Deltron Zero and Automator

I'll get off my ranty political soapbox for a bit. Sorry. I got to foaming at the mouth. DOWN BOY!

I just learned that Del the Funkee Homosapien is about to have a new album out (11th Hour) - he released a DVD early because production still hasn't wrapped up on the album. Also found out that there's going to be a follow-up album for Deltron 3030, which was sleeper bombshell that snuck into my library and continues to detonate solid beats and rhymes sending waves of audio joyness into my noodlebox. Dan the Automator, which some of you may know, is a SF-based DJ/producer that has masterminded some of the more recognized concept trip-hop space apocalypto rap out there, and was responsible for laying the tracks and production of Deltron 3030.

I was lucky enough to be in Oakland when rap was coming into its own, before the wave of mindless gangsta rap swept over suburbia and provided Dave Chappelle with enough "white boys rollin' thug life" material for years to come. I'm thinking of the skit with the black white supremacist, and Dave's supremacist character calls a group a white kids in car, which is bumping some heavy g-rap thumps, "a bunch of n***as" (I ain't saying the word now, people...you just saw what Michael Richards did...the wound is still fresh), and the kids are like...coool!

Anywho, it was in 89-92 and everyone was rapping. Ice Cube was still putting out solid albums - think "Death Certificate" - and in 91 Del (who is a cousin of Cube) released "I Wish My Brother George Was Here." You may know one of the singles from the album: Mistadobalina. Then there was Hieroglyphics, which was an amalgamation of a hefty crew of Oakland rappers who banded together to save costs on production, in order to launch their solo careers...Del was one. Casual another...Opio, A-Plus, Snupe, Tajai...

In my opinion, Del has had the most staying power, or maybe it's just that I get more from his lyrics. In any case, it's been about 15 years, and Del's still putting out music that continues to stimulate. He's not getting stoopid loot like Will Smith, but then again, he's not dropping "Gettin' Jiggy Wit' It."

Oakland Online

The Oakland Public Library has put a collection of historical Oakland photos up on the Internet. This is a very cool site. The photo of the Bay and Golden Gate taken from Skyline Boulevard in 1923 is remarkable. Being that I spend a good period of my formative years in Oakland, I feel very close to the city, and these photos show what the city and the surrounding areas looked like over a hundred years ago.

The U.S. Can't Afford To Deal With Its Trash...

...so we'll let our kids deal with it, if they aren't living in a real-life version of Waterworld.

You may have heard about the EPA and its resistance to regulating CO2 emissions. There's currently a case being heard by the Supreme Court about it. Nothing major. Do you know what the EPA mission is? Don't worry, I've got it right here:

EPA's purpose is to ensure that:

• All Americans are protected from significant risks to human health and the environment where they live, learn and work.
• National efforts to reduce environmental risk are based on the best available scientific information.
• Federal laws protecting human health and the environment are enforced fairly and effectively.
• Environmental protection is an integral consideration in U.S. policies concerning natural resources, human health, economic growth, energy, transportation, agriculture, industry, and international trade, and these factors are similarly considered in establishing environmental policy.
• All parts of society--communities, individuals, business, state and local governments, tribal governments--have access to accurate information sufficient to effectively participate in managing human health and environmental risks.
• Environmental protection contributes to making our communities and ecosystems diverse, sustainable and economically productive.
• The United States plays a leadership role in working with other nations to protect the global environment.

A couple of the EPA's stated goals worth highlighting are:

PREVENTING POLLUTION AND REDUCING RISK IN COMMUNITIES, HOMES, WORKPLACES AND ECOSYSTEMS:
Pollution prevention and risk management strategies aimed at cost-effectively eliminating, reducing, or minimizing emissions and contamination will result in cleaner and safer environments in which all Americans can reside, work, and enjoy life. EPA will safeguard ecosystems and promote the health of natural communities that are integral to the quality of life in this nation.

REDUCTION OF GLOBAL AND CROSS-BORDER ENVIRONMENTAL RISKS:
The United States will lead other nations in successful, multilateral efforts to reduce significant risks to human health and ecosystems from climate change, stratospheric ozone depletion, and other hazards of international concern.

You can read more about the EPA here.

