' body parts during a good romp in the sack, eh? But I diverge...)

Barker (the prosecutor in the case) thinks five years is fair for receiving oral sex from a schoolmate.

If the world isn't falling out of their chairs laughing at our backasswater ways with the Milton County nonsense, then it is surely crying now. Shoot, even Erik The Republican over at Peach Pundit thinks this case is seriously extreme.

You can sign an online petition to help Wilson's case here.

Full ESPN story here. HT to Harley D.

Fantasy Church

Some folks groove on fantasy football; some gotta have their fantasy fashion. Me, being a little freak of course, I play Fantasy Church. I freakin' get OFF when my fave menz bloggers get going with they righteous badass selvesez and start a'preachin' all fiery-like and fury-bound. Mmmmmm yeah sistahs. Hear 'em won't you. Preach on Brother Grift. Preach on Brother Tanton. You too Rev. Screed.

Chicken's 'a fryin' now!

You Are As You're Linked To

Hmmm... the SGR made MSM again, but I can't for the life of me find a single referral hit from this piece on the stats. Could this be to the dubious influence of Cox news service, or just to a total lack of interest in this blog?

Nothing else powers the sensation of having a voice like blogging!

Great Excuses. No Expectations

I grew up down a dirt road. (see I Am A Pine Tree) We had no neighbors. The closest house was occupied by a wizened old dude who did nothing more, from what I could tell, but re-arrange Coca Cola bottles in his dirt yard and tree tops all day long. (Evil spirits could thus be trapped in the bottles instead of worming into his feeble psyche, for you city folk.)

My folks didn't much care for random people. Never have, never will. They're kinda weird, but we don't choose our parents, and other than being, to this day, the oddest people I know, the folks are pretty cool people (and parents). Least they've grown into their oddness by now.

Anyways... and getting to the point here, I have an isolationist tendency by association, not by nature that's fer sure, as I was so driven to socialize as a teen that I'd go for episodic sessions of cheap, arm-waving emotionalism with the hardcore Baptists down the road just for something to do. My adolescent religious fervor was mostly a by-product of the drilling boredom associated with being raised by off-the-grid hermits. I quickly tired of the Baptists, with their polyester clothes and ugly trailer homes, and sought nicer fibers and higher tastes, if not powers, instead within my two grandmothers' sensible purse-clutching Anglican ways.

I'm off track here, moreorless like Christopher Hitchens' open to this brief essay about how stupid people really are, and how moronic passivity allows crime to fester. Says Hitchens:

But to find that you have been passively watching a crime, or crimes, in slow motion, must make you feel stupid as well as cowardly. This might help explain the slightly plaintive and defensive tone adopted by some of the local Kirkwoodians, such as the lady I cited above who had moved there just to avoid this kind of unpleasantness. "A lot of us are down on our luck and living paycheck to paycheck," observed Harry C. Reichard IV, who occupied the apartment above (Michael) Devlin's. "When you're just trying to survive, you don't pay a lot of attention to people around you." This justifiable emphasis on one's own priorities extends apparently even to the avoidance of idle gossip—as in, "I see the guy downstairs has just had another teenager." If the cops hadn't come, looking for something else entirely, the whole bizarre Devlin menage might have kept on burgeoning, until it either achieved a ripe old age or was forced by pressure of sheer population growth to relocate to a nicer neighborhood where the locals would be even less curious and where such things were noticed even less.

In other words, should we be keeping a much more watchful eye on our neighbors? Hitchens seems to think so. As mentioned, I'm trained to ignore a great deal of what might be considered abhorrent behavior just by my isolationist upbringing, and I honestly don't know exactly what to do, to this day, with neighbors, other than try to avoid them, something often hard to do in a condo complex.

However, I had a couple of rather strange incidents happened recently in my 'hood that involved a neighboring family. The lady of the house was observed by another neighbor as she came to her back fence with a massive pot of some mystery stew and proceeded to pour the contents of the pot over her own fence and into our condos' back yards. The contents of the pot were entirely rotted, to the point where when a neighbor and I began cleaning-up the mess of our neighbor, which we immediately did to keep our dogs out of the rot and to control our little rat infestation, we were overcome with gagging.

A few nights later, someone in that same household began firing some kind of weaponry into the air amidst another one of their impromptu, firework-laden celebrations. It caused a big brew ha-ha on the neighborhood discussion e-board the next day, but I merely tuned-out the rapid fire and went to bed. I don't know if anyone ever called the cops on the trigger-happy family for firing guns within the city limits. I know I never did.

Given the circumstances surrounding the circumstance of the boys who were held "captive" in Michael Devlin's cruddy apartment, should I have been more diligent about alerting authorities about "odd" behavior near my own home? (Indeed, illegal behavior in the case of guns used inside city limits.) Far as I know, no children were harmed in either incident, from what little I cared to delve into the matter to find out.

