FlaSoxxJim

I just saw the Florida numbers from the 2000 election on the news and it put it in perspective. When it was all said and done, and the recount was suspended, Bush won in Florida by 537 votes. Nader got more than 97,000 votees in the state. Several Republicans were on the news cheering Nader on in 2004, saying that for sure most of the votes he got in 2000 would have otherwise gone Democratic and they hope to see a similar result this time around. Maybe the two-party system asw it stands now fails to represent all viewpoints, but this election is not the time to make a statement. And as much as I disliked tthe outcome, I understood people voting for the Green Party candidate in 2000 trying to get 5% of the vote to qualify for federal election funds. But, running as an Independent this time around, there at least won't be that impetus to vote for him.

I want to ask Graham, Robertson, and their Jeezo-dollar theiving ilk the same thing.

FZ was a true original, and I am a BIG fan. The depth, range, and maturity of his collective body of work -- the dada stuff, the jazz-rock stuff, the "pottymouth" stuff, the classical stuff -- is akin to the lifetime output of someone like Mozart. The best thing about Zappa was that he knew that notes were just notes, and any one musical note coul conceivably follow any other note in a composition and conventional structure can take a leap. His misical life, the "Project/Object" was spent exploring and expressing the nuances of the "Big Note", and with that in mind, all of the circular/cyclical/self-referening in his music over the years("conceptual continuity", the "crux of the biscuit") still leaves me in awe. I left Freddy off the short list of upper echelon rock power vocalists only because this is the Freddy thread and that's why the topic came up. He was brilliant and pulled off stuff that would have come off campy or over-the-top had it been executed by anyone else. Mercury/May was as perfect a pairing as you'll find.

Like I said, I wasn't a huge Journey fan, but I have grown to appreciate the production standards of the Escape/Infinity era stuff. The best musician un the group was their first drummer, a Brit named Ansley Dunbar who did time in one of Zappa's Mothers incarnations, testament to his ability. Steve Perry is just one of those spot-on rock vocalists. Brad Delp (Boston) and Paul Rodgers are two others that I always had respect for even if I wasn't a big fan of their respective bands. Even Perry's screaming is melodic, as opposed to someone like Sammy Hagar. He never just opens up and lets out a "yearrrghh!" - it's always controlled, y'know? Lovin' Touchin' Squeezin', Lights, etc. are among the showcase songs that show some of his range.

That's the guy. Vocally, though, he couldn't be touched in his prime, even if you were not a huge Journey fan ( I wasn't).

You have some whiz-bang tautology going on here, PA! That's an asinine statement well beneath your thought capacity. Time and again, the simplest explanations are shown to be the most likely correct ones for natural phenomena. In this case, the natural phenomena being Life, the Universe, and Everything, the simplest explanation is most certainly NOT a Divine Agent without beginning or end who is omnipotent yet spends his time fretting over us and even walked among us and died for us in the form of Jesus. Nice, comforting, poetic, but hardly the best-fit line connecting all the points. Lose the Divine agent. Replace it with 14 billion years of cosmic evolution, 5-6 billion years of terran physical evolution, 4+ billion years of terran organic evolution occurring in every single on of trillions upon trillions of imperfectly replicating germ cells that represent the total reproductive capacity of the Earth's inhabitants over time. NOW you have a non-mystical, testable, theory that is far simpler than the need to invoke a Divine Hand. THAT STATEMENT is crap. It's Sunday school scare tactics, God's Eternal Carrot or Stick, and it best dropped as a bad habit. The laws of man and the societal mores of man can exist in the absence of Divine consequence. Love your neighbor because that's how you want to be treated, not because it'll cost you you soul if you don't. It's not all relative. It's merely bounded by the finite nature of our lives and the lives of those we influence. "You're only dancing on this Earth for a short while," said the wise Mr. Stevens. If there is no heaven, the take home message is to get hopping and make it here on Earth. We can't, so why spin your wheels? Why do nations kill and die over their interpretations of a Divine Will that may or may not exist and can never be comprehended at any rate. No human institution has resulted in more bloodshed than religion and the differing interpretations of His Will. Is that because God knows might makes right and in the end we'll all see who backed the right horse? Is it because God gets a kick out of it. Or could it be it's because there's nobody at the wheel? The smart money is on number three. Be careful out there. I've lost three good friends to rabid Christianity in the last 15 years. All of them good people beforehand too, none of them hit rock-bottom before they got saved. But I dearly miss them and I miss the original, critical thought they used to bring into the world.

