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The Annotated Beukemix, 2008

I did it last year, I'll do it again this year. These are the official liner notes for the 2008 Beukemix. If you get a hard copy of the mix, it comes in a paper sleeve with a track list in ten-point Courier. So if you're wondering where the hell the music came from, here's your info. Again, many of these videos are just fanmade stuff I picked because it had the song in full. Caveat Spectator.

1. Foux Du Fafa - Flight of the Conchords
Nels had given me the heads up on the Conchords' stage performances just before they got their own HBO show. This year I got their EP, their album, and their first-season DVDs. This song is especially charming if you've ever taken high-school French. The video linked above has optional English subtitles.

2. A Well Respected Man - The Kinks
The movie Juno reminded me of this fine song's existence. Somehow I'd missed it in my participation in the massive David Beukema Oldies Download Project of 2005-2006.

3. The Laws Have Changed - The New Pornographers
People have been recommending the New Pornographers to me for years. After "The Electric Version" showed up in Rock Band I decided to download their album and give 'em a whirl. Co-ed power pop at its finest.

4. Don't Make Me a Target - Spoon
Spoon's Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga came out last year, I finally downloaded it at the beginning of this one, and decided it would be an appropriate listen en route to the band's hometown of Austin in January.

5. War Pigs - Cake
This Sabbath cover was a b-side to something or other. This was the first song I listened to this year that immediately made the Beukemix. Bonus points for giving the anthemic guitar line at the end of the song to the trumpet. I spent an evening early this year figuring the line out on my own. (Horn section count = 1)

6. With the Dark - They Might Be Giants
I've been deeply disappointed with TMBG's new output for nearly a decade. A shame, because they'd long been one of my favorite groups. Anyway, I was delighted by this new mini-suite from their otherwise largely underhwelming most recent album. I think this clay-mation confection is an official video, but I'm not sure. (Horn section count = 2)

7. Run (I'm a Natural Disaster) - Gnarls Barkley
I love how frantic and menacing this song is, that the refrain is mostly "Run, children! Run for your life!" I also love how unrepentantly nerdy Gnarls Barkley are, in general, which especially comes across in their videos and performances. (Horn section count = 3)

8. New Shoes – Angelo Badalamenti
Got the second soundtrack to Twin Peaks this year. This cut is a moody, atmospheric standout.

9. I’m Not Crying - Flight of the Conchords
Rarely do I include two songs by the same artist, but this time I just couldn't decide. When Melissa and I watched the series for the first time, I think this was the song that hooked her. Anyway, this is on the Conchords' EP, The Distant Future.

10. Paper Planes – M.I.A.
Melissa's brother David was way into M.I.A. when we visited for Christmas last year. Understandable. Nels subsequently highlighted a couple of her videos on his blog. This song was used to great effect in the Red Band trailer for "Pineapple Express."

11. You Don’t Understand Me – The Raconteurs
I don't know what makes some songs appeal to me and others not, but I find that a strident song in a minor key with interesting instrumentation doesn't hurt.

12. Regulate – Warren G feat. Nate Dogg
As explained in episode 7 of Yacht Rock, this smooth Death Row Records jam samples from a somnambulant 1982 Michael MacDonald cut.

13. Polite Dancing Song – The Bird & The Bee
Another band I'd first heard of from Nels. Heard this song on The Current and liked it. (Horn section count = 4)

14. Moonage Daydream – David Bowie
Appears as a downloadable track in Rock Band that was included in a track pack for the Wii. Is excellent, but I had largely overlooked it in my previous listening to Ziggy Stardust. (Horn section count = 5)

15. Nel Cimitero Di Tucson – Gianfranco Reverberi
Music from an obscure spaghetti western. If you're wondering why it's familiar, click here. (Horn section count = 6)

16. Tell Me – Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
Melissa got really into Sharon Jones late last year and early this. This song jumped out at me this fall. It's like someone at Motown forgot to release an album back in 1965, and it was found in 2007. (Horn section count = 7)

17. My Iron Lung – Radiohead
Apparently every song from The Bends, or a cover thereof, is destined to end up on a Beukemix. Next year, will it be High and Dry, or Fake Plastic Trees? Played this song in Rock Band at Joe's on Labor Day. The bridges are difficult as hell.

18. Technical Difficulties – Dr. Octagon
Ex-roommate Dan Hetzel hooked me up with Dr. Octagon, one of Kool Keith's many alter egos a couple years ago. This popped up immediately before that Sharon Jones cut one morning on my commute. This album was produced by the same team behind the superior Deltron 3030. Absent Deltron II, it'll have to do. If you want to know what a truly crazy person would do with a rap career, look no further than Kool Keith. I don't mean he's a weird, wacky guy who sometimes behaves badly. I mean he seems literally insane.

