indoctrination

straight evil / the penguin

please stop talking.

there's no such thing as autopickle

For the last year, autotune has been nails on a chalkboard for me. T-Pain should have quit the whole thing after Snoop released the redundantly titled "Sensual Seduction." That song is pretty much a B Minus, but it's superior to most of the tracks that Pain poops out of his mouth, through a computer program, and into our ears.

Now autotune's stock is rising a little bit in the shoebomber's cultural index. First, if MLK is on board, it's tough for me to oppose.

Second, it is definitely livening up cable news.

Pain, if you are reading this, and I'm pretty sure you are (it's possible that the true identity of the mystery "contributor" known as ROBE is...T-Pain? It's possible?), take a cue from those videos. Autotune can be a sweet program. But you can't just think out loud and expect the program to polish that turd into gold. I wish things were different. Like we could all just asdjfjk all over this blog and the magic of computers would transform all that into a coherent post. But there's no such thing as an autopickle, and there's no autotune sophisticated enough to make your recent releases worthwhile. Take some pride in your work, Pain.

Root as a child?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5n9YslsI4CU&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fperezhilton%2Ecom%2Fpage%2F8%2F&feature=player_embedded

belle or jasmine?

discuss.

Jamal bin Habib

not as cool as


ps. BIN means son of....

oh soo soo hypocritical...

I find that I have a mix of emotions about the RNC's choice for new leadership in Michael Steele...for me its partly funny, angering, and just downright frustrating in some cases. Obviously not superficially frustrated at their choice in choosing a blackman, a move that is pretty much obvious and kinda silly but more for their, probable, reasons in doing such. It does however make me feel a bit better about republicans that they would be willing to go down that road, a road that i'm sure in many of their minds was a pretty big no no, and at best a last ditch effort...

Now the question is, did they do it for the right reasons...probably not but lets examine...

Did they just see that the Democrats choose a black guy and they won, so they are copying that? Or that now they have a black man at the head of thier party, the Democrats 'black guy' doesnt really provide them any further advantage...they cancel each other out...(didnt they try this when Obama ran against Alan Keys for the senate spot? didnt it horribly backfire)? Or possibly the most noble of reasons for the choice, they actually want to expand their party to groups, specifically minority groups and bring more people into the fold...a reason that I would say is a great reason to choose someone of that group, similar as if the Catholic church had choose an African or S. American to be their new Pople, trying to get greater foothold into these ever populating and possibly catholic regions...

However I just dont see it as being really the latter choice. BUT Steele runs around and talks like thats his goal and thats his mission, which is great for him. But what really frustrates me and makes me laugh is the way he does it. I really dont know much about the guy from prior to being the head of the RNC, so I'm not sure how he talked or acted before...if its the same then I apologize and I just laugh at the RNC...but if you listen to how he talks, he's literally trying to bring the RNC to the 'hood.' He says words like "swagger" and "son" "get up in their face..." "wack"... What makes this all funny, and I guess my point for this rant and anger is that this is THE RNC'S attempt to COUNTER OBAMA...Obama who basically ran as the most NON "urban" black guy possible...If he had said ANY of the above or even close to it, Fox News, and the RNC would have jumped all over him...you saw how they tried to make the 'fist bump' the 'terrorist hand shake' or some shit like that...its just ridiculous and so obvious how quickly the RNC just turns their boat....

I think this just continues to propagate frustrations I had from the Bush administration...how they would say one thing and 10 minutes/10 weeks later they would be on the other side of the fence without any accountability for being a "flip flopper"....like the whole point of media is to create some sort of accountability and record and have someone call them out on shit like that...and the only people that I saw do this were Jon Stewart, Colbert, and Rachel Maddow on MSNBC (she used to have a really sweet 'lame duck' watch towards the end of bush's term...); sucks that 2 of the 3 are supposed to be kinda like comedic new report shows... We need media to step up, have some balls, not be afraid of getting kicked out of the white house press room and ask some real questions...they should have done it for Bush, and I hope they start for Obama...we choose them and they are accountable to US...so make em sweat, ask hard questions, catch them in double speak, call them OUT when you catch them bullshitting...

in the end, i dont think this guy is staying around too long...and I'm sad cause hes kinda funny in the fact that he doest represent most republicans in any way shape or form, or at least no republicans that I’ve ever really met.. and he is generally detrimental to their movement, which for me as a Democrat and supporter of obama is great...

aight sorry...

anywho, check out the colbert rap battle that he "had" with Steele...Its got a lot of good clips of Steele saying some of the stuff that I mentioned above:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KP8_tXtb0Xc

three pointer

I started a blog

http://gawkingatclouds.blogspot.com

wait for it...

