I'M ELVIS PRESLEY IN THE SEVENTIES

Are you hiding from yourself, or am I just plain ugly?
APB: Something to Believe In


Shirts and skins. That's the framework the Daily Howler's Bob Somerby applies to people who are political news junkies, and it goes for liberals and conservatives alike. We human beings like to be told our side is right. We also like to ignore facts that fail to provide the tingling thrill of confirming our worldview. Somerby writes:

There are times, when you run a web site, when you’re stunned to discover the following fact: Readers have agreed with you down through the years only because they enjoy your conclusions. They’ll yelp and howl about the vile ways the words of the shirts have been misstated. But when someone misstate[s] the words of a skin, they’ll invent endless ways to support that.

Just another girl that broke my heart before I met you.
Lullatone: The Bedtime Beatbox


I was talking to a wise pundit the other day about politics, and this person said to me that Bob Somerby is "crazy." And I said the person was probably right. What I failed to add is, "So what? That's the point!" Josh Marshall, E.J. Dionne, Nicholas Kristof, Bob Herbert, Kevin Drum, The New Republic, Salon, Slate, The American Prospect, Washington Monthly... all make the rational decision not to talk about the role of the press corps in American politics, whether in covering up McCain's gaffes or in exaggerating Bill Clinton's pleasingly r-word Jesse Jackson remarks. Speaking the truth is a statement against interests.

Somerby goes on:

TO THE WORDS-IN-THEMSELVES: Once again, here’s Frank Rich, quoting two of the statements in question. We post this again for a reason:

RICH (4/6/08): Really, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton should be ashamed of themselves for libeling John McCain. As a growing chorus reiterates, their refrains that Mr. McCain is ''willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq'' (as Mr. Obama said) or ''willing to keep this war going for 100 years'' are flat-out wrong.

We’ll skip the part about shame and libel—but there you see two of the criticized comments. And Rich is right about those remarks: They plainly aren’t what McCain said.

What did we notice, when we watched Josh [Marshall] on yesterday’s TPMtv report? The gentleman spends almost five minutes defending the criticized remarks. But he never repeats the remarks he’s defending! Readers, when you see work like that, you know two things: First, you’re being viewed as a rube—and second, you’re being run.

This is how Hannity treats his viewers! Down through the years, the shirts have always lustily cheered when we’ve mentioned that.

AN INTERPRETIVE PRINCIPLE: Once again, here’s the basic Q-and-A in question. You may think McCain is dreaming of something that just cannot be. But he plainly didn’t say that he wanted a hundred-year war. When he spoke about that hundred years, he was expressly describing a peacetime situation:

QUESTION (1/3/08): President Bush has talked about our staying in Iraq for 50 years—

MCCAIN: Maybe a hundred. We've been in South Korea. We've been in Japan for 60 years. We've been in South Korea for 50 years or so. That'd be fine with me as long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed. Then it's fine with me.

You may think McCain is dreaming here. But he plainly didn’t say that he was “willing to send our troops into another 100 years of war in Iraq.”

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What part did I play in making you who you are?
Britney Spears: Lucky

SAD AND HAPPY, BUT I'D RATHER BE CONTENT

I'm in so deep I'm swimming with sharks.
Lucky Twice: Lucky

April Fool's?

Drug use increasingly glamorized in rap music, according to new study of 2-decade trends

UC-Berkeley researcher finds 6-fold increase in drug mentions, dramatic jump in positive 'framing'

Berkeley, CA, April 1, 2008 – Rap music has gone from an art form that largely warned against the dangers of substance abuse to one that often glorifies illegal drug use, according to the first systematic social science study of the genre covering nearly two decades. The study is published in the April 2008 issue of Addiction Research & Theory, a peer reviewed scientific journal.

“Positive portrayals of drug use have increased over time, and drug references increased overall,” says study author Denise Herd, Ph.D., Associate Dean of Students, School of Public Health, University of California, Berkeley. “This is an alarming trend, as rap artists are role models for the nation’s youth, especially in urban areas. Many of these young people are already at risk and need to get positive messages from the media.”

Dr. Herd and her team sampled 341 lyrics from the most popular songs in rap between 1979 and 1997. Each song was categorized in terms of its drug mentions, behaviors and contexts, as well as for its attitude towards drug use and consequences. Rap genres were also categorized, and drug-type mentions were coded and analyzed.

The researchers found that songs with references to drugs increased six-fold over this time span. Songs exhibiting positive attitudes toward drugs and the consequences of drug use also rose exponentially. Drug types mentioned changed significantly, and references of using drugs to signify glamour, wealth and sociability increased as well.

“This indicates a shift from cautionary songs, such as those that emphasized the dangers of cocaine and crack, to songs that glorify the use of marijuana and other drugs as part of a desirable hip-hop lifestyle,” says Dr. Herd. “This is alarming because young children are exposed to these messages. I don’t think this is a story we as a society want them to absorb.”

The change in references and drug portrayals was dramatic. Dr. Herd found that, of the 38 most popular songs between 1979 and 1984, only four, or 11%, contained drug references. By the late eighties that number had increased to 19%. The numbers continued to increase, and 69% of rap songs after 1993 mentioned drug use.

While songs early in rap history that mentioned drugs were generally cautionary tales about the dangers of crack, base or powdered cocaine (i.e., “White Lines”), mentions of marijuana and “blunts” (marijuana-stuffed cigars) doubled between 1979 and 1997, with many songs portraying the drugs as glamorous rewards of the hip-hop lifestyle (“The Chronic”).

Correct me if I'm wrong, but according to Bill Brewster and Frank Broughton's essential Last Night a DJ Saved My Life (page 234, in fact!):

The scene was far more druggy than today's rap stars prefer to remember, and along with pot-- modern hip hop's drug of choice-- plenty of less innocent pleasures were enjoyed. In between sixties heroin and eighties crack, the Bronx whizzed along on cocaine, which was then held to be non-addictive. Hence names like Kurtis Blow and Coke La Rock, and the fact that Melle Mel's record "White Lines" actually started life as an ironic celebration of cocaine, with the "Don't do it" message tacked on for commercial reasons.

So what's changed isn't rap, but the business environment.

If anyone's to blame, then, it's the record industry executives. Or guys like BET founder Bob Johnson, who got rich airing commercial music full of drug references, all the while canceling valuable news programming.

Or blame the rappers. Yeah. Fine. Won't somebody PLEASE think of the children?

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"Scattered over dawn's highway bleeding," I suppose.
Spiritualized: Don't Hold Me Close