Step into my time machine, week ten

Before we step in, two things. Last night's walk we spotted yet another deer, and Monday on the way into work saw another in the same spot. Also, a garter snake on this morning's walk.

Second, The big sighting on this morning's walk was the car sitting upside down just down the street. The driver was a young black man in cornrows, and he apparently had another couple of young men, one white, one black, with him. He had to have sped around the curve in front of our house, blew off the curve following it, bashed the tree on the passenger side corner and flipped- I assume the curb put him airborne before he hit the tree. He allegedly told first responders he "just looked up and saw the tree". I saw no evidence that said tree lept in front of him. After the wrecker finally got him tipped upright, the cops cuffed him and took him downtown, I didn't hear the charge. He didn't look intoxicated, just not real bright.

OK, on to the countdown. Kind of a ho-hum week, with only three of the 12 new debuts making a dent in my mind despite debuts by such acts as the Temptations, 3 Dog Night, and the Stylistics, and only three top 40 debuts. However, out of that three top 100 newbies is one who comes in in the top 40. The other two new chart hits that I knew were Neil Sedaka's That's When The Music Takes Me at 77 and Earth Wind and Fire's second chart hit, That's The Way Of The World at 69. Also, our big jumpers and droppers were in the nether reaches as well. James Taylor hops up 24 with How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You) at 68, and Chicago's Old Days has gotten old enough to drop 47 spots to 74.

The top 40 newbies start out with Everytime You Touch Me (I Get High) by Charlie Rich at 40, then comes Ringo Starr with It's All Down To Goodnight Vienna at 37. In the interests of drumming up a little suspense, we'll cut in here with the almost but not quite salute. This week, Seals and Crofts hold at 35 with I'll Play For You, a song that really has grown on me over the years. This was not a song that I was able to find a ton of interesting tidbits on, but I did learn that among the musicians on the song were the future nucleus of Toto, David Paich and Mike Porcaro. Interestingly, the Billboard chart (which adds airplay to sales) had this song peaking at 18 this week. This can only mean that Seals and Crofts fans are cheap bastards, or else that Jim and Dash's Baha'i faith led a lot of their fans to share. Or not.

Now we come to that high debut, making its first appearance all the way up at 33. That would be Elton John with Someone Saved My Life Tonight. We have 2 top 10 debuts, so 2 drop out. That would be thank God I'm A Country Boy dropping to 21 and Alice Cooper's Only Women, which peeked in last week and now falls to 20.

Let's do our tour of other years before hitting the top ten; this week we hit the 3's. Seeings as I never know any of the 90's top hits, I'm going to add the top song on the Modern Rock Charts, which at least I have a chance of knowing. Janet Jackson was top on pop this week in 1993 with That's the Way Love Goes; Porno for Pyros held the top spot on MR with Pets. In '83, Irene Cara was ending a 6-week run with Flashdance (What A Feeling); in '73 it was George Harrison with Give Me Love (Give Me Peace On Earth); in 1963, Kyu Sakamoto was ending a 4 week run with Ue O Muite Arukō, a Japanese language song much better known by its nickname of Sukiyaki; and in 1953, my man Percy Faith and his Orchestra were ending a nine week run at the top with the Theme to Moulin Rouge (Where Is Your Heart)-which makes the fifth song I've mentioned this week with a subtitle. What is this? Anyhow, this was another beautiful instrumental by the man that brought us to " A Summer Place" and this time I did recognize it.

Now, the top ten. Jumping 8 big notches to roost at the leadoff spot are the Eagles with One Of These Nights. Linda Ronstadt tumbles 5 to 9 with former top dog When Will I Be Loved. Number 8 is the debut for Olivia Newton-John's Please Mister Please, up 5 from 13. Batting cleanup is the falling Jessie Coulter with I'm Not Lisa; Pilot flies to 6 with Magic, up 3. Major Harris drops 2 to 5 with Love Won't Let Me Wait; Van McCoy Hustles up 3 to #4 with The Hustle; Michael Murphy finds it crowded at the top and falls to 3, down one, with Wildfire. McCartney and Wings soar 4 notches to 2 with Listen To What the Man Says. And believe it or not, we finally have our second multi-week top dog, Love Will Keep Us Together by the Captain and Tennille. See you next week and have a happy and SAFE 4th of July.