19. Surfin’ Snoopy – Vince Guaraldi
"'Find the true meaning of Christmas. Win MONEY, MONEY, MONEY. Spectacular, Super Colossal Neighborhood Christmas Lights and Display Contest!' Lights and display contest? Oh, no. My dog, gone commercial. I can't stand it. Oh!” (Horn section count = 8)

20. Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours – Stevie Wonder
You probably know this song as the theme music of the Obama campaign. It made the cut this year because of that, but also because it has a special sentimental significance for me and my lovely wife. Aw! (Horn section count = 9)

21. Gamma Ray – Beck
Beck's been singing with a peanut butter sandwich in his mouth since Sea Change, so I haven't felt the hook of his bizarre lyrics since Midnite Vultures. But this beat is great.

22. Powerhouse – Raymond Scott & His Quintette
Another musician Hetz flagged for me. If you've ever seen a Looney Tunes cartoon set in a factory, there's a good chance you'll recognize the bridge. (Wow.) (Horn section count = 10)

23. Frontier Psychiatrist – The Avalanches
Heard this on the Current a couple weeks back, and loved it immediately. The video is greatly entertaining. (Horn section count = 11)

Enjoy. Same time next year...
Posted by Fred at 7:00 AM 2 comments: Labels: Beukemix, music


Happy Turkey Day

Not much time to blog on a busy Thanksgiving, so instead, here's a Turkey Day treat: a Mystery Science Theater 3000 short film that was never released on TV. Assignment: Venezuela was an industrial film about the oil boom in Venezuela at mid-century. MST3K gave it the business for a CD-ROM project in the mid-to-late '90s. The project fell through, and they showed the short at the 1996 "Conventio-Con Expo Fest-a-Rama II: Electric Bugaloo" in Minneapolis. Later it was included as an extra on one of their DVDs. I remember it being funny, and through the wonder of YouTube, we can confirm or deny. It's in three parts, top to bottom. Enjoy!

Part One:



Posted by Fred at 3:19 PM 3 comments: Labels: comedy, MST3K


Improv: word up

Thanks to all who came to the Improv a-Go-Go last night. 7:22, the group I coach, had a fine -- if incredibly smutty -- set. And I had a blast DJing Five Man Job's set. For those who missed it, here's how it worked: at the end of intermission, we collected offered iPods from the audience. During the Five Man Job set, each scene was begun and inspired by music I selected from people's music collections. So much fun. That said, let me tell you, it's pretty harrowing to be entrusted with $2000-$3000 worth of pocketable personal electronics for a short period of time.

Also, I should note that if you've been using various iPods for five years (has it only been that long?) and are suddenly confronted with a Zune, the interface might as well be made of those crystals from the first couple Superman movies, with a display in Esperanto.

In any case, thanks to FMJ for the opportunity to play with them. I'm looking forward to the next time, which should be after the 1st of the year. More info as it becomes available.

Blogging will be light this week, as I will be jetting to the San Joaquin Valley tomorrow to join my wonderful wife and her family for the Giving of Thanks. I've blogged every weekday since the election, resulting in more posts than any previous month, which has been a hectic pace but enjoyable. After the holiday I'll be back with more stuff.
Posted by Fred at 7:12 AM No comments: Labels: blog wankery, improv, shameless self-promotion


Jams! #2: The Ecstasy of Gold

Happy Friday, people.

Ennio Morricone's music for the Sergio Leone spaghetti western "The Good, the Bad & the Ugly" is amazing. Everybody recognizes the opening theme, of course, and it is great, but the best stuff comes at the end of the movie. The music in the last half hour is not only my favorite stuff of Morricone's, not only some of my favorite film music, but some of my favorite music, period.

On the soundtrack album, the last two tracks are called "The Ecstasy of Gold" and "The Trio," and I love them both. I got the album when I was in my first year of grad school, and would listen to these tracks, plus the opening theme, on my discman immediately before tests to get myself pumped up. It worked. Structural analysis never felt so epic and purposeful. I would categorize these pieces as "get shit done" music.

The segment from the movie with "The Trio" in it kind of gives away the end of the movie, so those who don't mind spoilers can check it out here. So good. Meanwhile, here's The Ecstasy of Gold:

And here's an excellent concert performance of it:

Posted by Fred at 7:55 AM 1 comment: Labels: jams, movies, music


Senate and Sesame

First, an update for out-of-state friends who have been asking what's going on with the Senate election here in MN. The national media's been throwing around the word Florida a bit, it seems, which is not accurate. Minnesota has a close election, going into a mandatory, statewide recount. Florida had not only a close election but problems with their ballots in several counties, leading to a large number of people possibly voting for someone they didn't intend to vote for, and then recounts in some counties but not others (team Gore's big mistake, in my view), and so on (yadda yadda yadda). Anyway, that's not happening here. Here are some good sites for more info:

MNPublius is a good start for a lefty take on MN political news. This site is partisan to the point that I find myself rolling my eyes from time to time, but also does a good job of linking to other sites with related information. They in fact pointed me to the following links.

