“Larry the Cable Guy” seemed appropriate somehow…

As someone who knows the value of a good headline zinging across the globe via Twitter, I can appreciate why middle-aged, well-off Caucasian Forbes contributor Gene Marks would title his well-meaning essay/advice, “If I Were A Poor Black Kid.” As every blogger knows, with controversy comes increased traffic, some feigned outrage from bloggers both left and right (which brings in even more traffic) and parody. Even ridicule brings in more traffic (it’s a fuel that the Internet and reality TV runs on). I don’t want to give the impression that I found Marks’ essay offensive—I didn’t and he makes several good points—but then again, he completely misses out on the biggest elephant (of many) in the room:

Are there going to be ANY decent jobs—let alone careers—for much of the next generation in this hollowed out American economy, whether they are educated or not?

I was told this morning that 10% of the HDTV panels that are 40 inches or larger are manufactured by just fifteen workers at the Panasonic plant in Osaka, Japan. If that’s even close to accurate, it’s staggering. What opportunities will there be in the US where we hardly make anything of real value anymore?

However silly Gene Marks’ title is, at least it inspired one of the funniest things I’ve read in some time, Vanity Fair contributing editor Jim Windolf’s “If I Were a Middle-Aged White Guy,” published this morning at The Atlantic Wire. Here’s an excerpt:

If I happened to be making a quick stop at the 7-11, I would ease into the handicapped spot, because eighty percent of those people are faking it. This one guy I heard about had asthma. That’s how he got the handicapped plate. I would leave the engine running, partly so it wouldn’t get cold, and partly so that, if some actual, no-kidding-around handicapped person were to pull up in their specially made handicap-mobile, they would figure I was coming back shortly.

If I were a middle-aged white guy, I would work hard at my job. No one likes a lazy person. And I would smile at my coworkers, because no one likes a sourpuss. I would also be sure to ask my colleagues how their day was going, and I would talk about TV shows and football games with them, and I would perhaps mention that I hadn’t seen them in church lately, which is a funny thing to say nowadays, when there are so many people who haven’t accepted the Lord Jesus as our savior.

If I were to see a coworker slacking off, I might remark, in jest, “Some of us have work to do.” And if they told me to fuck off, I would call human resources and report them, because middle-aged white guys should not have to be subjected to such abusive talk. I would also discuss the incident with my immediate boss, and if he were to tell me, “You just need to worry about your own work and let me take care of the rest of the floor,” I would probably say, “It’s funny how you asshole liberals are always talking about ‘it takes a village,’ but the minute someone steps up to point out that one of the ‘villagers’ is slacking off, you get nothing but shit for it.” And if he were to reply, “Are we done here?”, I would probably just say something like, “Yeah, I guess we are. I guess nothing’s ever going to change around here,” and then I would walk back to my desk, muttering to myself. For a little office humor I would make sure a coworker or two heard me use the word “shotgun.”

If I were a middle-aged white guy, and my children were doing poorly in school, I would smash things in their rooms, the lamps and vacation souvenirs and such, and I would inform them that the stuff I had just broken to bits had been gained in exchange for a certain thing known as money, and you get money in this world because you have skills, like computer programming, and you acquire those skills only after you earn halfway decent grades in school, and then you offer those skills to an employer who will pay you for your services, even if they never take it seriously when you make the slightest remark about how you’re the main guy pulling his weight.

“If I Were a Middle-Aged White Guy” (The Atlantic Wire)

Below, a minisode of Harry Shearer and Martin Mull’s HBO mockumentary series, The History of White People in America
 

 
Radio Soulwax’s ambitious punk mash-up mix is the “Stars on 45” of hardcore.
 

 
Thank you Glen E. Friedman of New York City, NY!

 
98%?! Let me say that again, 98%!!!
 
(via Copyranter)

 
A 23-year-old South African woman was caught smuggling 3.3 lbs of cocaine into Thailand by hiding the drugs in her dreadlocks!

That much coke on your head would make for a very numb skull, wouldn’t it? That might explain why this numb-skull tried to import 3.3 lbs of coke into Thailand, a country known for enforcing harsh penalties on drug smugglers, including death.
 

 
(via Arbroath)

 
Patton Oswalt reenacts, with the assistance of director Jason Reitman, an actual phone message left on Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse voice mail by an irate customer who was kicked out of the theater for not following the no cell phone rule.

Earlier this year the Alamo Drafthouse launched a “Don’t Talk” PSA that went viral, generating (to date) close to 5 million views.  The video was funny and it also contributed to an ongoing dialogue about talking & texting during movies. 

It gained a few fans, including Patton Oswalt & Jason Reitman who decided to shoot a parody video of the famous “Angry Texter” while at the theater for a screening of Young Adult.

The dramatization of the voice mail isn’t nearly as putrid as the real thing. You be the judge. The original “Angry Texter” message can be heard after the jump.
 

 
Original pissed-off voice mail after the jump…

 
What could be a worse insult than this from those fine folks at Fox News?

A picture of Jerry Sandusky standing in for Mittens, perhaps?
 