Maybe next time it happens...

Live From The Armoire!

I'm just gonna turn this whole blog into a Biggy S. delivery device. Don't miss this critical update as the clock ticks towards State of The Union hour(s). Save the bubbies!

Caroline's Playing Tonight!

Caroline Monroe takes the stage at Smith's tonight to shine the light on her brand-new CD release, Ghost Town. Y'all are soooo in for a treat! Wish I could be there, but I'll have to catch her on TrueGritz instead. Caroline plays The Earl in February.

Oh yeah... Look for a new TG episode next week. 'Bout time those two gals got up off their fat asses, stopped watching Oprah and eating bon-bons all day long, and started cookin' some darn video for the men folk 'round here...

Keep An Eye On HB1

All of you Georgia bloggers who are keeping an eye on our current legislative process, you lucky dogs, please let me know if there's any news about our HB1's, hopefully lack of, progress/news in the Legislature. Even though I blogged my impressions about an initial hearing for HB1, I don't follow politics as much as I do culture and media issues, so often Georgia's wide world of psycho political items can slip through my cracks, even pro-choice issues. So I need some backup in the Gold Toilet Bowl Dome.

Emily Bazelon, a Slate.com editor and indie reporter who wrote this week's key NYTimes Magazine cover story: Is There A Post-Abortion Syndrome?, has expressed interest in our lovely little HB1 and its (the bill) ties to the Justice Foundation. (The Justice Foundation, and the things they do, was critical to her cover story.) So help me help her stay on top of this bill. Thanks!

Get A First Life

Heh heh. Sent to me by Cath, who sent the rogue site a Proceed and Permit letter.

Throw Enough Dove On The Fan...

Don't hold your breath 'cause it might not stick.

As President of the Biggy Shmuel Fan Club, let me bring your attention to the Big T's latest press-for-his-fine-video-effort. This time he turns his mesmerizingly gorgeous peepers on Dove body wash's failed YouTube campaign. Despite 3-M views, the Dove viral video campaign went swirling right down the drain.

In other words, marketeers with viral video dreams in your head, careful what you ask for before you GET it. Social media hates commercial crap almost as much as it hates MSM. Talk to the Biggy; he's watching you, Corporate Land.



NOTE: Careful dear, the Loch Nech monster is lurking in your pool.

I Am A Pine Tree

The Mind Of A Cell Phone... And Other Mobility Issues

I blog what I know. Since I don't get out of The Deep South much, I blog mostly about that. What I don't know is the rest of the world. From the looks of this fascinating blog, Future Perfect, by a Nokia researcher, Jan Chipchase, the world is simply one big cell phone issue. In a way, this is the oddest blog I've come across yet -- for that reason.

I was particularly fascinated by the deep-fried, succulent no doubt, rat dinner in China. I can't say that one made me rush to see if I still had a current passport. And honestly, the rest of the world seems so strange, from this blog's perspective, that I don't know if I really want to leave my American comfort zone anytime soon. After all, I am continually offended by the sight of hijabs in my own backyard.

Maybe some of us just aren't made to go global. Do we always need to? Have to? Especially now that we can just click to a blogger passing through Tehran.

(Note to Jan: If I was a cell phone manufacturer, I wouldn't want to overlook the massive Praise Jesus culture that invades not only daily life here in The South, but our laws. Not when you could be offering the Heritage Doll wallpaper. See below.)

Speaking of cell phones, there's a delightful little fuzz going on over at the AJC about 24. As mentioned by Panda's Keeper, the best part of that show is Jack Bauer's cell phone. It takes numerous hits for team and country and still keeps at it, never faltering. Just like Jack. I want me one of those cell phones. Then maybe I too will be a better American. I love that show.

Nobody Does It Better

No one can keep women in a perpetual state of hysteria better than our Dear Lord Jesus Christ. Ever since He stepped foot on the planet, women have been doing really odd things to themselves in His name.

The latest I-Love-Jesus-More-Than-You trend is the "Heritage Doll" - used to frame the "post-abortion syndrome" debate and to manipulate the most emotionally vulnerable women in our society: those in prison.

I can't decide who's committing the biggest sin here: the "Heritage Doll" maker, Rhonda Arias, 0r the lawmakers and officials who allow her access to the penal system to let her ply her vile, sick trade in hysteria and manipulation. From today's NYTimes Magazine cover story, Is There A Post-Abortion Syndrome?:

She (Arias) instructed the women (in prison) to stand up, speak in memory of their lost babies and take their heritage dolls to the altar. The women stood one by one. They clutched their dolls and said they were sorry. They imagined a baby with his father’s dimple or curly hair or green eyes. One woman mentioned a child who had been born and taken into state custody, and the woman who kissed the pictures of her daughters sent them her love. For the most part, though, the messy mothering of living children — and the reality of their lives outside the prison — did not intrude on the ceremony. The women focused on mourning the elusive, innocent loss represented by the dolls. They gave them fairy-tale names: Sarah Jewell, Angel Pillow, Xavier Dante. At a side table, Kimbrough and Harper wrote the names on certificates for children “expected to be born.” The documents promised, “By virtue of being conceived, the spirit of this child lives eternally with Jesus and in the heart and the mind of the mother, now and forevermore.”

