Tonight's Music

We've fought a hard battle and won a great victory.

So here's something smooth and relaxing to help decompress.

Enjoy.

Tonight's Music

This was recommended by a couple of readers and I heartily endorse their opinion. This is Blue Man Group's tribute to the murdered innocents of 9/11.

Tonight's Christmas Music

Mannheim Steamroller - Joy To The World

Tiger's lament

From The New York Post:

After all that time cavorting with an endless stream of floozies, Tiger Woods is now just a sad lone wolf.

The golf great has been spending his days in seclusion -- eating cereal and watching cartoons -- and his nights hitting golf balls to clear his head since his carefully crafted world unraveled following revelations of rampant womanizing that drove his wife out the door, it was reported yesterday.

Woods has isolated himself from even his closest friends since wife Elin Nordegren learned of his philandering ways, leading those close to him to worry he might be "cracking up."

[. . .]

Woods has not been seen in public since a bizarre Thanksgiving-weekend car crash outside his Florida home led to an endless stream of stories about steamy affairs, several of them long term.

But neighbors in the gated community where Woods lived with Nordegren say they spotted him coming home for therapy sessions with his outraged wife following their initial split.

"[He would] come by in the early evenings only for their counseling and therapy," a neighbor told Us Weekly.

During the agonizing sessions, Woods would "just apologize over and over again" for his sexual transgressions during their five-year marriage. Then he'd go to a local golf course to hit some balls.

"He goes after dark so he can't be seen," a source told the magazine. "For him, what's more therapeutic than hitting golf balls, the thing he's best at in the whole world?"

The therapy sessions did little to help. Nordegren has made it clear she is filing for divorce. She reportedly reached out to a top LA divorce lawyer to renegotiate her prenuptial agreement. She was spotted recently without her wedding and engagement rings on her finger.

The collapse of the marriage began Thanksgiving week, when the first of a bevy of Tiger birdies emerged. Nordegren reportedly chased Tiger out of their home with a golf club, which led to Woods crashing his SUV into a tree.

The floodgates then opened, with as many as 13 other women coming forward claiming steamy in-the-sheets action with Woods during the course of his marriage. There has been widespread speculation that Nordegren -- with whom Woods has two young children -- could try to take her hubby for half of his billion-dollar fortune.

OK, so Tiger is your average young male horn-dog who happens to be really good at playing golf. He turns pro and starts winning. The winning helps him chase more, and more high quality, skirt but then something weird happens.

The golf world, and the greater popular culture, look at Tiger and don't just see a young man who is really good at golf who has the potential to break all the records in the golf record book.

They look at Tiger and see a young man who can do all those things and who is also BLACK and have a collective orgasm.

Golf, like everything else in America, can now be regarded as "legitimate" only if it is dominated by a black man or woman.

If you doubt this just listen to our cool young and very "historic" president as he travels the world apologizing for the United States and asking our enemies to look beyond our wretched past in which "white (American) man's greed ran a world in need" and see our bright future now that we have properly placed the government of the nation into the hands of an African-born black man of the Third World* who understands that America's wealth, military power, liberty and world influence must be dramatically diminished if the world's downtrodden masses are ever to see true social justice.

But back to Tiger.

So young black Tiger looks around and realizes that because of the crushing load of white liberal guilt - not to mention the sheer stupidity - of the popular culture in general and the left-loon sports media in particular - that he is destined to be treated as a demi-god and that he can leverage this demi-god status into a truly massive fortune, but to get to the folding money he needed a squeaky-clean image because that is what corporate sponsors will pay the most for. A hero who not only turns in wins but who looks like Ward Clever (only black) while doing it.

So Tiger stops openly chasing skirt and bags himself a beautiful white supermodel wife and has the requisite 2.1 children and the comfy little mansion in the (high-end gated community) burbs.

Only one little problem.

This ain't who Tiger really is.

The real Tiger is a young horn-dog who loves to chase tail.

So when you are a billionaire demi-god who is constantly getting the message from society that he is perfect and can do no wrong and can have anything he wants.

And when women are throwing themselves at you 24/7 when you are traveling (while the wife stays home with the 2.1 kids) - you tend to reach up and pluck the low hanging fruit.