Media Matters takes on the overwrought rhetoric and purple prose of the national commentators, who seem somewhat ill-informed about what's going on here. As I say, this isn't Florida 2000. Also, contra Bill O'Reilly and the Coleman campaign, the state did not certify a winner based on the certified first vote count. 206 vote difference with Coleman in the lead, yes, but less than 0.5% difference, therefore too close to call, therefore no winner, therefore recount.

And KSTP gives a nice (video) overview of the "trunk ballots," a set of thirty-some ballots that were rumored to have been found in the trunk of somebody's car. It's not true:

As Media Matters has noted, Fritz Knaak, Coleman's recount lawyer and apparently the media origin of the story, has been quite up-front that he was misinformed. And yet some of the media has perpetuated the story. Check yo'self, media.

Finally, as an antidote to all this political business, here's a little something we can all enjoy. I'd intended for this song to be on the Beukemix this year, but can no longer find the link to an mp3 of it. So instead, here it is as a Youtube treat instead. I give you the haunting, melancholy "Lower Case n":

Posted by Fred at 7:29 AM No comments: Labels: music, pointless nostalgia, politics


Shames (Three Different Ones)

Here are three links to make you more disappointed in your fellow man.

First, with a hat tip to John Cole at Balloon Juice, is a Christmas decoration for the "there's a war on Christmas!" crowd. Cole puts it well:

In all seriousness, I guess you can’t expect people who reject evolution, who think the world was created 6,000 years ago, and who think Adam and Eve roamed the world with dinosaurs to know anything about basic American history, can you?

Next, via Andrew Sullivan, we have a head-slappingly inane piece of exercise equipment.

Words fail. Buildings tumble. The ground opens wide. I'm hopeful that the looming depression will kill this thing dead, for the sake of the species and for civilization.

Finally, found originally on Joe. My. God., The New Yorker spends some time with Prince and discovers that along with his conversion to Jehovah's Witness, he's not so cool with the gays:

Prince's spokesbots have claimed that he was misquoted or taken out of context. But Coates points out that the New Yorker fact-checkers are famously stringent. Also, the quote is remarkably specific, and seems to include its context. Super-disappointing. Way more than when I found out Beck is a lifelong Scientologist. Disappointing that the guy responsible for some of the most perfect pop music in the last 30 years, much of it highly popular in dance clubs, which figure in some way, as I understand it, into gay culture (I mean, I guess), is a total phobe. I'm reminded of when my music history prof. in college (himself of Russian Jewish heritage) got to Richard Wagner: he implored a separation of the music and the man. Just because Wagner was in some ways a horrible person doesn't make the Siegfried Idyll not beautiful or the Prelude to the third act of Lohengrin not stirring. With that in mind, I present some of the great work of an idiot with backwards views on homosexuality:

Watch more Purple Rain videos on AOL Video

Posted by Fred at 8:00 AM No comments: Labels: Classical Music, dumbness, insanity, music, politics


Quantum of Solace Updated, see bottom.

Here's the quick rundown of my complaints: Labels: James Bond, movies

Monday, November 17, 2008

George W. Bush & Email Addresses There was an article in the NYTimes over the weekend about Obama's addiction to his Blackberry. Due to presidential records laws, he is likely to have to go cold-turkey on the device as part of his transition. Buried in the story was an interesting tidbit about poultry of another kind (wetter, and with a leg injury). George W. Bush apparently loved communicating with friends by email, and had to give up his personal email just before taking office. The Times helpfully provides his old address, which is a random little bit of trivia:

“Since I do not want my private conversations looked at by those out to embarrass, the only course of action is not to correspond in cyberspace,” Mr. Bush wrote from his old address, email@example.com. “This saddens me. I have enjoyed conversing with each of you.”

I haven't tried the address, but I'd be surprised if it doesn't bounce back.

My immediate question was: why 94? Sometimes numbers in email addresses are borne out of necessity and random. When I had to come up with my first handle for my America On-Line screen-name in 1993, I was seated at my parents' kitchen table while on the phone with the service's customer service people, and scrambled to pick something suitable on short notice. There was a Nintendo Power book on the table, and I flipped through it looking for something I somehow identified with. I found an entry in the book about the Hunt For Red October Game Boy Game, which mentioned the Red October's captain, Marko "Mosht thingsh in here don't react well to bulletsh" Ramius. I liked the book and the movie was great, I thought; why not? I asked for Ramius as my screen-name.

