Rusko

Rusko is my favorite dubstep artist right now. He puts on a great live show and makes amazing tracks. He played a show in my town a month or two ago and I didn't go. I almost regret making that decision and will definitely try to see him perform next time he is on tour.

I was watching clips of his live gigs on Youtube and was really impressed with what I saw. He has great stage presence for a DJ and really pumps up the crowd. Some people have the opinion that he is arrogant, but he kind of has a reason to be.

His CD, O.M.G.!, is solid. This music video is especially amazing. It is called Hold On featuring Amber Coffman. It is a chill song with visuals that match. His CD is only $5 so I'm definitely going to have to go out and buy it because the MP3 version doesn't really do it justice.

Urb Magazine recently rated Rusko's record, O.M.G.!, as the #2 album of the year. Dubstep and dance music in general is really hot right now. Rusko is a good starting point to discover similar artists. Get on it.

Margaret Cho

A few years ago, I borrowed a Margaret Cho live stand-up DVD from my local video store. When I brought it up to the counter, the store clerk made a face and was like, "Ugh! Margaret Cho?! Really?!" I watched it, and ended up agreeing with because I didn't like the humor at that time.

However, this past year I have come to like her. At Bonnaroo, she did standup performances which I unfortunately did not get to attend. However she made a surprise appearance on stage when the band Gwar played a set on Saturday night. It was very entertaining.

So anyway, I watched this clip earlier today and enjoyed it very much:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=183l-qkr2_w

A line that especially reverberated with me was when she said, "...I went throught this whole thing. You know I was like "Am I gay? Am I straight?" And I realized, I'm just slutty."

I'm not going to get too into detail about my sexuality here, that while I don't consider myself slutty, I do greatly enjoy sex with different genders. If a person is moderately attractive, then I am open to being with them, regardless of whether they are male, female, in between, all of the above, or neither.

Don't Ask, Don't Tell Policy

So this weekend, the Senate officially appealed the Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell Policy. I guess this should technically be considered a victory for the LGBT community. After a back and forth struggle over whether it would turn our military forces into a bunch of weak fairies or not, the Democrats actually put up a fight and accomplished something for once. This is the second time DADT has been repealed, and hopefully it will stick. After seventeen years, non-heterosexual soldiers can once again serve openly.

I don’t necessarily care about this issue, as I dislike the military. I do however care about “freedom”; freedom for the average person such as myself, my family, and my friends. As I’ve aged however, my disdain has diminished. I have family members in the military who have served in other countries, including the Middle East, on multiple occasions. While I still don’t support our military policies, I cannot have the same passionate dislike as I did when I was younger, as I technically am personally invested in militaristic affairs.

The military needs all the enlistments it can get. It is a patriarchal, sexist system. They are hugely unpopular everywhere, and this may be a reason why our legislators pushed so hard in favor of a repeal. Allowing openly gay members will not change that. Having non-heterosexual forces will undoubtedly effect our standing in more conservative parts of the world, specifically the Middle East. On the flipside, studies on the successes and failures of DAD have been done and it will not decrease morale of our troops as has been commonly argued by opponents of the repeal.

Hearing John McCain in particular arguing against the repeal reaffirms the deceit and hypocrisy of politicians. He truly put his foot in his mouth while attempting to defend DADT.  Especially with a lame-duck session, lawmakers took off from their vacations to make this happen. He is already taking his vengeance by expressing to not vote for the START treaty, a ratification the U.S. made with Russia in order to reduce nuclear arms. He is making the repeal effort in conjunction with Joe Lieberman and Lindsey Graham. This is a typical political power struggle.

The tides have turned in favor the younger generation. Regardless of my feelings on the military, I acknowledge that it is a relief for people who have a personal investment in the issue. Celebrate while the win is fresh. Liberal victories will be few and far between when the new Republican-dominated session starts.

Wikileaks

This is something I spent half an hour writing half night. It's fragmented and poorly written, so I may or may not edit it in the near future.

