Here’s another of my all-time favorite tracks: Koinonia – Countin’ The Cost, from the Celebration LP. This thing has a groove that is infectious. It’s just the audio from the LP.
If you prefer, here’s a vid of the same tune, different version. It’s not quite as solid a recording in my opinion, but it’s a nice alternate version.
That’s Abe Laboriel on bass… one of the very best of the period, or to now, for that matter.
Patterico, whos day job is assistant district attorney, demonstrates his professional skills by giving the Speedway Bomber, b/k/a Brett Kimberlin an on-line anal examination. Patterico makes his case in detail. From Patterico examination of Kimberlin, I draw two easy conclusions:
One, Kimberlin is hypersensitive:
KIMBERLIN: He wrote a blog post that said that I framed him for this alleged assault.
THE COURT: Framed?
KIMBERLIN: That I framed him for this assault, and that I forged the documents from Suburban Hospital, and that I photoshopped pictures of my black eye.
Two, Kimberlin, just isn’t very smart, or chronically dishonest:
WALKER: And you were known as the “Speedway Bomber,” were you not?
KIMBERLIN: I don’t know that.
Via, Patterico’s Pontifications.
The Speedway Bomber wants the court to believe that is of offended by blogs post, and Tweets about him, but his not aware that is known as the Speedway Bomber. Sure.
Hat tip, Karen, the Lonely Conservative.
ABC News is among those discussing this:
ABC News’ Ben Forer and Olivia Katrandjian report:
The soft drink industry is fighting back against New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s proposed ban on large sugary drinks, by running an eye-catching, full-page ad in Sunday’s New York Times with an image of the mayor as a nanny.
The ad reads, “Bye Bye Venti: Nanny Bloomberg has taken his strange obsession with what you eat one step further. He now wants to make it illegal to serve ‘sugary drinks’ bigger than 16 oz. What’s next? Limits on the width of a pizza slice, size of a hamburger or amount of cream cheese on your bagel?”
Above and below the photo-shopped image of Bloomberg are the taglines: “You only thought you lived in the land of the free,” and “New Yorkers need a mayor, not a nanny.”
The Center for Consumer Freedom, which is behind the ad, refers to Bloomberg as the “Great Dictator” on its website.Bloomberg’s plan, which is part of an effort to curb obesity, would make it illegal for food service establishments such as restaurants, street vendors, sports venues and movie theaters to serve sugary drinks larger than 16 ounces.
The ban would apply to both bottled soda and fountain drinks containing more than 25 calories per eight ounces. It would not include alcohol, fruit juices, diet soda or any beverage that is at least half milk. Grocery stores and convenience stores would be exempt.
According to Bloomberg, New York City spends $4 billion a year on health care for overweight residents, and sugary drinks are the most significant factor in the increasing number of obese or overweight New Yorkers.
The consumer rights groups are correct, so far as they go. Clearly, this is the nanny state run amok, but now the question comes that very few people want to even address…. At what point did the stuff cross the line?
As a nation we sat idly by and watched this nonsense for decades, all the while our freedoms slipping away one by one. Why are we even pretending to worry about this now?
Our founders considered that the government which governs least governs best. This was in fact a foundational principle. Clearly, we have gone well beyond that to the point where there is no limitation on government power. Ask yourself; “Is there an area of my life that government doesn’t control?” The answer of course, is “no.” A bit euphemistic, but consider that your toilet is federally regulated. So is the toilet paper paper. So, for that matter, is the water in the bowl. Why, you can’t go to the bathroom without the Federal government sticking its nose into the process!
Similarly, when better than half of your income is going to government at some level…. (actually, it it far worse when you consider that better than half the money you spend on things, even absent direct taxes, go to taxes or unfunded mandates on businesses you buy from.., and usually pass on to the consumer in the form of higher prices, it’s more than that, even) I’d say there’s a lot I can’t do because of government… a lot of freedom has been lost right at the off.
Certainly, the current plans surrounding health care are a net loss for the cause of freedom. So to is the “environmental” movement, when given the force of government. These are just a couple of examples, of the all-inclusive list of things the government thinks it should have control over…These are things that affect your daily life. The founders understood all of this intuitively. They knew very well that government had to be limited in scope. Those limits placed on our Federal government by the founders are all but run over now.
