Now that he’s our music blogger, you can look for some regular insight into the latest music, the best music of days past, and up-and-coming performers, plus more interviews and performances. I think you’ll find his attitude and outlook infections and his writing captivating. I do.

Here’s my interview with him. I also posted it on the page featuring his music.

An interview with Dan Rickabus.

I have always said that polls are polls of people who agree to take a poll. This is true. You have to agree to do it in order to be counted at all. But take Gallup’s recent Presidential Tracking Poll – they do a three day rolling average pretty much non-stop. The media only tends to report big swings or tension building results – tension sells after all. Right now Ben Smith over at Politico has a short entry on his blog about how Obama is now at 46% approval. Now Ben’s a good guy and does his job well, although I wonder if he looked at the Gallup breakdown. If he had he would see a trend that I think points to where this country is heading.

18-29 Year Olds approve of the job President Obama is doing by 61%.

Think about that.

And think about those same voters in 2012, 2016…61% is not small and these folks do not stay 18-29 forever. They get older and as they do they are more and more likely to show up at the real polls – the voting booth – on election day.

30 to 49 year olds – my block – approve at 49%. I wonder why my block has a 20 year span and 18-29 is just an eleven year….I’d love to see the breakdown between 30 and 39…I have a feeling we’re not far below the 61%. In fact if anyone has an answer to this please email me or leave a comment below.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. We are in a generational shift in this country not a political one. Politics, as practiced currently, is a marketing game. The true differences between the parties are small – otherwise we would have had more than one Civil War. It simply boils down to how to pay for things and what should be private and what should be public. We are made to think we are different for the sake of easy politics. It’s no different than two fans of opposing Baseball teams – you may think they hate each other but they still both love the same game, Baseball.

Now what is dragging Obama’s numbers down? Those over 50. The demo 50-64 has him at 46%.

What’s fascinating is Gallup has an article up – you have to work to find it – about how President Obama is doing much better with the younger block of voters than either President George W. Bush or President Bill Clinton.

Clinton managed to get 57% approval from young voters and Bush only 46%.

Long story short – President Obama is doing just fine. Now Congress on the other hand…

As Americans, it is easy to avoid thinking about water issues because we seem less affected than developing countries. Perhaps this is true, but that doesn’t mean we turn a blind eye to the likes of Vivendi, Nestle and Perrier who want to sell a public good in the US and beyond.

People have a connection with their land and the resources reaped from the land. I would argue that many wars are fought not over political ideologies but scarcity of resources. Privatizing water for profit establishes an unfortunate dynamic which promotes a world where profit is promoted before life, a world where everything and anything becomes a commodity.

I am not suggesting we forget that providing water to residents is not free. It costs money to pump water and provide it to residents. Public utility rate systems in some US metropolitan cities provide incentives to consumers to reduce water consumption, charging more or less depending on use. The point being, these public agencies are more interested in the public good and held to a standard by the federal government to provide safe drinking water. I cannot say that a private company would have the same motivations, seeing as how their primary interest is profit. Perhaps there is a middle way for public and private agencies to work together but in any event, water is life and should not be used as a source of profit.

More information:

http://www.citizen.org/cmep/Water/general/

This week’s strip, on the theme of friendship, is entitled “Friendship… eh?”

In this current debate on Health Care I’ve been rather surprised by the resistance from the conservative right to providing universal health care to the country. And with out getting into the politics of it too much I am curious how people of faith view the concept of Universal Health Care. I have always felt that if someone is starving you feed them, if someone is dying you try to save their life. Now I do not take this as meaning you can not charge for basic services but should you profit off of it? Is it okay that someone made a profit off of someone dying of cancer? Or if someone made a profit off of texts to raise money for something like Haiti Earthquake Relief?

I personally feel that there is a fairly clear moral and ethical line that should not be crossed. Feel free to read and join the discussion here at the AVJ Writer’s Debate.

The concept of profit in a capitalist society is essentially devoid of ethical considerations. There is one goal:  increase net profit; even if it involves attaching misnomers to your pitch or creating subterfuges. It is usually only the most vile that resort to such extremities; however, even in the simplest sell-and-buy transactions there occurs a certain amount of manipulation.

Manipulation may simply occur through misrepresentation of person or skill. In a recent encounter with a woman who claimed that her calling in life was to help people heal their broken heart (once they had bought a certain book that she had written), I asked her what her perspective was on free advice to people who could not afford her book. She smirked and replied saying that in assisting people who did not pay, she would be wasting time and neglecting the customers who did. There are also spiritual healers (sangomas), back-door abortionists and such (essentially charlatans) who offer overpriced solutions to the ignorant, desperate and impoverished. In South Africa, there was a case in which a practicing 16-year-old spiritual healer mixed something toxic and killed himself and his family (an approximate total of 16 people died).  Profit sucks out the soul of humanity: any help needed comes with a price tag; all price tags come with an included and invisible mark up (pure-hearted charity excluded).

