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at least it’s better than falafel balls

Yum.Happy Tuesday.

In our house, I handle the money.  I take care of our savings, investments, bills, budget, etc.  I do most of this in a vacuum, as Sharaun’s threshold for caring about money vs. not caring about money is simple: As long as there’s money available when she needs it then there’s not a money problem.  This works for us for a couple reasons: 1) We communicate about spending pretty openly and regularly, and 2) We’re both fairly cheap, frugal.  Yeah we’re not the most miserly of penny-pinchers, but we don’t spend excessively.

Lately, I’ve been trying to share the details and workings of our budget with Sharaun.  This involves some “training” on my complex household-finances spreadsheet.  When I’ve tried to review it with her, I can tell she’s just favoring me – pretending she cares how much of my paycheck goes to the 401k, what the margin is on our stock sales, etc.  It’s OK, at least she knows where the spreadsheet is and how to (sorta) read it.  She’ll never have to be in the business of changing the numbers, hopefully, so I guess that’s about all I need to ask of her anyway.

One positive result of this budget review is Sharaun looking for little ways to save money.  Part of this has seen her decide that planning a weekly “menu” of dinners is more cost-effective (in terms of the shopping required) than planning things quick day-of.  Subsequently, she’s started trying to map out our meals in advance, choosing a bunch of dishes she cooks semi-regularly anyway and assembling them into a canon of stock meals she can rotate through.  I’m not exactly sure how this saves money (other than the assumption that shopping strictly against a fixed list discourages impulse purchases), but it has sparked an idea for the blog…

See, Sharaun’s exercises in meal-planning remind me of my own childhood.  Wherein my Mom would make a weekly meal schedule, a “menu” if you will, and post it to the fridge for the family to see.  She’d have the nights of the week and what would be for dinner each night.  As I kid, I took this for granted.  It was nice being able to look forward to Thursday’s “chicken and wild rice casserole” on Monday, the elements of predictability and anticipation worked well, I think even encouraged the family to come together at mealtime (which wasn’t an option, we always ate together).

Near universally, I loved my Mom’s cooking (I never was too big on tuna casserole).  Culinarily, I’d say my Mom was a study of the famously checkered Better Homes cookbook, which, along with the Joy of Cooking and a handful of recipes passed down from her mom – made up the lion’s share of her drawn-on resources.  Of these cookbooks, I think she lingered mostly in the “casserole” and/or “quick & easy family friendly” chapters.  I imagine the 70s having played a large role in her cooking style, not only a decade in which the US went casserole-crazy, but the decade where I suppose she defined her meal repertoire as a wife and mother.  Now this isn’t to say that casseroles were all my mom cooked, it’s just that I remember a lot of them.

And, like I said, me not being a picky eater my Mom’s fare nearly always seemed palatable.  I loved the casseroles, the pork chops, the hamburgers, all of it.  And it didn’t matter to me that we rotated through what must have been a few week’s of stable-recipes – in fact I think I rather enjoyed having a favorite few dishes I could count on popping up every so often.  The regularity was a good thing.  And, when my Mom did decide, by whim or necessity or whatever, to break from the standard meal rotation and try something new – it was always a notable evening.

And, with the last sentence of that, my now sixth paragraph, I’ve setup the actual bit I wanted to write about.  Sometimes I might overdo the exposition… y’know?  Anyway…

Sharaun’s menu-planning got us talking about my Mom’s menu-planning the other night at dinner.  And, thinking about that reminded me of a story that our family sometimes still talks about to this day: The time my mom thought she’d go all exotic and try making falafel balls for dinner. Talk about a break from the dinnertime status-quo, falafel balls were about as far away from our typical repast as you could get.  Perhaps Mom wanted to add an international flare to mealtime, perhaps there was a “falafel is ultimate good for you” fad going around at the time (you know… the flaxseed, whole grain, no trans-fat, and steel-cut oats kinda fad).  Whatever the motivation, the results will live forever in dinner-table infamy for our our family.