They were the best of POTUS, they were the worst...

Siena College has released its annual poll of a bevy of eggheads as to who were the best and worst presidents in US history. Of course, I know better and am going to point out some of the goofs these esteemed scholars made.

(Pictured, FDR and Buhannan.)

First, let's look at the categories. The first is background (family, experience). According to the Eggheads, a man like Adams (either one) scores higher (being from an elite family) than, say, Obama (who was raised by a single parent) or Lincoln (who, OMG, had to work for a living). Another dubious category is called Luck. They also included categories for Executive and Judicial Appointments. Finally, they asked them how they would rank the guys straight up and included this total. So, according to this category the top 5 were Lincoln (who finished 3rd), FDR (1st), Washington (4th), T.R. (2nd), and Jefferson (5th). My question is, if you have this category, why do you need the others?

Ok, now lets go category-by -category. Family background shows us that the most privileged of Presidents were Jefferson, JQ Adams, Madison, Adams #1, and FDR, while the poor turds at the bottom of the family bowl were Harding, Andy Johnson, Chet Arthur, Filmore, and Benjamin Harrison. Outside of the fact that Johnson, Harding, and Filmore are in most of the bottom 5 because they just sucked, I have to say that having been to Harrison's home and museum, I fail to see the logic here.

They gave reluctant kudos in party leadership to Reagan (5th) and LBJ (3rd), Communication to Reagan (again, 5th), and LBJ on ability to suck-up in congress (1st). Outside of the usuals, Jimmy Carter picked up a 5th from bottom in party leadership and handling congress, and GW Bush makes one of his 12 bottom 5's in Communicating. Clinton made #3 in handling the economy ( because "it's the economy, stupid" is catchier than "whip inflation now"). Not so surprisingly, Carter and GW Bush both took bottom 5's here. However, I think Hoover's dead last in this category is misinformed. He was just the guy in the chair when the house of cards collapsed. Perhaps in reference to this inequity, he also got a dead-last in Luck. Amusingly, this is the one case you can make for WH Harrison getting any ranking (seeings as he didn't even get the chair warm before he died) and HE comes in second-last. Who were the luckiest Presidents? Washington, TR, Reagan(?), Andy Jackson, and FDR. OK, now Reagan got shot at by one guy who hit him; Jackson got shot at by hundreds of Indians and they all missed. But Ron is luckier. Go figure.

I'm skipping the appointments for two reasons. WH Harrison doesn't live long enough to appoint anyone, and still manages to beat out at least 5 people on each category (OK, I can see where Grant (4th worst), GW Bush (3rd worst), and Harding (dead last) beat him out, but, c'mon...) Also, of course Washington got #1- look at who he had to pick from compared to these days.

Integrity was an easy call on the good side- Lincoln, Washington, the Adams family, and Madison. I'm sure it galled them that they couldn't find a spot for Nixon at the bottom of this list, but they made up for it by putting him dead last on Intelligence. Read any of the man's books and you'll agree that they totally discredited themselves here. Ditto for Hoover at 4th.

Overall ability was well done with Lincoln, FDR, TR, Washington and Jefferson; GW Bush at 4th from the bottom is a bit of a stretch (but not much of one). Woodrow Wilson got his one top 5 in Imagination ( a good pick) and Harding got dead last- I guess banging your mistress in the Oval Office broom closet would rank him higher on risk taking than imagination or intelligence).