Even the poor manipulate and make money off the poor. In certain clinics in South Africa, which are meant to aid the impoverished and provide medication to the sick, there are nurses who steal the government-provided medication and sell it instead of distributing it to the sick who approach the clinics for help. In old age homes, there are assistants who steal the belongings of the elderly to sell and make a profit. Orphanages are also robbed of their comforts with charity given toys and food being taken by the assistants for their own usage. Certain companies even use charity as a marketing gimmick – ‘for every (product) purchased, a percentage will be donated to (a random charity organisation)’.

In every finance-involved situation there is a capitalist salivating over the prospect of profit; be it a supposed act of goodwill or straight cut business deals. The most indigent are non-existent. Charity organizations and NGO’s can only do so much to assist them.

However, there also exist the genuinely good-hearted people who help out in times of need… free of charge. I like to think of such people as miniature land-bound gods; free of the capitalism shackles. As for me, I’m refining my entrepreneur skills in an attempt to profit of the rich – despite the soul-less nature of capitalism, everyone needs money. Myself included.

ASSERTION:
The government should help to ensure that no business profits excessively off the sick, disabled, or poor.

Tharuna Devchand is a young lady from South Africa with quite a talent for writing and entertaining. We’re excited to share her wit and her viewpoint with you.

Dan Rickabus is a musician from Michigan who we just featured on the site. We asked him to be our music blogger and he luckily said “yes.” I think you’ll find his music writing very cool and very enlightening.

Tharuna and Dan both love to hear opinions and share ideas, so don’t be shy.

First let me say it was an enjoyable conversation and I respect his desire to keep his morning listeners engaged and entertained even though I do not agree with many of his positions.

This past week I had shared some thoughts via CNN on the attempts by Sen. Bunning and Sen. Kyl to depict we the unemployed as lazy and with no ambition to find work. I, like millions of Americans, found this an insulting assertion. Allman had me on to discuss my “slam” as he called it. (can we retire that word yet?)

Instead of discussing the real consequences of the economic crisis and instead of focusing on the realities that it has brought – Allman chose to focus on me and my year of unemployment.

Side note - last week I received the first call for work I’ve had all year. I have sent out many resumes and received no response. A friend refered me to a company he worked for and they called. We talked and I did not book the gig. Today I learned that my friend no longer works there and is himself unemployed.

Allman’s solutions for the unemployed seemed to entirely focus on part time jobs. He seems to be in denial about the severities of this crisis and seems to want to depict the victims of it as deviants. This is unacceptable and if the conservative community continues to be representated by voices like Allman’s I can assure you they will never be taken seriously again.

People are hurting. People are starving. And Allman doesn’t appear to care to offer up real solutions. He repeatedly brought up McDonald’s and Walmart as potential employers for the over 6 millions people currently unemployed. I am not certain if they are simply sponsors of his that he’s trying to cleverly place within an interview but I am fairly certain that they can not hire all of the unemployed and certainly not full time. And I am confused why conservatives seem to have communist ideals – they seem to think everyone has a right to a job no matter if there is a need for a job. Just because I want a job does not mean I just get one.

Now – I listened to much of the rest of his program this morning and found one bit of his opinion interesting and oddly confusing. He and his callers seemed to advocate neighbors helping neighbors rather than relying on the government. As if the government was some outside influence into people’s lives. (something I can somewhat understand given President Bush’s wiretapping habits) Allman also kept talking about how 40% of his income goes to the federal government and he thinks that if he was taxed less that he would have more money to help people. All interesting ideas – except for one thing.

Governement is just people helping people. That is actually it’s intent.

One of his callers asserted that the founding fathers were just people helping each other – good neighbors. And we need to return to that. I wonder if the caller understood that when Franklin, Washington, Jefferson and the rest decided to help each other – as good neighbors – they did something called forming the government!

It says in our founding documents “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” I think these words stand on their own but I think some folks should pay attention to “promote the general welfare”. I wonder what that means? I think it means helping each other have a strong quality of life. We are a united country, not a divided on.

We work together, for apart we are nothing but people bumping into each other trying to survive.

It is our governemnt. It is our way of helping each other and lifting our nieghbors up. It only works if we pay attention and take part. And it only works if we do not allow ourselves to be distracted by the voices floating out there in the airwaves on our morning commutes. We must be involved. We must get to know our representatives. We must know how to read the laws that are being debated and we must pay attention. We must in order for our country to function well.

