Monday, July 26, 2010

Progress!

My official new favorite state, besides Indiana and Texas,  is now Arizona.  Not only is it beautiful there, if a little toasty during the summer and early fall, but they just seem to be doing a lot of good things lately.  I like the new gun law, for example.
----------

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Miles Davis: Cool Jazz Sound - April 1959

If you don't have Netflix, you probably should.  I loved watching this show from 1959 entitled "The Robert Herridge Theater."  It is a 30m live concert featuring the Miles Davis Quintet, accompanied by an in-studio orchestra led by Gil Evans.  This is a timeless jazz classic performance with cuts from "Kind of Blue " and "Miles Ahead," two albums which epitomize the cool jazz era.

It's cool to see the vintage mics, recording gear, and early television production techniques, too.  Fascinating. 

Go watch it. 

http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/Miles_Davis_Cool_Jazz_Sound/70014499?trkid=1211018

Shut up already and go DO something.

The NAACP's accusing the Tea Party Movement of overt racism is as clear a case of the "pot calling the kettle black" as anything I have ever seen.  It is as ironic and darkly humorous as it is poisonous and hypocritical.  There is no question that, historically, this storied organization has done much outstanding work in the the attainment of civil rights parity for ethnic minorities, principally African-Americans. However, much of their recent work is centered on institutionalizing racism through the same type of self-serving, sensationalistic, race-baiting-for-profit exercises that are routinely engaged in by the Reverends Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson Sr., and similar profiteers. 

I guess, like everybody else, they've all got mouths to feed and bills to pay over at the NAACP.  And shouting about problems that don't exist is a heckuva lot easier than actually doing something substantive these days. With all of the hopeandchange(tm) going on, plus the very real racism scandal going on at the Justice Department to avoid dealing with, they've really had to work hard to find some way to get themselves back in the news.

Yeah, these people make me a little cynical.
----