Land of the Lost

Here are a few links to an amazing story concerning a tribe in the Amazon jungle that has apparently never made contact with the outside world (AFP, Scotsman).  The photo here was taken as an aircraft startled an entire village, and the men aimed bows up at the photographers (I imagine it was a helicopter, but I’m not positive).

While it sounds like the organization releasing the photos is doing it with the interests of the natives at heart, the whole thing is still kind of insane.  Raising awareness about the natives and their coming struggle with encroaching modernity is great, but part of me wonders if this whole thing couldn’t have been handled differently.  (I don’t like it when a chopper goes over my head either.  But these people must have been absolutely terrified.)

Still fascinating though.

Are We There Yet?

Obama is looking strong in the final primary states of Montana and South Dakota.

Cue up the last dregs of team HRC complaining that he can’t win with white voters.  And that Puerto Rico is more representative of our country than, say, the 50 states that constitute our country.

Spring II

CXL

(If you have ever quit an imaginary job over an imaginary paycut,

mistakenly taken your house’s thermostat for a dial
with which to focus the windows,

written a play about the special relationship that blooms
when a withdrawn honor student is assigned to tutor
the school’s basketball star,

fallen in love with the woman who plays the part
of your character’s wife and bears you a child
that can communicate with rust,

been deafened by the panoply of voices in the classifieds

tied up every private detective in town with false leads,

taken photos of people saying “shut up,”

or know a place where you can get married at midnight,

then you know what I’m talking about.)

–Dave Berman, Cantos for James Michener

Geggy Tah

Youtubery.  Just because.

Florigan

May 31st looms as the DNC Rules Committee will meet to decide the fates of Michigan and Florida. Here’s a look at the folks who actually make up the group.

It’s way too beautiful outside to pay much attention to this stuff. But I can’t help myself.  “Hollywood for Ugly People” and all that.

Eric Cartman Moment

Recently, both The World and NPR have done pieces about an activist group called “Re-create 68″ (you can find their site easily enough without my help).

The sheer idiocy of an effort like this pretty much speaks for itself. A liberal activist group wants to recreate 1968? Really? The year both RFK and MLK were assassinated? The Chicago convention that ensured Nixon’s election and decades of Republican political dominance? Really?

A quick search shows that the usual right-wing suspects have already gotten plenty of mileage out of this. (Again, you’re welcome to search for yourself since I don’t feel like linking. Suffice it to say, Malkin, Human Events, and The Weekly Standard have all had something to say about it.)

Democrats never met a potential victory they couldn’t manage to derail. Since November 2006, it was comforting to think that this notion was starting to disappear. I hope my optimism wasn’t premature.

To be blunt, I’m going to have to side with Eric Cartman on this one.

Update: I wasn’t sure how much traction HRC’s “assassination” comment would get, but here’s Olbermann’s response for what it’s worth. He’s typically overblown, but makes some strong points towards the end.

Something to Du

Pitchfork interviews Paul Westerberg, and he dishes on the new ‘Mats reissues.

I still own Don’t Tell a Soul on cassette, somewhere.  And I’m willing to risk hipster Hades by stating that it really isn’t as disappointing an album as people make it out to be.  And that Hootenanny, despite the presence of some amazing songs, is way overrated.  (Perhaps it would have been better off as an EP leading the way to the holy alt-rock triumvirate that is Let It Be, Tim, and Pleased to Meet Me?)

Anyways, here are some clips of the glory days, circa 1981 in Minneapolis.  (Shockingly sober to boot.)

Spring

What you don’t understand are depths and shadows
They grow, Lance, though the sun covers them in a single day.
Grails here, grails there, grails tomorrow
A trick of light.
A trick of light streaming from the cup
You say, knowing only the unbent rock
The shells
That have somehow survived their maker.
The depths and shadows are beside all of this, somehow
Returning
Each man to what of him is not bone and skin and mortal
The moon
Which is beautiful and shell of the earth
Streaming.

–Jack Spicer, from The Holy Grail, “The Book of Gwenivere”

Department of Bad Ideas

Some recent chatter about a Clinton veep run: Bob Beckel, NPR. She’s certainly earned some leverage in a closely fought primary, but that and four bucks will get you a mocha latte these days.

Let’s try a hypothetical — if Clinton was going to win the nomination with as slim a margin of elected (i.e., non-”super”) delegates as Obama currently has over her, would there be so much talk regarding the need for an Obama vice-presidency?  Probably some, but certainly not as much.

The fact is, having an African American and a woman on the same ticket, while bolstering base support among Dems, would simply be painting a larger bullseye for the Republican smear machine to work off of.  And while Obama certainly needs to pick a running mate who shares his core values and positions on Iraq and the economy, he has every right to pick someone towards the center as he enters the national race.  (Let’s face it — a white male governor).

And this simply isn’t negotiable, however much Mario Cuomo would like to see it happen.

And to put it a bit more bluntly — Obama, or any future party nominee for that matter, shouldn’t have to deal with sharing the White House with Bill Clinton.  Simple as that.

Sad News

R.I.P. Robert Rauschenberg (wiki).

He helped move Abstract Expressionism away from total detachment and back into life.