Ahhh... the eternal comedy of abortion morality issues. And we haven't even gotten to the funny political gig yet! Someone at the NYT online edition has a delightful sense of humor though. They put a feature on Sarah Silverman just across from the shot of the heritage doll. I chortled long time over that. But only when my anger and disgust subsided.

The Future

Conversational snippet just overheard from my kid and her pal on their way out the door to play:

"Hurry, we'll be late for our work at the News Report."

Let's hope they're aspiring to online editorship.

Rejoice, We Have No Choice

The totally wacked-out writer Michael Chabon has a little tidbit here about The Future. (It took me all of a month to get through his freakin' brilliant review of the Dark Materials trilogy.)

As a (American) parent this graph naturally stood out:

If you ask my eight-year-old about the Future, he pretty much thinks the world is going to end, and that’s it. Most likely global warming, he says—floods, storms, desertification — but the possibility of viral pandemic, meteor impact, or some kind of nuclear exchange is not alien to his view of the days to come. Maybe not tomorrow, or a year from now. The kid is more than capable of generating a full head of optimistic steam about next week, next vacation, his tenth birthday. It’s only the world a hundred years on that leaves his hopes a blank. My son seems to take the end of everything, of all human endeavor and creation, for granted. He sees himself as living on the last page, if not in the last paragraph, of a long, strange and bewildering book.

Heck, my 6-year old daughter believes she's going to sing and dance to High School Musical forever. And that one day Troy (the boy lead in HSM. They're all "Troys" nowadays) will kiss her - on the lips. I am not going to tell her otherwise. I don't want her growing up to marry Chabon's little weirdo either, as what kinda childhood ideals would he have to fall back on/impose on her?

If more singing and dancing, feminine ideals in other words, were perpetuated in Western culture, we might not be in some of the cultural pickles we're obviously in now. Blame it on men and their violent pessimism. I'm really starting to think that most literary giants, other than Jane Austen and Tolstoy maybe, are full of shite. And yeah, particularly Faulkner. (Like Jamie Foxx saying "nigger," I can say stuff like that since I'm a white Southerner. Same argument, eh?) Maybe Chabon needs to pull an alethiometer out of his ass.

I hope, with my help, my kid continues to sing and dance her little heart out, for life. She'd better; her first talent show is this Friday night. Sheeze, all of us women folk had better be practicing our all-American moves... really really hard.

This post put together by this song, naturally enough:

On Pine Trees In The Winter Wind...

There is given an assurance of gardenias come spring.

The women of Tres Chicas will play you a redolent, harmonized world you'd find, perhaps by invitation only, in a garden obscured with vines of jasmine and ivy, worn stones and brick. Their deliberate, blended voices lure you into a feminine place lush with longing and lust and heartbreak and love, always love, mesmerizing you with a wave here and there of salt air from the ocean to remind you of how you will walk alone and onward, no matter how overgrown the darker path might be.

For the Chicas' womanly path is always strewn with broken dreams and promises never made, and leads to a garden of solitude and fortitude fragrant with tea olive and live oaks in silvery moonlight, glints of renewed dreams and senses and pools of Carolina light to waken to. A clink of the finest crystal by the fountain when you turn to see who might have joined you there inside the garden walls under the moon.

The Chicas, now on tour with their new album, Bloom Red and The Ordinary Girl, are a sound of Southern womanhood. Their strong, lingering harmonizing wafts and colors a room as dingy dark and stinking of disgusting bathroom deodorizer as even the hideous Smith's bar tonight in Atlanta, turning your head, if not the room, into a faded rose-patterned wallpaper tangle of memories and meadows of a North Carolina summer valley. They can play you into your heritage, your hopes, your summers. But mostly your longing. So walk clearly down to the river and renew your southern goth ways with some ivory lingerie, a bottle of champagne and a listen to Bloom Red and The Ordinary Girl.

Colonel Mustard In The Library

Gotta have a Biggy S. fix. Gawd he has the most gorgeous eyes I've ever seen.

Tres Chicas

Tres Chicas 8pm Smith's tonight.

Priceless

Art Buchwald announced his own death - on video. This is brilliant! What a man. What a life.

HT: JJ

Hell Is Just Inside The Perimeter

While out committing genuine journalism, imagine that at the AJC, Alan Judd and Andy Miller's excellent reporting on the hideous conditions of our state mental health facilities has gotten the attention of the feds. Hopefully full heat will now be applied.