As nice as they were to LBJ on other categories ( top 5s in Party Leadership, Handling Congress, Court Appts., and Domestic Accomplishments) I was shocked to see him take the booby prize in Executive Ability (where Obama should be keeping him company soon). They actually ranked WH Harrison here. On what, extrapolated data?

Anyway, they came out, as I said before, with FDR, TR, Lincoln, Washington, and Jefferson at the top, Andy Johnson, Buchanan, Harding, Pierce, and GW Bush at the bottom. I've always thought Johnson got a slightly bad rap here; I think Buchanan was far and away the worst. I'll have to see if I can find the list I made when they did this last year and post it someday.

The brushfire

If you've been following the comments section of my Sunday post, you'll see it triggered a brushfire (which I, being me, encouraged) of comments that swiftly veered off the beginning intent of challenging the "government is there to protect the minority" statement and has tumbled into faith, evolution, "neurotheology", and atheism as a religion. In fact, Joshua has just posted that he had three pages worth of comeback that accidentily got deleted and he'll be back later. I look foreward to it, responding to well thought- if from my perspective misguided- challenges only sharpens my own focus. But I, being me and not "anonymous", feel it is time to remind anyone who cares that the REAL point of my post had only to do with the idea that "protecting the minority" should be a minor part of what government does, not the focus that the ACLU and various other like minded groups would like it to be.
I would also like to address a point I took from Joshua during the original discussion so long ago- the impression I got that he believes man capable of evolving into something better. Even if I believed this possible, I see plenty of evidence that that "evolution" comes at a price. If signs like technological improvements, spiritual and/or scientific "liberation", advances in medicines and health techniques, international "co-operations" like the UN are to be considered birth-pangs of a new evolutionary state, why are their applications so haphazard? If a species evolves due to hardships, why then are not the people of the third world not evolving ways to survive while we are not? Even if we live in the godless world Joshua sees as logical, I think that the only evolution man can expect was best put by Zager and Evans:

In the year 2525
If man is still alive
If woman can survive
They may find
In the year 3535
Ain't gonna need to tell the truth, tell no lie
Everything you think, do and say
Is in the pill you took today
In the year 4545
Aint gonna need your teeth ,won't need your eyes
Won't find a thing to chew
Nobody's gonna look at you
In the year 5555
Your arms are hanging limp at your side
Your legs have nothing to do
Some machines doin' that for you
In the year 6565
Won't need no husband, won't need no wife
You'll pick your sons, pick your daughters too
From the bottom of a long glass tube wouwo
In the year of 7510
If God's a-comming,he oughta make it by then
Maybe He'll look around Himself and say
Guess it's time for the Judgement day
In the year of 8510God is gonna shake his mighty head then
He'll either say I'm pleased where man has been
Or tear it down and start again wouwo
In the year 9595
I'm kinda wondering if man is gonna be alive
He's taken everything this old earth can give
And he ain't put back nothing wouwo
Now it's been 10.000 years
man has cried a million tears
For what he never knew
now man's reign is through/But through eternal light
the twinkling of starlight
So very far away
Somewhere its only yesterday...

Man, it was too hot for a walk!

But with a nice breeze, we tried it anyways. Coming home, Scrappy actually had to stop and rest. Still, he managed to find some energy when we met laurie's baby bunny at the door. Oh, and before I forget, there was a deer in a meadow behind the industrial park we work at Friday morning, so we're up to 13 deer and 10 rabbit sightings. Anyway, when we got home the temp was 88.6- in the time it took to type this it is now reading 89.1. That gives us a heat index of 100 right now.

What government is for

Last night Laurie's brothers and I had a debate with your typical young liberal. You don't want to stereotype, but here it is- basing arguments on emotion rather than logic, making generalizations based on revisionist history, and unwilling to hear when his own words contradicted themselves. The type exemplified by Paul McCartney last week when he said that doubters of global warming are comparable to those who don't believe there was a holocaust. (Let's see: one is a theory, which by definition is an unproven assumption based on observation and one is a proven fact attesteded to by eyewitness testimony and mass graves. Yeah, I see the connection, Paul.) Anyway, I don't want to rehash the whole conversation, but I am going to quote one phrase of his that sums up the whole argument and the wrong headedness of it:
"The government is there to protect the minority from the majority."

