when the sun sets on the ghetto
all the broken stuff gets cold


this week the Jews are in N.C., Virginia and NYC

* From the Atlanta Silver Jews show: MP3 of smith and jones forever. other reviews, and directions to other live downloads can be found on the SJBB.

* Top Ten conservative idiots. excerpt:

"7. Jim Welker

"While we're on the subject of racism, let's take a peek at the recent antics of Colorado State Representative Jim Welker (R-Obviously) who previously made the Top 10 back in April 2005 for suggesting that gay marriage would lead to bestiality (see Idiots 192). Last week Welker was 'blasted by his colleagues for e-mailing an essay written by someone else that accused 'welfare-pampered blacks' of waiting for the government to save them from Hurricane Katrina,' according to the Rocky Mountain News.

"Welker later said he didn't agree with everything in the essay, although he didn't make any mention of that when he forwarded it, adding no comments. The essay contained a passage which read 'President Bush is not to blame for the rampant immorality of blacks.'

"When he realized that his racist email had caused an uproar in the Colorado General Assembly, Welker came up with the lame excuse that he forwarded the email 'because of its message about society victimizing people by making them dependent on government programs.'

"Yeah, sure he did."

* Momus discusses allen ginsberg. excerpt:

"At moments like this I think of Allen Ginsberg. I think of that gimmick he had -- and it also wasn't a gimmick -- of launching into a mantra at any given moment. Here's one, his Vajra Mantra. It's a lovely recording, a serious and sensuous pronunciation of holy syllables. And I think of Ginsberg's self-awarded license to pronounce these syllables as a strategy, in part, to avoid other syllables. His embrace of Buddhism might have been, amongst other things, a way for Ginsberg to be post-American, a way out of all sorts of conversations with people at universities, rallies, in cars and cafes, wherever; a way out of small talk which would ultimately just confirm certain American fixed ideas, and also confirm him as an American Jew. By becoming some sort of satyr-devotee, by mixing cultures and invoking gods who were non-gods, Ginsberg could escape all that rubbish, all that restricting clutter. I wish I had a gimmick like that! I wish I could break out a small electronic shruti box and just start chanting! Where do I need to apply for the license to do that? Do I need to be a 1960s person? An eccentric? A famous poet? A visiting lecturer?"

* Feingold plans to introduce a resolution in the U.S. Senate today to censure President Bush.

* "I refuse to have my best efforts - already heavily filtered in advance and subjected to the constraints of finance and time - rejected by any criteria whatsoever." -- Pete Townshend