"Never Stop"

In the 1980s, Echo and the Bunnymen were pretty big deals in their native England, but were never able to achieve much more than a cult following here.  Their dark, moody sound threw me off when I first heard them, but I learned to love them.  This song is one of their best.  In this performance, recorded at Royal Albert Hall in 1983, the basic quartet is joined by a host of other musicians in order to achieve the sound of the studio version.  I love the way the intro draws you in...




Lyrics | Echo And The Bunnymen lyrics - Never Stop lyrics

An incredible case of serendipity:  I had no idea when I first posted this in the wee hours of Tuesday morning, but Echo and the Bunnymen have reunited for a new album, The Fountain.  If you click the link above, you'll go to the band's home page and hear their new single, "Think I Need It Too."  They'll be appearing on Jimmy Kimmel Live (ABC) on October 23 in the middle of a small American tour.

NASCAR: Dover Preview

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

NASCAR has three races in two days on this weekend's schedule.  Two races and all the attention are at the Monster Mile, Dover International Speedway.  It's Week Two of the Chase for the Sprint Cup, the AAA 400, Sunday at 1 p.m. (ABC).

They call it the Monster Mile for a reason.  DIS is exactly one mile long with high banking (24° in the turns and 9° on the 1076-feet straightaways), which leads to higher speeds.  The cars get good grip on the concrete surface, which leads drivers to push the issue, but the surface is bumpy, which can lead to trouble, especially with the new double-file restarts.  The confines are tight -- a single-car spin can quickly turn into a multi-car accident that can cause problems with twelve drivers racing for a championship.

In Friday qualifying, Jimmie Johnson captured the pole with a lap of 22.878 seconds (157.356 mph). It was his second pole of the season.  Juan Montoya will be beside Johnson on the front row after a lap of 156.699 mph. Chase drivers took six of the first seven starting spots. Ryan Newman and Greg Biffle start on Row Two. Kasey Kahne and Jeff Gordon start in sixth and seventh respectively. Carl Edwards has the best average finish among active drivers at Dover, but he has his work cut out for him Sunday. He qualified 30th, worst among the Chasers.  (Race lineup)

Mark Martin comes into Dover with a 35-point lead over Johnson and Denny Hamlin.  Nine drivers are separated by less than 100 points.  Jeff Gordon is in tenth, 102 points back.  Kasey Kahne trails the Chase field, he's 161 points behind Martin after just one Chase race.

Protect Insurance Companies PSA

Funny or Die puts a fresh spin on health care reform with this public service announcement...

Protect Insurance Companies PSA from Will Ferrell

"Sometimes (Lester Piggot)"

While we were experiencing our deluge here in the Southeast last weekend, this song by James was playing on repeat on my mental iPod...





Lyrics | James lyrics - Sometimes (Lester Piggot) lyrics

I like the video, but I wonder how they managed to make it without someone in the band drowning. I also wonder why they cut the third (and best) verse of the song.

NASCAR: Loudon Preview

Image by The Pit Zone via Flickr

NASCAR travels to New Hampshire for a two-race weekend.  The big race is Sunday's Sylvania 300 at New Hampshire Motor Speedway.  It's the first race of the Chase for the Sprint Cup Championship, twelve drivers vying for the championship separated by just forty points.

I'm not a big fan of the Chase.  I like the old system where a driver had to be consistent over the entire season to win the championship.  Now, a driver just has to be consistent enough over the regular season, the first 26 races, to be in the Top 12 and make the Chase.  The Chase is a playoff format; the points of the 12 Chase drivers are reset and they begin the playoffs on an almost equal footing.  The winner of the Sprint Cup champion is the best of the 12 over the final ten races of the season.  Big leads are almost always erased.  Last season, Jimmie Johnson took home the championship that should have belonged to Jeff Gordon.  Now, I'm not a Jeff Gordon fan so that's not necessarily a bad thing, but I am a Tony Stewart fan and this year eleven other drivers are vying to take home his championship.  He had a 197-point lead after Richmond, but starts this Chase ten points behind Mark Martin.  NASCAR got tired of drivers running away with championships, clinching them with races left on the schedule, and came up with this playoff format.

I also don't like the scoring system for the Chase.  It's the same as any other time of the season, but twelve drivers are competing for the championship alongside 31 other drivers who have their own reasons for being there.  Shouldn't the Chase drivers be scored separately from the other drivers?

