They're Even Afraid of Athletic Competition

Without going too much into it, pretty much everyone who is even remotely close to unbiased about the situation agrees the American drug war is completely screwed up. Heck, even a lot of people who are strongly biased to support the drug war admit it's screwed up. Whether you believe in the legalization of drugs or not, it's pretty hard to deny our current system of mass incarceration and ever-increasing penalties is having absolutely no effect on the levels of drug use in our nation and is having all sorts of deleterious effects (with little things like us having the most people in prison in the world, measured by raw numbers of percentages, and having more people in prison on drug charges than the entire EU has in prison for any reason).

Yet what's frustrating for people who would like to reform this broken system (let alone people who would advocate for legalization) is that when presented with the fairly indisputable evidence of how the war on drugs is not working, the official government responses is to pretty much put their fingers in their ears and yell "la la la! I can't hear you!" until you go away.

And in what has to be the most humorous analogy for this I've ever stumbled across, in the Congressional Softball League in D.C., the ONDCP's Czardinals refuse to play the drug-policy reform Capitol Hemp One Hitters (I swear to God I'm not making up either of those names).

While the Czardinals claim a scheduling problem is preventing the match up, the One Hitters took to a press release to note this has happened 6 years running now and wondered why the ONDCP was so afraid to face them, either in debate or on the softball diamond.

McBain: The Movie

Sorry blogging has been so light lately. I'm on the very tail end of my great overseas adventure, so I've been really busy cramming work in, seeing friends for the last time, and all the other things one does at the end of a long trip overseas.

But to tide you over until I return with my patented brand of angrily ranting into the empty void of the internet, someone has stitched together all of the McBain clips from the Simpsons over the years and it pretty seamlessly becomes a pretty good action flick.

The writes claim this is entirely a coincidence, but knowing those folks, I wouldn't be too surprised if this was a little intentional...

How Good Is It If It Has Nothing To Say?

I hated Eminem long before doing so was cool, though I had a friend who long tried to persuade me I was wrong to dismiss him so flippantly. He tried to convince me that Em had really great rhyming skills, and his flow was impressive, and all the other things that various music critics and fans have cited for liking him. But being a self-righteous college activist, I would tell him I simply couldn't sign off on any music that brazenly misogynistic and homophobic, and was frankly surprised he could. His defense was that you don't have to agree with everything someone says to like their music (which I agree with), but I would retort that if you really disagree with much of what someone says, then why are you listening to their music?

And while I'd like to think I've gotten a little less self-righteous over the years and have come to accept more music I might have once found questionable, I think the basic point still holds. At a certain point, someone's objectionable lyrics just override whatever else their music might have to offer. It reminds me of a review I read a couple years back of a Snoop album in which the reviewer wrote something to the effect of "Sure, Snoop has one of the best and most recognizable flows in all of rap, but he doesn't really have anything worthwhile to say with it."

And this sort of debate happens all the time in music, but it coming to the fore now as the indie world has fallen in love with flavor-of-the-moment rapper Tyler, The Creator, whose debut features music so violently misogynistic and homophobic it's become notable in a genre that's pretty much known for such things.

Sara of Tegan and Sara recently took to the interwebs to object to the uncritical praise Tyler's gotten from otherwise intelligent folks, writing in part:

As journalists and colleagues defend, excuse and congratulate 'Tyler, the Creator,' I find it impossible not to comment. In any other industry would I be expected to tolerate, overlook, and find deeper meaning in this kid's sickening rhetoric? Why should I care about this music or its 'brilliance' when the message is so repulsive and irresponsible?... The more I think about it, the more I think people don't actually want to go up against this particular bully because he's popular. Who sticks up for women and gay people now? It seems entirely uncool to do so in the indie rock world, and I'll argue that point with ANYONE.

It's a somewhat tired point, but still relevant. Even more telling about the state of gender relations in our time, though, is probably Tyler's response:

"If Tegan And Sara Need Some Hard Dick, Hit Me Up!"