I field produced, a couple of years ago, a shoot for the Kaiser Family Foundation at Georgia Regional State Hospital for this package. Although this important-in-itself story about the Olmstead Act doesn't focus on the conditions at Georgia Regional and doesn't show the horrid stuff, that place IS hell on earth. In every (unimaginable) way possible. We treat animals at the county shelter much, much better.

Meanwhile, back at the source-of-all-funding ranch, a lot of nothing is busy happening.

Technorati Rankings

I see James and I are running neck and neck on Technorati. First one to break into the Top Ten Thousand gets to host the strip poker party. Loser has to pay the booze bill. And yeah, I'll put it all on YouTube.

Bimbos, Incompetence and Junk Science

Seeds and stems:

John Sugg does the current Georgia Legislature up right. And he's just barely scratching the gold plate off of that toilet bowl. More episodes surely to follow.

The McMansion Madame is undergoing a career surge. Let's hear it for the forty-something ladies. We rule. Now if we bloggers could just get on her attorney's to-call list...

Jeff Jarvis quizzes me on Davos. I give him the dignity of a straight-up reply. I like him. I really do.

SoCon07 is heating up. Leonard has the who's who here.

And yeah, the new Shins release is really really good. Always the best. True blue.

My Bedroom For An Original Thought

Seems Bobby Lefsetz is getting awfully close to the mind of George Will who's quoting Brian Williams. Heck, these dudes' utter lack of originality is almost as bad as handing out trophies to little kids!

First there was Mr. Will in the Washington Post in full clueless prattle about the evil of blogging:

Time's issue includes an unenthralled essay by NBC's Brian Williams, who believes that raptures over the Web's egalitarianism arise from the same impulse that causes today's youth soccer programs to award trophies -- "entire bedrooms full" -- to any child who shows up: "The danger just might be that we miss the next great book or the next great idea, or that we will fail to meet the next great challenge . . . because we are too busy celebrating ourselves and listening to the same tune we already know by heart."

Then along comes Bobby who's at least not half as clueless as Will and a whole lot funnier if not any more original:

If you believe they are, sadly, you’re on a completely different page from me. This reminds me of the baby boomers’ kids, ALL of whom got trophies for playing in the soccer league, even if their team ended up in last place. I mean can’t we draw the line ANYWHERE anymore? Does EVERYBODY have to get in? Are we afraid of hurting every last person’s feelings?

Lordy hon, if Brian Williams is setting the intellectual tone, we are all soooo screwed.

TV Tonight

Atlanta producer Gayla Jamison's film, Lives For Sale, is on WPBA tonight at 9pm. According to the site, Lives For Sale is a one-hour "investigative documentary exposes the painful, rarely seen human side of illegal immigration - including the growing black market trade in human beings."

Following Lives For Sale, at 10:00pm also on WBPA, there will be a local townhall meeting with Gayla there. Gayla has worked for years on bringing this documentary to the public, so I'm excited to see her project come to fruition. Please watch and participate in the discussion if you can.

Gasper and Ralph Died For Homer's Sins

And ours too. Naomi A. Rose, a marine mammal scientist for The Humane Society of the United States, blasts the Georgia Aquarium right out of the water in this AJC op/ed.

It is shameful what happened to Ralph and Gasper, those beautiful animals. Shameful. And I am to blame as much as anyone out there. I love the Georgia Aquarium. My kid loves it. I bought into the hype, the spin, and bought an annual membership pass so I could indulge my senses all year long.

So bloggers... should we blog a boycott of the Georgia Aquarium? I am soooo torn. My participation in enslaving beings that should be roaming free is self-serving and deplorable. And it is killing majestic animals. How do I explain this to a child? Or my sushi habit...

HT: PS

Beware Herd-Words Amongst Us

The great ego/writer Martin Amis is calling for more "mental and verbal" snobbery. Hon, I am so there. Amis also confirms a deep and abiding love for that other great ego/writer, Christopher Hitchens, or just "Hitch" to those lucky enough to go drinking with him. Shit, they'll be renewing their vows in The Spectator if we're not careful. Hell, they ain't got nothin' on my new-best little threesome. Duly noted I note.

Many will try, few will keep up.

Blog A New Voice

Why is blogging so addictive? Why do we feel compelled to write and put ourselves out there almost every day? Because there has never been a forum, other than journaling of course and that's been private territory, that is remotely like blogging. It is, when done honestly and often, a deep journey into ourselves -- who we really are, what we mean to the world around us, and who we want to become. How we react, sense and perceive our reality, and, chiefly, the role our individual histories bring to the table. We test our sensibilities, ask for acceptance (well, sometimes) by soliciting comments from those around us who may or may not share our perspective.

