Good evening, welcome to EBD’s Wednesday edition of Late Nite Radio. Several weeks ago at SDA, Paul linked to his Cjunk post, “ Gaze In Wonder at Your Frigidaire.” The title is a line from the song “Auschwitz to Ipswich” by Jarvis Cocker, who is perhaps best known as the frontman for the British band Pulp.
One might expect any song about the West’s passivity and unwillingness to defend itself culturally at home to take an anthemic, “we must fight this” tack, but Cocker takes the opposite approach: his first-person narrator is a faithless, dissipated, sadly self-pleasuring Western everyman who has given up the ghost on the matter of his culture. He recognizes a cultural sunset, but since he uses his own life as a reference point, he sees nothing of real value being lost; since society is just himself writ large, it is no more worthy of being saved than he is. Cocker’s apt use in this case of the small, first-person ironic voice serves to limn the inexorable connectedness between citizens’ seemingly inconsequential personal attributes and civilizational changes of historic consequence.
It’s just a song we’re talking about, of course, one mostly notable for its subject matter. Before we get to it, I have a quick question for SDA readers: are there any other popular songs extant that either mention, refer to, defend, or acknowledge the value of western culture — even if only metaphorically — vis a vis others? I can’t think of any; if you can, please elaborate in the comments.
Anyway, here it is, without further ado: Jarvis Cocker sings From Auschwitz to Ipswich.
The comments are open, as always, for your Reader Tips.
It’s H-is fault, again.
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“Canada Housing Starts Rise to 140,700 Units in June
Canadian housing starts rose in June on construction of both single- and multiple-unit homes, Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. said today from Ottawa.
The total of 140,700 units on an annualized basis compared with a revised 130,300 units in May. Economists anticipated the pace of starts would be 130,000 units, according the median of 17 responses in a Bloomberg survey.
Recent data on Canada’s housing market, which the Bank of Canada said in April would cut 1.1 percentage points from growth in 2009, indicate the economy may be recovering from its first recession since 1992.
“The data are consistent with other measures, including home sales and building permits, that suggest that we are making a significant move off the lows, perhaps in response to low mortgage rates and diminished fears that recession will turn into depression,” Avery Shenfeld, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce’s chief economist, said in a note to clients.
The total value of permits issued by municipalities jumped 15 percent to C$5.02 billion ($4.34 billion), Statistics Canada said July 7 in Ottawa. Existing home sales rose 8 percent from the previous month on a seasonally adjusted basis, the Canadian Real Estate Association said June 15 in a statement from Ottawa.
Canada will contract 2.3 percent in 2009 and grow 1.6 percent in 2010, the IMF said yesterday. The IMF had predicted in April the Canadian economy would shrink 2.5 percent this year before rebounding to 1.2 percent in 2010.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601082&sid=aeCSRkEAd0cg
KevinB,
Beautiful and accurate comment. BRAVO!
Hardboiled, you egghead:
1- The Isotope shortage issue is the result of many Fed Government stalling and procrastination…Way before Harper.
2-The Canadian stimulus which many Conservative minded citizens like myself opposed and still are again’st would likely not have happened had Harper ruled with a majority. The 3 stooges of the Coalition along with Barry Soetoro’s election win which promised massive tax spending all but forced Harper into playing the game which he did not want to do initially. Augment that with the fact the MSM are a bunch of useless corrupt marxist leftards who keep fouls in the dark 24/7 by not even questioning Barry and the Stooges rational and you get where we stand today.
Why did’nt Harper stick to his principles you ask?
Because in all likelyhood his Government would of been defeated sooner or later this year. A situation that is totally unacceptable and that would have put the country in the hands of much worse that we have now.
EBD – great catch !!
When a conservative hears the phrase ‘income tax’, he thinks: ‘tax’, and when an Obama voter hears the phrase ‘income tax,’ he thinks: ‘income’, because they are both half-wits. When a fully witted person hears the phrase ‘income tax’, he thinks: ‘income tax’.
Rep. Henry Waxman (of Wackjob-Malarkey fame) moves on to his next wacky project: funding public health care with surtaxes on businesses and “the rich”:
“As discussed in the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee, the surtax would apply to individuals with adjusted gross income of more than $200,000 and couples over $250,000, according to officials involved in the discussion. Most spoke on condition of anonymity because the talks were private.
Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Nev., a member of the panel, said the panel is looking at a surtax around 3.5 percent.
In addition, key lawmakers are expected to call for a tax or fee equal to a percentage of a worker’s salary on employers who do not offer health benefits.
Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., has said his committee needs to come up with $600 billion in new taxes to deliver on Obama’s goal of sweeping changes to the nation’s health care system to bring down costs and cover the 50 million uninsured. Hundreds of billions of dollars more would come from cuts to Medicare and Medicaid to pay for legislation expected to cost around $1 trillion over 10 years.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090709/ap_on_go_co/us_health_care_overhaul
Egyptian TV:
Host: “Egyptian Lawyer Nagla Al-Imam has proposed that young Arab men should sexually harass Israeli girls wherever they may be, and using any possible method, as a new means in the resistance against Israel. We have with us the lawyer, Nagla Al-Iman from Cairo. Welcome. What is the purpose of this proposal of yours?”
Al-Imam: “This is a form of resistance. In my opinion, (Israeli girls) are fair game for all Arabs, and there is nothing wrong with…”
H: “On what grounds?”
Al-Imam: “First of all, they violate our rights, and they ‘rape’ the land. Few things are as grave as the rape of land. In my view, this is a new form of resistance.”
H: “As a lawyer, don’t you think this might expose Arab youth to punishment for violating laws against sexual harassment?”
Al-Imam: “Most Arab countries — with the exception of three or four which I don’t think allow Israeli women to enter anyway — most Arab countries do not have sexual harassment laws. Therefore, if Arab Women are fair game for Arab men, there is nothing wrong with Israeli women being fair game as well.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nDqWGtykYNE
h/t bcatfur
Posted by: Right Honorable Terry Tory at July 9, 2009 12:27 PM
1 – “it was like that when we got here”
Canadian are facing a huge increase in risk to health through deferred diagnosis and health care rationing. Government ineptitude killing Canadians. All for issue management and opinion shaping.
“It was like that when we got here”
Great argument man.
2 – So Harper growing government by 20% during the first three years was conservatism in action huh?
You’ve been swigging the partisan koolaid talking points.
You should stay the course. Sincere reflection and thought can trigger cognitive dissonance.
Most partisans are ill prepared to realize their efforts and belief in a political party really reduce them to the actions of a fool.
Vit:
Nearly right. When a fully witted person hears “income tax”, he first thinks “There will be a tax on income”, then he thinks “How will ‘income’ be defined?”.
In the 1970’s, taking a year off university, I worked preparing tax returns for SW Ontario farmers. Now, if you and I have a rural property, and we grow lots of tomatoes, peppers, etc. which we then put up for the winter, that’s fine. If the zoning permits, and we raise a few chickens for eggs in the summer, and then slaughter them in the fall, that’s OK too. Get a piglet in spring and have a pig roast in fall? Go to it!
But if you’re a farmer, every single one of those activities is taxable; you have to estimate the commercial value of those vegetables and/or meat, and add that to your taxable income (Caveat This was true in the 1970’s and I have made no effort to keep current, so no idea if that’s true today). So, that leads one to wonder:
If you’re a hairdresser, and you cut your three kids’ and husband’s hair every other week, do you have to add 4 * 26 * 20 = $2,080 to your income? If you’re a seamstress, do you have to add a factor for the clothes you made for your kids? If you’re a contractor, do you have to include an amount for the repairs you made on your own home?
For me, this hits very close to home. I have provided “for fee” financial advice to third parties. On the farmer template above, should I incur capital gains on my own transactions, will they be taxed as capital gains or ordinary income? That’s a huge difference.
Since I’m sure you’re a decent and honourable guy, Vit, I’m sure the distinctions above don’t occur to you. I’m slightly more cynical; they occur to me.
CTV is showing it’s true colors “Red”
they now have a Poll up Re: the PM being late by 1min 45sec to the photo-op
stephen harper kept world leaders waiting, once again, when he was late for a G8 photo op
who’s to blame?
the prime minister himself 56%
his staff 44%
Ctv misses the mark on this poll they should have had a 3rd option.
Who Care’s! other then the Socialist Media in Canada in their attempt once again to tarnish the PM.