"Rubbing the Sore"

I didn't care too much for "Mad Man: Is Glenn Beck Bad for America?," Time Magazine's latest cover story by David Von Drehle.  I don't think it did a very good job of answering the question posed in the title.  But I did like this little excerpt...

We tell ourselves a tale in America, and you can read it in Latin on the back of a buck: E pluribus unum. Many people from many lands, made one in a patriotic forge. And there's truth in that story — it conjures powerful pictures in the theater of our national mind. But it can also be misleading. Lots of Americans can't stand one another, don't trust each other and are willing — even eager — to believe the worst about one another. This story is as old as the gun used by Vice President Aaron Burr to kill his political rival Alexander Hamilton. And it's as new as the $1 million–plus in fresh campaign contributions heaped on Republican Representative Joe Wilson of South Carolina after he hollered "You lie!" at the President during a joint session of Congress. Anger and suspicion ebb and flow through our history, from the anti-Catholic musings of the 19th century Know-Nothing Party to the truthers and birthers of today.

We're in a flood stage, and who's to blame? The answer is like the estimates of the size of the crowd in Washington: Whom do you trust? Either the corrupt, communist-loving traitors on the left are causing this, or it's the racist, greedy warmongers on the right, or maybe the dishonest, incompetent, conniving media, which refuse to tell the truth about whomever you personally happen to despise.

But we can all agree that — no matter where it comes from — rubbing the sore has become a lucrative business.

Apparently Alternet liked the article even less than I did.
Salon has an interesting article about "the man who changed Glenn Beck's life."

Norman Borlaug: 1914 - 2009

Image via Wikipedia

Norman Borlaug, agricultural scientist, died at his home in Dallas, Texas, Saturday from complications from cancer.  He was 95.

When I was a kid (we're talking the Dark Ages here, the late 60s), Dr. Paul Erhlich published his book The Population Bomb in which he predicted that population growth would very shortly outpace agricultural growth.  Erhlich looked at the exponentially-growing population and declared that "the battle to feed all of humanity is over ... In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now."

That Erhlich's predictions have yet to come true is largely the result of the work of Norman Borlaug.

From the New York Times...

Dr. Borlaug’s advances in plant breeding led to spectacular success in increasing food production in Latin America and Asia and brought him international acclaim. In 1970, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

He was widely described as the father of the broad agricultural movement called the Green Revolution, though decidedly reluctant to accept the title. “A miserable term,” he said, characteristically shrugging off any air of self-importance.

Yet his work had a far-reaching impact on the lives of millions of people in developing countries. His breeding of high-yielding crop varieties helped to avert mass famines that were widely predicted in the 1960s, altering the course of history.

Largely because of his work, countries that had been food deficient, like Mexico and India, became self-sufficient in producing cereal grains.

“More than any other single person of this age, he has helped provide bread for a hungry world,” the Nobel committee said in presenting him with the Peace Prize. “We have made this choice in the hope that providing bread will also give the world peace.”

Borlaug was one of only five people to win the Nobel Peace Prize, the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the Congressional Gold Medal.  In an episode of Penn and Teller: Bullshit! that deals with genetically modified food, Borlaug is referred to as "the greatest human being who ever lived" and is credited with saving the lives of a billion (with a 'B') people.  And he also got a nice mention in an episode of The West Wing.

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Jim Carroll: 1949 - 2009

 Jim Carroll, poet, punk rocker, and author of The Basketball Diaries, passed away Friday.  He died of a heart attack at the age of 60.  I first became aware of him back during my college radio days when The Jim Carroll Band released "Catholic Boy."  This song from the album seems like a fitting tribute...



His NY Times obit

Sports Update

Baseball -- the Braves and the pennant races

I was trying to stay up-to-date with the Atlanta Braves, but grew disgusted with them.  In my last update, the Braves were on their way to Florida to begin a four-game set with the Marlins.  They were tied with the Marlins for second place in the NL East and in good shape in the NL wildcard race.  They took the first two games of that series and life was good.  Then they lost the third game on a late home run and got blown out in the fourth game.  The slide continued with the Cincinnati Reds sweeping the Braves in a three-game series at home.  That made five losses in a row and things looked pretty dismal.  But the Braves are trying to salvage something.  They went back on the road and took two out of three from the Astros and three straight from the Cardinals.