Blogging is a discovery process. Narcissistic, yes, but vital to becoming the person we are really meant to be. The strong, avid bloggers keep at it because they simply love to write, and in doing so some of them are becoming genuine writers, not just neo-journalists and opinionists. It's fascinating to watch this process evolve; the poet, the sentimentalist, the dreamer, the realist, the cynic, the naysayer, the prophet, the teacher, the champion, the truth all begin to emerge in the person who is driven to blog. A voice is sculpted and crafted and turned over to an audience. A life's story begins to emerge.

I had the delight of discovering the beginnings of a couple of deeply original and inspired voices of genuine, contemporary southern culture over the last few days within a couple of key posts. One was from James. The other from Will Hinton. There's something critical and seminal in these two unpolished musings on the past King Day. Linking to such emerging voices is simply at the heart of why I started my own blog in the first place, why my own blog emerged from my history, and why I started the e-zine WaySouth in the nineties too. I know there is a strong, uniquely southern voice out there. And I for one sure don't want to miss a musing.

One note, I've disabled "comment moderation" here too to encourage more comments. Blogging without comments is the equivalent of drinking alone - why bother?

This post put together by Yo La Tengo, Beta Band and Cat Stevens.

Color Blind - It Can Happen

Will Hinton at Peach Pundit has an excellent post about what King Day means if you're a white Southerner. The follow-up comments are critical.

Start The Clock

Countdown to The Shins' new release, Wincing The Night Away... only 8 more days to go. I cannot freakin' wait. The best part? Imagining who I'd fuck for the first time while listening to that for the first time. The sound. The intensity. The lingerie. (Always black.) The wine? Beer? Oh wow. Girls get OFF on that kinda thing.

And WolfeMan, if you didn't live in bf Brazil (where you're likely getting more than your fair share already) and didn't have really bad hair, you'd be on the short list fer sure.

Take Your Davos And Shove It

How do you know when a good blog has jumped the shark? When the author starts preening and fluttering about going to Davos. Oh hurl, hurl, hurl. Davos = place where Eason Jordan flamed out.

Power Up

Think the Spacey Gracey Review could be termed an "educational" outlet? Heck, call it what you will, but I sure would like me one of these here FM radio frequencies The Man is doling out to the media needy and downtrodden. Than again, if you can't make money off of it, where's the measurable value? Who wants just the same 'ole lipflapper, informational bullshit? Give me cash any 'ole day.

Either way, The Man's gonna get his share. Somehow. Someway.

Greatness Makes Our Happy Meals Possible

First Stephen Colbert sticks a red hot poker in the eye of the media elite at the '06 White House Correspondent's dinner. (Some say Colbert should have been Person of The Year. Ain't that the truthiness.) Now Bill Moyers is preaching from the Church of Social Media to kick-start '07.

Wonder if they're listening out there in La-La Land? Rest assured, the liars and charlatans like Edelman, the networks, Madison Avenue and certain music industry types aren't ever gonna get it. They'll just keep charging, flailing up to the front of the parade they think they're gonna lead, the parade they never even knew existed until it about turned the corner for Main Street. They'll be overrun by the circus freaks and clowns and geeks and monkeys from the back - again.

This Moyers speech is so important I hope you will take the time to read it all. This excerpt is from Craig Aaron of FreePress. net, covering the National Conference for Media Reform, taking place this weekend in Memphis. (And yeah, I'd have sold my momma, again, to have been there, but some of us are busy committing original content in our own backyards; others are simply conference addicts.)

Journalist and author Bill Moyers denounced Big Media corporations Friday in a fiery speech that opened the National Conference for Media Reform in Memphis.

Moyers told a packed house of more than 3,000 activists and organizers that the independent press is under sustained attack, with a few corporations conspiring with political leaders to create an Orwellian world "in which language conceals reality, and the pursuit of personal gain and partisan power are wrapped in rhetoric that turns truth to lies and lies to truth."

Full video and audio of Moyers' Speech is available at http://www.freepress.net/conference

Evoking the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., Moyers compared big media corporations to plantation owners and American media consumers to their slaves.

“What happened to radio, happened to television, and then it happened to cable. If we are not diligent, then it will happen to the Internet, [creating] a media plantation for the 21st century dominated by the same corporate and ideological forces that have controlled the media for the last 50 years.”

“Something is wrong with this system,” Moyers added. “This is the moment freedom begins, the moment you realize someone else has been writing your story, and it’s time you took the pen from his hand and started writing it yourself.”

Moyers honed in on the issue of Net Neutrality, which he dubbed the “Equal Access Provision of the Internet,” and praised SavetheInternet.com’s grassroots and online organizing efforts, saying that Washington hadn’t reckoned with this movement “that once again reminded the powers that be that people want the media to foster democracy, not to quench it.”

Moyers called the SavetheInternet.com campaign critical, as soon virtually all media will be delivered to homes via a single high speed broadband connection. “We now have it in our means to tell a different story than Big Media,” Moyers said. “This is the great gift of the digital revolution, and you must never let them take it away from you.”

All coverage from Memphis is here.