Well said, KevinB, although, actually, there are ways
in which I’m far more cynical than you, it’s just that I’m
pathologically optimistic, so nobody calls it cynicism 😉
Not trying to get sappy or anything, but seriously, Vit, I do think you’re an honourable and decent guy. You and I (and ET, and god forbid Kate) may disagree from time to time, but I still appreciate you.
Well, on the not trying to get sappy or anything front, KevinB, I still owe you an apology for the tone of my comment to you on July 3. Sure, I was just demonstrating how optimists get pissed off ~ would you pessimists quit yer danm bellyachin’ ~ but I should have written it in the generic sense, not seemingly to you. Anyway, enough with this chatter, or Kate will smack us upside the head.
Vitruvius: I suggest that a person who *doesn’t* think “tax” when he hears about tax on income is, if not a half-wit, engaging in excessive, unwarranted semantic-hair splitting for the sake of itself.
A tax on income is a tax. Recognizing this does not make one a “half-wit.”
Correct, EBD, that was a rhetorical excess. I was trying
to riff off the joke, but, thinking about it over lunch,
I realized I didn’t do a very good job. Sorry about that.
No harm no foul, V.
Kate! Charles Adler just called you “Cousin Kate”, LOL!
New Angus Poll
conservative 36%
liberal 30%
ndp 16%
bq & grn Who gives a shit
*this explains the increase in leftist media assault’s of inmaterial crap on the Govt & PM
*will cbc & ctv/globemedia report this poll? we will have to wait & see My bet,Not.
IggyBush? BushIggy?
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“REPUBLICANS FOR IGNATIEFF PRAISES MICHAEL IGNATIEFF FOR DEFENDING GEORGE W. BUSH IN RECENTLY-DISCOVERED AUDIO CLIP(sic)
* Liberal leader said human rights and the promotion of democracy was a central feature of the Bush Administration
* Names Bush alongside human rights leaders Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt and Jimmy Carter
JULY 9, 2009 — Republicans for Ignatieff, an international online community for Republican supporters of Michael Ignatieff, the new Leader of Canada’s Liberal Party, today released a recently-discovered audio clip of Michael Ignatieff publicly defending former President George W. Bush and naming him alongside other great human rights leaders.
Speaking to an audience at Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland in January 2005, Ignatieff admitted he was courting controversy when he said:
“Don’t forget that the speech by a U.S. President that most directly committed the United States to the promotion of human rights and democracy in the Arab world was given by George W. Bush.”
Ignatieff’s naming of Bush immediately followed his references to human rights leaders Eleanor Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt and Jimmy Carter.
Ignatieff also told his audience that “human rights and the promotion of democracy” was a “central feature” of the Bush Administration.
Listen to the unedited, in-context two minute and twelve second clip by clicking on the following link:”
http://www.republicansforignatieff.com/
Remember cbc and their financial woes? Well,obviously they have been solved. How else would they be able to afford to send staff to follow Iggy around? Cbc has this video up—-http://www.cbc.ca/news/video/—,hope it works. Priorities,it’s all about priorities,like spending undisclosed millions and millions chasing Mulroney.
Getting back to EBD’s original question:
I don’t think popular songs get to be popular by contrasting two systems; they either celebrate one or decry another. So, here are my two examples:For the negative, BB Gabor’s “Nyet Nyet Soviet”
Nyet nyet Soviet, Soviet jewry
I said nyet nyet Soviet, Soviet jewry
Nyet nyet Soviet, Soviet jewry
I said nyet nyet Soviet, Soviet jewry
I say no no no no no no no no no – they shouted “Yes!”
And snapped the Soviet jewelry around my wrists
I want to go go go go go go go go go – but they say “Stay!”
The KGB is coming to put me away
I’m just a little dec-a-dec-a-dec-a-dent
I smoke my tea in the bed
They call me a dissident
When you’re better dead than red
I said no no no no no no no no no – they shouted “Yes!”
And snapped the Soviet jewelry around my wrists
And for the positive, what could be better than Satchmo’s “What a Wonderful World”? I still get a little teary eyed every time I hear it.
“Most partisans are ill prepared to realize their efforts………… really reduce them to the actions of a fool.”
And some partisans even pretend they arte not partisan. Or annoying, pointless,repetitive and simplistic.