Have a good Memorial Day
Posted on May 28th, 2007 by Brad
I’m outsourcing my Memorial Day tribute to the Arcade Fire:
Also: I could point out that the Yankees are now trailing my Red Sox by 12 and a half games, but I know it won’t last much longer. I am, however, enjoying it whilst it lasts.
Pax.
Seb adds: Nothing to add actually, just checking some tech stuff. Carry on please.
I’m outsourcing my Memorial Day to Paul Krugman.
“In this place where valor sleeps, we are reminded why America has always gone to war reluctantly, because we know the costs of war.� That’s what President Bush said last year, in a Memorial Day ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery.
Those were fine words, spoken by a man with less right to say them than any president in our nation’s history. For Mr. Bush took us to war not with reluctance, but with unseemly eagerness.
Krugman is teh awesome. Really, the best major pundit out there. He has mercifully yet to be infected by DC insiderism of Tom Friedman and MoDo.
Yup. And look — it seems he’s been reading Sadly, No!
When Rudy Giuliani says that Iran, which had nothing to do with 9/11, is part of a “movement� that “has already displayed more aggressive tendencies by coming here and killing us,� he should be treated as a lunatic.
When Mitt Romney says that a coalition of “Shia and Sunni and Hezbollah and Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda� wants to “bring down the West,� he should be ridiculed for his ignorance.
And when John McCain says that Osama, who isn’t in Iraq, will “follow us home� if we leave, he should be laughed at.
Its every citizen’s patriotic duty to wiggle their ass around to some wild shit this Memorial Day.
Actually, I think the lead could increase. Matsuzaka and Drew and Lugo are only going to get better.
Of course, Youkilis and Lowell and Tavarez could come back to earth, and the Yankees could start pitching, I guess . . . .
And Timlin is coming back! Argh! Run away!
Red and Black- I think you’re the only anarchist I’ve ever known (and I’ve known quite a few of them) who actually gives a damn about baseball- many of them are too anal to actually enjoy life. Where’d that come from? 🙂
Also: I could point out that the Yankees are now trailing my Red Sox by 12 and a half games, but I know it won’t last much longer.
Fear not, Brad. It’s over for the Yankees and I’m actually disappointed. I always hope the Yankees and Sox will meet in the playoffs but this year we won’t even have the the late summer drama of a Yankees/Sox pennant race. What you should be dreading is an ’86 rematch. Pedro is your looming nightmare.
What’s the German word for schadenfreude, again?
Part One: Freepers band ghouliani supporters.
Part Deux: Murkans pleased to be on lookout for brown islamo-mexi-homo-commie-fascists. And bigoted Eagle Scouts.
Part Drei: Booming Utah Town Is Short on Booze.
Incidentally, I just love the new preview function. Just type stuff in, and *bam* it appears right there on the screen, verbatim, as if by magic. Its like having our own personal Judith Miller.
I could point out that the Yankees are now trailing my Red Sox by 12 and a half games, but I know it won’t last much longer.
Howard Johnson, er, Lawnguylander, is right, it’s over for my beloved Yanks. This team won’t finish higher than third – and then only if they manage to stave off the fearsome Devil Rays. Otherwise, the dank, cockroach-infested AL East basement is a distinct possibility.
Unless the Boss gets us Steve Trout or DH’s Rick Rhoden.
They aren’t the wrong ones. They are not the gun, they are the bullet. Decisions made in elegant, wood paneled rooms, around gleaming tables by men it clean suits send them off to a land of death and horror. They quickly learn. To survive, they become something else. Something hard, and twisted. They learn to lay the front sight on center mass, and squeeze three times. And to move on. Fuckit. Don’t mean nothing. They learn to hold a wounded comrade’s hand, to tell the bloody mess it’s gonna be alright as the corpsman slams him with morphine and blood expander with tears streaming down his muddy cheeks. They learn to shake off the fear after a battle, to load their mags, bum a cigarette and find a quiet place to talk. “Did you see that shit?”
They learn again, when they get home. No one gets it. No one understands. They can’t. They weren’t there. They don’t have blood that will never wash off. They don’t carry scars – the easy ones, the ones in flesh and bone, and the harder, more deadly variety, deep inside. So they young men, broken, changed, wondering why the world looks like a grainy, black and white cartoon, try to find their way in this world, this world that isn’t, that cannot be real. Where decisions have no consequences, and a new car is important, and life is taken for granted.