It was taken, of course, so they added some random numbers. Thus, once AOL connected their email to the rest of the internet (not originally part of the service, I think internet email came along with billing not by the minute -- thank God internet billing by time doesn't exist any more), my first email address was firstname.lastname@example.org. Feel free to try sending a message. Maybe it will go back in time and 1995-me can tell you how awesome the first Mystery Science Theater Conventio-con was. The answer is: very nerdily awesome.

So again, why 94? The fact that the number is internal to the rest of the name suggests a personal choice, rather than random appendage. To Wikipedia! Is Bush's birthday September 4? No. Nor is it his daughters' or wife's birthday or his wedding date. The only significant September 4 in his biography seems to be his DUI arrest in 1976. I wondered if, given his Born Again status, and how his alcoholism was part of what pushed him in that direction, he looked back at that date as important in his spiritual development. I'd say maybe not, since he didn't give up drinking until 1986.

Then I realized he was elected Governor of Texas in 1994. So that's probably the answer.

What was your first email address? If it had numbers in it, were they meaningful (and why) or random?
Posted by Fred at 7:00 AM 3 comments: Labels: internet, pointless nostalgia, politics


Jams! #1: Rock the House It's Friday; time for a jam!

Doin' back spins, Running Man and more
Party down with vigor and candor

This is Rock the House by Gorillaz. Not my favorite Gorillaz cut or my favorite rap of Del's (those titles go to Clint Eastwood), but it is the origin of this blog's name. The line above is early in the second verse. This video is goofy as hell, and marginally disturbing. Enjoy, and happy Friday.
Posted by Fred at 7:00 AM No comments: Labels: blog wankery, jams, music, music video


'Cause what you see you might not get Today's topic: lessons in narrative swiped from Russian formalism -- the syuzhet and the fabula.

So have you guys seen this movie Primer? Excuse the language, but it is a mindfuck. The main characters, engineers working on potentially patentable projects in their garage as a side business, discover that they've created a time machine. They use it at first to get rich daytrading, but then one of them gets involved in re-engineering social situations (in particular an incident with a gun at a party). Subsequently, both try to prevent each other, or other versions of themselves from completing certain actions, sometimes taking the place of themselves in conversations they previously experienced and reciting their earlier lines from recordings or notes they've made, sometimes taking an extra time machine inside the time machine to make loops within loops, and so on. On top of all of that, the movie portrays these events in both non-chronological and non-sequential order. Good God.

I saw this movie on DVD a few years ago, and liked it, even though it made my head spin. My head didn't spin for the reason it might watching a movie like Mulholland Dr. (a favorite of mine) or some other Lynch flick that's mindbending for being oblique. Rather, it's mindbending because it's complicated. It's smartly written by guys with backgrounds in math, physics and engineering, so the jargon is convincing. And it doesn't hold your hand to explain anything, even as the plot seems to quintuple back on itself and pile paradoxes upon paradoxes.

A current or recent Grinnell College student who I do not know recently posted on her Plan (text-only blog accessible to people in the larger Grinnell community) her intention to rewatch the movie until it all made sense. She posted a link to this paper (spoilers!) by one Jason Gendler that analyzes the film and attempts to iron out its narrative. The paper repeatedly, and centrally, uses two words with which I was not familiar, fabula and syuzhet. Context suggested that each were somehow components of narrative structure, but to really understand what Gendler was writing, I did some digging.

Neither term had a dictionary.com or wikipedia entry, though they were mentioned in the article on Russian formalism, from which the terms originate. Google brought me to a helpful table from a Penn State comparative lit course that explained them well: the syuzhet is what is presented by the creator of a narrative, what you perceive directly by watching or reading; the fabula is your interpretation of the actual story, of what happened, which may expand beyond what you are told or shown. Here's the table, which is great...

And some examples off the top of my head (spoilers abound!):

Star Wars: In the syuzhet, Greedo tells Han Solo that Jabba doesn't take kindly to smugglers who dump their cargo at the first sign of an Imperial patrol. Han responds that even he gets boarded sometimes. In the fabula, the viewer imagines further the incident described.

The Searchers: In the syuzhet, Ethan Edwards grabs his left arm as he walks out a silhouetted doorway. In the fabula of certain viewers, Edwards is having a heart attack.

The Sopranos (NELS, SKIP THIS ONE!): In the syuzhet, in the final moment of the show, as "Don't Stop Believing" plays on the jukebox, Tony Soprano looks up in response to the dinging bell at the front door of the diner where he and his family are eating. The screen and music cut abruptly to black silence. In MY fabula, Tony has just been shot to death by the guy in the Members' Only Jacket who went into the bathroom moments before.