 
Via Media Matters

 
Yes, ‘The Can” is the ‘Can’ we all know and love - Holger, Jaki, Michael, Irmin and, in this early 70s incarnation, the iconic Damo Suzuki. Here is a clip of the band performing the title track of the Roland Klick film ‘Deadlock’ in 1970 on Germany’s Westdeutscher Rundfunk television station.

When I first stumbled upon this clip, I assumed the TV producers had made an amusing mistake by adding an unwanted definitive article to the start of the band’s name. However, after checking the Can wiki page, it turns out that the additional “The” may not have been a mistake after all:

[By 1968] the band used the names “Inner Space” and “The Can” before finally settling on “CAN”. Liebezeit subsequently suggested the backronym “communism, anarchism, nihilism” for the band’s name. [Wow, what an amazing backronym!]

However, by the time this footage was recorded in 1970 the band had already released two records as ‘Can’ - Monster Movies and Soundtracks, which mostly featured Malcolm Mooney on vocals rather than Suzuki. So I think a little chortle can be had without feeling too foolish, but who knows, maybe it was a genuine mistake or maybe the bad flirted with a new name for a new singer? Either way, if it’s ‘The Can’ or just plain old ‘Can’ this is some great early footage of true musical pioneers: 

The Can “Deadlock” live 1970
 

 
After the jump, the awesome ‘Mother Sky’ from the same session…

Photo by Allen Ginsberg

This wonderful short animated film by Drew Christie recounts musicologist John Cohen’s first meeting with Harry Everett Smith, polymath autodidact weirdo, experimental filmmaker and the Grammy-award-winning compiler of the classic Anthology of American Folk Music.

It’s an absolute delight! Guaranteed to make you smile or double your money back.

There are several similarly charming Harry Smith anecdotes like this one recounted in books such as Harry Smith: The Avant-Garde in the American Vernacular (Andrew Perchuck and Rani Singh); Think of the Self Speaking (edited by Rani Singh); American Magus: Harry Smith (edited by Paola Igliori) and the monograph Harry Smith: Fragments of a Northwest Life (Darrin Daniel).

My favorite Smith anecdote, and I think this one comes via Allen Ginsberg—pretty sure—is that Smith usually wore eyeglasses that he found in the trash. If he happened upon some discarded glasses, tried them on and they were better than the ones he was wearing, he’d toss the old ones and keep the new ones!

And speaking of Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music, if the animation intrigues you, and his Anthology box set is something that you are unfamiliar with, you can listen to this special podcast about it on the American Standard Time blog’s Roadhouse Radio show.
 

 
Via John Coulthart

 
Charley says… was a series of Public Information Films, shown in the UK during the 1970s and 1980s, in which a talkative cat, Charley, advised a young boy, Tony, about everyday safety issues. Along with my fellow generation of young things, I learnt not to go off with strangers, never play with matches, and beware the dangers of tables. Sadly, these days charlie usually advises me to do all of the above.

The voice of the incomprehensible ginger tomcat was supplied by Kenny Everett, while the boy was voiced by the child of one of producer Richard Taylor’s neighbors. The Charley says… animations were so popular that they were voted the UK’s favorite Public Information Film, and came in at number 95 in Channel 4’s 100 Greatest Cartoons in 2005.
 

 
More miaows of wisdom from Charley, after the jump…
 

 
If embattled WI Governor Scott Walker can’t win fair and square at the ballot box in the now all but inevitable recall election he faces—WI Dems are making a big announcement on Thursday about the recall campaign’s progress—then why not try something immoral and shysty?

I’ll tell you why NOT, Scott: It makes people hate your fucking guts even more and it makes them all the more determined to kick your ass to the curb. 

For every story of voter suppression and menacing of Recall Walker volunteers by brain-addled reichwingers, there are more people making up their minds by the minute to boot this toxic motherfucker out of office.

It’s odd that it didn’t occur to to Walker and his weasely Republicans cronies that this kind of story might prove to be a bit of a public relations NIGHTMARE and that there would be push-back—and plenty of it—with this sort of extremely ill-advised move. From People’s World:

For more than 60 years Ruthelle Frank has not missed an election in her town, her state and her country. She first voted in 1948 and has voted in every single election since then.

She is herself an elected official in her hometown of Brokaw, Wisconsin. She is a member of the Brokaw Village Board.

Now, however, because of the new Republican voter ID law in Wisconsin, 2012 will be the first year Frank can’t vote.

Under the new law people must carry a new state issued photo ID in order to vote. The ID itself is free but one must have a birth certificate in order to get the free ID. Birth certificates, for those in Wisconsin who don’t have them, cost $20. Opponents of the Republican voter ID law argue that this, by itself, amounts to an unconstitutional poll tax.

Frank’s first problem is that she does not have a birth certificate. People born at home in the 1920s in Wisconsin did not receive official birth certificates. Like many others in 1927, Frank was born in her own house.

The ACLU have stepped in on Ruthelle Frank’s behalf to challenge this vileness in court.

WHO would think something like this is smart politically??? Well… Republicans apparently. If you can’t beat ‘em, CHEAT ‘em.