Then you get caught on film with your hand down one of your doxy's pants - in the parking lot of a church, no less - and the reporters and their magazine prove what total whores they are by spiking the story in exchange for an interview and a magazine cover.

Other golfers keep your secrets. PGA officials keep your secrets. Reporters keep your secrets. Sponsors keep your secrets.

All because you are a demi-god and a cash cow.

Then one day your wife finds out about one or more of the other women and goes ballistic by coming after you with a sand wedge. She goes upside your head with that thing and whacks you so hard that you get a concussion. You stumble out to the SUV and try to flee, maybe to the emergency room. But you are in and out of consciousness and the enraged woman that you had hired to be your perfect storybook wife is chasing the damn car and trying to smash out the back window so she can get in and finish the job of turning your brain into a shapeless mass of blood pudding and you run over a fire hydrant and hit a tree.

Thankfully someone calls the cops before the wife can get to you and after spending enough time at hospital for the doctors to see that you aren't about to slip into a coma you embark on the next great adventure life has for you.

Damage Control!

You offer the wife millions and a re-negotiated prenuptial agreement to stay with you for a couple of more years so you can rebuild your demi-god status with the sponsors and you make what is probably the second worst mistake of you life.

You appeal to the press to respect your privacy.

Ain't gonna happen even if you are black and a demi-god.

They lied for you in covering up your true character.

Now everyone knows that they aren't really a corps of responsible sports journalists. Instead they are a gang of star-struck fanboys who are willing to lie to their readers for the opportunity to hang out at the clubhouse with you (where they also cover up what a nasty piece of work you are, treating wait staff and anyone else beneath you on the pecking order like toilet paper).

No, you made the press look bad and for that there will be no forgiveness, unless you manage to get back on top, then they'll crawl back and beg for the chance to lick your black ass again, but for now they are in damage control mode of their own and will pick and pry at the scabs of your personal life and spread out all the pus for the world to see.

So enjoy your self-made bed Tiger.

If you had been willing to be worth a couple hundred million instead of a few billion you could have been honest with the world and chased as much tail as you wanted. But the brass ring wasn't enough for you. You wanted the gold ring - and you got it.

But you can't have your cake and eat it too.

Finally let's talk about the wife.

When she signed a prenuptial agreement she turned her marriage into a business contract. So what is happening between her and Tiger right now is basically a dispute between management and labor. Right now the shortest road for Tiger to regain billionaire demi-god status runs right between her. . . let's not go there. Let's just say that it runs through her willingness to publicly forgive and trust Tiger.

But that doesn't seem to be happening because it seems that Mrs. Tiger actually managed to delude herself into believing that a genuine marriage with genuine love and commitment could be hiding behind a prenup in which she had to stay married a certain number of years for it to "vest".

No wonder Tiger's depressed. His wife has gone from being a necessary component in his carefully crafted public image and is now in full bore "woman scorned" mode and every week that she seethes and consults with lawyers about just how big a check she can force him to write he loses tens of millions of revenue from lost sponsors.

And to top it off the demi-god who could do no wrong and who could have anything he wanted and who got off on the feeling of power that came from abusing anyone who couldn't fight back now has to watch himself being reinvented as the favored target of late night talk-show hosts and the punchline of a million dirty jokes told in thousands of working class corner bars across the fruited plain.

Well, here is a nice video from The Bangles to help set the mood.

Tonight's Christmas Music

This is one of my holiday favorites. Trans-Siberian Orchestra's Christmas Eve/Sarajevo - 12/24.

This is from their DVD The Ghosts of Christmas Eve.

Tonight's Music

Julie Fowlis - Hùg Air A' Bhonaid Mhòir

Today's Music

For all my loyal readers who are not out shopping on Black Friday, or for those of you who just got home, exhausted and bruised, from the malls and Wal Mart here is a tune to cheer the day. This is the Swiss Celtic Folk Metal group Eluveitie playing a something a little more traditional. This features a pair of electric bagpipes.

Falling like a stone

From the Politico:

President Obama's job approval numbers will dip below 50% for the first time today in Gallup's daily tracking poll, according to a Gallup official.