OK. This being said, why is there so much resistance to 'minimizing emissions and contamination'? The fact that of all the developed nations in the world only we and Australia failed to ratify the Kyoto Treaty, does this speak to the EPA's commitment in leading "...other nations in successful, multilateral efforts to reduce significant risks to human health and ecosystems from climate change, stratospheric ozone depletion, and other hazards of international concern..."? Hmm. I'm confused.

The D.C. Circuit Court ruled in favor the EPA stating that the agency '...lacks the authority to regulate greenhouse gas emissions...' It sounds like there's two options here: 1) make the EPA change their BS mission statement and goals, or 2) make it a more robust organization so it can step up to the plate to effectively combat the War on Emissions (I figure we can call it a war - I learned it from Dubya.)

It could be that we could actually create some jobs that would allow people to actually do something that was ethically rewarding: making the world a better place by making it a cleaner and healthier place. Is that more important than stimulating conflict and leveraging profits on the old military-industrial complex model that Eisenhower warned us about? Does this make me a tree-hugging hippie pacifist bed-wetting liberal Commie pinko? Labels...whatever. Say it to my face and I'll bust your grill, though. I've got Charleton Heston and big guns on speed dial. Michael Moore will film it all. Blockbuster won't carry the DVD, but Netflix will.

Your Taxpayer Dollars Telling You Not To Fornicate...Sinner

Just when you thought it was going to be okay...just when we could collectively see the light at the end of the tunnel, and even the lumbering, drooling, mentally challenged Bushco apparatus seemed to be indicating a willingness to move in a less Neanderthal fashion - wait, that's not fair to Neanderthals...how about Australopithecus afarensis - the jokiest joke that's ever been joked was joking its way across the Internets.

Apparently, our taxpayer dollars are funding useful programs designed to teach people between 12-29 years old to wait until marriage before having sex. Here are the guidelines. Ha. HA! HAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAAA!! Isn't that the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard! It's a good thing that we spent $50 million dollars on that program. Those were your dollars and my dollars. I have no problem with teenagers receiving the message - let's at least let these kids get out of high school first before they start having kids, but 20-30?! There must have been some last ditch effort by the Christian Coalition to pressure Bush by blackmailing him with pictures of him nuzzling with Sen. Clinton.

My favorite legislative priority has got to be letter D. Oh Letter D, you tease me with your hidden agenda.

d) teaches that a mutually faithful monogamous relationship in the context of marriage is the expected standard of human sexual activity;

So, are there any boys and girls who can interpret this...um, priority? It's a loaded statement to be sure, and it could be argued that I'm reading more into it than it deserves, but I hear the message: Christ the Lord ordained the man-boy with penis and the woman-girl with vagina and both shall wait until the 30th summer before engaging in any bumping of the uglies, which of course should only follow after appropriate matrimonial ceremonies, which of course are not available to homersexuals or lebanese people, as they are evil and are choosing to live their life of sin. Tell me if I'm wrong.

I pity the poor troop of souls that sit in their lifeless business environment (read: prairie dog cubedom) and craft and disseminate this tripe for a paycheck. It smacks of fascist propaganda. I'm going to have to side with Jocelyn Elders on this one - she was the Surgeon General in '93, until Clinton had to ask for her resignation because she publicly stated that masturbation should perhaps be taught in order to help prevent STDs in teens. She also said, "As long as I was in Washington I never met anybody that I thought was good enough, who knew enough or who loved enough to make sexual decisions for anybody else." Christlovers/meth-smoking closet-pastors wanted her head. How dare she take the power away from the church and give to humanity!

Big ups to Mark Morford on sfgate for keeping it rizzle. If he were hyphy, he'd no doubt be rolling gas, break, dip with doe's open mang!

The Impact Of Good, Sound Reporting

Wal-Mart Sales Disappointing

Quite possibly the most insightful poll ever executed. My hat's off to The Onion for another glorious and scholarly study. This American institution really has its finger on the pulse of the country!

Jackson Does Hobbits

What recent film trilogy will be spitting hot celluloid acid into the face of wannabe copycat films for the next 3 decades? The Lord of the Rings trilogy, of course.

You may be aware that there was a novel preceding The Lord of the Rings (which Tolkien didn't actually think of as a trilogy, by the way) called "The Hobbit." This is where we first see the One Ring and meet Bilbo Baggins and Gandalf. Hell, even Balin, Gimli's younger cousin, is represented here. I won't go into the storyline, as you probably already know it. If not, tell me where you live and I will come over and beat you over the head with the book.