Memento: In the syuzhet, at the end of the film, Leonard has been looking for the man he says raped and murdered his wife. He has been telling the story of Sammy Jankis, a man who like him, suffered from a loss of any short-term memory. A man who claims to be acting as an ally, but who Leonard killed at the beginning of the film (which comes chronologically last), accuses Leonard of lying to himself, that Sammy was a con-man. In a montage of shots playing under the audio of this conversation, Leonard is shown giving his wife insulin shots, something Sammy did in the earlier stories. In the fabula, it is up to the viewer to decide whether Leonard killed his wife by unintentional insulin overdose, whether he had in fact already had his revenge, whether Sammy was a con-man, and indeed, whether Leonard was what he claimed.

I find these concepts very intriguing and potentially useful for understanding and discussing films. It draws a bright line between what you saw when you watched the movie, and what the film was "supposed" to be about. Thus, David Lynch isn't being an ass when he refuses to explain what the hell was happening in one of his movies. He's just letting the syuzhet speak for itself and leaving the fabula to the viewer. They also help explain my reaction to Oliver Stone's JFK, which Melissa and I watched a couple weeks ago. I find the film's syuzhet masterful: it's well-plotted, scripted, cast, acted, shot & edited. But my version of the fabula is somewhat different from the one Stone presents through the author's voice character of Jim Garrison (Kevin Costner). Granted, this is based on the intrusion of the real world into my interpretation of the narrative, but there it is.

Thanks, Russian formalism!
Posted by Fred at 7:08 AM 2 comments: Labels: literature, movies, nerdery


First Blogiversary!

In all the election excitement, I missed the fact that the one-year anniversary of this blog had passed. It was November 1st of 2007 that I started this BS. In between, I've run hot & cold on posting, sometimes barely writing in a given month, sometimes posting as much as three times a week (or four, last week, my highest rate of blogging yet). I've experimented with a regular feature, the Weeklypedia quiz, which became increasingly less regular and more inaccurately named.

Trafficwise, I passed the 1,000-pageview mark at the end of April. Given that I didn't add StatCounter to the front page until at least a month in, it might have been sooner. That said, there have been about 2 1/2 as many views since then as before then. I started using Google analytics a few months ago, which is great, and tells me not only how much traffic I'm getting, but where it's coming from.

In the last month, there have been single page views each from Mexico, Costa Rica, Germany, Austria, Poland, Sweden, Afghanistan, the UAE, and Indonesia and three hits each from The Netherlands, UK, and Canada. It is unknown how many of those visits were accidental. The most popular Google search that led people here (vigor space probe), with 22 hits, probably was intended to find information on an actual Vigor probe that was intended to study Venus, but failed due to a major error in units of measurement. Take that with a grain of salt, though, as I haven't been able to find another reference to this probe besides the one I just linked.

Anyway, thank you for reading and humoring me in my flights of fancy and delusions of grandeur. I enjoy writing this stuff, and especially have enjoyed your comments. I've got some fun ideas to write about, which I hopefully will not dawdle on too long.

Finally, a request: do any of you know of a good, free option for hosting short audio clips online for streaming? Something like YouTube but for audio? Lemme know.
Posted by Fred at 8:00 AM 3 comments: Labels: blog wankery, shameless self-promotion

Tuesday, November 11, 2008

An after-dinner Beck mint

Alright, now that the big election posts are out of the way, it's back to the random connections that inspired this blog in the first place.

I discovered last week that Beck's song "E-Pro," from his album Guero, samples the drum beat from the Beastie Boys' "So Whatcha Want," from way back on Check Your Head. In fact, Beck gave the Beasties a songwriting co-credit on the track. Both songs are good, especially the original. Incidentally, both songs are in Rock Band 2; once that comes out for the Wii, I'll have to investigate whether the drum parts in the game are tracked the same. Here are the videos:

[E-Pro: Universal Music Group are jerks for disallowing embedding of YouTube videos]

[So Whatcha Want: The Beastie Boys are not jerks

This provides me with an opportunity to state that Beck's last really good album was Midnite Vultures in 1999. I'm probably biased, since this came out when I was in college and I listened the hell out of that album for about a year and a half, and even drove 5 hours in a snowstorm to see Beck in Kansas City during that time but dammit, he hasn't been the same since. There are a few cuts on Guero I liked, but the biggest problem I have is that you can't understand his insane lyrics anymore. I mean, what's the point of stringing together bizarre turns of phrase and clever wordplay if you're going to mumble your way through it? I may not know what "Norman Schwartzkopf / somethin' tells me you wanna go home / champagne bottles / custom clothes you own / calling up from special area codes" means, but I could understand the words and it is funky. I'll have to give Modern Guilt a listen, and see if he's cleaned up his act and his diction.