The actual point here is that my Mom’s falafel balls turned out horrible.  Now, I can’t quite recall if this is because we simply agreed that we weren’t falafel people or if she actually botched the recipe and the resulting “balls” were inedible.  But either way, the family universally agreed that falafel balls were the worst thing ever. In fact, I still get a smile when I think about how we all choked down our hesitant bites at the dinner table, and can remember being a bit surprised by my folks’ open disgust at how badly they’d turned out (as a kid I guess I was somewhat stumped that my Mom’s feelings weren’t hurt, and that she was openly acknowledging how horrid her own creation was).

Point being that, from that meal on, no matter how bad anything we ate was – we could always joke that it was, at least, “not as bad as falafel balls.”  To this day I sometimes catch myself thinking that in my head when I don’t like something I’m eating.

“Hey, at least it’s better than falafel balls.”

I’m lucky now… Sharaun is an excellent chef, and has a wide selection of things she cooks for our family.  In fact, I’ve said to her on many occasion that I’ve not disliked anything she’s ever made for us – and I’m being honest.  Her meals are almost always enjoyable, and I always find myself grateful for the food she makes for Keaton and I.  I make sure and let her know that, and I think I do so fairly religiously after each meal. And, I’ve told her the falafel ball family apocrypha too – so maybe knowing that the low-mark on the bar is pretty dang low gives her that extra confidence.  Ha.

Well, I think I remembered that right… maybe the falafel balls were only a big deal in my head.

Goodnight!

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time flies

3yoSunday afternoon and it’s raining.

Appropriately, Zeppelin’s “Rain Song” has shuffled up on the iPod.  This song always reminds me of walking to Robin’s house from mine, back around 8th grade or so.  My first real girlfriend.  Keaton’s got her head on my lap and I’m trying to pretend these stupid apple slices are as good a “snack” as the leftover piece of pizza in the fridge would be (being a salty-carbs-over-sweets-anyday guy, fruit as snacks just doesn’t cut it).

Sharaun’s been gone most of the afternoon, first at a baby shower and now at the the gym (where I’ll be later, I think).  That means I get a lot of time with Keaton.  OK so she napped for most of it, and I for a good bit too, but we did get some time hang out.  Keaton knows that Dad’s not much of a TV guy, and that when we’re home together (and whenever he can get away with it, really), he’s got tunes on rather than the television.  And lately she’s been asking more questions like, “Daddy, what are we listening to?,” and “Daddy, what band is this?”  For me this is simply thrilling; I love it.

So much so that I started teaching and quizzing her today, trying to see if she would repeat back the groups I’d name for her.  I was having so much fun hearing her exclaim things like, “But beetles can’t talk!,” and, “Butter-feel band,” (no, she seriously said those things) that I got out the iPhone and recorded the following exchange.  Thought it was worth posting, so here ya go:

[audio:PFloyd.mp3]
Talk about leading a guy on only to crush his fragile heart in the end!

Funny girl, that Keaton…

Oh, and, did I mention that Keaton had her big three-year-old birthday last week?  No, well she did.  Prompted by that event, I think, I added some new pictures to her gallery.  Make sure you head over there and check out what’s been going on in Keatonland for the past couple months.  Here’s the link, enjoy.

Goodnight.

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stuck in the thicklebits

The thicklebits.The other day Keaton came running to Sharaun, seemingly in distress.

Mommy!!  Can you help me find Kia?!

You can’t find Kia?

No, she’s stuck in the thicklebits.

She’s stuck where?

In the thicklebits.

Now, if it were me on the receiving end of this conversation, I would just assume the “thicklebits” was a made-up three-year-old word (albeit a nicely-phrased one, with the assonance and whatnot).  But Sharaun, she’s more in-tune with the Keaton-mind than am I.

