Jefblog

There are many excellent BBQ places in Kansas City. I haven't tried them all yet, but Bryant's, Jack's Stack and others are all really really good. Surprisingly though, an L.A. based restaurant in Kansas City's wonderful Country Club Plaza has one of the best BBQ ribs plates in town, IMHO.
Houston's, just north off the main drag of 47th on Wornall, where it runs at a diagonal to the main streets.
Houston's has ribs that fall off the bone, a great sauce and excellent fries, both russet and sweet potatoes. Plus, it's a great place to eat alone, with nice low light, comfortable booths, and a dining room that is at once open, intimate and private. Great salads and steaks as well.
Houston's. Next time you are in KC, check it out.

From David Michael Green at the Regressive Antidote:

To be a progressive in America is to condemn yourself to a lifetime of disappointment, watching your country lurch from political stupidity to imbecilic tragedy, watching every decent candidate you’ve ever supported getting hammered and humiliated, and you along with them, by proxy.

Dare I say it? This year feels different. <more>

I daresay the political writing has been better lately. Politics have actually been interesting, and even encouraging in a very limited way. David's post is about Billary, and the rest...along with an interesting suggestion for Obama's VP pick.

Eisenhower: not bad, all things considered. Thanks for the warning, Ike! Not that anyone listened.

Kennedy: not enough time. could've gone either way. was pretty good with the vision thing, though. and the ladies...

Johnson: see Nixon

Nixon: LBJ & RMN: Two figures from Greek tragedy. Or should that be Shakespeare? Regardless, These two presided over the Great Upheaval. I remember wondering as a 16 year old in 1973 whether the U.S. govt was going to endure or be overthrown. How naive I was...

Ford: well, I had a good time during Ford. So what can I say? He's tainted by the Warren Commission thing in my book.

Carter: Carter was ok to me. Very over criticized. Like Nixon, he rehabilitated himself a bit post-Presidency.

Reagan: he was an idiot. and he sucked. People that idolize this guy....

Bush I: Patrician son of a bitch. The Bushes are a crime family far far worse than the Kennedys. They are bastards, stupid, dangerous, harmful. This one looks good compared to his Caligula-like son. The possible undoing of America can be laid largely at the feet of La Famiglia Bushia. Of course, all the wankers who supported these jerks are equally as culpable.

Clinton(s): Almost as bad as the Bushes. No. Wait. Worse. Cuz they know better.

Bush II: Fuck it. I give up.

// posted by The Commander @ 12:00 AM

Ah, Rude Pundit, you know what to say:

"If this was a real democracy, we'd be out in the streets shutting the nation down until Bush resigned, taking Cheney with him. The unions would call for general strikes, as would immigrant rights groups, poverty groups, families of soldiers. All seventy percent of us. Clogging the cities and towns, demanding that we take back the country from the people who want to harm us.

But this is not a real democracy. It is a group of geographically tied together people with pretense to democracy, fearful of actual power because it means actual responsibility for themselves, for each other."

Pretty much on the money, unfortunately. I travel throughout the US, and I love the American people, who are basically goodhearted and caring, but who are collectively very sick at the moment.
Lord help us all....

From the Rude Pundit:

"On this Fourth of July, howzabout some words from the original American rude pundit, Thomas Paine, the ass-kickingest Founder.

From The American Crisis V:
"If there is a sin superior to every other, it is that of willful and offensive war. Most other sins are circumscribed within narrow limits, that is, the power of one man cannot give them a very general extension, and many kinds of sins have only a mental existence from which no infection arises; but he who is the author of a war, lets loose the whole contagion of hell, and opens a vein that bleeds a nation to death."