Yesterday was Operation: Blackface. People were to wear black clothing or armbands, and change their profile pictures to black icons if they had a Facebook. I heard an argument that the title of the project was racist and I guess I can sort of understand that perspective. Someone said that when people tried to protest the term it was christened, their comments were deleted. That is not okay. The creators should have expected the outcry and planned ahead as to avoid situations that could cause a lack of unity.

While I greatly support Wikileaks, there are a couple aspects of it that are wrong. The creator, Julian Assange, is a rapist. It is not okay that he has raped women. I don’t care how it happened, “surprise sex” is a cop-out term. When a person tells you to stop doing something, you stop, especially in regards to sex. I support his Wikileaks project and hope that it thrives, but I do not support those particular actions. I heard Sweden’s punishment for rape is a mere $700. That is paltry, and a joke. One of the people Assange raped is connected to the FBI. Is this a coincidence. The world may never know.

We should all enjoy the Wikileaks project while it is at its height. This kind of momentum of a counter-movement cannot be maintained. It may never happen again. This kind of exposure of corrupt actions has never happened in the past, and governments of the world will ensure that it is even harder to happen again. Heck, federal agencies are even banning their employees from reading leaked cables.

I have friends who have been arrested for less. Thought crimes can even put an idealist activist behind bars. If the government thinks you’re a threat they will cut you down to size, before your cause is even half-way effective. Common community organizers are on the FBI’s watch list. I wonder, with my few years in the political scene, what they have on me. How thick is my file right now? There are ways to find out, but I don’t want to go through the process. Maybe in the future, when I’m not occupied with other more worthwhile endeavors, I’ll file a request.

Anyway, I find Julian Assange to be a modern day revolutionary. Governments aren’t crumbling to their knees, rather, the opposite is happening. They are on the offensive, demanding his head for exposing their dirty secrets. I am worried he might get assassinated. If he does, I won’t be surprised. Too many good people die young in a way. I supported Operation: Blackface even though its racist. Why can’t our causes be unified? This is an essential question.

A major reason this will be ineffective though, is because it is based solely on Facebook. The website is compactible, online, and can easily be ignored, On the flipside, news outlets will report on it allowing it to be heard about it a greater volume. I don’t want to say we should take to the streets, because I am burnt out from activism and most people don’t do it. We could write our legislators, but they don’t give jack shit about us. They only care about lobbyists and who can line their pockets with money.

Julian Assange is not a terrorist, but I don’t view him as a journalist either. He is simply a man who provided something unique to the world. It will be the history books. How will he be viewed? At first, the media painted him as a hero but now he is evil. Time was going to make him the person of the year, but changed it to someone I don’t like. I forget who that person was, but last year it was Ben Bernanke. Obviously, the award doesn’t mean jack shit. Ben Bernanke is a dickhead. Assange is better off without that award. Compared to his current problems at hand, having the honor revoked is nothing.

It’s possible he may get tortured in prison. This is what is supposedly happening to the person who originally leaked one of the cables. The courts couldn’t decide whether to grant him bail or not. He was given bail, then it was revoked. Life is fucked. We are all ants, cogs in the machine. The only lessons governments are learning from this experience is how to keep better secrets. I’m worried we will also find it harder to access knowledge bases in the future as well.

B.Lewis

The other week, I discovered this really amazing artist from San Jose called B.Lewis.



His entire digital ablum, La Semaine, can be downloaded for free here-http://blewis.bandcamp.com/album/la-semaine.

Also, I am a really bad person.

Drunken Embarassment

So last night, I visited one of my favorite bars and got drunk. I'm a lightweight and even though I drink often, I still manage to get intoxicated extremely quickly. The bartender made this delicious blue speciality drink with different kinds of rum. After that, I went to my friend's house that was nearby and met a couple of his housemates. We talked a bit, I did some drunken stupid stuff and then wandered home.