But the days are dwindling down to a precious few.  There are just 19 games left and the Braves are pretty much where they were at the beginning of the month as far as the division standings -- they're in third place, 7 1/2 games behind the Phillies.  They've lost ground in the wildcard race though -- they're now in fourth place, 6 1/2 games behind the Rockies.  The good news is that the remaining games are all against NL East opponents.  The bad news is that they've got to win most of them and the Phillies or the Rockies are going to have to have a terrible swoon.  The Braves open up a three-game series against the Mets Tuesday evening.

Overall, the baseball season has been a drag if you like close races.  The Los Angeles Dodgers are holding onto a three game lead over the Rockies in the NL West, and that's about the closest thing we have to a pennant race.  The Phillies lead the Marlins by 6 1/2 in the NL East.  The Cardinals, even after the sweep by the Braves, lead the Cubs by 9 1/2 in the NL Central.  In the American League, the Yankees lead Boston by seven in the East, the Tigers lead the Twins by 5 1/2 in the Central and the Angels lead the Rangers by six in the West.  The wildcard races are a little closer -- Boston leads Texas by four in the AL, and the Rockies lead the Giants by 4 1/2 in the NL.

College Football -- the SEC

Half-Baked Political Analysis

Politically, last week was pretty strange with most of the news centered around two presidential speeches. On Tuesday, President Obama gave a back-to-school speech (which struck me as odd since the kiddies around here have been back at school for weeks now). The next day, the president gave his health care address before a joint session of Congress.

The hysterical reactions of the president's detractors before, during and after both speeches only served to make the president seem more...well, presidential, in comparison. The overreaction of the political right to the back-to-school speech was especially laughable. The fringe that can't decide if Obama is a socialist or a Nazi or a closet Muslim born in Kenya were vehemently declaring that Obama was trying to indoctrinate our impressionable schoolchildren. The whole thing centered around a poorly worded lesson plan in which children were asked to write letters to themselves on how they could help the president. At least that was the only halfway coherent objection I ever heard about the whole thing.

What did they think the president wanted them to help with? That was never fully articulated, but if Obama wanted it, it had to be bad. When the president gave a speech in which he basically said, "Study hard, stay in school," the whole hullabaloo made the loons seem even more loon-like than usual.

I'm not sure the health care speech was the "game changer" the Democrats are claiming. There was a bump in the polls and people who watched with an open mind were impressed, but too much attention was focused on Joe Wilson and Republicans behaving badly and not enough on what the president actually said.

WTF?

I wanted real health care reform and all I got was this stupid t-shirt!

Meanwhile, there's absolutely no irony in this Quote of the Day...

“The American people are fed up with the political games in Washington, and I refuse to participate in an effort to divert our attention away from the task at hand of reforming health insurance and creating new jobs. Having apologized on Wednesday to the White House, we agreed that we must move forward in a civil manner to do the work the American people have sent us here to do. Health insurance reform is too important to take a backseat to political partisanship.”

-- Congressman Joe "You Lie" Wilson

Quotable

“We’ll find out whether people don’t want to watch a woman anchor the news or whether they just didn’t want to watch Katie (Couric).”

-- a "veteran television news industry executive" comments on the news that Diane Sawyer will replace Charlie Gibson as anchor of ABC "World News"

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Something Different

Image via CrunchBase

Over the weekend I ran across a blogging tool called Zemanta. I'm in an experimental stage right now, trying to figure out how it all works and whether it adds or distracts from the old "Meanwhile..." blog.

It's a pretty neat little gadget. If you use Firefox, it's a simple plug-in. I believe there is also a plug-in for Internet Explorer and some other browsers. When you start to type out a new post (or edit an existing post), it suggests links, tags, pictures, and related articles to add to the post. You can use any or all of the suggestions as you see fit. It also works with certain email programs.

Check out Zemanta in action in some of my newer posts and let me know what you think. Does it add or distract?

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"Imitation of Life"

R.E.M.'s "Imitation of Life" is one of their great pop songs but, like most of their stream-of-consciousness ditty's, it's hard to figure out just what they're driving at sometimes. I'm not a big fan of videos, but this is one of my all-time favorites. It's about twenty seconds of the same scene played forward, then backward, then forward again with a lot of panning and zooming on selected parts.

R.E.M. - New Music - More Music Videos

Lyrics | Rem lyrics - Imitation Of Life lyrics