Were we directed from Washington when to sow and when to reap, we should soon want
bread. – Thomas JeffersonThe two enemies of the people are criminals and government, so let us tie the second
down with the chains of the constitution so the second will not become the legalized
version of the first. – Thomas JeffersonGovernment big enough to supply everything you need is big enough to take everything you have … The course of history shows that as a government grows, liberty decreases.
– Thomas Jefferson
So again, I ask the question; at what point did the government cross the line?
I suggest it was the first freedom lost. And think about how that happened; we thought it was a good idea at the time. We thought would provide us a little security. Franklin spoke to that;
Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.
~Benjamin Franklin
And, may I add, that other than in the shortest of terms, we won’t get it, either.
This issue speaks to the entire government health care takeover. Look at the mayor’s logic. He’s suggesting that because the government is spending backs number of dollars on health care, that gives him the right to make a law Banning that which current science thinks is costing the government healthcare system money. At what point does it stop? The fact is it doesn’t. As Jefferson points out the natural tendency is for government growth. I point to health care is an example, not as the whole enchilada. It is merely one of the myriad of places where government control has grown far too much for our good, and certainly irrespective of the concept of freedom.
We’re coming up on the Fourth of July, pretty quick. A little over a month’s time away. Isn’t it time we started remembering and respecting the principles that we were founded on? Certainly, our supposed “leaders” have lost their way. Perhaps it’s time we lost our current crop of “leaders”, hmmm?
California is paying the price for recycling a failed governor, Governor Moonbeam, a/k/a Jerry Brown. Can Governor Moonbeam read the writing on the wall and pull the plug on pipe dream of bullet train. I kind of doubt it, from CBS Money Watch:
LOS ANGELES — A new poll finds California voters are experiencing buyers’ remorse over a proposed $68 billion bullet train project, as the number of lawsuits against the rail system grows.Fifty-five percent of voters want to see the high-speed rail bond issue that was approved in 2008 back on the ballot, and 59 percent say they would now vote against it, according to the USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times survey (lat.ms/N9tTcm) published Saturday.Since the $9 billion borrowing plan was passed, the projected cost of the bullet train between Los Angeles and San Francisco has roughly doubled, and it will now share track with slower commuter and freight trains in some areas, the Times said.
A majority of voters have turned against the ambitious undertaking just as Gov. Jerry Brown is pushing lawmakers to approve the start of construction in the Central Valley later this year.
California already recalled on failed governor. Time to make it two.
Hat tip: Legal Insurrection
Evidently the democrats in Wisconsin are in full panic mode. There June surprise fell apart in an hour, from Jim Hoft, Gateway Pundit:
Pathetic. Wisconsin Democrats dropped a Scott Walker love child story today – two days out from the recall election.
The far left Wisconsin Citizens Media Co-op reported:[…]
How sad and desperate. Wisconsin Democrats should be embarrassed.
It took one call and about an hour to refute the bogus report.
The Daily Kos, not exactly a bastion of conservatism, reported on the developments.
A story too pathetic for even the Daily Kos.
I note with some sadness, the passing last night of Richard Dawson, of Family Feud and of Hogan’s Heroes, and a number of other projects. He was 79. Here he is talking about the British accent he took on in the Hogan’s Heroes show.
The Obama administration is confused. It wants to pretend illegal combatants have the same rights as citizens, but Obama desperateness wants to look like a commander-in-chief. So what do you do when your reprobate of an attorney general, Eric Holder forbids treating captured enemy combatants like captured enemy soldiers? Under Holder, captured enemy combatants have no intelligence value, there is no point in capturing them. So Obama simply orders them to killed, and he calls it bravery. From Charles Krauthammer, National Review:
This administration came out opposing military tribunals, wanting to try Khalid Sheik Mohammed in New York, reading the Christmas Day bomber his Miranda rights, and trying mightily (and unsuccessfully, there being — surprise! — no plausible alternative) to close Guantanamo. Yet alongside this exquisite delicacy about the rights of terrorists is the campaign to kill them in their beds.