"Gallup Daily tracking results just in. Obama will be below 50% for the first time when we update our numbers at 1:00 p.m.," wrote Gallup.com managing news editor Lymari Morales on Twitter.

His approval numbers have bounced down to the 50% mark several times, driven by weaker support from independents and Republicans, but hadn't crossed it.

The slide is worrying for the White House, but it's probably not yet panic time. Ronald Reagan's approval numbers dropped well below 40% during the depths of his first term recession. If Obama's bad stretch puts him in the high forties or low fifties, that's not a crippling political problem. If he languishes there or drops further, it may become one.

The critical difference between Reagan and Obama is that Reagan's policies were rooted in conservative free-market principles which could not help but end the recession and usher in an era of unrivaled peacetime economic expansion.

Obama, on the other hand, is pursuing policies rooted in Marxism and cannot help but create an anemic, jobless recovery which will slide back into recession - probably before next Fall.

This 180 degree difference between the orientation of Reagan and Obama will guarantee a 180 degree difference in outcomes.

Reagan is, and will continue to be, venerated as the greatest president of the 20th century.

Obama, name will become an obscenity - literally. In future decades if someone on broadcast television is tasteless enough to utter the word "Obama" it will be bleeped out and the actor's mouth will be digitally blurred so that no one will be able to read his lips and write angry letters to the network.

Here is a video to celebrate Obama's political future.

Tonight's Music

Another, somewhat more traditional, Eluveitie video.

Good memory

Our friend Patrick, who blogs at the Pagan Temple left a comment to my post None So Blind as Those Who Will Not See which included this:

I don't know if you'll remember what I'm talking about, Lem, but I'm ready to join you by that open fire with that bottle of wine.

Of course I remember what he is talking about.


The July 22, 2007 post titled The Moonbats Cultural Death Wish, in which I made this statement:

Ladies and gentlemen I give you exhibit 9,854,541,336,874,599,476 why I hate the left with every fiber of my being. Why I would gladly throw every last one of them alive and screaming into a giant bonfire. Then drink wine, dance and play the bagpipes while they burned.

That comment set the left-wing blogs into paroxysms of foaming madness and inspired one to them to create the picture you see above.

All I can say is you bring the marshmallows and weenies and I'll bring the Boone's Farm.

And for tonight's music here is The Swiss Death Metal Group Eluveitie with a pair of electric bagpipes.

Tonight's Music

My Three Kilts. I'll be seeing them Friday night at Jack of the Wood in Asheville.

Tonight's Music

Qntal - Von Den Elbin

Tonight's Music

Sardinia



M'Ionam

Two from Camercaillie's CD Beautiful Wasteland, one of their best.

However their fan base disagreed. The band's willingness to go beyond the traditional Celtic mold and incorporate other musical styles into their music infuriated many of their most loyal fans. After this CD the band retreated into more traditional Celtic musical forms, even titling their next all original CD Nàdurra , (Naturally, for its reliance upon traditional instruments, rhythms, ect.).

Although the band's later work has been excellent it has never matched what it could have been had they continued to expand their horizons and blend the best of what the rest of the world had to offer with their traditional Celtic sound.

Tonight's Music

Two from Aaron Copland, the man who proves that great composers persisted into the 20th century.





OK, three from Copeland:

Tonight's Music

Bruce Hornsby doing Bluegrass. It must be a sign of the Apocalypse.

Today's Music

I haven't posted music in a while so here are three nice videos:



Altan - Dúlamán. The nicest song ever about seaweed.



Rathlestair - Dragonfly



And finally Poor Man's Fortune performing at the North Texas Irish Festival. Yes, that is E.J. Jones sitting in.

Tonight's Music

Sharon Shannon - Galway Girl

Tonight's Music

Celtic Woman performs there new song O, America!

The group describes the song as a tribute to the American Dream.

Chloe Agnew said at a recent concert:

"'O, America!' is a dedication to you to thank you for being the first country to embrace us as Celtic Woman. We feel as though we are part of your family now and for that we are very honored and proud. You are our true inspiration!"

Tonight's Music

Rathkeltair performing Dragonfly.

Tonight's Music

Part 6 of the Six Mile Bridge concert.