"I'm a gangsta, and gangstas don't ask questions."

did your OG check come?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpBP9dALcWw

the best....

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp=27447282�

If you guys didnt have a chance to watch, Clinton and Obama were on stage together the other day. Its just soo amazing how they have a way with words, and how they are able to inspire so many people...if I could pay for that...

On this occassion its tough to say who was better, obviously it was Obama's crowd, and Clinton still looks like he's being forced into campaigning for Obama, but damn they are a dynamic duo...rediculous. Also rediculous that Bill was basically soo good at being a president that he got his wife elected to senate. I mean I think Hilary is great and desrves to be there, but I'm sure when she first ran people juged her more on him than on herself...

anyways, back to my point that these guys truly inspire me, and make me feel like there is hope for our country. I've recently been feeling down becuase I feel like the people of the US are soo easily hoodwinked sometimes. I mean I can see voting for bush the first time around, but after his blunders and bad mistakes after the first 4 years, I'm not sure how he got re-elected. And now Palin, I mean shes great at being about the republican base, and I'm ok with people believing in those ideals and philosophies, but whether or not you agree with what she says, you cannot seriously tell me that people think she's ready to run the US. I mean compared to Bush maybe, but seriuosly? Have you seen any of her interviews? Like when Katie Curick asked her what newspapers and magazines she read...I mean even if your from mars, you can easily ramble of 3 newspapers, the times, the wall street journal, and your hometown paper for crist sake...Also, she got on SNL and basically did her skit with whats her name...like she let the baldwin dude like talk shit about her on tv and just stood there and took it for 30 seconds...what were they thinking? did she just want to say "live from ny?"...I mean in general its less her fault than McCain's for picking someone that he didnt know shit about other than her sex....but still, I can understand how she took the stage and shook things up and thats great, but people still being all about her...cant stand it.

heres to hope and change...

'spread the wealth around'

For those of you who missed it, the OECD put out a report last week called Growing Unequal?. The report focused on income distribution and poverty in OECD countries. In the midst, as we likely are, of a very serious recession, this report strikes me as particularly relevant. It shouldn't be surprising to most that according to the report, the gap between the rich and the poor has continued to widen over the past two decades. What concerns me is that I sense a very strong sense of apathy about this issue. Interestingly, I read about the report in the Financial Times (of London), but nobody has mentioned it to me here at home, nor have I seen any mention of it in the media.

I'll spare you a country by country breakdown (I was disaappointed to see that both inequality and rates of child poverty have gotten worse in Canada), but I found notable that many of the changes are attributed to demographic changes in the labor force. The bird's eye view is that people in obsolete jobs get left behind as economies increasingly shift into more valuable, often information-intensive roles. Here, it must be said, strong social programs such as education seem to be the key. Protectionism, even when it manages to keep obsolete jobs around, too often leads to stagnant wages that cause the workers' income to shrink over time (on a relative basis). Indeed, the authors make this very point, although certainly not exclusively.

Nordic countries and western European countries, such as
Austria, Belgium and the Netherlands. Social spending on people of working age
was 7-8% of national income in 2005 and the share of working-age people in
poverty was between 5% and 8%. At the other end of the spectrum, Korea, Mexico,
Turkey and the United States spent 2% or less of national income on benefits and
had 12-15% of the working age population in poverty.

I could go on for pages and pages about this, but instead, I'll just encourage you to go and read the report yourself.

The authors also emphasize that "Work alone is not sufficient to avoid poverty: more than half of poor people live in households where one or more members are in work." Sad, no? On this closing note, I would strongly urge all of you to read The Working Poor: Invisible in America by David Shipley.

NKW

HOLY $HIZA....

http://www.foxsearchlight.com/notorious/


with TEASER!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Damn, i might come back to NY just to watch this....i guess just with nitin, but still...pub crawl may way back to the east coast...

Schwarzenegger library…

Did anyone know that in Demolition man they predicted that Arnold would get the 61st amendment passed and become the president of the uS>????

I bet gulp did, and I bet gulp could recite the dialoge line for line with perfect actor accents...