NO IT IS NOT!!!!!!

Our friend spoke alot about the founding fathers' intent ( a subject I told him he would be well served reading George Washington's diaries to get some real facts about) but if you look at that intent, a goal such as he expressed would have been better served by never revolting. The government they fought against was protecting the interests of the minority- the elite that were running the colonies from England. They revolted because the majority, living in the colonies, were not being served by absentee landlordship. You see, Joshua, the truth is that a government such as you described is what was already in existance. It goes by various names: monarchy, one-party state, dictatorship. You can use that last one in the old Roman sense. I'm not necessarily hinting at oppression, just the lack of majority voice.

What the founding fathers created here was a - in our friend's own words- a representative democracy. In this Government, the goal is THE GREATER GOOD FOR THE MOST PEOPLE. The declaration of Independance (surely a good example of the founding fathers' intent) says, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. "
That does not mean that a lone man can say, "I don't believe in God, the government should eliminate all places and events that expose me to religion." That is tyranny of the minority, which is what the founding fathers were trying to escape. What it can be applied to is, "I don't belive in God, I don't think I should be isolated from my classmates in a public school setting because of it." While that does happen- to no great extent- our friend seems to think government persecuting him for the sake of religion includes "in God we trust" on his money and "under God" in the pledge of alliegiance and moments of silence. He honestly belives that the government is harming him by allowing these! To this, I say: Don't read your money! Leave "Under God " out when you pledge alliegiance! Don't pray when you keep silent! The Muslims might have a case on these things, saying that they might be committing a sin if they did them. An atheist or agnostic only has annoyance, it's not like the God that doesn't exist is going to send them to the hell in fairy tales to punish them for doing so. If you are truly atheist, religion is foolishness that cannot harm you anymore that a group of people playing a game across the street. If you belive you are being harmed by these things, you are not being an atheist- YOU ARE BEING AN ACTIVIST AGAINST GOD. Thus, by giving any notice to it, you are implying belief that there is a god of some sort.

Now, our friend was intelligent and well spoken. But as Chuck said, "There is 'education' and there is EDUCATION."

One last way to look at it. My theory of government says that, if a senior class votes to have an invocation at graduation and one person is opposed, find a way to accomodate the person without disrupting the happiness of the majority. Our friend's way says that everyone else must suffer to placate the minority. Which really makes more sense? Keep in mind that our friend's theory of Government is not limited to its affect on religion. What if the lone man wanted no girls present? Or blacks, or Mexicans? What if he was offended by kids with long hair, or black shoes? The ACLU protects minorities, thus we have cases where homeless child predators are allowed to live in parks across the street from schools because chasing them out would violate their rights. Tell me again who we want to protect.

Step into my time machine, week nine

This week we have 12 hot 100 debuts, 4 joining the top forty for the first time, two top ten debuts, a party that got out of control, a great song to play for a baby, and -yet again- a new top dog. Let's go!



The hot hundred debuts included the Hudson Brothers one big hit. You may or may not remember that they had a variety show the summer before; you may not know that brother Bill was married to Goldie Hawn (before Kurt Russell beefed up and moved in) and is Kate Hudson's daddy. The song was a Beach Boys-esque number that played on CKLW when I was a kid of 13 called Rendezvous. Love that song. At 97 came David Bowie with Fame; 95 was the Amazing Rhythym Aces with a song I always thought (back then) was Kenny Rogers, Third Rate Romance. 93 was the first big hit for KC and the Sunshine Band, Get Down Tonight; sweet baby James Taylor came in at 92 with How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You). And at 82 was the first run for Judy Collins with Send In The Clowns; it would crack the top forty later on, and return again in 1977, this time breaching the top 20.



