Me Email Pretty Someday

A friend of mine just sent me the subject line of an email she received promoting continuing online education (name X'd out):

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Edulocate News <newsletter@edulocate-news.com>
Date: Tue, Nov 17, 2009 at 7:10 AM
Subject: XXXXX, are online classes are right for you
To: XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

FAIL.

Race and Drugs in NYC

It's stuff like this that should continually remind you that the 'post-racial society' rhetoric is a cruel joke.

Mood Music Monday

I really detest pop sensations. Not out of some hipsterish I'm-too-cool-for-anything-anyone's-ever-heard-of sort of reason, but rather that I have come to terms with the fact that I am, indeed, getting too old for this shit. (This may also be reflected in my general resentment towards hipsterism while I simultaneously maintain good friendships with a few hipsters. Everyone has their irrational prejudices, I suppose.)

But my good friend Libby has become enamored with the music and image of one "Lady Gaga." When I first came across the sensation in question, I sorta rolled my eyes and was thankful for no longer owning a radio on which to hear said contrived music and blatant image shaping.

But, alas, I read Libby's blog and caught the new song (I had, to this point, ignored the link on her gchat status) out of idle curiosity.

Damn it, it's catchy.

She says:

Lady Gaga with her extreme appearance and over-the-top fashion, seems to be the female answer to Marilyn Manson. Her music is much more accessible and mainstream than MM’s ever was, so I’ll say she’s like a love-child between MM and Madonna.

Personally, I thought it more resembled Annie Lennox's Eurythmics years with an updated beat, but essentially provocative, intelligent, and alluring to a unorthodox and semi-prurient interest. (It does not escape my attention that Mr. Manson covered the Eurythmics' version of Sweet Dreams linked above.)

Anyway. Here it is, my reluctant surrender to the pop sensation Lady Gaga.

Quote of the Day

The Obama Administration continues to leverage heavily on the growing cult of personality surrounding Obama — much like the one surrounding Bush in his first term. For many, Obama’s popularity is unaffected by the fact that he is pursuing the very same hostile policies as Bush on civil liberties, privacy, and open government. More importantly, there appears no reaction to the disconnect between his rhetoric and his actions. Once again, liberals are committing the same mistake that conservatives committed with Bush. Many continue to display blind loyalty and offer little criticism of the President while core values are continue to be challenged by his Administration.

-GW Law Professor Jonathan Turley on Obama's grandstanding hypocrisy viz. "government transparency" on human rights violations.

Please Give

I never really said anything about the ads and donate button I put on my blog because, well, I hate asking for money. I figure: it's there, you know what it's there for, if you want to give, you will. (If, like me, you're reading this and almost all blogs in an rss feed: fyi--there's a donate button and Amazon.com ads on my blog. You know what it's there for.)

Anyway, I'm writing this not to ask you to give money to me...well, directly* anyway. I want you to give to my former colleagues over at reason some cash. They are great people and great writers. Surviving in today's media market is hard enough, let alone as a non-profit outfit.

Their pitch is hilarious, by the way. I invite you to read it here. And, as Radley points out, you can be funny as you want to be when you give.

*Not only will you be supporting reason staffers, but writers like me unable crank out pieces for a living who can find a libertarian outlet to publish in when the conservatives and liberals pass on our work. And you can give money to them as a way to incentivize me to write more for them and rationalize to yourself why you're not giving money to me directly.