Immediately, she recognized the “thicklebits” as a Keaton-esque mis-pronunciation of a Backyardigans tune.  Apparently, in a certain episode where the intrepid Tasha, Uniqua, Tyrone, Pablo, and Austin are about to trek off into the deepest regions of a dark jungle, they sing a song that goes something like this…

Into the thick of it. Into the thick of it.
Into the thick of it. Ugh!
We’re tramping through the bush.
On and on we push. Into the thick of it,
But we can’t see where we’re going.
We’ve made a stellar start.
To find the jungle’s heart.
But all we’ll find is nothing,
If we can’t see where we’re going!
Into the thick of it.
Into the thick of it. Into the thick of it.
But we can’t see where we’re going!
Into the thick of it.
Into the thick of it. Into the thick of it.
But we can’t see where we’re going! Ugh!
The jungle’s kind of tricky,
The path is never straight,
And sometimes there’s no path at all
Which makes it hard to navigate.
Although the jungle’s thick,
We’re moving through it quick.
But that won’t do us any good
If we’re going around in circles.
Into the thick of it.
Into the thick of it. Into the thick of it.
We’re going round in circles! Ugh!
These trees look so familiar,
We’ve been here once before.
You’re right, except it wasn’t once
It was three times, or four.
Stuck in the thick of it!
Stuck in the thick of it!
Stuck in the thick of it!
We’ve gone around in circles

And so was solved the mystery of the “thicklebits.”

Like I said, I think it’s a great word; and I’ve taken to saying it all the time now when I want to refer somewhere way-far-off-lost.  Like, “I can’t find the matching left sock for my black pair, it’s like it’s lost in the thicklebits,” or, “Did you hear that weirdo talking about the stimulus, was his brain off in the thicklebits or what?”

Goodnight internet.

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before pro tools and cubase

Original.Monday night and I’ll kick off this music-centric entry with a prayer:

Dear Lord I’d like to thank you.

For the first time since I discovered Beatles bootlegs, became a fervent collector, and eventually amassed all that there was to hear (quite truthfully), and then quit the game once the unreleased material dried up, you have blessed us fanatics with something truly amazing. As always, I am in awe of the work of these sonic wizards, and I thank you for bringing new material to the forefront.

Blessed be the well-oiled and poorly-secured doors on the Apple vaults.

No but seriously, last week one of the holy grails of unreleased Beatles’ material leaked out to the web: the full eleven minute “take 20” of the White Album track, “Revolution 1,” which is the slowed-down, mellowed-out original version of the heavier (and more familiar to most) “Revolution” released earlier that summer in 1968 as a B-side to “Hey Jude.” This take is described in Beatles recording session expert Mark Lewisohn’s incredibly detailed book, Complete Beatles Chronicle, with the following entry:

Tuesday 4 June, 1968
Studio Three, EMI Studios, London

A session of unusual overdubs and experiments for “Revolution 1” 2:30pm-1:00am.  John re-taped his lead vocal – and, attempting to alter his voice in some way, he lay flat out on the floor of studio three while doing so.

Paul and George added a persistent backing vocal that went along the lines of “Mama Dada Mama Dada Mama Dada” towards the end of the ten-minute recording, Ringo added some percussive clicks, John a tone-pedal guitar part, Paul an organ part and the group then spent some time creating two tape loops, neither of which was used.

A rough mono mix of take 20 (which was a reduction of 19) and an additional copy of this made at the end of the session were taken away by John and one other person (unnamed on studio documents).

So there you go. Fifty years later that “additional copy” made for “one other unnamed person” has made it onto the internet. One of only two copies in the world, the other presumably still locked away in the studio gathering dust. Tip o’ the hat to you, unnamed person.  Too bad that I am, in all likelihood, celebrating the passing of unnamed person – as I’d be willing to bet that was the catalyst for a changing of hands, or sharing without repercussion, of this tape.

And, before I continue this essay on the new tape, I need  to wax a bit about the current state of the bootleg “scene…”  Please bear with me (or, skip three paragraphs ahead if you simply can’t).

While I’ve been away from the “Beatleg” trade for years now, I do still follow what small “development” there is in terms of new material, new labels and players, and what may be on the horizon. With most of the old-school European bootleggers now IFPI’d out of business, all physical production has moved to Japan. I have a hunch that most of the material appearing is still coming from the same European and US “sources,” but that it’s just too risky anymore to print the physical media in that arena. Besides, the internet has marginalized the market for physical bootlegs. Sure you’re still guaranteed the collectors who want the physical discs – but you don’t have to seek them out in order to hear the material, as the new generation will just wait until they are digitized and put on their favorite tracker to download.

