The Shocking State of War Music

Music generally at the moment sucks. Two words will defuse any argument you have against that statement... Justin Bieber...

I know there is a rationale that music responds to the social state of a country... in the '70s there was depravation everywhere, and some great music, and maybe more importantly, musical genres developed as a consequence. To be fair, there was some great music just a little prior to that too, which is kinda the thrust of my post. The Vietnam war seemed to be responsible for a whole slew of great songs, if the modern day chroniclers of that conflict are to be believed. songs that have featured, and appear linked with the ill fated attempt at regime change in a far off country, number such greats as The End (The Doors), White Rabbit (Jefferson Airplane), Tracks of My Tears (The Miracles) and even Wonderful World (Louis Armstrong). I'm not sure all of those were actually created as any kind of protest song... But the fact remains... We have at least one un-winnable war on our hands, budget deficits, austerity etc. yet no new edgy music sensation to take all our minds off things... What is the world coming to?

Just 'cos I'm paranoid, doesn't mean everyone isn't out to get me...

The American military... you have to love 'em
Following the discovery of three successful suicides at their holiday camp in Cuba for foreign nationals, the top brass have suggested that they did it out of spite...

"They have no regard for life, either ours or their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us." - Rear Adm Harris

He has a point... If I was taken (illegally?) to a foreign prison, held without trial or possibility of trial for 2 or 3 years and made to wear orange 24/7, my reaction would be to kill my self just to make my captors feel bad...

Idiots.

(full story http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/5068228.stm)

'This time next year Rodney, We'll be millionaires...'

I finally succumbed to the financial pressures of having such a popular blog site, with so many visitors, and added an adsense banner...
Actually not for the vast income it will no doubt generate, but more out of curiosity to see what kind of adverts they reckon fit to the kinda random content of the blog...
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On a slightly different topic, I noticed yet another car company shutting down UK operations in the midlands. Once again the government sprang into action in order to defend the ever decreasing manufacturing base in Britain... actually lying (allegedly) about the fair playing field between the UK and our euronation friends as regards employment conditions...
I guess it would be nice if they were actually proactive rather than reactive in trying to secure even a short term nevermind medium or long term future for UK citizens to be anything other than shop assistants or call centre staff...
Is it time for that revolution yet?
The way things are going, there could be a bristling trade for brickies to build the wall to stand everyone against... (as in 1st up against the wall come the revolution)

I vote for a reciprocal action against the french for pulling out of Coventry, by closing down a couple of British owned factories in france... oh hang on, there isn't any British owned factories anywhere anymore is there?

Anyway, too much doom and gloom... here are a couple of excerpts from bbc news 'have your say' comments that didn't quite make it to the website, for some reason..

Never mind ventriloquists like Keith Harris and Roger DeCourcey. Whatabout Professor Stephen Hawking? I saw him on telly lathering on aboutgalaxies for hours and I never saw his lips move once. Genius.Mike Woods, e-mail

With reference to that series "Manhunt" where ex-Special Forces soldierstry to hunt down Andy McNab. Why don't the producers include a coupleof Iraqis in the hunting team? They found the tw*t quickly enough thelast time he played hide and seek with them. Shuggie, Email

Hats off to the witty burglars who stole my entire CD collection withthe exception of "There is Nothing Left to Lose" by the Foo Fighters. Ihope that when sentencing, the judge takes into account their splendidsense of humour.Chris Scaife, Jesmond

I see on the news that Lord Hutton says he is "satisfied that DavidKelly took his own life". He may not have liked Dr Kelly that much, butisn't this taking gloating just a little too far?Dave Owen, Edinburgh

I was extremely saddened to hear of Richard Whiteley's recent death.But I was cheered to imagine his life support machine making the famousCountdown "da-da, da-da, da-da-da-da! Booooooo!" sound as he took hisfinal breaths.Tripod

I never worry about the destination when I'm going on holiday. My dadis Iranian and my mum is Irish, so I spend most of the time in customs.Stan

What's all this nonsense about that 66-year-old Romanian woman being theworld's oldest mum? My mum's 77. Beat that. Thomas

A quick joke...

A woman was shopping at her local supermarket where she selected:

* 2 litres of low fat milk
* a carton of eggs
* 2 litres of orange juice
* a head of lettuce
* half a dozen tomatoes
* a 500g jar of coffee
* a 250g pack of bacon

As she was unloading her items on the conveyor belt to check out, A
drunk standing behind her watched as she placed the items in front of
the cashier.

While the cashier was ringing up her purchases, the drunk calmly
stated, "You must be single."

The woman was a bit startled by this proclamation, but she was
intrigued by the derelict's intuition, since she was indeed single.
She looked at her six items on the belt and saw nothing particularly
unusual about her selections that could have tipped off the Drunk to her marital status.

Curiosity getting the better of her, she said, "Well, you know what,
you're absolutely correct. But how on earth did you know that?"

The drunk replied, "Cause you're ugly."

Erm... Joke?

Hands up all those that can't take a joke...

Shame to waste a good soapbox...

And another thing...

(deep breath... dodgy ground here)

ISLAM...

May I apologise in advance if I upset anyone... I know it's dodgy territory, but I promise... no cartoons!

My parents were christians... They had God... They muttered and complained when Life of Brian was released... BUT they didn't burn embassies, threaten to kill people or anything violent... they just muttered...

Now while I agree with the right to practice whatever religion you like, I must admit I'm getting oh so slightly tired of Islam...
For a religion that is as old as it is, you would kinda think that it could be better organised, more resilient, and generally more easy going

More organised as in there doesn't seem to be a concensus on condemnation of acts portrayed in the name of Islam, which most true Muslims seem to abhor too...

More resilient as in, surely if Islam has been around as long as it has, it doesn't have too much to prove...

And more easy going as in... CARTOONS ffs... no disrespect intended, but surely any god would have a sense of humour, or at least the opportunity to get his own back if he was really offended

I watch daily events with an impending sense of doom... The warmongers may be pulling the strings, maybe manipulating the press, and provoking reaction, but surely religion, if you have it, is a spiritual thing... why dirty that with political crap?

For the record, I try and avoid religion as much as I can. My soul is doing just fine... I try and treat people as I find them without having to conform to a view based on the hidden agendas of the religious elite. I'm sure most sane people that 'have' religion do so too... it's just a shame that...

a) That extremist views sell papers
b) That Islam is treated as the new evil
c) We can't all just accept that opinions are just the rantings of the individual, and shouldn't be treated as an indication of a nation's feelings

Just my view... don't crucify/torture/behead me for it...

My Space - My Arse

So Micro$oft decided to change the world again...

I'm not usually the Luddite, but what was wrong with the old profiles on messenger? You knew where you were with profiles... Mine had been there untouched since about 2002, and now it's a distant memory :(

At least on the default my space profile they have my occupation down as Barbarian, which raised a chuckle, but what of my flower arranging hobby, or my flagrant useage of Nietzsche quotes?

What would Micro$oft think if I chose to arbitrarily discard parts of their software? like the need to activate, or indeed buy their stuff?
Erm... ok... sounds like a fair deal to me

But did we need our 'own space'? Is this just Bill and his merry men trying to sugar coat the few remaining free speech arenas on the internet? We can't take the right to free speech for granted anymore it seems, what with the new religious incitement laws being shoehorned through parliament, and most of the 'free world' big internet companies rolling over on command from governments... (yes China, but also in the US as well...)

for the record Bill... 'My Space' begins when I turn off the computer, and dare to step outside... And if it's 'My Space' will I get a percentage of the advertising revenue for the adverts that I'm sure will cover our spaces?