Heart to Sarah Palin: "Fuck Off!"

OK, OK, maybe I'm paraphrasing a little.

Still, the rock band Heart has told Republican VP candidate Palin to stop using their 1977 classic "Barracuda," even though it is the fantastically-unqualified Palin's nickname. Their record label, Sony/BMG, has sent a cease-and-desist letter to the McCain/Palin campaign.

From the statement by sisters Ann and Nancy Wilson, founders of Heart:

"Sarah Palin's views and values in NO WAY represent us as American women. We ask that our song 'Barracuda' no longer be used to promote her image. The song 'Barracuda' was written in the late 70s as a scathing rant against the soulless, corporate nature of the music business, particularly for women. (The 'barracuda' represented the business.) While Heart did not and would not authorize the use of their song at the RNC, there's irony in Republican strategists' choice to make use of it there."

Heh. I knew I always liked them.

This is not the first time McCain and/or his party have been asked by a recording artist to stop playing their music. In fact, during this campaign, this is at least the sixth time an artist has asked either McCain or the GOP to stop using their songs, as Republican politics and beliefs go against everything they stand for. John Mellencamp, John Hall of the band Orleans (now a Democratic congressman from New York), Van Halen, Jackson Browne, and Frankie Valli have all previously chastised McCain for playing their music without permission.

Oh, and actor Mike Myers forced McCain to take down a web clip earlier this year that used a scene from "Wayne's World" without permission.

This may seem like a trivial matter, but maybe there's a lesson to be learned here. Is it possible that McCain and Palin -- and the voters they are trying to court -- are not sophisticated enough to handle the subtlety of music lyrics?

I mean, Barracuda, as the Wilson sisters note, was intended to be a rant against the soulless nature of the music business. Isn't there, as they say, more than a little irony in the Republican party, the most corporate-owned political party in the history of the world, using it as an anthem? I can just see the empty-headed GOPers bopping along in their seats, not even realizing that the song is about their fat, white, corporate-owned asses.

For heaven's sake, Mellencamp's song Our Country calls on government to "help the poor and common man." Does that sound like something the Republican Party is particularly interested in?

I guess McCain really is the heir to Ronald Reagan, who blindly played Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" at rallies in 1984, until Springsteen asked the campaign to stop. Reagan and the other dullards around him thought it was a nice, patriotic song about how great it was to have been born in the USA.

If only they could have done something complicated like, oh, I don't know, listened to the goddamn lyrics, maybe they'd have figured it out.

But again, reading, subtlety, deeper meaning -- these are not part of the GOP's platform.

Is Grandpa McCain the next Doug Flutie??

For his sake, he'd better hope so. Because he's just thrown a GIANT Hail Mary pass with his selection of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate.

I'm not sure what to think of this. A lot of speculation at DailyKos that other people (Romney, Lieberman, Pawlenty) turned McCain down and Palin wasn't his first choice.

I dunno. To me, this feels like a potential game-changer, something McCain needed to do to shake up the race. Despite recent polls that show the race between Barack Obama and McCain nearly tied, the electoral math is much better for Obama. Basically, if Obama wins any one of Colorado, Ohio, or Virginia, it's a done deal. There's virtually no way McCain can get to 270 electoral votes without all three of those states.

So I think the McCain campaign knew they needed a huge pick, a gamble. When a football team is losing by 4 with only 5 seconds left on the clock, and they're 60 yards from the endzone, there's only one thing to do -- throw a Hail Mary pass.

Most of the time, Hail Mary passes fall to the ground, incomplete, game over. But every so often (less than 10% of the time), a receiver makes a miraculous catch and the team that was behind wins the game. It's that less than 10% chance I'm kind of concerned about.

What can be said with certainty, however, is that this was completely a political choice for McCain. He's not thinking about how to best govern this nation, he's thinking about winning, plain and simple. (If Obama had chosen Hillary Clinton as his running mate, I would have said the same thing about him.)

I mean, come on. John McCain is 72 years old (today is his birthday, actually). He'd be the oldest person ever inaugurated president. He has a history of cancer. It's not crude to suggest that there's a decent possibility he could have health problems (or possibly even die) during four years, or especially eight years, as President.