Funny enough, hardcore bootleg addicts being a peculiar bunch, it’s not a surprise that there’s a growing “rip opposition” movement amongst the die-hards, in which they promise not to rip the discs and post them on torrent trackers for the world to hear. This somewhat anti-sharing, reveling in exclusivity snobbery is classic Beatleg hoarder behavior… so it’s not unexpected. After all, he who has the rarest cut wins.

But, in this day and age, you simply cannot keep things off the internet. Unless you’re unwilling to brag, unwilling to cut just that one copy for your best mate and fellow collector, it’s gonna end up online. And let’s face it, what good is having the rarest bit of tape in the world if you can’ brag about having the rarest bit of tape in the world, right? And so, even things shared amongst a privileged few under strict pacts of non-torrenting will, and do, end up online.

And so it is that I’m here listening to this amazing piece of history, five minutes into an eleven minute descent into John & Yoko tape-loop madness. I can remember the stories I read as a teenager, how John had taken some of the “stranger” bits of the extended “Revolution 1” sessions and warped, reversed, and wrecked them into his music-concrete stunner, “Revolution 9.” “Revolution 9,” the track that I used to be scared to listen to in the dark. Seriously. And, in this brilliant new leak, you can hear the elements John used to craft that piece of “musical” nonsense. The bassline Lennon buried as the “drive” for his piece, the tape-stretched and effect-drenched yelps and whoops, it’s all there. But here, in this take of “Revolution 1,” it’s still musical.

And, I’ll be honest, I listened to it at least ten times this morning, over and over and over. Hearing pristine new Beatles audio like this hasn’t been an experience I’ve had in a good while. Not since the “Hey Jude” sessions leaks back before Anthology have I been this intrigued with a new leak, nor has there been a leak this significant.

Well, I suppose the Sgt. Pepper multi-tracks were about equal in importance, but you don’t get the gravity of hearing “new” material with them – just the underlying 4-tracks of songs you’re already intimately familiar with. That said, to me the availability of this recording trumps the Pepper multi-tracks in terms of sheer enjoyment derived from listening.

I got into a bit of an academic discussion about the track with Ben today… the only one I really know who can stand to get “academic” about music, other than a close buddy in Florida who wasn’t online at the time and doesn’t quite share my Gods-on-high view of the Beatles. I shared the track with him and he queued it up at work for a listen. His reaction interested me, as he remarked something like, “This is very shoegazer-ish, just epic. Goes on and on and on and on. Like a Ride song. This track is downright great. Love it.”

At which point, I got on a favorite soapbox of mine and tried to explain how, listening to stuff like this now, with our modern appreciation of music, it’s hard to imagine just how groundbreaking and ahead of its time it was back in 1968. I tell this to Sharaun all the time when she says things like, “Yeah, the Beatles are good, but I don’t hear why people think they were so revolutionary or groundbreaking.”

It’s all well and good to say something like that having had the luxury of hearing all the areas music has managed to explore since the Beatles were around. What they invented, modern music has emulated… so without going back into the past and unhearing what those musical seeds blossomed into post-Beatles it’s virtually impossible to hear the stuff as one would have then, that is – in a context all its own.

Anyway, I make a similar argument to Ben, saying how, at the time, some of the more inspired bits the Beatles did stood wholly on their own ground, without reference and completely new unto the world. He agrees with me, and we both wonder at how some of the interesting techniques were achieved in the pre-digital world. Before Pro Tools and Cubase, the kind of stretched and warped vocals Lennon gets on the recording were done completely manually, pressing pencil erasers to running tapes, feeding microphones through hand-built effects pedals, physically cutting and looping tape (yes, with scissors and tape). We both bask for a while in the combined glow of the recording and our hipster music-nerd pomp, and close the conversation by agreeing that it’s like someone travelled back in time and anonymously dropped a copy of Nowhere at Lennon’s flat.