Our big movers this week are, on the upside, Freddie Fender's Wasted Days and Wasted Nights, jumping 22 to land at 51; on the downward spiral, Grand Funk's Bad time, dropping 14 to 30. Just one each this week, unlike last week's mess.



Coming into the top 40 were Hot Chocolate at 40 with Disco Queen (didn't recognize it); Mike Post's theme to The Rockford Files at 37; Glen Campbell returns to the 40 for the first time since 1971's Dream Baby with the future top dog Rhinestone Cowboy; and riding the fame of Jimmie Walker and his catch phrase, studio band Bazuka comes in at 32 with Dyn-o-mite.



Our almost-but-not-quite salute this week
goes to the Average White Band with their follow up to the top dog Pick Up The Pieces, called Cut The Cake. This basically instrumental tune (which again, no recollection upon playing) peaked last week at 12 and began its descent this week at 23. Notable about this Scottish band was a Hollywood party the year before, in which the band's drummer died of a heroin overdose, and the bassist would have as well except that Cher managed to keep him awake until help arrived. I must have lost my invitation.



Two come into the top ten, two drop out. Bailing were Sister Golden Hair, who at 13 spots just missed the big dropper, to 20; and the Doobies, having been taken into our arms and rocked before they left, dropped the one crucial spot to 11.



This week's tour of other year's top dogs takes us through the terrible twos. Mariah Carey in 1992 with I'll Be There was starting a 3 week run at the top; in 1982, the Human League was just starting a 4 week run with Don't You Want Me. In 1972 Gallery was stopping in for a week with Nice To Be With You; in 1962, at which point I was about a month-and-a-half old, David Rose's Orchestra was #1 with The Stripper. In 1952, her nibs, Miss Georgia Gibbs, was number one with the tango-flavored Kiss of Fire- and had been keeping the likes of Eddie Fisher and Al Martino out of the penthouse at that point for 5 of her 8-week run. Nifty song.



Here we go to the top ten. Leading off, Alice Cooper makes his second foray into the upper crust with Only Women, up one. In the 9th spot, up three, is another Scottish band with -outside of this week's number one- the most played song of the summer, Pilot with (Oh Oh Oh, It's) Magic. John Denver stops off at 8 with former top dog Thank God I'm A Country Boy; batting cleanup is Van McCoy's The Hustle, up 2 to 7. Wings also rise 2 to 6 with Listen To What The Man Says; Jessie Coulter moves up one to 5 with I'm Not Lisa. Linda Ronstadt got her answer- she was loved last week. Not so much this week, as she tumbles from top dog to 4. once and future Delfonic Major Harris holds in the 3 hole with Love Won't Let Me Wait (apparently the chart will, though). Michael Murphy moves up 2 to the runner up spot with Wildfire. And if you were here last week, the new top dog is no surprise; it hit the top ten running at 2 then and is number one now- The Captain and Tennille with Love Will Keep Us Together.




Martin Index set new highs the last two weeks; 43 last week, 44 this one. See you next week and we'll see if Toni and Daryl can last more than one week at the top.

The end is near- maybe

Well, this Tuesday we were informed that we were dropping to 11 hour days, getting off at 5:30. Still had Saturday posted as a nooner, though. However, at 4:45 it was announced to screams of rejoicing that the day was done at 5 pm and no Saturday!

Believe thou me, we are very happy that the mad dash to get your patio replacement cushions is ebbing at last. I know I personally caught myself in a month's worth of mistakes the last three days. Last week, I missed a day, Victor missed a day and a half, Jose missed Firday morning, Gustavo missed Saturday, and this week a new girl evaporated and Laurie missed Monday and Tuesday. And that's just the cutters. Hopefully, we can get in a few weeks of manageable hours before the whole thing bottoms out.