Jesus Died For Ugly Bobby's Sins, Not Mine

Just when you think you can tolerate men again, maybe just possibly maybe, then one of 'em goes and writes utter shite like this. This time about that dearly beloved space biscuit, Patti Smith, who, admittedly, is a total bat-brain from freakin' suburban New Jersey. She changed a lot of women though. Changed 'em up at least. Shook 'em the fuck up, and all over the freakin' world too, thank you very much. Permanently. For life. Hell yeah.

Fuck you, Ugly Bobby. You are more full of utter wordshit than even DTL.

If we could cast votes in someone's honor, kinda like sending a donation to a charity in lieu of just lovely flowers when someone dies of some weird kinda cancer, I'd vote for Hillary in the primary in DTL's name just for a cheap giggle.

And the gender wars commence all over again... sigh.

The New Georgia Gang

I finally figured out what it is I loathe so about Yuppies... they simply cain't talk no trash. Could say the same about Yankees, but there are good Yankees. Just no good Yuppies.

No such worries, inconvenience or societal discomfort here. You know your own tribe when you go drinking with it. Off the bat. And give a nod to Albert the Shrub for inventin' the Internets while you're at it.

(Honestly, I think these boys wish they'd made The List!)

Spank The (Corporate) Monkey

He's at it again! Biggy Shmuly once more tries to save corporate America from itself. I hear Biggy S. may be popping by the ATL soon. I'll arrange a blogger meet-up in his honor, should that happen. People are talking to people as I type...

Russian Proverb

Amber, this one's for you. You sprang immediately to mind upon hearing it... as quoted to me over the phone by a random NARAL membership solicitor. (And yes, I renewed my membership.)

God Hates The Peace Of Those Who Are Born For War

Hot List

My my my... names are starting to circulate! And not just around the Gold Dome. The names on The List are starting to make the rounds, meaning the list of exclusive clientele of the McMansion Madames out at Sugarloaf. The SGR got wind that there might be at least one Atlanta radio personality on that list. Stay tuned! When my sources give me more, then you'll get more too.

Oh this is just lip-smacking juicy good! Better than the Campbell trial. Bloggers: cams and laptops at the ready.

UPDATE: There are no "Atlanta radio personalities" on The List. Least not the "real" list. Bad sources, bad.

Reign o'er Me

God is surely a woman. How do I know? After a rather brutal week, She gives me my due, my moments of joy -- the gift of driving a bunch of six-year old girls to school on a beautiful breaking morning with The Greatest (thanks for the CD for X-mas Aunty M) fueling the ride, the girls yapping up their gossipy little storms in the back. Six-year olds do not like Cat Power! Too bad. I'm the mommy 'round here. I have stereo priviledges from the front seat. Ah... aint' life grand!? Again.

Now for a little Cat Stevens coming around again...

Woe To Ladies Who Lunch... and Blog

Wonder if W will divert a few of those "escalated" troops down South? I could use a few good men about right now. Woke up to the news that I'm being threatened by religious extremists. And I'm not even a Sunni! Just Episcopalian. And although I deeply appreciate Rusty and Doug blogging about it, would it not have been the White Knight kinda thing to actually pick-up the phone and call to let me know I was being threatened out there all alone in the wilds of the blogosphere? Typical ... none of 'em ever call. And I know their mommas raised them to do better.

I will alert the proper authorities -- the media. Then do lunch, of course. With my lawyer.

Eat Your Laws

BTW, the hot place to see and be seen for lunch, do a little biz, gossip up a storm, eat too, during this start of the Gold Dome session is, of all places, that hipster joint Six Feet Under on Memorial. I thought I'd swing by for a quick bite on the way home from Legi-Fest '07 (see entry below) yesterday, but I simply could not get in the door for all the reps and white male suits and lobbyistas and more vaguely leering but mostly just-suits trying to look nonchalantly like Important White Men-O-Power blocking my right of way. Nary a tattoo in the lot! Least none anyone other than a femme lobbyist would be privy to. The p-lot was crammed with vehicles, some illegally parked, bearing backwater county plates such as Coffee and Sumter and Appling. And the ubiquitous "Sonny" sticker, of course. Think I'll stick with LB (Lower Buckhead), my side 'o town, for lunching with my Enquirer.

Jesus Kept Me From Losing It

So I wander down to the Gold Dome this morning, the Coverdale Building actually, to see some gen-u-ine legislation in action for the first time in my life. What was going on was a public hearing on HB1, see post below, a bill written to completely ban abortion in Georgia.


What really was going on in Room 606 was a freakin' Jesus rally! An arms-in-the-air, bad music playin', Jesus worshipping prayer rally by fundamentalist Christian righties, masked as a legislative hearing of course.

Oh hon, believe me when I tell you there were tears and testimony and testifying and fiery God-like righteousness everywhere you looked. Pure theocracy-in-action, certainly not democracy.


