Another Lost Weekend

Okay, you people are lucky. Oh yeah. I coulda linked frivolous ditties like Starship's "We Built This City" or C.W. McCall's "Convoy" or Jigsaw's "Sky High".

But no, I've centered on weightier numbers. Just 'cuz that's where I'm at tonight. So I give you Greg Lake.

Picking up the torch from Greg, there's the Fureys with Davey Arthur singing about more people dying in vain. Which of course is infinitely more uplifting than the Pogues "And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda" -- that includes the line "And when I woke up in my hospital bed / And saw what it had done, Christ I wished I was dead / Never knew there were worse things than dying."

And in keeping with the death-pop theme, there's this beauty of Nirvana covering Terry Jacks' 1974 classic "Seasons in the Sun". I like it not so much for the irony, but particularly for fact that all three bandmembers play opposite - Cobain on drums, Grohl on bass, Novoselic on guitar. And they all look totally lost. But I like that.

Shit, where's Henry Gross when you need him? "Shannon is gone, I heard she drifted off to sea..."

Puppies are great.

When You Walk Through A Storm...

...you never walk alone.

In fact, the USA walks better than most. Though I kinda want to be a Canadian. Good bacon there.

The Real Hockey Stick

That red line looks an awful lot like a hockey stick. One unfortunately based on real data...

Fire and Ice

Obama Caucuses with GOP?!?

Wait, what?

The Republican congressional caucus invited President Obama to a conclave in Baltimore today. And Obama went!

He was peppered with tough questions on jobs, public debt, and healthcare, among many other issues. And he answered them! Candidly!

Yeah, there were some jibes back and forth. But overall it was a civil meeting, where both sides got to stake their positions and air their grievances about the other side's methods. It was stunning to watch even the condensed episode on PBS's Newshour this evening.

Look, I've been pretty tough on both the President and the entire Congress. But Obama showed serious stones to walk into that group.

Mongol respect Sheriff Bart.

I highly recommend viewing the full version if you have an hour...

That's With a "T"

Let's see, total debt north of 12 trillion. Receipts around 2 to 2-1/2 trill. Expenditures at 3-1/2 t. Treasure wantonly squandered.

Figures on U.S. government spending & debt below (last six digits are eliminated).

Total public debt subject to limit Jan. 22  12,245,872

Statutory debt limit                        12,394,000

Total public debt outstanding Jan. 22       12,302,465

Operating balance Jan. 22                      142,454

Interest fiscal year 2009                      383,365

Interest fiscal year 2008                      451,154

Deficit fiscal year 2009                     1,417,121

Deficit fiscal year 2008                       454,798

Receipts fiscal year 2009                    2,104,613

Receipts fiscal year 2008                    2,523,642

Outlays fiscal year 2009                     3,521,734

Outlays fiscal year 2008                     2,978,440

Gold assets in September                        11,041

Source: Associated Press

System of a Down

Janet Reno, err, Napolitano has issued clarification of her ridiculous weekend statement that the "system worked" during the Great Northwest Airlines Underwear Bomb Attempt.

This of course comes in light of facts like Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab of Nigeria was on a terrorist watch list, yet not on a no-fly list. Terribly sorry for the racial/ethnic insensitivity you are about to read. However, anyone with a name and country of origin such as Umar's should be subject to immediate and invasive scrutiny.

But we've also been treated to uncorroborated reports that the, uh, "suspect" had paid cash, checked no luggage, been aided by an airline employee through security, that another passenger 20 rows back had filmed the entire flight, and that al Qaeda practices methods to evade advanced detection techniques.

Naturally, the only rational response is to........ invade the privacy of, increase the hassle to, and maximize confusion among the 99.999% of innocent flyers worldwide, particularly infants and the elderly. Seriously.

Imagine you're a 74 year-old guy with a bum prostate who's been fed only salty peanuts and several half-cans of diet Coke during the first 4 hours of your cross-continental flight. On a very good day you're capable of squirting a couple ounces at a time, usually every 10 to 15 minutes. Now, you've gotta hold that for the entire last hour of your flight while strapped in between two fat people and jostled in heavy turbulance?

Or what about the 2-year old who sucked down 20 sippy cups worth of juice, water, and ginger ale in that same span? Now she's gotta pee like Sea Biscuit or puke over an entire 3-row quadrant.

So now the calls are coming loud from hard-ass security types, well-connected scanner manufacturers, and politicians looking for cover alike: INSTALL FULL-BODY SCREENERS EVERYWHERE IMMEDIATELY!!!!!!

Sorry, I'm not sold. As Dr. B commented in the post below, we're looking for folks of a "certain type". They're not all that hard to find. Especially when their own prominent & wealthy fathers call their home government and the US freaking Embassy -- several times! -- to express grave concern about their son's increasing radicalism.

In the words of George Clooney's "Up in the Air" character when charged with being racist: "I'm like my mother, I stereotype. It's faster."

Oh, by the way, we have an exclusive image of Dr. B crossing security at Edmonton Airport:

"Life is a waterfall

we drink from the river,

then we turn around and put up our walls..."