You festoon your prisoners with rights — but you take no prisoners. The morality is perverse. Which is why the results are so mixed. We do kill terror operatives, an important part of the War on Terror, but we gratuitously forfeit potentially life-saving intelligence.
The good doctor says more, a lot more.
This is one of my all-time favorite tracks… George Howard’s Dancing in the Sun… the title track from the LP. It’s a tune I played a lot of when I was doing Jazz radio years ago. Recorded in 1986, we lost him a few years later… 1998… to colin cancer, I think it was. Sad. Would have loved going to see him. Still, we have his music… and what a better theme to start June with?
Oh, wow. I NEVER knew this film existed.
I”ve raved for years about the “Friends and Love” concert, held 42 years ago this month, at the Eastman Theater in my home town of Rochester NY… what a concert… but never knew this film existed until about ten minutes ago.
This was the concert that started Chuck Mangione’s career. He was invited to conduct the event and was basically given full rein on the affair. He composed everything in the concert, arranged it. And then performed it, in front of a standing room only crowd of around 3600 people.
That’s Chuck up front, of course. Steve Gadd on drums, Don Potter, who is, along with Bat McGrath, were a duo that were something of a Rochester legend on guitar, and of course, the? Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. GERRY NIEWOOD doing that fabulous solo, on his soprano saxophone, (Niewood was one of Chuck’s band that died trying to land at the Buffalo airport) as well as Tony Levin who has been on everyone’s LP at one time or another, on Electric Bass and Marvin Stamm on trumpet.
This was pretty much a defining moment for modern jazz. And I wonder, in retrospect, if the people involved knew it at that time.
Heckled yes. shouted down, no. from Alica M. Cohn, Hill:
Obama campaign adviser David Axelrod was shouted down Thursday at an event in Boston that was staged to attack Mitt Romney’s record as governor of Massachusetts.
Axelrod called the press conference to hammer home the Obama campaign’s critique of Romney’s time as governor, and brought along officials from around the state to reinforce the message.
But the pro-Obama speakers had to shout to be heard over the “boos” from Romney supporters who showed up for the event. Holding “Obama Isn’t Working” and other pro-Romney signs, they blew bubbles at the stage and loudly chanted, “Where are the jobs?” and “broken record.”
Video:
David, if you can’t take the political heat, stay out of the political kitchen.
David’s axe may be dull, like his boss’s mental faculties, but Axelrod was heard. Not that he had much to say.
I wonder if David Axelrod’s found the mole, yet?
Because it’s not precisely accidental that Axelrod got rhetorically ambushed today at his take-em-by-surprise press conference, while Mitt Romney did not.
Is the Obama campaign sinking. I am not a big Mitt Romney fan. Then who is? However unlike John McLame in 2008, Romney will go to the offensive, and unlike 2008, Obama has a record.
Underplayed, this one is. Too pop for Jazz stations, I guess, and too Jazz for pop stations, even soft rockers.
But it fits both, I’ve always thought.
With the Obama administration, gaffes are not a bug but, rather feature, via Doug Powers @ Michelle Malkin:
US President Barack Obama’s description of a Nazi German Holocaust site as a “Polish death camp” shocked Poland, whose leaders insist the record be set straight 67 years after World War II.
Obama on Tuesday labeled the Nazi facility used to process Jews for extermination as a “Polish death camp.” The White House later said the president “misspoke” and expressed “regret”.
Niles Gardner, Telegraph (UK) via Fausta:
President Obama has a long track record of insulting the Poles. In 2010 he chose to play golf on the day of the funeral of the Polish President Lech Kaczynski, the Polish First Lady, and 94 senior officials who perished in the Smolensk air disaster. Eight months earlier he humiliated Warsaw by pulling out of the agreement over Third Site missile defence installations in Poland and the Czech Republic.
It not a gaffe. It is a pattern.