For a guy who's supposed to be a lyrical genius, you'd think he might be able to come up with a bit more intelligent come back...

Update: Emma Carmichael has a much more intelligent take on this.

The Legal Power of Dylan Lyrics

In grading piles of student papers every semester, certain trends start to appear pretty quickly. The obvious plagiarists, the smart kids, the ones who obviously didn't write their own papers, etc. Amongst these many types, there's always the arty/alternative kid who includes lines from their favorite band because, you know, man, music like, is deep.

And I have to admit, I was one of those guys. My senior thesis features multiple Rage Against the Machine quotes as chapter headings, because I'm edgy like that.

But it turns out, it's not just solipsistic undergrads who do this. Apparently, it's pretty common for judges to do it as well, which is either heartening or depressing, depending on your view of the world. 

And befitting the over-representation of baby boomers currently on the bench, a recent study finds that Dylan is by far the most quoted lyricist of them all, cited over twice as often as the runner up Beatles. I like to pictures these judges at home, Pink Floyd posters on the wall, scratchy hi-fi spinning in the background, sitting at a wobbly desk, pounding out these deep opinions, envisioning how much this shit is going to blow the minds of those squares down at the courthouse...

Noted legal scholar

Links Instead of Insight

Hey folks, running short on time again, so here's some fun links to while away your precious time:

First, if you're interested in developing an exacting matrix that will help you understand the maximum amount of drunk you can get for the least amount of calories consumed (and who isn't interested in that?), then I present Get Drunk Not Fat.com.

Second, and far more awesome, the internet has now arrived at the most useful universal measurement: the Danzig. Right now it only converts metric to Danzig, but metric was always just the stepping stone to a better universal measurement anyway...

Rules For The Internet

This video should be federally-mandadted viewing for anyone who uses the internet, or at least anyone who ever comments on internet message boards:




Oh yeah, and it turns out some terrorist guy was killed by the U.S. While normally this sort of thing is what I use this blog to rant about, I'm too blown away by how even otherwise-rational human beings are celebrating this like we all get free puppies and ice cream.

So I'm most likely never going to do a longer post about this, but I will say it doesn't really mean anything. It's not going to magically bring people back to life, it's not going to end the two and half wars we have going on, it's not going to restore our civil liberties, etc.

But hey, it will give the president an approval ratings boost for a few months. So I guess that's something, right?

Your Beastie Boys Link-O-Rama (Featuring Two Links!)

By now, I'm assuming you've seen Fight For Your Right Revisited, the short film starring everyone ever, ostensibly taking place shortly after the video for Fight For Your Right ends.

If you have not seen it yet, go watch it now. It will make you laugh and bop your head, like the first time you listen to a skit-heavy West Coast album. Seriously, go watch it. I'll wait.

Ok, welcome back. Funny, right? Well, if you didn't understand the song, it's likely because the Beastie Boys are notoriously dense and obscure with their references. Luckily enough, the fine folks over at the AVClub have put together a compendium of 167 Beastie Boy references explained.

Now you, too, can be the obnoxious person who insists on explaining what a song is referencing, despite it being clear no one cares. And everyone likes that guy, right? Right? Guys?

God Bless The Internet

Every time I come across a really stupid website that is hilariously entertaining but simultaneously the kind of thing I can't believe anyone wasted their time putting together, I can't help but feel that's the exact reason the internet exists. I can only feel sorry for previous generations that had no way to access the wide world of people wasting their time on pointless shit solely to bring mild amusement to complete strangers. That must have been a horrible world to live in.

A perfect example of this is the tumblr Dads Are The Original Hipsters.

If I were feeling more intelligent today, I'd write something about the ironic appropriation of past styles/cultures. Instead, I'll just point out how incredibly true this simple yet profound statement is. And I'm living proof, with about every cool piece of clothing I own having been pilfered from my old man's closet...

How Do You End A Beer Fast?

With a bacon smoothie, apparently.

