[Artwork by DONKEYHOTEY] BY WILLIAM C. HENRY I’ve long felt that if you want to learn something about the character of a Presidential candidate, do a little “spotting” of the backgrounds and beliefs of those they’re “nesting” with. In the case of the likely Republican finalist, a careful scoping reveals no less than a bevy of buzzards. Nowhere in this carrion banquet masquerading as the Republican primary can the maxim patch “guilty by association” be more justly sewn than onto the empty suit aka Mitt Romney. Mitt’s that “paragon of virtue” (their words, not mine) who installed Robert Bork and Frank VanderSloot as his top legal […]
REVIEW: Black Keys @ The Wells Fargo Center
[Artwork by SEILER] BY JONATHAN VALANIA FOR THE INQUIRER Given the expansive economies of the ‘90s, it was no wonder that stripped-down, gutbucket guitar-and-drum duos like Flat Duo Jets and Doo Rag couldn’t get arrested, their minimalist roots-rock exiled to the sub basements of the indie concert circuit and the privileged ghetto of college radio. But in this age of austerity, when everyone is doing more with less, it is stripped-down, gutbucket guitar-and-drum duos like The White Stripes and, more recently, The Black Keys, that have made some of the most seminal and commercially-viable music. Upon the release of 2010’s […]
ALLSTEZZY: I Am Harrisburg
Repping Harrisburg and repping it hard.
Newspapers Winning In The Race To The Bottom
LINKED IN: The fastest-growing industries include renewables (+49.2%), internet (+24.6%), online publishing (+24.3%), and e-learning (+15.9%). Fastest-shrinking industries were newspapers (-28.4%), retail (-15.5%), building materials (-14.2%), and automotive (-12.8%). Instead of the growth in percentage terms, we also examined the volume of job gain / loss by industry, as indicated by the largest bubbles in the figure above. Our data show that even through the recession, the industries with the largest volume of employment growth (the largest circles on the figure above) were internet, hospitals & healthcare, health, wellness & fitness, oil & energy, IT and renewables. On the other […]
If Willie Wonka Was Directed By The Tea Party
So much for ‘so shines a good deed in a weary world.’ [h/t Scot Dantzer]
CITIZENS UNITED AGAINST CITIZENS UNITED: Win $25,000 If You Can Prove Your Employer Is Using Company Money To Influence The Election
A large coalition of public interest, government reform, consumer, labor, grassroots and progressive organizations today announced a major national campaign to target corporations that use corporate treasury funds to affect the outcome of the fall election, especially contributing to shadowy Super PACs or to 501c4s that run ads but are not legally obligated to disclose their donors. Groups include: Common Cause, Public Citizen, Coalition for Accountability in Political Spending (CAPS), Service Employees International Union, MoveOn.org, Americans United for Change, Public Interest Research Group (PIRG), Public Campaign Action Fund, Campaign for America’s Future,National People’s Action, Progress NOW, Every Child Matters, Health Care for America […]
FUNNY: What SXSW Looks Like To The Chinese
This is actually pretty accurate.
GOING ROGUE: 16 Dead In Afghanistan After U.S. Soldier Goes On Civilian Killing Spree
ASSOCIATED PRESS: A U.S. service member walked out of his base in southern Afghanistan before dawn Sunday and started shooting Afghan civilians, Afghan and NATOofficials said. An Associated Press photographer reported seeing 15 bodies of Afghans allegedly killed in the shooting. The photographer saw the bodies — some of them burned and some covered with blankets — in the villages of Alkozai and Balandi in Kandahar province’s Panjwai district. The villages are about 500 yards from a U.S. base. People were killed in the shooting spree in Kandahar province, Gov. Tooryalai Wesa said, though he did not provide numbers. “The […]
THEATER REVIEW: A Sacrilicious Romeo And Juliet
In my high school English class, we spent a couple of weeks on the Romantic poets who pretty much coined the term ‘waxing poetic.’ Shakespeare was in there, and the whole section was almost as bad as algebra… until we came to Stephen Dunn’s The Flea. The Flea is a playful little ditty in which a young man attempts to convince his ‘love’ to let him take her virginity. Impishly, he points out that a flea, by biting them both, has already played metaphorical priest and mixed their bloods together (in its swollen stomach). Don’t buy it? She doesn’t either. […]
Rendell Subpoenaed By Treasury Dept. For Speaking Fees From Iranian Group On Terrorist List
WASHINGTON TIMES: The Treasury Department’s counterterrorism arm is investigating speaking fees paid to a long-time Democratic Party leader who is among the most vocal advocates of an Iranian opposition group designated as a terrorist group by the State Department. Former Pennsylvania Gov. Edward G. Rendell told The Washington Times that Treasury investigators last week subpoenaed records related to payments he has accepted in exchange for public speaking engagements. Mr. Rendell is among a bipartisan group of prominent former officials – including Cabinet-level Republicans – who have accepted payment in exchange for speeches calling for the removal of the Mujahideen-e Khalq […]
TONITE: John K. Samson At Union Transfer
BY MIKE WALSH Here’s a hypothetical: let’s say you’re up late. Very late. It’s quiet, you’re alone, and you’re stuck on the world wide interweb watching Maru videos. You have to get up early for work, but you just can’t stop watching that fat furry little fucker being insufferably cute. And you’re telling yourself that this is ridiculous, you are pathetic, just go to bed, and then you notice a music video titled “Plea from a Cat Named Virtute” from a band you’ve never heard of—the Weakerthans. You click the link, and it’s not an actual video, just the song […]
EXCERPT: Blooze, Rock And The Pop Narcotic
BY JONATHAN VALANIA The Black Keys are two kids from Akron, Ohio who went down to the big rock show and never came back. When a couple seats on the other side of the velvet rope opened up, they snuck in and sat down. So far nobody’s asked them to leave, in fact they’ve been downright hospitable. The new, uber-catchy El Camino sold 206,000 units the first week out of the gate, went gold shortly thereafter and is currently on its way to platinum. To ensure that it gets there and then some the Keys have booked a yearlong […]