Low Friends in High Places
Though I remain unemployed and, seemingly, unemployable, I still know a little bit about public relations. And an old and obvious PR maneuver is to dump bad or embarrassing news out on a Friday afternoon. If you can get away with doing it on a Friday afternoon before a holiday – let’s say when lots of peo

Dinosaur Victrola, Dinosaur Rock Writers
When you’re The Happy Misanthrope, one of life’s small pleasures is the semi-regular e-mail delivery of Dave Marsh’s Rock and Rap Confidential. Dave and a vast array of freelancers report and opine on music, politics, and the intersection of the two, and it’s always entertaining.So entertaining, in fact

In Search of The Real America
Almost a year ago, at a campaign stop in North Carolina, Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin praised small towns as “the real America” and “the

The Daughter and the Papa
Perhaps the most surprising thing about Mackenzie Phillips’ revelation that she and her father had a “consensual incest” relationship for 10 years is that it’s really not surprising at all.

Go Figure
I am told that people can no longer see themselves in the "followers" section of the homepage, and that the inference is that I've somehow disappeared them. I have no explanation for this - I still see everybody - and rest assured I would never purge anybody from following this blog and wouldn't know how to even if I wanted to. Which I don't. Sorry for any confusion.