For the record, Odelay was Beck's best album and I wish I could dance like Beck. 
Monday, November 10, 2008

Election Reaction: Proposition 8 The most disappointing result of Tuesday night was the passage of Proposition 8 in California, which amended the state's constitution to ban same-sex marriage. The margin by which it passed (52.3% to 47.7) was surprising, given that in the last weeks before Election Day, polls showed the measure failing by about the same difference.

Some notes:

1. Why is it that in California, ballot items that involve tax or spending issues seem to take a supermajority to pass, but amending the constitution needs only a simple 50%+1 majority? This seems hopelessly backwards.

2. Thankfully, the CA Attorney General has stated that the approximately 18,000 same-sex couples who married this year will remain married. Here's hoping that continues to stand, and that the normalcy of those marriages continues to undermine claims that gay marriage somehow endangers the sanctity of heterosexual unions. Of course, the way that opponents of equality have lied and spun statistics (Sweden is dying, you know!) thus far, perhaps this is wishful thinking.

3. It is disappointing that two particularly high-profile opponents of the amendment didn't do more to stop it. Barack Obama and Gov. Arnold Schwartzanegger both voiced their opposition to the proposition, but did not campaign against it. I find it hard to believe either that their voices wouldn't have at least made up some of the difference OR that spending this bit of capital would have harmed them politically enough to make a difference for their respective electoral chances. Grow a backbone, people.

4. Early exit polls suggested that African-Americans might have made the difference in passing the bill, but subsequent analysis seems to prove otherwise, though it is true that, of ethnic groups, African American voters in California showed the largest proportion of support for Prop. 8 (about 70%).

5. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, officially, as an organization, poured money into the Yes-on-8 effort in California, and encouraged its supporters to do the same. Mitt Romney recently explained why:

Romney's difficulties in the Republican primaries came in part from being a Mormon in a party dominated by a religious base distrustful of that religion. Was this agreement by the Church of LDS a way to buy respect from the religious right? Gross.

Note that not all Mormons were willing to follow the Church's lead. Hall-of-Fame 49'er Steve Young, a Mormon, contributed and campaigned for the No-on-8 efforts. Here's hoping that he can continue to be a strong example. It's disturbing to see the official institution of an entire faith group play politics in such a hateful, discriminatory way, but heartening to see that some of their membership is bucking the leadership.

On this last note, Todd Zywicki at the Volokh Conspiracy wrote an either under-informed or under-honest post painting the marriage equality supporters in California who have taken out their frustration by picketing at a Mormon temple as mindless bigots. He trots out the misleading exit polls and suggests the protests would be more accurately (but "less-politically-correctly") pointed at black churches. Even with two updates, he does not address the very substantial role that the Mormon Church played in the passage of Proposition 8. His blogging colleage Dale Carpenter, who writes often about gay rights, had a much more on-point post discouraging people from tarring all Mormons with the same brush, while still encouraging drawing attention to the church's actions and making constructive suggestions as to useful projects for protest.

6. One lesson I'm personally taking from the Proposition 8 campaigns in California is that it isn't enough to argue against these marriage amendments, as the No On 8 campaigns did, from a perspective that says "no matter what you think of marriage, we shouldn't put discrimination in the constitution." That may be true, but it isn't the point, nor is it the whole point that supporters of 8 lied in suggesting that kids will be indoctrinated or recruited. The point is that America needs to get past thinking of gay people and their relationships as necessarily icky. There is nothing icky about a committed monogamous relationship that seeks to grow deeper with time. What those of us proudly allied with the gay rights movement seek is not somehow special or unique, but the same boring stuff to which the rest of us are already blessed to have access. Tuesday was a setback. But it's not the end of the story. Onward and upward.
Posted by Fred at 8:00 AM 1 comment: Labels: equality, News, politics


Election Reaction: In Congress

OK, more election reactions; let's look down ballot across the land.

The Dems picked up a chunk of seats in the Senate and House, and depending on the results of a few outstanding races, they stand to pick up some more. That includes Senate races the afore-mentioned MN, the about-to-runoff-on-December-3rd GA race, and the still-counting AK, and a number of House races mostly too obscure for me to know about them, save Darcy Burner (D) vs. Dave Reichert (R - i) in the Washington 8th, where the Burner, a former Microsoft project manager, got a raw deal from the Seattle Times throughout the campaign. Trivia!

A theme this year seems to be "Re-elect Your Corrupt Congressman or Congresspeople!" Like Michelle Bachmann but for different reasons, Reps. Jack Murtha (D, PA) and William Jefferson (D, LA) are embarrassments, and should not be in their offices. The former was re-elected, even after calling his constituents racists, and the latter, who apparently STILL hasn't been indicted for corruption despite it being almost two years since the Feds found he had a freezer full of cash (literally, literally!), advanced to a run-off later this month. I don't understand how elections in Louisiana work, but it seems to take about as long as the NBA post-season.

