Craig's Blog

Michael Moore and the plight of the liberals

I caught this news story today about Michael Moore's latest shinanigans. When the original story hit the tabloids (lets face it, the word “newspaper” is too high a compliment for the current print media) that Disney was somehow censoring Moore's latest movie by breaking contract with him. He claimed that Disney felt the movie content was too politically charged, since it centered around more of his anti-Bush rhetoric. Right then and there, I knew it was a big publicity stunt and it turns out it was. So Moore claims to be someone who speaks the “real” truth about how King George is screwing us all. Then he pulls this little white lie to get himself heard. So he's just another fool with his own little petty agenda, another wannabe king. Get in line buddy, the line is long, maybe bin Laden will let you bud in line.

So I've been searching for what's considered the liberal point of view in this country, a spokeperson, a source, something. Somebody to give me a different viewpoint on how our country is being handled since I don't feel at ease with some of it. All I keep finding are people that have a lot to say but they offer no solutions, only complaints about the current state of affairs. Al Franken is a good example, all he says is to be completely opposite of Bill O'Reilly. He even named his radio show the O'Franken Factor. The closest I've gotten to understanding the liberal viewpoint is by reading Bill Maher, and I don't consider him a liberal. It just seems those who do get their voices heard are complete idiots and therefore newsworthy by the media. So the crap media just feeds the flames of crap journalism and talking heads that have nothing of value to say. It's like a positive feedback cycle. Do you know most people ages 18-30 get their news from the John Stewart Daily Show (a half hour comedy making fun of the news)? I half expect to turn on the tube and see Jay Leno giving the news on NBC someday. The media is all a big game played by power brokers to sell more Coca-Cola and the latest Hollywood shithole movie. So if they don't report worthy news, report on overblown situations to increase their revenues, dumb down the general public (aka consumers) who cares, it's money in the bank for the fat cats. It's like Orwell -- peace is war, hate is love.

Anyway back to the liberals. Is there a liberal point of view? Do our views really differ that much anymore? Have we become politically homogenous? Have we all become little automatons of the media? Is this just another 'lusion? Where's the crazy socialist when you need him most? Oh he's in line behind Michael Moore, nevermind ;-)

KSHE 95

I grew up listening to my favorite rock station, KSHE 95 in St.Louis. They grew out of the counter-culture of the 1960s and acquired quite a faithful audience over the years. It was known for playing whole albums and of course playing up the drugs part of sex, drugs and rock n roll. They took chances with bands that were begging to be played and eventually made it big (ei. REO Speedwagon, Sammy Hagar, Rush). They were heavily involved with sponsoring large outdoor concerts, namely the Mississippi River Festivals. It was “cool” to listen to KSHE growing up. Like all good things those days are over, they've been usurped by corporate radio and now are just a vanilla top 40 rock station that lives off their heritage as the “first“ rock station and it's colorful history. Somebody wrote a good article on it's history on kuroshin. It's interesting to me how KSHE's popularity disseminated into the other parts of the country. I can remember seeing people filesharing mp3s on Napster and prefacing the titles with (KSHE Classic).

So where does that leave us? Well I'm older now and hopefully wiser. I still listen to a lot of the music I grew up with, some of it I've come to the realization of how shallow and cheap it really was. I've expanded my musical “experience” to classical, big band, country, showtunes, folk and other genres. Unlike the popular XM satellite radio which pidgeon holes you into a certain genre, I'd prefer a radio station that would play a mixture of a lot of genres. I see nothing wrong with playing Beethoven next to Ted Nugent, or Garth Brooks next to Frank Sinatra. To me it would be full immersion, total entertainment. So as result of this I (with the help of my friend Lou) have collected a large set of mp3s (numbering around 8000 in my last count) that I usually play randomly from my hard drive. Its the ideal radio station for me, everything I like, no commercials and at random. Happy happy joy joy!

What does the future hold? XM Radio? Internet radio? Good question. Something the music industry is spending a large amount of time, money and energy trying to decide for us. As the old Cheap Trick song went -- “you can't stop the music“...

As a side note, when I lived in Cincinnati they had a popular rock station that had some history too. I don't remember the call letters but they referred to themselves as “the Frog”. Like KSHE it fell from grace and now just pump out tape loops of AC/DC and the Doors.