I did read through everything you posted, didn't ignore it, and 'choice' vs. 'free will' is a semantic argument by definition. Furthermore, reading the chapters from Ephesians and Romans that you posted verses ffrom purporting to show predestination in the bible is still more semantics. In those chapters, the "Predestined" ones are all of mankind which would let the Spirit lead them. That is not anything akin predeterminiation in the Calvinist sense or in the Catholic sense or in the 12 Tribes of Israel sense. It's the opposite. It is affirnation of the central belief that Jesus died for the benefit of all man, not just for some, and it is (drum roll) those who FREELY CHOOSE to be led by the Spirit that will reap the rewards. There's some good stuff in there, to be sure. Christianity is easily in my top 10 favorite world religions.

...and for this let us give thanks.

The possibility of choice presupposes that you have the capacity to make that choice, ie, free will. Now this is mere semantics, is it not?

Uuuhhh, ummm, yeeah sure. Is my ignorance showing yet? Good things have come from splitting entrenched voter bases. Harold Washington winning the Democratic Mayoral nomination in 1983 while Byrne and Daley 'split the white vote' is a good example. Washington was a much more effective Mayor than either of the other two, as Richie keeps reminding you all with his city circus antics. In the current situation, though, the consequences of splitting the entrenched 'anti-Bush' vote would be dire. Still, I don't think Nader will do nearly as well as he did in 2000 with the Greens, and even then he only got like 2-3% of the vote in the states where he was on the ballot.

Those sound like examples of free will to me.

You are correct, it is that simple. But in the upcoming election where we are all aware that votes "for Kerry" will really be votes "against Bush", and Kerry just happens to be the guy. I certainly don't want to see the "against Bush" votes split among possibly several better solutions (compared to Bush and Kerry) if the end result is that Bush wins. This is no time for idealism, it's time for ANYONE BUT BUSH.

I recall seeing flyers for them, but I never had a chance to check them out, actually. Good stuff?

I am not amused. This will only hurt the nominated Democrat's chances, despite earlier suggestions on the board that you can't assume that a vote for Nader would have been a vote for the Democratic candidate. With such a diverse group of people comprising the "Anybody But Bush" legions, a single strong contender is better than having Nader in the mix to pull any of those votes. Not running as the Green candidate this time around, hopefully his influence will be minimal.

Dogertown in Vero is just a few minutes up the road from work (very convenient for playing hookey during ST). Maybe I'll stop by and give Jose everyone's love, huh?

I know, but it isn't all bad, is it? (*It isn't even half Brad!*)

Wanna kno how I kknew you were a fan? Easy, I see you shiver with antici - (*Say It*) - pation! to all the Wild and Untamed Things P.S. Keep safe from the trouble and pain.

Matheny would fit right in, as would DiMeola, or some of the classics like Joe Pass and Django. But it is a rock list so I guess that's why they're not there. To their credit, they at least got John McGlaughlin (sp?) in, probably because the mahavishnu stuff was more on the rock side.

I agree with WU - Give SRV another listen, especially the live stuff. Then remember that all that juicy guitar is coming from just one guitarist.

¿Presidente Bush es el diablo? Ninguna mierda.

This is just a lively offseason discourse, as is the Bush/Abortion thread and any number of others at any given time 'round here. Bob is official-certified Good People because, among other things, he spent his college days listening to the forever-cool and really underappreciated Material Issue. Philosophical/political/religious difference give people something to talk about and hopefullly we all learn a thing or two along the way. But, Gawd dammit, if it gets to be May, June, or July and there's not some decent baseball on the South Side to talk about I'll be a miserable bastard and I won't want anything to do with any of y'all. Fair warning...

OK, it's also bugging me that not one of the Sreely Dan guitar ringers is on there. Elliot Randall, Skunk Baxter, Rick Derringer, Denny Dias... one of them at least should have cracked the top 100.

Like I say, I'm noot going to nitpick the order of all but the demigods (Jimi et al), as long as they made the list. I would happily lose Angus from that list if it frees up a spot for Billy Gibbons though.

It was the ABC Prime Time interview from last Monday that I refer to when I say ha came off as sidestepping the issues. I don't know if the NBC material you are refering to was taped later but it sound like it may have been in which case he'd have been ready to come up with some better answers to the questions at hand. Again I did not see anything on NBC (and haven't seen any interview material since Prime Time), but I don't think he or his father was unfairly treated in that. He was given a chance to distance himself from radical views of his father which he may or may not share. He refused to do so on Prime Time bacause he did not want to speak poorly of his father, but if on NBC he conceded a Holocost in whicj 6+ million Jews were killed, he did exactly what he refused to do on Monday. Now how hard was that?