And then there's Alaska. Oh, Alaska. Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo, who had been on top of Alaskan corruption rumors and investigations long before Palin was selected by McCain, jokes that the rest of the nation should take the Alaska Independence Party up on their offer to secede. They seem to be on their way to re-electing not only their soon-to-be-indicted Representative-at-large Don Young but their Septuple-felon Senior Senator Ted Stevens. Both of these despite polling that in the final days of the campaign reliably showed both of them losing. And, despite having their governor on the presidential ticket, apparently turnout is looking like it was down around 10% from 2004, even though early voting records in the state were shattered. Zuh? Really, rhetorical flourish aside, this is truly bizarre and I'm not sure I buy it. I guess they're still counting early and absentee ballots, of which there are many, but this is weird.

I wouldn't be sad to see Stevens or Young go, neither of whom I would be happy about in the Congress if they were Democrats, either. Getting Ted "Series of Tubes" Stevens as far away from oversight of the internet as possible seems to me to be a worthwhile project. Despite being convicted two (?) weeks ago on seven counts of corruption by accepting undisclosed gifts of great value, he subsequently claimed that he is not, in fact, convicted until he has exhausted all appeals. That's true in every way except fact and spirit of the law.

Actually, Stevens' re-election may not be as irrational as it appears. Thanks to the nepotistic shenanigans of former governor Frank Murkowski (appointed his daughter), Alaska voters stripped the governor of the ability to appoint Senators to vacancies. So while Sarah Palin may not be able to pick the next Senator if Stevens goes to jail, resigns, or is kicked out (the latter of which is likely if he is indeed re-elected), she may run for the open seat in the proscribed special election. And I suspect she'd win. So maybe the conservative voters of the Last Frontier are crazy like foxes.

In South Carolina, Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R) is gone, after describing the agenda of her opponent Kay Hagan (D), who is in fact a Sunday school teacher, as "godless" and an "atheist agenda." Good riddance to Dole and welcome another moderate Dem to the mid-Atlantic seabord.

It took a couple days to call, but it seems that Democrat Jeff Merkley may have unseated incumbent Republican Gordon Smith in Oregon. Smith is a Republican Senator I wouldn't have minded if he'd stayed. He's moderate on a lot of issues, gay-friendly, and has a history of working with Democrats. He even touted projects he'd worked on with Sen. Obama in campaign ads. Also, he is second cousins with the two Udalls who were elected to the Senate in New Mexico and Colorado. Had he stayed, the Smith-Udall family would have made up 3% of the Senate.

If Franken pulls it off in the recounts here in MN, and Stevens loses as the remainind votes are counted in AK, and (this is the big stretch) Saxby Chambliss loses the runoff in GA, the Democrats will hold a 60-vote majority in the Senate. Filibuster-proof. Neat, except it doesn't really matter. Having a simple majority grants control of the body, of course. But voting on cloture on an issue isnt automatic. You actually have to have 60 votes on a given issue, regardless of party. This swings both ways. Liberal Republicans like Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, have voted with Democrats on divisive issues on occasion, as has John McCain, for that matter. So even without 60 Democrats, they can get to 60 votes to end debate if they put together a workable coalition. By the same token, conservative Democrats could join in a filibuster if so inclined. Honestly, I'm just relieved that the Democratic majority is now Lieberman-proofed.

Next time: Prop. 8. Boo Prop. 8.
Posted by Fred at 6:39 PM No comments: Labels: News, politics

Thursday, November 6, 2008

Election Reaction: Minnesota Edition

Note 1: MN Senate numbers changed to reflect update by Secretary of State.
Note 2: Changed the number again, down to 236, due to a data entry error in one county.

For liberals in Minnesota, the local news was a bit less positive than the big national story.

The race for US Senate and top Jewish-Minnesotan-guy-born-in-New-York between Norm Coleman (R,i) and Al Franken (D) is extremely close. At last count, Coleman leads by 236 in a field of 2.9 million votes. The difference is 0.008% of the total votes cast. To put that in perspective, if you equate the total votes to the length of the Golden Gate Bridge (8,981 ft), the difference between Coleman and Franken is about 9 inches. Wow! In Minnesota, a statewide recount is triggered automatically by any difference less than 0.5%, so that will be happening.

According to MN Sec. of State Mark Ritchie on MPR yesterday, the vote will first be certified by the canvass boards in mid-November, and then each county will recount their votes by hand. It is not uncommon, apparently, for people to be baffled by the, honestly, really easy instructions on the Scantron ballots. Ritchie says some people will mark an X or a check mark in the bubble instead of filling it, or circle the candidate. So the counties will look for these votes, under the no-doubt annoyingly watchful eyes of both campaigns' legal observers.

