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Showing posts from March 27, 2016

Virtual gig.

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You really have to stop watching that show, Marvin. It's not good for your electronic brain. And too much television can be bad for your visual detection sensors. Hoo boy. It's hard to be a father, sometimes. Not that that's technically my role with respect to Marvin (my personal robot assistant). His birth father is actually our mad science adviser, Mitch Macaphee, but given the fact that Mitch is something other than fatherly (the term "grisly" comes to mind), I do sometimes act as a surrogate. Though admittedly, the role does not come naturally to me. Especially when your adopted son is literally made of brass. Anyway ... Marvin has taken to watching concerts on television. His favorite is Austin City Limits, though he does spend some time rolling through re-runs of Don Kirshner's Rock Concert. A couple of hours of this, then comes the inevitable question: Why aren't WE ever on Austin City Limits? How come WE never get booked for Saturday Night Live...

No dogma.

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All right. I am as cynical as just about any political observer on the left. And when it comes to centrist Clintonism, I find I have less and less tolerance as I get older. (Hearing Hillary talk about NATO, for example, is enough to send me through the roof.) That said, I want to make a principled argument against the notion of clinging to the "Bernie or Bust" sentiment beyond the primary contests. I know that most politically active people focus heavily on candidates, sometimes at the cost of policy positions, and that Democrats in particular are accused of "falling in love" with their choices, as opposed to "falling in line" like the Republicans usually do (and they will ... mark my words). My advice is not to redeem that particular piece of pundit fodder. As much as I love Bernie Sanders, I know that he would be the first to tell you to focus on the movement, not the man. The most important component in the argument against "Bernie or Bust...