Yeah, it really is that advanced. I know, after all this you might want to hear it too, right? Well OK, here ‘tis. Enjoy.

And now that you’ve heard it, you’re free to accuse me of gushing over nothing. But you have to understand where I’m coming from, the history of the matter here. What’s that, you don’t really understand the history? I’ve never told you the history? Oh man… this is… big.

In fact, now that I think about it, I’ve written about bits and snatches of my history with bootlegs over the years, but a quick search of the blog annals shows I’ve never tacked a concise overview of how it all started, how it all got just a little bit out of control, and how it arrived where it is today.

But, I’ll get to it tomorrow, as I’ve already written a ton today.  Hope someone enjoyed it, take care  – I’m off to the gym (but not before I load up this new leak on the iPod for some more ear-time).

Goodnight.

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for both the sunshine and rain

Sunshowers.Friday the sun was out and shining in Northern California.  Oh and I was enticed… started thinking Spring and Summer thoughts: barbecues, camping, hiking, swimming… I was enticed to be sure.  Even the trees agreed with me, as some are sporting premature pink and white buds as if the weather really were changing.

Saturday the blessed weather held.  Sharaun had a New Kids on the Block fan “meetup” in the city, and so Keaton and (no, wait… you’re still thinking about that bit before the comma, right?  Yeah, a New Kids on the Block fan “meetup”) so Keaton and I had the morning to ourselves. Me with designs on heading to the gym later, and her with plenty of energy to expend, I decided on a course of action which would take care of both and afford us a chance to enjoy the unseasonably nice weather.

I hitched the kiddie trailer on the bike and trekked to the local park where we met friends for playtime in the warmth.  Others shared our idea, and Spring-enthusiasm, and the place was packed.  The smell of charcoal filled the air as folks grilled hot dogs and burgers, the premature pink and white buds of humankind I guess.  Keaton ran around with her compatriot Jake, swinging, climbing, and running around the bases on the baseball field; was a great time.

Sunday the cold and rain returned.  It’s good, really, we need the rain something awful.  Against my Spring fever, I do hope it sticks around for a while and fills up the Sierra lakes and streams which so badly wont for it.

All the rain, and a dosing of fertilizer, has nearly re-greened my lawn to good-neighbor standards.  It’s also got the weeds in full-season, choking out any area where the grass isn’t thick enough to fight them off.  I wrote briefly before about how I was considering a lawn service, and I think I’m even closer now to making that decision: I want a lawn service.  I want to pay someone my hard-earned money to come in and make the place beatiful.  Or… do I?  Man, this is a tough one.

Anyway, it was a good weekend; for both the sunshine and rain.  Let’s see where the week goes, shall we?

Goodnight.

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comforting. permanent.

Gleeman.Thursday night.

After some 5:30pm peer pressure from coworkers, I did an about face on my “going home, going to dinner, then going to the gym” evening and instead joined them at the bar for happy hour.  It was a welcomed break.  See, the whole annual review process at the sawmill culminated today, ending in a manager staring-contest worth of Guinness.  In the end, things went as good as can be expected, and, as always, the proceedings were torture.  So, to recap: reviews are done; cold beer was had; calorie intake was monitored.  Let’s go.

The crew that met tonight for happy hour is a crew I’ve run with almost from day-one at the sawmill.  Because of this, we have a lot of history, a lot of stories.  And, on the rare occasion when we all get together (difficult these days, as we now live on different continents), those same told and re-told stories are trotted out and run once around the track again for old-time sake.  Something of a tradition, even though we’ve all heard them before, we tell them again.

… the Cuban arm-wrestling contest in the Shanghai apartment…

… the guy who left a pair of soiled underwear in his desk drawer after losing his job…

Seems like they get funnier and more grand with each telling.  How a story about “finding” an employee who’d  gone completely MIA whilst in Taiwan by seeing him on television, whilst visiting there yourself months later, being arrested in a transvestite prostitution sting can get any more “grand” remains to be seen, but we seem to be able to pull it off.

