"A little ditty..."

Ahh, it's nice to know someone else has this kind of a problem (http://hughhewitt.townhall.com/g/e9851d97-85f6-4581-8800-35eadfdb3e73). I have had to deal with this ever since I can remember. One of my favorite bands that has posed this problem is Slayer. I completely dig their music, and yet I am completely aware that some of their lyrics are satanic. I'm not much of a churchgoer, but more than that, I'm certainly no devil worshiper. I'm sure, now being a parent myself, regardless of being a good kid who earned good grades (all the way through graduate school) and hung out with other good kids, this probably provided at least a little unease for my parents. Nowadays, I just wonder how a guy who says he believes in God, or at least a higher being, like vocalist Tom Araya claims to, can belt out the satanic lyrics guitarists Kerry King and Jeff Hanneman sometimes write.

However, such a contradiction, or conflict, wasn't brought to my attention until I graduated and started working. A female coworker said that by buying Marilyn Manson records, I was supporting his beliefs. I disagreed simply on the grounds that I did not share those beliefs, I just dug the music (even though I've never been interested in seeing them live, unlike Slayer).

That passed and I didn't think about it again until a few years later when I started listening to Rage Against the Machine and System of a Down. The conflict hit home harder partially due to my maturity, but mostly because I was much more interested in the social issues RATM and SOAD addressed than I was the religious issues dealt with by Slayer and MM. I can't think of anything RATM and SOAD sing about with which I agree. They both take a hard left at the ideological fork in the road, particularly RATM. RATM, and now Audioslave guitarist Tom Morello, who has a Harvard degree in, I believe political science, and SOAD lead singer Serj Tankian formed a group called Axis of Justice. They support and demonstrate for, among other things (most notably to me), the minimum wage, workers' rights and anti-globalization. In my mind, workers have a right to work wherever they want (assuming the employer agrees) and a safe work place, but that's it.

I will probably continue to listen to and buy the music of these acts while holding my nose at some of what they espouse. Until someone comes along raging at an equal decibel level about the inefficiencies of the tax code or the erosion of states rights, I think I'm stuck.

Timing is Everything

Mom charged after toddler drowned in tub
A 29-year-old Charlotte woman was charged with capital murder Monday after she told authorities she drowned her 3-year-old daughter in the bathtub, said David Soward, chief deputy of the Atascosa County Sheriff's Department.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/news/metro/stories/MYSA021307.01A.daughter_drowned.1bdf1c3.html
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This reminds me two people I just read about in Bernard Goldberg's 110 People Who Are Screwing Up America.
One was a lady in New York who, after she found out she was pregnant with triplets (a single and a pair of twins), asked a doctor "Is it possible to get rid of one of them? Or two of them?" because "I'd have to give up my life and start shopping at Costco". He said yes, so he helped her "selectively reduce" with a "shot of potassium chloride to the heart" of each twin.
The other is the doctor who invented partial-birth abortion. He talked of how he would "grab the foot of the fetus" and "collapse the head" and pull "it" out.

Keep voting democrat!

Wonderful, Wonderful, Wonderful!

When a BIG component of the msm realizes the benefits of free trade (http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/02/AR2007020201541.html), there is a real chance remaining skepticism will be further eroded. If the New York Times were to jump on board and acknowledge the obvious, free trade would become the norm.

Wait a second...(http://www.nytimes.com/2007/02/02/opinion/02fri1.html?_r=1&n=Top%2fOpinion%2fEditorials%20and%20Op%2dEd%2fEditorials&oref=slogin). Wow! I am impressed!