"Were government a mere manufacture or article of commerce, immaterial by whom it should be made or sold, we might as well employ her as another, but when we consider it as the fountain from whence the general manners and morality of a country take their rise, that the persons entrusted with the execution thereof are by their serious example an authority to support these principles, how abominably absurd is the idea of being hereafter governed by a set of men who have been guilty of forgery, perjury, treachery, theft and every species of villany which the lowest wretches on earth could practise or invent. What greater public curse can befall any country than to be under such authority, and what greater blessing than to be delivered therefrom. The soul of any man of sentiment would rise in brave rebellion against them, and spurn them from the earth."

In The American Crisis VI, Paine writes what could be the epitaph for the Bush administration:
"If you look back you see nothing but loss and disgrace. If you look forward the same scene continues, and the close is an impenetrable gloom."

Or maybe this, from The American Crisis X:
"It is strange that a nation must run through such a labyrinth of trouble, and expend such a mass of wealth to gain the wisdom which an hour's reflection might have taught."

This list could go on and on, without even getting into Rights of Man. From The American Crisis XII:
"That a nation is to be ruined by peace and commerce, and fourteen or fifteen millions a-year less expenses than before, is a new doctrine in politics. We have heard much clamor of national savings and economy; but surely the true economy would be, to save the whole charge of a silly, foolish, and headstrong war; because, compared with this, all other retrenchments are baubles and trifles." [more...]

For my main Lady, Downtown Lucy Brown. You know who you are.

So, to start I will briefly write about seeing Ratdog, Bob Weir's group, at the Beacon Theatre in Manhattan on Thursday.
OMIGOD! What a killer show! An astounding set list for all GD fans. And the band was quite good and quite motivated to play from the Dead's repetoire.
It was interesting to watch Bob, the perennial boy. Bob's an elder now. His hair is white, he is balding at the top, and his bushy mustache makes him look like Grizzly Adams. He was doin guitar hero struts, which I am not sure I liked. I mean, they are OK, but when you are sixty, it looks a bit weird.
Still, watching Bob go at it was encouraging. He is ten years older than I, and so I get a glimpse of what life could be like in ten years. He's got respect, and he is still in command, and maybe even still kind of sexy (I'll have to ask some female Bobby fans).
I've worried about all these things as I move down the slope of life, as it were. I'm at the top of the loop, and the downward momentum is gathering. How to handle it with dignity is the question.
I also was thinking of my late friend Andrea with whom I shared many musical passions, including dancing at Dead shows. We spent plenty of time being Deadheads, and the last Dead related show we went to together was at the Beacon in 2003. So needless to say, she was on my mind, and I was sadly missing her. She really loved roses, as does Robert Hunter, who has plenty of rose imagery in his lyrics for the Dead. Andrea always had red roses around, and had the best rose perfume. When ever I smell that scent, I think of her. So, I was feeling sad and aged.
In the second set Bob launched into Lost Sailor, which took me back to times dancing with her to that song. As I was descending a bit more into grief and sadness and self pity, and right during a rockin part of the song, a beautiful red rose fell into my lap from up above!!! A little message from my long lost friend.....
It really cheered me up, in a bittersweet sorta way.
Hey, I know some one up in the balcony threw it, but it was the timing! So in my own way, I figure A used that person to talk to me. Thanks Andrea! I will always love you!
So, back to Bob. A great high energy show, Bob still belts em out, and makes the high notes work. The drumz space break featured Kenny Brooks, the sax player, and some DJ and some horn players and was a great sort of jazz hip hop rave mix dance kind of thing that really hit a great groove. Bob left the stage so the "kids" could mess around and they did good.
All in all, a great show. Go see Ratdog!!

Andrea you are always in my heart and thoughts. Love you, wherever you are.

You know, I am just not that motivated to blog much. I spend a lot of time reading blogs, mostly about food and politics. And from time to time I should post about politics, I guess.
So, I will give this another try for those 2 readers out there. Mostly about whatever comes up.
I travel frequently and I like to comment on restaurants and so on. I don't want to be too personal, to the point this becomes banal. However I mostly blog for those who know me a bit already, and am not that interested in blogging for the public at large, so personal it is, I guess.

Now if I can just motivate.....