Every single time we get together.  Comforting.  Permanent.

A good way to start off a weekend.

Goodnight.

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a new empire in rags

Freeper.Well guys, it’s Tuesday night and I’ve been writing all day long.  From early morning until five o’clock I hovered over the keyboard banging keys to create reviews of my employees.  And then, fingers still stiff and sore from that – I went on a blog tirade.  So then, it’s a longwinded political rant today, and I’m not going to do as much pre-defense and positioning as I typically do (mostly because it’s all embedded in the glut of it all).  I’ll return to regular blogging as soon as possible.

One of my favorite daily (when I can) reads are the all-out crazy forums over at the neo-conservative haven that is Free Republic. “Freepers,” as they are called, have a simply laid out forum where they can post stories and comment back… and the prevailing topics of conversation could be said to lend insight into what the larger GOP “base” is talking about. Of course, there are nuts everywhere on the internet (and in the real world, for that matter) – both on the left and right and even in the non-committal center. But man, the Freepers can really do some good crazy… like Hannity crazy. Oh wait… you don’t think Hannity is crazy?… oh boy you’re gonna love this then…

I mean, some of the threads there are just beautiful.  Here, check some of this cerebral stuff:

Took the words right out of my mouth!! I am a member of Team Sarah and we are doing everything possible to assist Sarah in anyway necessary to get her the nomination in 2012. She will wipe the floor with Obama, please, Obama is crapping his pants now thinking of it. He doesn’t want to be in the same room with Sarah Palin, if they do debate, I hope he is wearing dark pants

From Dissing Palin

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Couldn’t they put the koran in the bathroom? That’s where my copy is, at least what’s left of it.

Shouldn’t it be on the floor where islamderthals can walk on it?

From Libraries put Bible on top shelf in a sop to Muslims

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Foolish people, Lord, worship a man rather than You. The thing created ignores its Creator and worships a fellow creation. What a crazy world we live in these days, and getting crazier by the moment.

Heavenly Father, we come to You today amazed that almost one month into the Obama Presidency that there is never a lack of things to pray for. I wish his first month would have been less eventful, but as I feared, he has moved swiftly in his destruction of all that we hold near and dear. Still, we are not destroyed entirely and so there is hope. There may be scars we may pay for for years, but if You were to intervene, this nation could still be saved. Whether or not it is in Your plan to intervene in this case is not something that You have revealed to me. Still, I believe it pleases You when we recognize You for who You are. You are the great Almighty God, and nothing is too difficult for You. Men’s hearts are as putty in Your hands. And Obama’s heart is not beyond Your grasp. Is he meant for judgment or amazement? I really don’t know. But so that we may have peaceful lives in this nation, I pray for his soul that the world may be amazed at the change You bring in his life.

From PRAY for our Nation and For the Conversion of President Obama – Day 96

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Radical Islam is an insane murder cult.

Moderate Islam is its Trojan Horse in the West.

From Islamic subversion alleged by speaker, where we learn the secret-Mulsims are silently implementing Islamic law in the USA

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In a brainwashing project that ought to tug on liberal heartstrings, schoolchildren have been encouraged to address prayers to Chairman Zero. A touching example:

I would appreciate it if you would try to make this a greener planet and try to bring home the troops and end the war. I am very luckey because I am not part of a military family, but it saddens me to hear about all the people who die in Iraque and know that somewhere In the world people are greiving over a lost family member.

It looks like our public schools are succeeding in their mission of cranking out a new generation of Democrats.

From Children Taught to Pray to Obama

Sorry to over-represent the religious aspect, but those tend to be some of the “better” threads.  And now that I’ve poked a little fun (to be fair, there are some level-headed folks on there too), I feel like I can use the open-door to talk about my current theory around the neo-conservative movement in the US.

For my purposes here, I want to lump a bunch of folks into one category – that may seem unfair, but I want to apply some thinking to the group as a whole, and I’m trying to make the point that, although modern conservatives have a varied and diverse taxonomy, some things can be said of them as a group.