Several weeks back I blogged about J. Wilson, an Iowa man who gave up food for Lent, subsisting only on beer.

At first it was only 4 beers a day during the week and then 5 a day on the weekends, but it had to be upped to 5 a day every day to keep up his energy. Not only is that somewhat funny, it's also probably the only time you'll hear someone say they need some more beer to keep up their energy.

In any event, thankfully someone was there to cover him breaking the fast, which he did with a bacon smoothie (smoothies apparently being the best way to ease back into solid food).

Which I think makes the ordeal even more awesome. You subsist only on beer for 6 and a half weeks, and bacon truly is the only thing you could use to make that better...

Here's A Blog For You To Follow

For those of you in and/or around the Mpls/St. Paul area who like food, you should check out the Heavy Table, a mostly non-pretentious foodie blog. Well, I'm not sure if it counts as "foodie" because they mostly review places at which you could afford to eat, but nonetheless they seem to know their stuff.

They also have some fun on-going features like "What's In Your Fridge?" which they kicked off appropriately by checking in on what's in Prince's fridge.

Not only is Prince's fridge just about as wacky as you might expect it to be, His Purpleness did not allow any cameras in his house, so the post is accompanied by a pencil sketch of the fridge. Which just seems more appropriate anyway.

Back In Action

Been sick and busy the last week, thus the lack of blogging. But I'm back healthy (if no less busy), so the blogging should get back to some semblance of regularity. That being said, I don't actually have much time today, so here's a hastily written post!

If you're like me and aging out of the time when you're with "it" and what has become "it" is now weird and scary to you, fret no longer. Simply consult this handy illustrated list of scenesters to fill yourself in on what the kids are up to these days.

And if you want to look cool to them, might I suggest picking up a nicely rendered Iggy Pop action figure for your ironic art collection?

This Would Have Been a More Appropriate Blog Yesterday

It's probably pretty old news to anyone who reads this blog, but there's a pretty staggering number of major U.S. corporations that pay no federal taxes. Or some, like GE, not only don't pay taxes, they get government subsidies on top of that, putting them in the "negative 600% tax bracket" as Jon Stewart put it.

But to highlight the most egregious abuses, my friend and yours Bernie Sanders put together a list of the Top 10 Corporate Tax Cheats.

To borrow from a current Facebook meme, I don't recall NPR, teacher's unions, and people on social security creating this recession, and yet...

Post-Racial America

Now that we have a bi-racial President, that nasty "racism" business is completely behind us, right? I mean, clearly there can't be any more problems now that we've had a small number of successful people of color in important public and business positions, right?

But man, remember how horrible things used to be? Like when people believed crazy things about how people of different races were better than others and that mixing the two would result in all sorts of horrible problems?

I mean, I remember a time when as many as 46% of Republicans in Mississippi thought all interracial marriages should be illegal. Those were dark times, the times of...um...now. Because that is indeed currently what 46% of Mississippi Republicans believe.

But don't worry; we certainly don't need pointless things like Affirmative Action, because we're past all of that racism stuff...

How Much Are You Paying For War?

Probably more than you think. Go to the Afghan War Calculator and you can see approximately how much of your earnings this year went to pay for the war in Afghanistan.

And then, of course, don't forget to factor in the money you're paying to bomb Libya and the on-going war technical assistance provided to Iraq.

But if you think this is a lot, remember, upwards of a tens of cents of your yearly earnings are going to egregious wastes like National Public Radio and k-12 education, so maybe if we completely eliminate those things we can start cutting into this war debt...

News Roundup!

Been too busy to blog lately, so here's things I would normally have something much more witty to say about:

--Jesse "The Body" is considering another foray into politics - if Rand Paul decides to run as an independent (but not if he does so as a Republican), Jesse will be glad to be his running mate.

--In a move that should surprise no one, the Yankees were caught cheating. In a move that should surprise you even less, MLB will take no action on the matter. It's almost as if a team with large amounts of money and great name recognition can get away with whatever they want...

