what matters in america

From the front page of today's Huffington Post:

Plus, it's hot on Twitter!

c'mon people, what the hell's it going to take?

Seriously.

cold war

Still not much bloggin' energy, but I'd been meaning to post this for a while with some would-be clever writing about how you should go buy the album and listen to it all the way through in one sitting while giving it your undivided attention. So, sorry about the lack of cleverness, but do it anyway. This woman is an artist of astonishing potential (which, if you're not already familiar with her work, will only become obvious when you've heard more than just this song).

how anonymous did it

Fascinating.

(via ars technica)

irish spring

On Monday afternoon, August 2nd (our 26th anniversary), Rocket Girl went shopping at the local Costco and bought, among other things, two very large packages of 4 oz. bars of Irish Spring "Original" soap. They were put away in their traditional place in the bathroom cabinet next to the shower where they would be within easy reach whenever it became time to replace a bar that had eroded past efficient cleansing utility.

This morning, I opened the last of those bars of soap.

For the first time in a little over six months, Irish Spring soap is back on our shopping list.

Fuck.

ecstatic dances for the human sacrifices

Not much energy for bloggin' around the Citizen's place these days, so what better time to fulfill my goal of making the archetypal liberal blog post:

What digby said.

emperor tomato ketchup

In honor of an unexpected development in another of my sources of distraction, here's Stereolab performing Cybele's Reverie and Les Yper Sound live on Jools Holland back in the mid 90s.

adventures in marketing #1 - pink ponies: a case study

fuckyeahgirlsyoungwomenwhoplaysaxophoneinhighschooljazzbands*

Especially baritone saxophone. (And although Blogger limits the size of pictures to the point that you probably can't tell, there's one playing trombone as well, which is also pretty awesome.)

* Gratuitous tumblr reference

not a rant

One of the principles I adopted upon returning to the blog was to avoid using it as an outlet for the personal outrage so often generated by the political and social state of our nation. Frankly, there are others who do it much better (Glenn Greenwald and the Rude Pundit for two), and, probably more importantly, it's just too damn depressing.

So, as the post title says, this is not one of the rants that used to occasionally appear here. Instead it's just a strong suggestion that you read this (and be sure to read the updates at the end about the treatment of David House and Jane Hamsher at Quantico this morning).

This is what is being done in all of our names. What the hell have we become?