Now, who am I talking about here? Those referred to as neo-conservative and the Christian or religious right, that’s who. It’s my belief that these groups are killing the Republican party, and that if their philosophies are not decoupled from its basic dogma the GOP will not win a general election again in this increasingly moderate USA.

Hey look, I realize the GOP’s “problem” has been looked at and analyzed (not to mention denied in its very existence) by folks with a heck of a lot more degrees than I have, and I’ll be the first to say my thoughts here aren’t entirely my own. I’ve read several political pundits variations on this same thing, so I’m at best doing an ineloquent rewrite here of an already prominent school of thought. But, that’s what the internet is all about right? I also realize things aren’t near as simple as an “extreme” right becoming an increasingly alienated minority in an ever-more progressive nation – but that’s a reality and it’s where I’ve chosen to write. With those disclaimers in place, I’ll plow along.

Part of the GOP’s problem right now, as I see it, is that they’ve completely lost “country focus.” That is, their “base” has become a group that is fighting stupid battles, and as such their platform and policy have drifted away from things which are centered on the welfare of the nation and has instead been laser focused on several extremely divisive wedge issues. I’ll go even further, and say that this “base” has become xenophobic, fear-controlled, overly militaristic, ritualistically distrustful, and even strangely proud of their cloistered ignorance.

Oh boy, there it goes… now I’ve got some folks mad I’m sure. If the party continues to court this group as their “base,” I believe they are doomed to spiral into obscurity.

What seems at-odds to me, however, is that I don’t really believe these types are the true GOP “base.” In fact, I think the GOP’s got it wrong… and that there is a large group of traditionalist conservatives and right-leaning moderates who are being alienated by the party’s pandering to these more “extreme” factions.

The “base” doesn’t have to be the folks who are afraid of people with brown skin, doesn’t have to be the people who think Islam = terrorism, doesn’t have to be those who would remove evolution from curriculum and prize profit-generation over sustainability. Oh look, now I’ve opened myself up to arguments that I’m pigeonholing and stereotyping conservatives. Just bear with me and accept that I’m talking about just those folks who believe those things, and am not trying to apply those qualities to all conservatives.

The point here is that there’s a whole other “base” the GOP can court and develop. It’s those folks who want a fiscally conservative government, a less involved government, to keep their guns, to be governed by guiding principles set forth in the Constitution. And no, I’m not speaking strictly about Libertarians or Madisonians or whatever you choose to call those folks who want to return to the embryonic and idealized government in place during the days immediately following the Philadelphia Convention, though parts of their ilk would certainly fall in here (well, but for the conspiracy nuts… looking at you Truthers and Federal Reserve haters and Moon-landing doubters). But, it’s this base… which is undeniably a more “moderate” base, that I think could do the GOP right in coming elections.

As a party that would have any designs on acquiring office again, I fully believe the GOP will have to make concessions which will completely alienate a percentage of the current “base.” Unfortunately, in a strictly two-party system this might be suicide, and is likely why it hasn’t yet been done. I’m sure Republican political strategists who are multiple whole-brains more intelligent than I have mulled this, it’s a certainty. And, if they’re anything like me, they may have realized that there may be a solution that’s neither black nor white – yet something in between. That is, I believe you can successfully court this more moderate conservative “base” and at the same time alienate as few “extremists” as possible. Sure you’re gonna lose some, the most hard-core… but I’d argue those are the thinkers you need most to lose as they hold the most party-damaging ideology.

If you can convince Christians that they are free to hold their views and those views will continue to be respected by government, but that they simply have no place being legislated – you stand to minimize losses from their corner. If you can convince neocons that a military strategy of homeland-security coupled with a well-educated technologically-advanced population is a better than one of Manifest Destiny, world-police, or Imperialist expansionism – you stand to minimize losses from their corner. Once you’ve successfully stratified those groups into the somewhat open-minded and the absolutely close-minded, you can begin to rebuild your new “base.”

