“The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley”

Most are more familiar with the standard English version “The best laid schemes of mice and men go often askew” from the poem "To a Mouse, on Turning Her Up in Her Nest with the Plough" by Scotsman Robert Burns in 1785. Jason Levin an Oregon middle school teacher who was willing going to great lengths to crash and bring down the Tea Party Movement quit his teaching job before the school district fired him. School district apparently did an investigation on the teacher but did not release any information.

“Levin, a media lab technology teacher at Conestoga Middle School, drew international attention last spring after creating crashtheteaparty.org. The now defunct site had said it was part of a national movement to "dismantle and demolish the tea party by any nonviolent means necessary."


The site encouraged people to infiltrate the tea party, then misspell protest signs, make wild claims during interviews and perform other public actions that would damage the public's opinion of the tea party.”

Are we sure we are talking about a middle school teacher and not a middle school student?

“In a now deleted post on his "Crash the Tea Party" Web site, he called on his supporters to collect the Social Security numbers -- among other personal identifying information -- about as many Tea Party supporters as possible at the numerous rallies that took place on Thursday, Tax Day.


"Some other thoughts are to ask people at the rally to sign a petition renouncing socialism. See just how much info you can get from these folks (name address, DOB, Social Security #). The more data we can mine from the Tea Partiers, the more mayhem we can cause with it!!!!" he wrote.”

How old is this guy? So would it be ok Mr. Levin if someone took your personal information and misused it and put you through hell? Of course it’s different, right? Well maybe it’s just me but I see this as immature and self-center act.

“Levin has said he would seek to embarrass Tea Partiers by attending their rallies dressed as Adolf Hitler, carrying signs bearing racist, sexist and anti-gay epithets and acting as offensively as possible -- anything short of throwing punches.”

Really Mr. Levin, you want to dressing up as Hitler to embarrass the Tea Party? Sir, get a life. You really have nothing better to do with yourself? Are you really that afraid of a group that is basically a Libertarian movement that supports lower taxes and smaller government. Mr. Levin you as a teacher should realize Hitler and the Nazi Party not only was about being anti-Semitic but was Socialist that believed in big government and government control of people. So it’s kind of stupid to be dressed up Hitler and go to a small government and less interference in people’s lives rally, isn’t it? Ah! That’s right Mr. Levin was a teacher for a public school which depends on government funding by tax payers. So big government and taxes is good for them.

When I was in public school many many years ago the teachers weren’t paid much and lucky to a modest pension. I remember that it wasn’t uncommon to see your teacher working as a clerk in a store when school was out for summer break. I liked the majority of my teachers and even then I felt they were underpaid. But when I was in High School I started to asked them why did you become a teacher? Now a couple males teachers said they became teachers to keep from going to Vietnam but they as well as the rest of the male and female teachers said because they love teaching and that they don’t teach because of the money or the benefits or the respect because there isn’t any. But it was because they really love to teach. But I wonder about many teachers today. I’m sure there are those who love teaching but would many of them today be willing to do it if it was 20 plus years ago.

Anyway let’s get back to the Tea Party thing.

“In a recent interview with Talking Points Memo, Levin said of his plans, "Our goal is that whenever a Tea Partier says 'Barack Obama was not born in America,' we're going be right there next to them saying, 'Yeah, in fact he wasn't born on Earth! He's an alien!'"

Mr. Levin seems to have a problem Birthers whom some go to Tea Parties but Mr. Levin what about liberal 9/11 Truthers? Will you going stand up to a Truther as well? Personally I don’t waste my time with either one. Until there is real evidence and not conspiracy theory I have more important things to worry about. Are all Tea Party members Birthers? I doubt it.

Look whackos show up to all political events. They show up liberal events and conservative events and everywhere in between. So will a racist or far right nut show up to a Tea Party? I have no doubt they will, but is the Tea Party sexist, anti-Semitic, anti-gay and racist? I’m sure many on the left will say yes, and there are certain members of the media and liberal bloggers that have been working hard to find any little thing that they can use to discredit the Tea Party but yet just can’t seem to bring them down. The Washington Times did interview at least three people “whom are black”.

“The Washington Times caught up with several health care bill protesters, all three of whom are black, and asked their thoughts on the allegations regarding the racial epithets.

Bill Owens Jr., a Tea Party Express leader from Las Vegas, said he did not experience or witness any racial hostility.


"I had a chance to be among these people. It's not about pigmentation. You have race issues going on all the time; however, I'm not seeing anything significant from these rallies. It's just not there," he said. "Does a person find a racist once in a while? . . . Sure, you find that anywhere. These people are concerned about the issues of where you stand, not what color you are."

Charlene Freedman, a health care bill protester from New Jersey, has been to Washington four times, since she first attended the 9/12 rally. When asked if she witnessed or heard any racial hostility from the crowd, she said: "Absolutely not . . . just well-wishers. I didn't see color. They didn't see my color. We're just American citizens, and we're here to say, 'Keep America free.' I’ve heard nothing about racism . . . nothing at all."


Jay Jarbo came to the health care protest from Atlanta and explained: "I just want to see them follow the Constitution, and they're not doing that. Anyone that tries to throw around the racial thing, just squash it, because this has nothing to do with race. I haven't heard anyone say anything about race at any one of these events," Mr. Jarbo said. "Honestly, this is the type of thing people bring up to distract from the real issues, and it's always about race in this country, and its always the last card in the deck that everyone plays."