They do not want your sympathy. They do not want a hand out. They want you to TRY, just please fucking TRY to understand what has happened to them. To give them a chance. To have patience when they seem to be pulled in other directions. To remember they didn’t choose this path, and that ultimately, they went there and did these things and saw these things for YOU. They just want to know that what they did was right, and that someday, somehow, things will be right again for them.
Don’t forget ’em. Ever…
mikey
The Yankees are toast. A few days ago, I found myself thinking, “They might have a chance if Clemens has anything left. And Mussina. And Rivera. And Giambi. And Damon. And Abreu…”
Too many key players in decline, and everyone else except Pettite, Posada & Jeter is young and/or mediocre.
Mets sure are looking good, though…
Don’t be so sure the Red Sox’s lead won’t last. The Yankees don’t have the horses.
And aren’t the Yankees a great team to root against?
Me. Cleveland Indians. The Sox better watch out tonight. The Indians are on a roll.
I humbly submit Boston’s “More Than a Feeling” for your Memorial Day rocking pleasure.
No link. Couldn’t find anything good on youtube.
It’s terrible, isn’t it, Brad. I keep waiting for them to implode, beginning by losing in terrible ways to shitty teams like Texas, only they don’t. Well, keep the faith; there’s still plenty of time. I’m old enough to clearly recall a 13 or 14 game lead in July, 1978, and look how well that turned out.
“Intervention” is a very moving song, and that was a great performance on SNL. It was the type of moment that makes you sit stock straight on the couch in the middle of the night, thinking, “what the hell is that?”
It doesn’t look good for the Yanks. Clemens and Hughes will fill out the rotation nicely, and Clippard looks like a decent 6th, meaning Igawa can, if he figures out how to pitch, can go sit in the pen and keep Farnsworth the fuck away from the mound.
But amazingly enough, the lineup is a problem. Not picking up Sexson in the offseason for anything short of Hughes or Tabata was plain dumb. Getting shite out of 1st and right will kill any offense. It still pisses me off Steinbrenner made Cash sign Sheff instead of Vlad. Then Pavano/Wright/Womack instead of Beltran, which then forced the goddamn Damon move.
If George does fire Cashman after the season he’s an even bigger senile old asshole than any of us thought. The Yank’s problems come from Steinbrenner making all the wrong choices since 01, and losing 3/5ths of a WS rotation, too, of course. (Signing Moose being the exception, but that was a nobrainer.)
On the other hand, if ever there was a team with the potential to pull an 02 A’s second half demolition of the league, it’s the Yanks. I’m NOT predicting it, just saying it’s possible.
And the Mets?
Feh, they’re the Braves’ playthings, the whole world knows it. N besides, they’re in the NL. Saying they’re the best in that league is like saying the Weekly Standard has the most journalistic integrity of wingnut publications. Big effin deal, tho 86 was fun, yes.
Paul- Yeah, Arcade Fire are brilliant. “Neighborhood 3 (Power Out)” has a similar “WTF is THAT?!!?” power to it- and their lyrics are awesome as well: “And the power’s out in the heart of man…” Too good. My fav. bands currently are Radiohead, Arcade Fire and Sigur Ros.
It still pisses me off Steinbrenner made Cash sign Sheff instead of Vlad.
Well, he was very concerned about durability. *snicker*
Red and Black- I think you’re the only anarchist I’ve ever known (and I’ve known quite a few of them) who actually gives a damn about baseball- many of them are too anal to actually enjoy life. Where’d that come from? 🙂
Brad R.,
People with a wide variety of ideas label themselves “anarchists”. The label doesn’t indicate what one is actually working toward. I think the whole anti-civ/green/animal rights thing is really harmful, and there’s a strain of that among Boston college students. In contrast, most of the anarchist communists I know follow baseball, shower regularly, have jobs, eat meat, etc..
You should stop by the Lucy Parsons Center and pick up a copy of the latest issue of Northeastern Anarchist. I think you’ll find it less loopy than you expect.
Okay, late to the party. I usually read this site once a day, don’t know how I missed another Arcade Fire video.
That one seems like a “softer” version of Intervention – the full band version is always hard to resist turning the volume WAY up. Still awesome though.
and Red and Black thanks for the tip about Northeastern Anarchist – Lucy Parsons is one of my “most admired” people for a reason.
(and besides – just how many other people managed to scare the authorities SO MUCH that all their writings were burned upon their death ?)
hi there!
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