September 7, 2016

Can Gretchen Carlson sue Ailes?

I'm not finding that she cannot sue Roger Ailes outside of the settlement with Fox.

September 6, 2016

Hilarious story by my maple walnut friend, Al Howard

Occasionally I post things by one of my favorite people in the world, San Diego musician Al Howard. He is so funny, and so right on, this time especially. You can Facebook him at Alfred Howard. If you live around there go check out his music.

A lot of times when the phone rings at Cow records, I spend the first half of the call trying to figure out if I’m being pranked, scanning for soft giggles and asking myself “is this dude fucking with me, is this really his voice, can he really be talking this slowly, is he really going to sing an entire off key version of Gotye’s Somebody that I used to Know before asking me who the artist is?” and questions of that nature. I guess it takes a particular kind of person to dial up a record store clerk in this day and age, you know, with google existing and what not. Last night the phone rang and I knew I had to write it down word for word because it was going to be exceptional. He spoke in that beautiful and ubiquitous redneck accent, the same one that somehow exists in Montgomery Alabama, Van Horn Texas and Kingman Arizona, the same accent you expect to deliver a line like “honey, you’re too pretty for math” or “science is fer queers.” I answered with my polite telephone voice “Cow records, Al speaking”. To which he responds with a slow molasses drawl “I don’t know who Al is, but are you the black one?”
Since I am the black one (more of a maple walnut really, but I’m good with black), I said “yes”.
To which he responded, “Well I don’t mean to be derogatory, I don’t know how y’all like to be pronounced, but do you have that Lynyrd Skynyrd cd you held fer me?”
“I DON’T KNOW HOW Y’ALL LIKE TO BE PRONUNCED”
I was dying, along with the English language. See, here’s how racism works, if you need to distinguish between a white and a black guy, it’s perfectly acceptable to use an adjective to describe the person. If you were attending a Run The Jewels concert and Killer Mike kicked you in the face, you could say “the black one did it”, though more than likely I should thank him for autographing your teeth cause he’s a fucking legend. That’s not racist. But once you go as far as to assume that one member of a race can speak for the entire race, like if you thought I knew how all black people liked to be “pronounced”. That’s where it shifts to racism. Same if I were to assume all women had the same opinion of Hillary Clinton, that would be sexism, or maybe just stupidity. I’m not entirely sure. I guess I like to be “pronounced” Al, the name he literally said back to me, that would have probably been the best. I thought to explain all this to him, but I know he’d simply respond with “You got my Skynyrd or what?” so I saved my breath for the next battle.
Midnight Pine CD Release this Friday at Moniker, gonna be a good’n.

September 2, 2016

Taco Trucks? Got a favorite?

I do. I have them mapped out here in NORCAL. La Fuenga in the little town of Shelton is my favorite.

September 2, 2016

Study: Stoned driving not a crash risk

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/02/11/stoned-driving-crash-risk_n_6654810.html

Of course the anti everything bunch will discount this, but the truth is, as we all know, being stoned is not a driving risk. The first study to say so.

September 1, 2016

Why don't we care about the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) protests?

Thirty-eight activists were arrested in two states on Wednesday as protests against the $3.8 billion Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) continue.

While construction on one section of the pipeline has been halted until a court ruling expected next week, work continues at other sites. Earlier this week, a federal judge in Des Moines, Iowa, foiled an attempt by DAPL parent company Energy Transfer Partners to silence protests there by denying its request for a temporary restraining order.

Subsequently, 30 people were taken into custody on Wednesday, during "one of the largest demonstrations yet" in that state against the four-state pipeline project, according to the Des Moines Register.

"It also was the first time a formal effort was made to encourage a large number of arrests in a bid to obstruct construction work in Iowa," the Register noted. "Organizers vowed afterward that additional demonstrations will be forthcoming, along with more arrests."

Eight more "water protectors" were arrested in North Dakota on Wednesday, during a protest that saw several people lock themselves to heavy machinery and authorities shut down a stretch of highway. One man, Iyuskin American Horse of the Sicangu Lakota (Rosebud Sioux Tribe), spent more than six hours attached to a digger at a DAPL worksite in Mandan, North Dakota.

"I am here to protect the water for the children and all of the unborn, and to protect our ways of life," said American Horse. "I came here to let them know that what they're doing is wrong. This is nonviolent civil disobedience—and this is what it comes down to, and I'm here."

More here: http://www.commondreams.org/news/2016/09/01/world-watching-tribal-members-put-bodies-path-dakota-pipeline