Just to make clear I’m not a Tea Party member but I do agree with some of the things they state that they are for; like lower taxes and smaller government. But I’m a moderate or independent Republican. So Republicans would call me a RINO “Republican In Name Only”, all because I don’t vote straight Republican. But that’s my right as an American.

Mr. Levin should think about this. If some racist right wing loon shows up to a Tea Party gathering spout hateful things but now thanks to Mr. Levin the Tea Party can excuse them as some liberal infiltrator. Oh well, “The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men gang aft agley”

UR

Return of the Record Album?

So I was reading this article on CNN.com “Who's still listening to vinyl?” and it took me back. In my life time I’ve seen record albums (LP, 78s & 45s), 8 tracks, cassettes, CDs and now MP3s. Well I haven’t done the MP3 thing yet. I know some twenty something(s) who are now into getting records and enjoy listening to them. Of course to me it would be nostalgic to them it’s “Retro”. Ah getting old.

I remember when records were thought to be replaced by 8 tracks. This how my first record collection started, I got them handed down to me from my older brothers mostly Beatles, Rolling Stones and The Who, but I also got 8 tracks. 8 tracks had a great sound and you could take them with you, if you had an 8 track player in your car or a portable player. You could even select a song by clicking thru tracks if your player had that capability. The draw backs of the 8 track was many times it had to change tracks in the middle of a song and they were kind of cumbersome to carry around and of course if the tape broke. First 8 tracks I bought with my own money I saved from doing chores was an Alice Cooper album.

Then came the cassette, it was smaller than an 8 track but the sound quality was not as good a record or an 8 track but as teenager who cares. It was portable and you could play it anywhere there was a cassette player. Plus you could take a blank tape and copy a record album to it and play it in your car. But again a draw back with a cassette tape was if the tape broke or got tangled up in the player. Probably the biggest problem with cassettes is you couldn’t select a song. You had to either fast forward or rewind and keep hitting play until you find the beginning of a song. First cassette was a Beatle album. Needless to say I had many 8 tracks and cassettes but it was records that favored.

Record LP albums were great. First you had a great sound but what was even better was the covers and sleeves the records came in. They had either photos or cover art and sometime you found a poster or a collectable photo or a gift certificate. I remember how I would slide the record out, put it on the turn table then set the stylus (aka needle) on the record and sit back looking at the album cover as you waited for the song to start. Your eyes fixed on the cover you ears listening to the low hiss and crackles or pops of the grooves; I was just waiting in anticipation of the first note or sound. Then lost in the sounds of the record and lost visually in the cover or the slide out the sleeve which usually had liner notes and read it over and over. I remember I knew an old man who had a record player set up in a laundry room of an apartment building in the apartment complex I grew up in and I would go over and sit with him as we listen to old 78 records. These records were heavier feeling than modern vinyl records and if you drop them they would break. But I would sit there with him listening to old operas, classical, big bands and crooners. To me this was just as magical as listening to my contemporary vinyl records. The great thing was the imaginary journey you take through the music and even the covers of the records. You couldn’t take the music with you. You had to stay in one place, you could only go as far has you could hear it. Oh and my first record album I bought with money I saved was a David Bowie album.

So the draw backs for records was not being able to listen to it on the move but the other draw back was that you wanted to listen to just one song you had to careful place on the right grooves which could be a pain. But you could usually find a 45 record and even cooler was sometimes lucked out and got a good song on the B side. Another problem was your records had two sides and when one side was done you had to go over and flip it over to listen to the rest of the record. And having the same problem with 8 tracks and cassettes what is one going to do?

Well, the answer was the CD. The CD seems to be the answer for uninterrupted play. That was the selling point. Oh yea, and you were saving trees. CD’s were small and come in plastic cases with less paper. Of course later it became bad to have all those plastic cases floating out there and getting thrown away, so then CDs came in hard paper sleeves and then back to plastic cases. Anyway, CDs sound isn’t bad but not quite same as records and you could take it with you and play it on a portable CD played then CD players became fashionable in cars not to mention if you had a disk drive in you computer. You can select song tracks and even select random play. But what I didn’t like about CD’s was that it comes in a case that is like 5” by 5” give or take an inch. Sure it’s convenient but you can barely see the cover and if you open it you either have fold out or a booklet which either way even with young eyes you need a magnifying glass to read it. Unlike the 12” by 12” record album cover. Oh well as disappointed as I was with the demise of records I accepted it and began getting CDs. But so far I have resisted MP3s which to me is nothing but creations of an A.D.D. society. My first CD well not sure those days are little fuzzy but it might have been a best of ELO or Brian Eno or maybe Ramones.

But I am hopeful with an apparently resurgent of the record albums I won’t be the last generation to enjoy the magic that comes with whole package of a vinyl album and the imaginations that is inspired.

A friend the other day told me he heard a report that our future will lack American inventors because today’s youth lack creativity and imagination. I’m sure there more to it than the lack of records but that’s a post for another day.

I may venture deep into the back of my closet and bring out what few records I have left and play them. Oh wait I don’t have a record player anymore. Rats, screwed again!

UR

Changes

I’m currently making changes to my blog. So over next few days or weeks things may change and hopefully nothing will be lost.

I will be trying different things as I experiment and become familiar with features.

I like to extend my thanks to The Editrix for her helpful suggestion. Being new at all this, constructive suggestions are always welcome. Feed back is welcome.

If anyone like to make a suggestion please feel free but all changes are my choice. If I don't use your suggestion please don't take it personal.


Thanks,
UR