I do, of course, hope for a net gain for Franken of at least 237 votes. It's time the Brave New Workshop had a Senator. But for every me in this state, there's approximately one not-me on this question. The divisiveness of this Senate race was unusual (clearly proven by the numbers). It's tough to say what Barkley's effect on the race was. I suspect he got a lot of "a pox on both your houses" voters. There was as much, if not more, advertising against each major candidate on the basis of personal rancor as actual issues. For everyone who finds Franken personally repellent, there are those who feel the same about Norm Coleman. I'm one of these latter, finding Coleman somewhat moderate as Republicans go but also completely slimy and opportunistic. His suggestion that a recount should not proceed due to the "need for the healing process" plays into this impression. Seriously, Norm, "hopefully, you don't have TV ads during an election recount"? No kidding; why are you even bringing it up?

In other MN election news, I'm disappointed that Madia lost to Paulsen in the 3rd district. Madia's biography (young, South Asian heritage, Iraq war vet, Republican until recently) and moderation make him seem like he should be appealing to moderates and a kind of person the Democratic party could use more of. I hope he finds his way into politics yet.

An open letter to the 6th District: What the hell? Conservative district or no, to re-elect Bachmann after she shit the bed on national TV and then spent two weeks distorting or lying about what she said? And if El Tinklenberg can't make use of an opening like that, and the flood of national money that ensued, I've got no use for him. Bachmann's an embarrassment. The 6th, like the Gubernatorial race, needs a better DFL candidate (seriously, Dems, Mike Hatch?).

Finally, this guy is both an asshole for his actions, and an idiot for writing about it in public under his real name. Good riddance.
Posted by Fred at 12:07 PM No comments: 

Election reaction: The Big One

What a night. We had 12 or so friends over to watch the returns last night. We allowed ourselves to go into full media saturation mode, flipping the TV from CNN to Fox to Comedy Central, the radio in the dining room staying on NPR, MSNBC on the desktop computer, and three laptops floating around. Plus lots of delicious junk food & cheap champagne.

The atmosphere was electric. People yelled news from room-to-room as states were called by various networks. The big marker board was scribbled-in. When the networks called the election, seemingly all at once, the noisemakers came out. At this point, we were all excited seemingly on a horse-race level as much as anything else. I'm speaking for myself and projecting on the others, but I think we were delighted to each have voted, for the first time in our lives, for a winning presidential candidate.

McCain gave an excellent and gracious concession speech. He rejected the bitterness and divisiveness of his campaign, silencing some boos at first, and made a strong appeal to finding middle ground and shared solutions to the challenge ahead. He invoked the history of the moment, too, reflecting on what it says about the United States to have elected its first African-American president (the first black executive of a major western power, too, if I'm not mistaken). This was the McCain I admired in the 2000 primaries and throughout the first Bush administration, little seen in this general election. If Obama does some reaching out to McCain, and works to overcome the distrust McCain seems to have had of him since early 2005, McCain could be a helpful ally across the aisle. Honestly, if the circular conservative firing squad takes aim at McCain as much as I expect it will, the Senator may find more common cause with the President than his party on some issues (immigration and the environment chief among them).

When Obama spoke we were mostly silent, and for several of us, it got a bit dusty in the room. For my part the symbolism of the moment was incredibly moving, as were the possibilities of the return of American soft power on the global stage and an inspirational, oratory leadership not seen in this country in my lifetime.*

Lots of work to do, people, but last night is worth celebrating.

U-S-A! U-S-A!

* OK, conservatives, Reagan was a Great Communicator. I'm thinking Kennedy, I'll grant you Reagan -- I'm feeling magnanimous today. You're welcome.**

** Magnanimous and arrogant.
Posted by Fred at 10:32 AM 1 comment: 
Tuesday, November 4, 2008

Done and Done Vote #207, St. Helena Catholic Church, Minneapolis.

Melissa and I got in line around 6:45. Waited an hour and 15 to vote. A similar wait, incidentally, to the one I had at a precinct across town in 2004. I ran into a former improv classmate and a college classmate, both of whom it turns out live on our street within two blocks of us.

Plenty of ballots and booths. Choke point was table where registered people checked in. There were only two or three spots for check-in; they could have used at least one or two more teams.

I don't get why other states muck around with old-school machines, complicated ballots, or dubious electronics. Gimme a Scantron (Scantron and Scranton have literally -- literally! -- the same letters in them) any day of the week. It's the best of both worlds: rapid results when you scan it in, but it leaves a verifiable paper trail that's difficult to mess with.

Ultimately, while symbolically exciting, my voting experience was procedurally boring. That's the way I like it. I don't know why other states can't seem to figure out how to run an election, but I'm glad they have around here.
Posted by Fred at 10:51 AM 1 comment: Labels: civics, politics Blogging Friends from Minneapolis Other Grinnell Alums' Blogs Good links