For a moment there, I thought the righty goons were gonna all crawl along on their knees towards the altar, only there was no altar in this room, just the State Seal of Jesus Camp, I mean Georgia.

My new hero, Bernita from Blog For Democracy, blogged the whole freak show live. I was too stunned to do much except take a few of the shots you see here, then pray for the strength to keep my mouth shut and not get arrested by blurting out things like, "Oh God, just free us from these total fucktards!!!!"


We all need to now get on our knees and pray that HB1 never makes it out of committee.

FYI, the stack of documents in the above shot is "testimony" taken by women who have had abortions. (See Bernita for more on that nonsense.) The docs should now include blog entries written by women subjected to the horror of democracy being thrashed into theocracy by the psycho Christian Right.

The three shot below the seal is of the men (the people actually elected to public office by other people) who wrote and support this bill designed just for a woman's body.

I gotta go have a shot of something now. Just like Bernita. (You had to have been there. You'd be drinking now too, trust me.)

Pro-Choice Voices Need Hearing

Because the stupid people who want control of our most vital body parts are at it again. Honestly, what planet do these anti-choicers come from? Planet Georgia! Select members of the Georgia Legislature have once again taken it upon themselves to decide for us women folk what we will or will not do with our uteri. (Like that'll ever really happen.)

House Bill #1 kicks off the '07 session with a special anti-choice rally this Tuesday to urge the Legislature to pass the abortion ban, or HB1.

According to NARAL Pro-Choice Georgia:

Tuesday, January 9, 2007, from 9:00 am - 3:00 pm (in room 606 of the Coverdale Building), the American Life League and Rep. Bobby Franklin (sponsor of HB1, the near-total abortion ban) plan to hold a "public hearing" (a rally) pushing an abortion ban similar to the one defeated by voters in South Dakota last year.

We will not lose this fight for our reproductive health!

NARAL Pro-Choice Georgia wants you to know what anti-choice forces are doing and that we won't let their outrageous efforts go unnoticed.

We will be at the rally to observe and then inform our members and the media about these anti-choice activities that threaten our reproductive freedom.

Call 404-875-6338 for more details about this public hearing.

Please join us at the Coverdale Building anytime from 10am-3pm Tuesday the 9th, if you can, to counter this fundamentalist-driven, (some other person's) religion-based nonsensical babble they call legislation in this backasswards state. And believe you me, you'll need a smoke and a martini after wading through the fucktard drivel of HB1.

My Dandy Dot Com

There are no words... only longing.

Brit Hume Is A Pig

Just for grins and giggles, I'm watching Fox News while the vote on Nancy Pelosi is being taken. It's not funny though; Brit Hume just tried, clumsily and with utter snarky meanness, to imply that Nancy Pelosi only reproduced so that grandchildren could be used for a family values-esque photo-op on swearing-in day. His commentary is pathetic, disrespectful, petulant, dreary and void of any life, under these particular partisan circumstances. If I hadn't worked around Brit Hume once before and known firsthand of his vast pomposity and tsunami-like, room clearing ego, I'd be shocked and appalled.

Hume certainly seems to light up when young hotties are around though.

We Don't Need No Stinkin' Badges

Or do we? Damn the syndicate?

The revolution is, once again, masked as ye 'olde power-grab. Now the Media Bloggers Association (yes, I'm a member so who really wants to be in that club?) wants to clean-up us bloggers real nice like so that we can be credentialed for big news coverage events, in this case the pending Scooter Libby trial in Washington. From today's MBA emailed (by Robert Cox) missive:

Dear MBA Member,

I was not quite ready to announce this but as this news is probably going to be mentioned in a major newspaper tomorrow I figure I had better go ahead and fill you all in tonight. As you know, I've been working on creating new opportunities for bloggers including "access" for bloggers.

Those efforts are now bearing fruit as we have our first high-profile opportunity. The U.S. District Court in Washington, DC has agreed to provide the MBA with two seats at the upcoming Scooter Libby Trial.

Those members interested to participate need to send me an email expressing their interest and some preferred dates. Our plan is to put together a schedule of 15-20 bloggers. Each blogger will be given one of our two press credentials for a few days (we can play with exact dates once I have expressions of interest from members).

The blogger can either be you or someone who blogs on a group blog you run (technically members of your group blog are already members, something we are sorting out with the new membership database but that is a different matter). I am hoping to create some overlap in the schedule so there is always one "veteran" and one "rookie" in our two seats. Bloggers who participate are expected to crank out a good deal of material and participate in the syndication of the content through the MBA web site.

Maybe this is a good thing, but as Leonard Witt at PJNet asks, do we really want Robert Cox of MBA bestowing privileges we can likely access on our own, thank you very much?

Without benefit of MBA and while MSM slept, we have quietly been committing journalism (and been credentialed as "real" media too in the case of my company, WaySouth Media, Inc.) without need of anointment by the Washington media power structure, old or otherwise.