--Have you just been burning with a desire to see a head-to-head infographic comparison of Bob Dylan and Kanye West albums? If so, your oddly specific wish has been granted.

Regular blogging full of wit and sparkling commentary to resume next week...

There Goes Your Afternoon

If you came of age during a certain time, say for instance, the exact period of time I came of age, you probably remember the shitty little hand held electronic games that were nearly ubiquitous. As a kid who was generally denied video games by his parents (and now look at me; parents of today, let this be a lesson to you), these were a God send. Sure, they were crummy, repetitive, and usually very difficult to discern how gameplay was even supposed to take place, but dammit, they were a video game I could have.

Well, in the internet's ever increasing attempts to destroy the last vestiges of my productivity, a Polish firm Hipopotam has digitized and put most of them online. They've not only managed to keep the frustratingly clunky game play, but even the plastic thunk of the controllers.

This may or may not be what I end up doing with the rest of my day...

Please Feel Old Now

This picture comes from a photo collection taken at various shopping malls in 1990.

Look at them, and then marvel at the fact that 1990 is now over 20 years ago...

What You Should Be Reading

I've written here before about my unabashed love for Deadspin, the snarky sports blog that's for more informative and interesting than pretty much all other sports news sites combined.

Now they have a new running feature from the eggheads at the Harvard College Sports Analysis Collective. As the name implies, they're a group of Harvard students and researchers applying quantitative analysis to sports (e.g. Sabrmetrics and the like).

In their recurring contribution to Deadpsin, they're applying their fancy school mathematics to the sports exploits of fictional characters. For example, today they looked at the usage rate of the Fresh Prince of Bel Air in the one time he played organized basketball on the show. In previous entries they've looked at such burning questions as how often Trey Parker should theoretically lose a game of Baseketball, and the box score from the cartoon/live-action/product placement reels of Space Jam.

Also, they produce sweet charts like this:

The Fresh Prince only missed one shot, and it was half court

Well, If They Wanted Dignity They Shouldn't Be Poor

In the latest in a long line of ridiculous public policy measures designed to strip punish the poor for being poor and to strip them of the last few shreds of dignity they have remaining, Minnesota Republicans are trying to push a bill that would make it so public assistance could not be converted to cash form (ever) and could only be sued at special terminals at select stores.

What's the justification? Well, this is public money! If we're going to give these people money, then we should be able to dictate every detail about where, when, why, and how they can use it. Down to every last penny.

Of course, if we give hundreds of millions of dollars of public money to banks and investment firms (as, you know, a thank you for fucking up the entire world economy), it's nothing less than fascism to even argue we should have any say over how they spend it. Only a God-less socialist would suggest that the least we could do is not allow them to award themselves multi-million dollar bonuses for completely fucking up at their jobs.

After all, I'm sure they'll do something useful with the money, not blow it all on food and rent like those lazy poor people...

Baseball!

With the start of the season a mere 15 days away, I'm starting to become acutely I'll be missing the first two months of my favorite sport. Fortunately the baseball season lasts approximately three years, but still.

So in the meantime, I've been reading a shit load of baseball-centric blogs to fill the void in my life, and wanted to pass along some of the highlights of these exploits.

First, there's the all-steroids team featuring a player at each position who most clearly benefited from some time on the juice. Notable for Twins fans in the inclusion of David Ortiz, who in his 6 years with the Twins manages 58 home runs total, and then went to Boston and got a locker next to a known steroid user and suddenly couldn't stop hitting home runs. Also not too coincidentally, he suddenly lost the ability to hit homers after said roids hookup was traded to LA...


Also of great interest is the first ever NCAA-bracket to determine the greatest set of facial Hair in Twins history. While I assume it's inevitable the Pav-stache will take the day, check out all of the first round brackets (conveniently broken down into Griffith era, Pohlad era, 21st century, and worst of all time), and be sure to get over there in time to vote for the second round.