Posts by Simon Grigg
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Steve,
You saying Al Gore said he invented the internet and your quote are rather different things no?"The Internet would not be where it is in the United States without the strong support given to it and related research areas by the Vice President in his current role and in his earlier role as Senator."
Also Snopes
As you were....
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Yes...Tony...I should've known that but the braincells are not what they were.
Soulmine was, for years, one of the best shops in the country too. and his enthusiasm was the key to that...I always enjoyed talking music to him. I can see him now extolling the virtues of some obscure 12" to me in a way that meant you needed that record (and he just happened to have a copy in stock).
We'd actually planned to do a Marching Orders single on Propeller as a one off as I recall, but events intervened
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I got my first ever copy (Penknife Glides cover) from Vibes sometime in '81 and never missed a single issue for the next 10 years
who was that guy who ran Vibes? I think he went on to Soul MIne in Wellington.....a lovely guy but, shall we say, very very enthusiastic...he sent me a telegram about a Screaming Meemees single (Stars in My Eyes) which I turned into a RIU ad, it was so, umm, enthusiastic
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I blame the change in the licensing laws. There was a lot wrong with 10 o'clock closing but at least it made sure gigs kicked off on time...
whoops, I can claim a wee bit of responsibility for that when we decided, from 92 onwards, to put Nathan Haines & The Enforcers on at 1am, in Cause Celebre, playing through to four or five (or later). As you say it was licensing that forced it. When clubs closed by law at 3am it was an 11-3 set, but when the "man" says you gotta stay open until six.....
As a licensee it was a pain in the butt...you make the same money but over six hours rather than three, with an associated and unavoidable rise in costs.
But it gave us a hell of an edge over everybody else in town.
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Hi Russell,
God i wish I could've been there, but geography got in the way. Although I was never on the the RIU pay list as such, I think flatting with Murray for four years (1980-83) plus countless inches of ink made me feel like part of the family. Murray used to come home from those deadlines in the Bedford a physical wreck and disappear into the bathroom for tweny four hours, sleeping in the bath! Then he announced he was going to do another magazine (Xtra) and then another (Shake)!And it was all done for the passion he had for the music. Sadly, as time goes on, I think many in NZ have forgotten the massive, and unequaled contribution Mo made to the nation's music...both it's industry and it's taste. I was once asked by a journalist in Melbourne why NZ was so much more adventurous musically than Australia, and I replied "Murray Cammick"...and I think it's appalling how quickly that industry has let that thought go (then again we no longer have the likes of Jerry Wise or Tim Murdoch to remind some).
I had to laugh at the LOVE story...I had the same experience in the College Hill flat..I agreed not to play it at home, if he'd leave his Bob Seger records at the office....
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I find it depressing that it wasn't so long ago that real conservative writers and thinkers like Russell Kirk, William F. Buckley, Alan Bloom and Francis Fukuyama were on the bestseller lists and getting serious media attention.
And also on that, there is a real, almost tangible sense that philosophies of the right are so tattered and discredited that their published thoughts (and I'm thinking more of the likes of Buckley and Kristol) are far more likely to be kept at arms length by the mainstream media in 2007 than in earlier years....almost a desire to avoid association with the rantings of The National Review or even the editorial stance of the Wall Street journal (their call to pardon Libby suffered quite a firestorm, even from the likes of CNN and the WSJ's own blogs)
And I could draw a similar line of de-evolution on the left
I disagree (but then I would), the renewed focus in the United States on the part of the liberal / progressive blogasphere and essayists, in the wake of last November's election, and the earlier and ongoing collapse in popular support for both Bush (28% last week on CBS) / Cheney and the policies of those that have guided them in recent years, seems to me to evident and self-invigorating. Show me anything on the right with either the profile or the power of Kos or MyDD. The right may hate them but they offer nothing that compares.
Whilst on the right, the packs seem to be turning on and wildly flailing in some sort of desperation at each other....and let us not forget that Coulter's comments were made at one of the most respected Republican meets, endorsed by no less than Cheney, at which she was a key speaker. She sits close to the centre rather than the fringes of the right
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Francis Fukuyama
I would say that Mr Fukuyama's most recent work, in 2006, was the recipient as much, if not more ink, especially in the mainstream, than any of his earlier books...and it reached number one on the NYT list as I recall.
He reached the front page of The Independent on it's release, had extensive coverage in all the major US broadsheets, The Times, and The Telegraph, was given a half hour on BBC World and interviewed on CNN.
I'm not sure what you mean by "serious media attention"
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Craig,
there is a vast gulf between the vitriol urging violence used over and over again by Coulter and a few unchecked facts, and misquoted sources in Moore's' footnotes.Moore, as I said I have my problems with him, largely due to lazy editing, and a tendancy to, shall we say, drift with the facts. I'm well aware that the rabid right have moved mountains to discredit him including repeated cries of "FLAT OUT LIES" but there is a vast difference between a flawed attempt (and despite the best efforts of the much criticised Hitchens piece, and the like, much of Moore's work does, and has stood up to scrutiny, or at least has been argued independently of Moore, in his favour with some success) to provide an alternative vision of the political realities that Americans live with day to day, and a relentlessly vicious columnist who offers little more than hate, infused with calls to violence, and incites others to that hatred, to simply line her own pockets.
I don't defend and can't defend Michael Moore's failings but to me the difference is obvious..and has nothing to do with giving the man a pass for anything.
Oh, and incidentally in both Bush elections Manhattan voted around 80% for the Democrat, so whilst his claim may not be precise, its, as a turn of phrase, roughly correct, and indicative of the way he is is perhaps more loose with facts rather than offering straight up invention.
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Who would have guessed that the Michael Moore of the far-right would finally be useful for something?
I have my own problems with Moore but I think it's a wee bit unfair to lump him in with with someone whose quotes include:
"we should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them to Christianity."
when discussing the Muslim world, even if its said (or especially if it's said primarily) to sell books