And this makes the selection of his Vice President all the more crucial. So who does he pick? A woman who has been governor of Alaska for two years. Before that, she was mayor of the town of Wasilla, Alaska, a town of less than 10,000 people.

This makes her qualified to be second in line to the Presidency of the United States, behind a 72-year-old man?

All of McCain and the Republican Party's criticism of Barack Obama for being "inexperienced" (which he's not) just went out the window.

The McCain camp did time this pick very well; the press coverage is now all about Sarah Palin, pushing the coverage of Obama's masterful acceptance speech in front of 80,000 people last night to the sidelines. The timing was no accident, of course.

This is a political trick, a desperate act by a desperate man. But, the most dangerous animal is a cornered one, so I'm not celebrating Obama's win as a foregone conclusion just yet. Interesting to see how this plays out in the minds of the American people; and that will depend on how it is presented to them by the media.

Will the media pounce on this pick and ridicule Palin for being unprepared and unqualified, as they did with Dan Quayle in 1988?

Or will the media continue their love affair with John McCain and lavish praise on him for his "daring" and "unorthodox" choice?

Only time will tell.

New Sophie pix and video!!!

New pictures and new videos of Sophie are posted on her website:

sophie.rzeszut.com

Here's a sneak peek:

What the hell is "tonguemack shri(m)p"??!

synagogue shopping

You know, they say that a man often chooses a wife that reminds him of his mother. Without slipping too deeply into a Freudian quagmire here, I will say that the two hardest-working people I've ever known in my life are my wife Raya and my mom.

Both of them are amazing dedicated employees. When they take a job, they take it on 100%, offering unwavering loyalty to the company/organization they serve.

Yesterday, Temple Beth-El rewarded Raya's loyalty of three years by eliminating her position. They seem to think that getting rid of her pittance of a salary is the answer (or, at least an answer) to the synagogue's financial difficulties.

They seem to think that all of her hard work as program and youth director can either be replaced or they can do without. They think that her youth director roles can be filled by unpaid or low-paid college students or other "young people."

Mm hmm. Like college students are going to be jumping at the chance to ride a bus to Orlando with a bunch of teenagers.

Like college students are going to think about Temple Beth-El, day and night, the way Raya did. Raya was amazingly dedicated to her job. People called us at home, kids called her cell phone, sent her messages on Facebook.

I'm enraged at the synagogue leadership, and don't think it can possibly be an enjoyable place for us to worship ever again. Two main reasons.

First of all, there had to be some idea weeks or months ago that eliminating this position was a possibility. The synagogue leadership could have been decent to Raya and said to her, "Look, we don't know if your position will be funded next year. You might want to update your resume." As shocking as that would have been, it would have given Raya a few months to start looking for something else. And wouldn't it have been easier on them to have Raya leave of her own accord, rather than having to let her go in a tear-filled and I'm certain amazingly awkward meeting?

The second reason is this: I know that non-profit organizations have to balance their books. And I know, in tough economic times, people cut back on their charitable donations. Temple Beth-El is in a decades-old building, the maintenance and repair costs alone are a struggle for them to keep up with.

But it's the people, the staff, that make the synagogue what it is. And the fact that TBE has decided to put such low emphasis on adult and youth programming is heart-breaking.

Especially the youth programming. Raya had a small but dedicated group of kids. We saw many of them at Camp Ramah last weekend. A lot of these kids are the children (or even grandchildren) of the current and past leaders of Temple Beth-El.

If the synagogue doesn't think these kids are important enough to need a youth director, doesn't develop an attachment to Beth-El in these young people, who is going to be running TBE 30-40 years from now???

And if the books are balanced, great. But if there's no programs happening at the synagogue, who the hell cares about the books?

Last year, Raya and I made a substantial charitable pledge to Beth-El. The largest charitable pledge we'd ever made to any organization. By far.

Scheduled to be paid over five years, we'd only paid 1/5th of it so far. I can guarantee you we're not paying the rest. I'm not interested in supporting a synagogue that treats its employees -- and its members -- like this.

And I can't possibly worship there any more, either. Because if we were to go to TBE, on a Shabbat evening or morning, or for High Holiday services, I'm going to see some of these assholes who were involved in this brainless and poorly-handled decision.

I really don't want to have to say to someone, "Fuck Off" in the middle of a synagogue.