Those hardline conservatives who simply cannot deal with these concessions will be out of luck, and can perhaps have a go at creating a viable third party. I guess I’m not really sure how huge this group is, and, as I said above, perhaps they are too large to be cast out and still leave enough “moderate” folks for a viable party. Perhaps this is the GOP’s quandary: they have to court today’s “base” because without them they are nothing. All the more reason for an image makeover, says I. What the party needs is its thinking conservatives back… those who align with conservative social policy, fiscal policy, foreign policy, energy policy, etc. – but who are not driven by phobia, racism, and rank biggest-dick Nationalism.

The bottom line is that, unless Republicans can change the knee-jerk classification of their rally-cry from: “Dollars before humanity. Because the Bible said so. Dollars before environment. Kneel to Christ or pay the price!,” they are doomed.

Republicans can be environmentally conscious. Republicans can be proponents of social justice. Republicans can support free-market capitalism without turning a blind eye to greed and corruption. Republicans can share an airplane with a Muslim; a cab with a Sikh. Republicans can have a less binary understanding of “good” and “evil,” and might enjoy a vacation someday to Iran. They can be all this and more, it’s in their existing and potential constituency right now, I promise.

So here’s where you yell something like, “So you want to turn the USA into a Godless carbon-copy of handout-happy Europe?!”  No; whatever; actually that’s a stupid thing to say, idiot.  I want the USA to be a place where my children can live freely, stand to prosper with hard work, and are for the most part safe.  And, being a Democrat myself… I don’t want to see the Republicans die.  Just like Home Depot needs Lowes and McDonalds needs Burger King (although a bit more important than just healthy competition).  As a Democrat, I rely on the GOP to check my party’s stupid spending diarrhea, pipedream socialism, and overly humanistic hippie “everything’s cool with me” mentality.

So c’mon GOP, pull out of this tailspin.  We’re all waiting for the second coming of Buckley, for a new Reagan.  Something. Get it together conservatives, get a party colonic and clear the old clinging crap out of your pipes.  You’ll feel better for it, and it’ll give you new life.

Done.  OK?

But, since you’re this far… I’ll do a bit of epilogue here, I think.

Reading this, you may be tempted to think I’m over-indicting religion or religious folks. I’m not; I promise. Religion certainly plays a role here, but it’s not the problem. Part of the problem is that the Right wants to legislate morality – and this simply won’t work. In fact, there are several books making their way through Christian circles right now that show the Bible speaks against pushing religion through government.

Unfortunately, the problem the GOP has is also the problem that American Christians have: That is, the two have been near inextricably tied. Christians are looked at as environment-hating, frightened warmongering Hawks who want to cram their belief systems down the collective throat of the populous; and the GOP is seen this way by association. Conversely, the GOP is seen in a similar light; and Christians the same by the reverse association. The connected stereotypes feed on each other, and do harm to both.

It seems both Christians and the GOP are suffering from the whole Kleenex vs. “tissue,” Xerox vs. “copy” brand-image dilution problem. Both could benefit from a little distinction. Christians can be Christians, Republicans Republicans. Their ideologies may even overlap to a large extent – but they need to steer away from co-identification.  Same deal with with the party and its neocon element…

What’s interesting here (to me, at least) is that I identify as religious, as “Christian”… I believe in a lot of the principles and theology (to tell you exactly what super/sub-set would take forever, and I’m not entirely sure myself yet).  Thing is, I know plenty of church-going folks who feel as I’ve written here, that the “religious right” is tanking the Republican party, and are pushing for disengagement from the business of politics.  I hope that line of thought gets wings.  Bottom line, even though it’s easy for my more agnostic/atheistic friends like to immediately paint God-phyllic folks as feces-throwing cultural barbarians – nothing could be more untrue.  Sure some of them are, but there are nuts in all walks.

So, wrapping up – let’s get smarter people everywhere. On the left, on the right, in the middle, in the pulpit, in the classrooms, in the boardrooms… everywhere.  Let’s bring rational thought back to politics, let’s bring intelligent discourse, respectful debate, accountability.

Now, how we gonna do that?

No time to proofread, typos surely abound.  Goodnight.