Walter Russell Mead notes:
Scott Walker’s union battles may be getting all the headlines at the moment, but far away in the Empire State a very different governor is getting into a battle of his own with the unions. Although Andrew Cuomo’s union fights have not been the sort of cage match as Gov Walker’s in Wisconsin, they’ve been pretty serious, especially for a state known for its liberal, pro-union politics. Cuomo’s early struggles involved reducing benefits for public sector unions and pushing for a tougher teacher evaluation process. The latest round of the union fight concerns delegate seats at September’s DNC meeting in Charlotte.
Politico reports that during the last week, Cuomo removed the leaders of four of New York’s largest public-sector unions from their seats at the convention. Although three of the leaders were eventually reinstated, it was only after considerable wrangling by the unions and frantic calls to Cuomo’s office. Although the Governor denies any motive that at the very least, Cuomo is sending a message to the unions that he will be more difficult to work with than previous Democratic governors.
Hmmm. This seems to me a reaction to the political reality that unions are very unpopular with voters, particularly public sector unions. Mead thinks so, as well.But as Mead points out this reaction of Cuomo based on nothing more than a power grab:
Ever since Teddy Roosevelt and FDR, governors of New York have had presidential ambitions—Dewey, Rockefeller (who made it to Veep), Averill Harriman and Andrew Cuomo’s father all angled for the nation’s top job during their political careers.
This Cuomo is likely no exception, and significantly, he seems to think that a record of standing up to public sector unions might boost his national ambitions. Looking at Hilary Clinton’s sky high popularity ratings, Cuomo may be thinking that the Democratic center could be the path to bigger things.
But notice the difference, here. Whereas the Lamestream media has been trumpeting the anti-union message of Walker in it’s attempt to bolster the failing effort to have him removed, they’ve said hardly anything at all, about Cuomo being equally realistic about Unions and the damage they do.
Apparently word has gone out from Detroit on just how damaging unions can be. Investor’s Business Daily:
Poor Detroit. It hasn’t had any good news for decades, and now, despite a $77 billion bailout of the auto industry, its population continues to implode. The No. 1 reason: the United Auto Workers union.
Census data released Tuesday show Detroit’s population has plunged 25% since 2000 to just 713,777 souls – the same as 100 years ago, before the auto industry’s heyday. As recently as the 1970s, Detroit had 1.8 million people.
What’s happening is no secret: Detroiters are fleeing an economic disaster, the irreversible decline of the Big Three automakers.
In his now-famous Super Bowl commercial for Chrysler, rapper Eminem drives up to a theater in a sleek new 200 model and says, “This is the Motor City. And this is what we do.” But, sadly, that’s no longer the case. Detroit’s decline has been shocking.
Sure, a lot of the blame goes to a generation of bad management. But the main reason for Detroit’s decline is the greed of the industry’s main union, the UAW, which priced the Big Three out of the market.
Well, let’s be fair to the UAW, and for that matter unions in general here. They’re only part of the reason. The other part is liberalism.. the growth of government intrusion. That’s a problem that Walker has been quite successful in attacking, but Cuomo, will not even make the attempt. Which, to my mind, is precisely why the media a tax walker and says nothing whatsoever about Andrew Cuomo.
Let’s take a historical perspective, here. If you want to see what happened to Detroit’s auto industry, one need only look at the historical perspective of the passenger railroad industry in this country. It seems a strange parallel, but parallel it is as you’ll see.
Consider the linkage; we had a huge, and mildly profitable, passenger railroad industry in these United States years ago. Unionization, and over regulation by government, placed a large burden on the railroad companies. So large was that burden, in fact, that the railroad industry started petitioning government to not run particular routes anymore. The government in its wisdom decided that there were too many people who depended on the railroads for their transportation. As such they denied the railroad companies that permission to cut costs by cutting lines. As such the railroad industry went under. Union imposed operating costs, government imposed operating costs, meant low profits, and indeed huge losses. When the government and the unions finally killed off the golden goose, the government stepped in with Amtrak who has never turned dime one, in total, and has invariably been a huge burden on the American taxpayer.
So what is with the American auto industry. So it soon will be with the American trucking industry. The growth of government, the unrealistic demands of unions, combined to make capitalism impossible.
The question becomes do we have anybody capable of turning that around on our political horizon?
