Summer Concerts

So grateful to be near a world capitol where the big names pass through on their concert tours...

First up: Daft Punk



An awsome set up with the two DJ's in their robot suits. I didn't expect much from the show, but I knew quite a few tracks like "One more time" and "Around the world" - those poppy house remixes... But the lights and effects were too good and they rocked the whole stadium.

Second up: The Beastie Boys!!!!!

A dream to see them from 50 feet away, even though they're fighting the gray hair and were a bit lackluster, they hit the big ones like "No sleep till Brooklyn" and "Brass Monkey" and of course "Sabotage" - and yes, I was in the pit!
MixMaster Mike also litterally broke the needle he was scratching so fast. Awsome.


Next Up: Solidays, Rock en Seine (Bjork, Tool, Erik Truffaz, possibly Lauryn Hill)

Role Reversal News - Al Qaeda occupies the U.S.

Just to understand what the Afghans are going through, here's the latest report transcribed as a role-reversal (and numbers augmented to roughly reflect population percentage).

"Al Qaeda-led air raid kills seventeen U.S. children

Mon Jun 18, 2007 3:38AM EDT

Reuters

By John Anderson

Washington (Reuters) - At least seventeen children have been killed in an Al Qaeda-led air strike on an Evangelical Christian school in the eastern United States, sources said on Monday, amid rising anger over civilian deaths from terrorist military operations.

Violence has surged in recent months in the United States after the traditional winter lull, with foreign forces launching attacks against American strongholds in the south and east and the Evangelical Christian militias hitting back with a string of suicide bombings.

In a separate incident, three Al Qaeda soldiers and their English interpreter were killed on Sunday when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle near the southern city of Raleigh.

The air strike, late on Sunday in North Carolina near the South Carolina border, was part of an operation aimed at a compound containing an evangelical church and school thought to have been used as a safehouse by Christian militia fighters, sources said.

The United Christian Militia is fighting alongside the Republicans to overthrow America's Taliban-backed government and drive out foreign troops. Al Qaeda-led forces removed the Republicans from power in 2001 for refusing to hand over Christian Militia leader George W. Bush.

The Al Qaeda statement said early reports showed seventeen children at the church school had been killed in the air strike and several militants were also killed.

The church sustained minor damage, it added.

More than 1,120 civilians have been killed by foreign troops in America in recent months, according to the U.S. government and residents.

The deaths have sparked street protests calling for U.S. President Abdul Al-Hamad's resignation and the withdrawal of Al Qaeda troops from the United States. Al Qaeda forces make up the bulk of the more than 500,000 foreign troops operating in the country.

Faced with resurgent Christian Militia attacks, growing frustration over corruption and lack of economic development, Al-Hamad has warned that civilian deaths would have dangerous consequences for his government and the troops.

Nearly 60,000 people have been killed in the United States of America over the past 17 months. About 10,500 of them have been civilians."

Is that what it feels like to be occupied by your enemy? Is that what we're doing right now? Wow.

Old School Children's Television

Taking a moment to stop and remember growing up at a time when television for children was a new and heartfelt thing. Pioneers of children's entertainment like Fred Rogers, Jim Henson and the cast of Sesame Street put together programs that were not only fun and educational for kids, but were filled with positive messages of self worth, respect and love for others and a joy of creativity, silliness and laughter. These values seem to be rare in today's television programs for kids, and I am grateful to have grown up with the loving, rainbow-filled artwork that was the result of the creative and free-thinking time in the 1960's and 1970's. Remember these?

ABC's

The number song from Sesame Street

The orange sings Carmen on Sesame Street

Kermit and Cookie Monster

Reading Rainbow Opening

Mr. Rogers Opening

Mr. Rogers Closing

Mr. Rogers Lifetime Achievement Emmy

A Note on Wildlife and Forests

IT seems that despite the fact that we've all heard of global warming, deforestation and endangered species, the situation is not improving. It seems that people feel better just knowing that these problems exist, and trust that enough people must know about them by now that someone is doing what it takes to fix them. In fact, I am convinced that the past ten years have seen no slowing in these destructive processes, but in fact the opposite, and I believe the next ten years will see more harm than has ever been done to the earth ever in the past, collectively.

Reuters article about deforestation

While I try to do my part to educate others, give some money to those associations I trust, and shop responsibly when I can, I am convinced now that most of the next generation will never in their lives visit a forest. They are disappearing so quietly and so quickly that most people aren't missing them yet. One generation can be glad to have the cash profits from selling those big old trees that just took up space, and enjoy a new life as a farmer, with sunshine and land of their own. But when 3 billion people think like this, and once the forest is sold and razed, how can it ever return? Sure weeds may someday take over an abandoned farm, but the original tree and animal species that inhabited that unique ecosystem are gone forever. Forever. And our grandchildren won't miss them because they never experienced walking beneath living things two stories high. Cool, damp breezes will be rare, and everyone will blame others for the dust storms, droughts, floods and hurricanes of the future. Already most people in northern and central France must drive almost an hour to find a forest, and then it is a managed forest, with trees planted in rows, or acres that are thinnned, harvested and rotated every 50 years. There are few animals and no natural sense of beauty or wilderness since the paths are flat, straight and paved, and turn at exact angles.



Wild animals will also become a rare phenomenon in the next hundred years, so that most of what remain in zoos will be the last examples of other living creatures that used to inhabit the earth with humans. The deer, rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, and the occasional bear or mountain lion that still roam North America are already gone from the European continent. People drive an hour to come stare at the few captive deer that are kept in a part of the forest here where we live, and the deer stare blankly at the people on the other side of the fence, with ears flopped down and no fear or energy in their stare. In another 300 years most children will learn of the animals of the past, when giraffes and bears are in books alongside dinosaurs, and only dogs, cats, birds, fish and insects will remain to accompany humanity.

The stupid thing is that we can stop it now, but we won't, because we need a new end table from Target, and the fact that it's 20% cheaper than an antique or something made from sustainable wood means that we'll buy it, even if it's made in China and even if we're aware of what we're doing (I just bought said end-table from Target two weeks ago...). So we're all guilty, and yet, we each have to measure our own efforts, and not the efforts of others.