Lemme give you a quick link list of independent Atlanta bloggers who have stumbled into genuine journalism, should you need a refresher...

Drifting Through The Grift (exclusive Loveshack porn saga coverage)
Georgia Podcast Network (podcasts on new media you won't find elsewhere)
TrueGritz ( media "rights" to the Olympics)
Peachtree Screed (Mayor Franklin's racial tones)
Bernaisesource (overall excellent, original PR industry analysis)

Are there others? I'm sure there are. Send the Atlanta-based ones to me and I'll add to the list.

Is having an umbrella organization, a syndicate, act on our behalf and thus bestowing that group and its leader, Robert Cox, with the power of our compliance, at utter cross purposes with the very nature of independent blogging itself? I'd be all for getting a stinkin' badge, but under these rules?

Members also could seek credentialed status by undergoing training or demonstrating other work as professional journalists. They also must agree to the organization's ethical standards and adopt formal editorial and corrections policies.

Free The Country Club Ho's!

Honestly, call these suburban call gals what you will, but be sure you call 'em rich! Thanks for the golf course tip, PS. No doubt more lives have been ruined out there in Gwinnett by small minds-at-large rather than prostitution.

New Attitude, New Media, New Strategy, Whatever!

According to DebkaFile.com (a bunch of spooks, so they say), Saddam's execution, media-botched or otherwise, was part of the overall "new and improved" Bush strategy for Iraq, the strategy that keeps threatening a full media-reveal of troop escalation and stuff like that. Says DebkaFile:

It (the strategy? execution? Debka can be a little vague) hinged on the cooperation of two key national religious figures: the most revered Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, and the Sunni cleric with the most influence on the Sunni Arab insurgency and the Baath, Sheik Hares al-Dari, head of the Sunna Scholars Council. The plan as conceived by the US president is not contingent on engaging either Iran or Syria.

In full here.

Wonder what God told Pat Robertson about this latest development? And did She mention exactly how many more American lives will be needed to fuel the power-grab for Islamic clerics? Ahhh... the mind of God. And W. Talk about your infinite mysteries...

More about this fascinating "way beyond media" site here.

Was Saddam Lynched?

And why we should give a damn. From uberbadass, Christopher Hitchens, writing for Slate (not Booze) dot com:

How could it have come to this? Did U.S. officials know that the designated "executioners" would be the unwashed goons of Muqtada Sadr's "Mahdi Army"—the same sort of thugs who killed Abdul Majid al-Khoei in Najaf just after the liberation and who indulge in extra-judicial murder of Iraqis every night and day? Did our envoys and representatives ask for any sort of assurances before turning over a prisoner who was being held under the Geneva Conventions?

Full story here.

Buddhist In The House

Let's mix our politics with a different religion this go-round. Hank Johnson, who took over our 4th from Cynthia McKinney, is a Buddhist.

Yoweee... Georgians elected a black Buddhist! Johnson will be sworn in tomorrow. Now this is one for the record books. From a NYT blog:

Representative-elect Hank Johnson, a Georgia Democrat who ousted Representative Cynthia McKinney in the Democratic primary, became a Buddhist decades ago, though his family does not share that faith. A spokesperson said that Mr. Johnson plans to use a Bible, citing tradition.

Besides, there is no book in Buddhism that’s equivalent to the Bible or the Koran, said Representative-elect Mazie Hirono, a Hawaii Democrat. She said she probably would not use any book, but that in the past, when she was sworn in as lieutenant governor, she used a friend’s family Bible.

Full entry, with comments, here.

Johnson's campaign website has no mention of his Buddhism, so it's hard to say if he's a practicing one or not, but Congresspedia does. Maybe he'll give a few tips on meditation and karma to us in the Anglican community.

Much Beloved James Brown Statue

Augusta, Georgia -- The James Brown statue, with tributes:

Photos courtesy of Tom Roche.

God Talks Too Much

She just told Pat Robertson all her dirty little secrets. Again.

Write Your Damn Thank You Notes

MOMania, or Theresa over at the AJC, poses a timely question on her (fake) blog today: Do you make your kids write thank-you notes? You'd better believe I make my kid write thank you notes, particularly after Christmas, although I admit to getting slack, occasionally, when the slew of gifts comes in at the annual kiddy party come March. We've hardly gotten out all the Christmas notes when that CF rolls around.

Woe to the family that doesn't command the children to write thank you notes. That family will be talked about behind its back as the white trash it undoubtedly is all year long by the families that do write them. The practice of sending thank you notes down South, preferably on monogrammed stationary, is as sacred as bowing before the family portrait of Robert E. Lee every morning.

And no, emailing, blogging or YouTubing a thank you doesn't count, especially in my family as most of its members are too:

a.) arrogant
b.) drunk
c.) batty

to own or operate a computer.