Now I can understand why conservatives have such a negative view of government – I mean every time a conservative is in power our country begins spying on it’s citizens, launching us into dangerous wars and they always end their tenure with the country in a deep recession. I may be making a bit of a joke here but the facts do speak for themselves.

One reason I no longer vote republican (and I use to) is because I noticed this hypocrisy and it pushed me away from their party and my conversation with Allman today reaffirmed my concerns about their point of view. I’m not saying the democrats are perfect but they at least understand that government is meant to help, not hurt and intrude. For example I am always appalled that conservatives are okay with profiting off of the sick and the poor and whenever Democrats try to keep that from happening the republican party stands up and crosses their arms – protecting profit – no matter the morality.

I mean according to Allman all the unemployed should be denied unemployment insurance. I ask him this – what if the 6 plus million people currently unemployed just can not find work? Can not find permament work? What would that do to our country? What would the ripple effect be of 6 million people not paying their bills, not buying goods? How many more people would be out of work?

I think Allman forgets that for many of us this is life and death – it is not a joke. It is not a topic for a radio show to have fun with – it is serious. It is life and death. If we do not find work we die – especially if Allman has his way.

That is unless our neighbors help us stay alive – like Allman suggests. And given the sheer number of people that are unemployed and the ripple effect it would create – we would need to organize some body to help our neighbors. Probably elect some leaders to organize the effort. And very soon – neighbors helping neighbors turns into well….a government.

Which we already have.

Soundtrack to this post: “Dollars & Cents” by Radiohead, from Amnesiac. (I’ll be doing this for every post I make. It will always be a song that relates directly to what the content of the post, and you can listen to it while reading, after reading, or not at all! Just a suggestion, and honestly, another excuse to share music!)

Radiohead performs “Dollars & Cents” on BBC Sessions.

“Money, so they say, is the root of all evil today. But if you ask for a rise, it’s no surprise that they’re giving none away.” Too right you were, Roger Waters.

Making true art in our mile-a-minute capitalist society has always been a tricky process. So much so, that one would instantly assume and anticipate a struggle after making the decision to pursue music as a career. That is, unless you have the unhindered backing of a big-time record label like in your dreams. However, all too often the concept of profit is held in higher regard than the concept of true musicianship. Pressure to sell and mold your sound accordingly definitely wasn’t in your dream, but it is without a doubt in the reality of major labels. As a result, there is an intense increase in the number of bands who have dropped from the big-label scene to lesser indie supporters, allowing them to do what they want. After the monumental success of their 2008 self titled debut, Seattle’s Fleet Foxes were met by five offers from the big dogs, and they turned every single one down. Their lead songwriter, Robin Pecknold was quoted as saying that major labels were “anti-music.” Quite a bold statement, but a justified one. When profit enters into the artistic process, it begins to feel like attempting to fit a circle into a square. This odd couple of the rigid, money-based world and the fluid universe of music is the foundation for the “music industry,” and I think we can all agree it’s a shaky one.

To utilize a metaphor that will solidify my nerd-dom, profit seems to be to music as The Force is to Jedi knights. The right amount of money used in the right way can be the light from heaven for a band or musician. It can provide new equipment for experimentation of tones and sounds. It can increase the overall well being and comfort of the musicians, allowing them to forget about monetary stresses and focus on true expression. For example, imagine if a musician like Andrew Bird, whose multi-instrumentalist and arranger characteristics impress the buh-Jesus out of every listener, never had the money to buy a loop-pedal?

Andrew Bird performs the mind-blowing “Anonanimal”

However, money can be a true poison to good music. Success, if large enough, can induce a kind of artistic apathy in later work. We’ve all heard the term “sell-out” that is all-too-often thrown around by angsty punkers and hipsters showcasing their disgust for anything the general public enjoys. However, the term does hold some kind of meaning at it’s core. Enough profit can promote changes in music to steer it more toward the direction of mass popularity. It can also promote a static nature to a band that has achieved recognition for their single, and chooses then to simply replicate that formula to keep the bankroll bulky. Take Nickelback for example: A band that gets debris thrown at their foreheads at their own concerts for their general artistic dishonesty.

Nickelback’s Narrow Escape

The bottom line is, music is an everchanging, plasmatic entity. It’s already extremely risky to box it and tranform it into a product. The purity of this audible artform can be nearly destroyed by attempting to squeeze it into a monetary system. However, everybody’s gotta eat, right? And musicians definitely aren’t nobody. What determines the distinction between profit being a blessing or a curse to music is the honesty and strength of the artists themselves. Fortunately for us, there are enough genuine artistic geniuses in today’s world to provide us with one of the most unique and groundbreaking musical climates the world has ever seen.