Random clips shot today in the drizzle on my street in Clinton Hill. Testing a theory that anything is made more watchable if you play Cat Stevens’ “Trouble” on top of it.
Live or work in Brooklyn? Come by 55 Lexington Ave. in Clinton Hill tomorrow around 6pm for some BBQ and beers on the roof.
Kelly Taylor has generously donated a keg of Kelso Hop Lager, brewed just around the corner! You can read more about the Greenpoint Beer Works on ClintonHillBlog.
Damn Bloomberg, you and Charlie want to take away our guns because of some fucked up kid in Virginia? Next can we ban cars to prevent drunk driving deaths?
The main reason our founding fathers wanted us to have guns is as a check against the power of our own government. James Madison in the Federalist Papers: the Constitution preserves “The advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation … (where) the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.”
Disarmed people are neither free nor safe - they become the criminals’ prey and the tyrants’ playthings. When the civilians are defenseless and their government goes bad, however, thousands and millions of innocents die.
China: In 1935 the Nationalist government prohibits the private ownership of firearms. The Communists take over in 1949 - they keep the population disarmed. During 38 years of Communist violence and economic ‘experiments’, they wipe out 35 million Chinese - and possibly as many as 100 million. During all this time Red Chinese dictator Mao Tse-Tung controls all the guns.
Russia: The Communists took power in Russia in 1917, and immediately passed laws making it almost impossible for non-party members to own firearms. Then, in 1929 Soviet dictator Josef Stalin decrees that all livestock, produce, and farmland belong to the State. Farmers are ordered to surrender their land and livestock, and to move to government-owned collective farms. First, to terrorize the rest into submission, several million of the most prosperous farmers are sent to forced labor camps or killed outright. These ‘Kulaks’ are demonized by the Communists. Because of ten years of firearms confiscation, farmers can only fight back with farm tools.
Germany: After Hitler disarmed the population by passing the Nuremberg Laws, pre-war Germany was a picture of domestic tranquility – unless you were a Jew.
People always snicker at the idea that little Joe Citizen with his shotgun or semi-automatic rifle can stand up to the might of the U.S. Army. And I say, the Vietnamese did a pretty damn good job of it, and the Iraqis seem to be too.
There’s also the statistical evidence that says gun violence rises when you ban guns. Why? Because criminals don’t get their guns legally anyway. A gun ban takes guns out of the victim’s hands, not the perpetrator’s. You think gangbangers in Bed Stuy buy shotguns at Wal-Mart?
And if none of this persuades you, can I just close by saying guns are fucking sexy.
Since the early 1980s small, independent groups of ordinary citizens have attempted to crack the mystery of the space-time continuum using nothing more than the Toyota Camry.
Aaron Valdez is one of our top performers at Wreck & Salvage. He assembled this video from spare parts and elbow grease.
Photo taken at Rodeo Bar. Darren Schlappich of Frog Holler hired me to produce a DVD of their live performances Friday and Saturday night. I have 8 tapes to go through, and from what I’ve seen, it’s going to make for a badazzz DVD. They were on point both nights, the audience was into it, and my 2nd cameraman and I got a ton of really great footage. Look for the DVD in a couple months.
My friend Michael Leonhard shot stills, digital color and 3200 speed black & white. Here are a few samples:
I am, incidentally, Honorary President of the American Humanist Association, having succeeded the late, great science fiction writer Isaac Asimov in that totally functionless capacity. We had a memorial service for Isaac a few years back, and I spoke and said at one point, “Isaac is up in heaven now.” It was the funniest thing I could have said to an audience of humanists. I rolled them in the aisles. It was several minutes before order could be restored. And if I should ever die, God forbid, I hope you will say, “Kurt is up in heaven now.” That’s my favorite joke.
We all know the bad things about smoking. Here are some good things:
“Scientists have found evidence that smoking might help prevent the onset of various dementias. Many dementias go hand-in-hand with a loss of chemical receptors in the brain that just happen to be stimulated by nicotine. Smoking seems to bolster these receptors, and smokers have more of them. The theory is that smokers may then have more to lose before they start losing their minds. “It does seem that nicotine has a preventative effect, but the problem is that the other stuff in the cigarette tends to rot everything else,” says Roger Bullock, a specialist in dementia and director of the Kingshill Research Centre in Swindon. So if your time is nearly up anyway, and you have somehow managed to steer a course past the Scylla and Charybdis of heart attacks and tumours, smoking might just help you retain your marbles.”
AND…
For man to have started smoking, he needed a reason,
and the reason is still the same today. Man found that by
smoking different substances he could maintain better health,
by supplying the body rapidly with needed elements, and at
the same time combat many microscopic organisms. The rapid
oxidization of the substances, cooks any organisms on the plant
while chemically braking down the elements. It was wise for
man to begin to use for his betterment the fact that elements
enter the blood system faster through the lungs, and not only
does the burning of the bush take the place of digestion, it
also save the energy it would take to digest. Man soon found
that he could better control his mind with a more controlled
diet. And that each person could seek-out, through experiment,
an herb that might help balance his metabolism.
The burning bush has been educational to man, but it has
caused man to have to develop his selfdiscipline, a major move
away from the animals. Let us not forget, what got us here,
what formed man from the dust of the earth, and without which
we would fall back.
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