Needless to say, based on the enormous success of the Peter Jackson films, which put New Zealand back on the map for most people this side of the international date line, New Line Cinemas has been wanting to do two more Tolkien films with Mr. Jackson at the helm. It seems however, that there was some *gasp* shady back curtain dealings that prevented Mr. Jackson from only reaping $500 million dollars instead of $750 million dollars - these aren't real figures, I can't back this up on paper. Peter was pissed and sued New Line, and New Line told him to suck eggs and said they didn't want to do the next two films. There was a collective shudder for Tolkien fans.

Fast forward to today, and we find that the Saul Zaentz production company will get the rights to film by the end of next year if New Line fails to make the movie. Saul had made the animated versions of these tales back in the 70s. You may also be familiar with the name as it the eponymous studio put out such greats as "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest", "Amadeus", "The Unbearable Lightness of Being", "The Mosquito Coast", and "The English Patient." The studio seems to be a better match all around. It's known for quality films, and was the pioneer in bringing Tolkien's words to the silver screen. Additionally, Zaentz wants Jackson do to the films should the studio get the rights. Sweeeeeet.

What's real cool for me is that when I worked in Emeryville, a bunch of us would eat lunch in the area of the studio. I always knew it for Cuckoo's Nest and Amadeus, and thought it was so cool that this was the house that made them.

Do you care? Is this your cup of tea? Maybe not. I have a very good friend who just doesn't feel these kinds of movies, and in fact made the cardinal sin of walking out on one of the best films to come out in the 80s: David Lynch's "Dune." We still speak. Poor guy...what are you going to do - stop speaking to your friend because he doesn't like sand worms?

The Lack of Daily Postings Did Not Precipitate The Use Of The Term "Civil War"

After all that brouhaha about me making a post a day, and my comment about losing momentum came back to bite me in the delete key. I have to apologize, but my son got sick and my wife and I have been dealing with high fevers, infant Tylenol, and ibuprofen. I had to give my son so many cold baths to bring his temperature down that he developed a Pavlovian response to the sound of running water. Needless to say, he ate some of the gumbo I made, which of course included the use of freshly made turkey stock boiled from several carcasses of this Thanksgiving's feast. I love it how my son likes spicy foods accented with citrus.

Speaking of spicy, the political heat embroiled in the spin of our media has cooked up a new term for our presence in Iraq: civil war. This smacks of Cronkite commenting on the conflict in Vietnam as unwinnable, and no doubt is tied to the current political shift we've seen as a result of the recent election. Once the general perception of our presence in the Middle East, namely Iraq, moves from one of enhancing personal freedoms and potentially establishing a democratic society to the issue of how apropos our presence is in a country that is undergoing power struggles within its own factions, we're going to see more and more people questioning the validity of remaining in the country and putting our sons and daughters in harm's way.

I keep thinking of something interesting I heard on NPR the other day. The announcer was interviewing an official (sorry, I don't have the transcript) who mentioned that in order to cement a democratic foundation in a country, there needs to be an overwhelming desire of the people to have such a government. Now this is just my limited opinion, but Islamic countries are very very different from democratic societies, and there is little or no separation from church and state. Of course, Iraq is a tad more secular, but in the vacuum of power that we helped usher with the removal of Saddam Hussein, we've seen explosions (pardon the pun) of violence erupt across the Shite and Sunni landscape. While there's the beginnings of democracy taking root, we see that decisions made as a result of the new governing body culminating in the assassination of elected public officials. We don't see the populace accepting majority opinion.

Of course, I'm familiar with the phrase "...it takes a few rotten apples to spoil the barrel", however, given that we've assisted in destabilizing the region it doesn't seem like there's any way we can ethically and immediately extricate ourselves from the country until there's some semblance of normalcy unless we want to let the barrel implode. Sound familiar? Sounds like Vietnam to me.

I'm dying to hear what our politicians will propose for foreign policy in the next Presidential election. What do you think, gentle reader?

Something completely unrelated - are you looking for a new book and want something new, fresh, engaging, brilliant that takes place in a land depicted from the hand of the man that created the Sistine Chapel (ok, I'm stretching that one?) Try China Miéville's Perdido Street Station. This author introduces a myriad of topics, ideas and characters upon which lesser authors would base an entire novel.