Shampoo Challange.....

I challange any and all of our great picklers to find me a shampoo that does not, FOR FREE, give you an extra 20% of shampoo....

wtf is this, some sort of big joke? scam? does JnJ think we are soo stupid as to be like, well they offer me 20% more so I should go with them...and 20% more than what? More than when they first started manufacturing the bottles 40 freakig years ago???? come on

Norman Mailer, 1962 (Some Things Stay The Same)

To the Editor of Playboy
December 21, 1962

Dear Sir,

I wish you hadn't billed the debate between William Buckley and myself as a meeting between a conservative and a liberal. I don't care if people call me a radical, a rebel, a red, a revolutionary, an outsider, an outlaw, a Bolshevik, an anarchist, a nihilist, or even a left conservative, but please don't ever call me a liberal.

Yours,
Norman Mailer

sandwiches, sweaters and wtf....

lest start with wtf....
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26952469/
you dont need to read the article, just know the title, NYT "Concerns grow about Palin's readiness as test looms"...i mean are you seriuos? did people actually believe she could be the president of the us, cause if so wow im glad I live in barcelona.

Next, sweaters. So im at this club with my friend mike and like 10 dudes roll in with thier button downs tucked into their jeans all, literally all sporting sweaters around their necks, like this was some sort of lame ass country club/dueschbag appreciation day...I think they were from Mexico, not sure though...need to check that out.

Also other than a council on pickles I think one needs to be made on sandwiches. A sandwhich is not just 2 loaves of bread with some meat in the middle...you gotta have the ill ness, the cheese, the lettuce, the tomatoe, dare I say it, the PICKLE!!!people in Spain are leading half lives without access to proper sandwiches...thus I think a council should be made and rules adhered to on what does and does not constitue a sandwhich.

thats about it for me, reid u made this too difficult...

and i leave you with this pickled image. What do my two favorite things combined looke like?

i was gonna start picklin'...

but then, walking around campus, i noticed a familiar sight on a tv screen. mtv deux was playing a rap video filmed on court street in the cradle of hip hop history known as carroll gardens. two things caught my eye-one, the restaurant marco polo was featured in the background.

in front of marco polo was assembled the unwhitest assembly of individuals i have ever seen on court street. and one of these guys (marco polo himself) is actually not unwhite at all. in fact, he's a very well known white dude that we have for a long time been calling BRIAN ROOT BERNSTEIN.



That's right-BRB, who has also fooled the world into thinking he is not actually Collie Buddz:


has yet another identity. I know you think he just wanted to put Carroll Gardens on the map, but i contend that no, he is in fact trying to compete with his bitter rival Gulpreet Singh for total alternate identities (Gulp is also known to the world as Bill Richardson, Jon Belushi, and Horatio Sanz).

























So be advised-the war is on. Root's catching up to Gulp with a pretty bold move, but Gulp still has the edge.

In the meantime, all of our loyal readers should know that our pickling operation is currently active in the ENTIRE FUCKING GLOBE (the entire fucking globe meaning: Brooklyn, Barcelona, Los Angeles, possibly DC/Vermont. I see you Robe Riche.)! And we are currently right at the precipice of actually picklin' stuff. So if you are in one of those locales, you can be sure to sample our many pickled products some time soon.






(areas of our pickling operation (graphic representation))

xoxoxo

richard reid

Trumpets

Well, the last few weeks have been busy, to say the least.

While Jamal left for Spain, my old company went bankrupt, and the US financial system collapsed, I was listening to the new TV On The Radio album, titled Dear Science. The album is phenomenal, to say the least, and I'm very excited to see them at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple this October. Speaking of which, just what do you do at these meetings, Jamal? I'd like you guys listen to the third track, Dancing Choose, and pay attention to the trumpets at the end. Isn't that wicked energy?

In other news, my initial reaction to McCain pulling out of Friday's debate was that it was politically brilliant. Somehow, he nearly found a way to turn the economic issue in his favour by drawing Obama into displaying his 'ambition over country' attitude. True to form, though, Barack Obama handled it in exactly the right way, so I can only hope that all goes as Rob Rich says it will. Seriously, though, who isn't excited to see John McCain trying to keep up in a debate?

On the note of Fort Greene, my childhood friend Shival is working out great as a roommate, but it looks like he may have to move out for October. So I'm back on the search.

Sour pickles are better than sweet.





NKW