(from http://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/washington/house-judiciary-approves-bill-ending-bulk-nsa-data-collection/130970)
". . . The House Judiciary Committee on a voice vote has unanimously approved the USA Freedom Act (H.R. 3361). The bill would end bulk data collection by the National Security Agency, as well as boost transparency and reporting requirements for targeted data requests, require more specificity in those requests, and minimize retention and dissemination of nonpublic data.
The compromise version hashed out over the past weekend was said to be a compromise between Judiciary chair Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.). The bill was sponsored by Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.).
The White House has taken some steps to reign in NSA data collection, but not enough for critics, including a host of groups planning a day of activism June 5, the anniversary of the first story about NSA surveillance, based on info from leaker Edward Snowden.
At the bill's markup Wednesday, the recurring theme was that the legislation would end bulk data collection that had been conducted, but shouldn't have been, under The PATRIOT Act.
An amendment was defeated that could have led to private companies having to retain customer data longer than they currently do. . ."
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
(from http://www.11points.com/Books/11_Things_The_Bible_Bans,_But_You_Do_Anyway
All quotes are translations from the New American Standard Bible)
1. Leviticus 19:27 reads "You shall not round off the side-growth of your heads nor harm the edges of your beard."
2. Football. At least, the pure version of football, where you play with a pigskin. And you're doubly breaking that if you wake up, eat some sausage. . . Leviticus 11:8, which is discussing pigs, reads "You shall not eat of their flesh nor touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you."
3. Fortune telling. Before you call a 900 number (do people still call 900 numbers, by the way?), read your horoscope or crack open a fortune cookie, realize you're in huge trouble if you do. Leviticus 19:31 reads "Do not turn to mediums or spiritists; do not seek them out to be defiled by them. I am the Lord your God." The penalty for that? Check Leviticus 20:6: "As for the person who turns to mediums and to spiritists, to play the harlot after them, I will also set My face against that person and will cut him off from among his people."
4. Pulling out. The Bible doesn't get too much into birth control... it's clearly pro-populating but, back when it was written, no one really anticipated the condom or the sponge, so those don't get specific bans.
But... pulling out does. One of the most famous sexual-oriented Bible verses... the one that's used as anti-masturbation rhetoric... is actually anti-pulling out. It's Genesis 38:9-10: "Onan knew that the offspring would not be his; so when he went in to his brother's wife, he wasted his seed on the ground in order not to give offspring to his brother. But what he did was displeasing in the sight of the Lord; so He took his life also."
5. No tattoos. Leviticus 19:28 reads, "You shall not make any cuts in your body for the dead nor make any tattoo marks on yourselves: I am the Lord."
Not even a little butterfly on your ankle. Or Thug Life across your abdomen. Or even, fittingly enough, a cross.
6. Polyester, or any other fabric blends. The Bible doesn't want you to wear polyester. Not just because it looks cheap. It's sinfully unnatural. Leviticus 19:19 reads, "You are to keep My statutes. You shall not breed together two kinds of your cattle; you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed, nor wear a garment upon you of two kinds of material mixed together."
7. Divorce. The Bible is very clear on this one: No divorcing. You can't do it. Because when you marry someone, according to Mark 10:8, you "are no longer two, but one flesh." And, Mark 10:9 reads, "What therefore God has joined together, let no man separate." Mark gets even more hardcore about it a few verses later, in Mark 10:11-12, "And He said to them, 'Whoever divorces his wife and marries another woman commits adultery against her; and if she herself divorces her husband and marries another man, she is committing adultery.'"
8. Letting people without testicles into church. Whether you've been castrated or lost one or two balls to cancer isn't important. The Bible doesn't get that specific. It just says you can't pray. Deuteronomy 23:1 reads (this is the God's Word translation, which spells it out better), "A man whose testicles are crushed or whose penis is cut off may never join the assembly of the Lord." Oh, and the next verse says that if you're a bastard, the child of a bastard... or even have a great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandchild of a bastard, you can't come to church or synagogue either. Deuteronomy 23:2 reads, "No one of illegitimate birth shall enter the assembly of the Lord; none of his descendants, even to the tenth generation, shall enter the assembly of the Lord."
9. Wearing gold. 1 Timothy 2:9 doesn't like your gold necklace at all. Or your pearl necklace. Or any clothes you're wearing that you didn't get from Forever 21, Old Navy or H&M. "Likewise, I want women to adorn themselves with proper clothing, modestly and discreetly, not with braided hair and gold or pearls or costly garments."
10. Lobster, shrimp and clam chowder: All banned. Shellfish. Leviticus 11:10 reads, "But whatever is in the seas and in the rivers that does not have fins and scales among all the teeming life of the water, and among all the living creatures that are in the water, they are detestable things to you." And shellfish is right in that wheelhouse. Leviticus 11 bans a TON of animals from being eaten (it's THE basis for Kosher law); beyond shellfish and pig, it also says you can't eat camel, rock badger, rabbit, eagle, vulture, buzzard, falcon, raven, crow, ostrich, owl, seagull, hawk, pelican, stork, heron, bat, winged insects that walk on four legs unless they have joints to jump with like grasshoppers (?), bear, mole, mouse, lizard, gecko, crocodile, chameleon and snail.
11. Your wife defending your life in a fight by grabbing your attacker's genitals. No joke. Deuteronomy actually devotes two verses to this exact scenario: Deuteronomy 25:11-12. "If two men, a man and his countryman, are struggling together, and the wife of one comes near to deliver her husband from the hand of the one who is striking him, and puts out her hand and seizes his genitals, then you shall cut off her hand; you shall not show pity."
That's impossible to misinterpret. Ladies, if your husband is getting mugged, make sure to kick the mugger in the pills. Do not do the grip and squeeze (no matter what "Miss Congeniality" might advise). Or your hand needs to be cut off.
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
. . . the gory details of behind-the-scenes politics at the highest level of The U.S. government gives one pause. Granted, I was just a kid when these people were active, but it is absolutely mind-boggling to learn of the great lengths to which some will go in the interest of power. And money, for that matter, although my current reading material is about power while the sub-plot of 'money can easily buy power' (a fact of which our current conservative supreme court justices are blissfully unaware) is all too present. And this is really nothing new to our times, my lifetime or recent history. As long as history has been recorded the very same has been true. It makes me quite content with my own principles. I will never be rich (financially) nor powerful (politically), but I will always be honest and true to myself and in any and all human interactions in which I participate. Really!
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
Six AM
The buses aren't nearly as crowded
As the night before
Someone said there was
Music and laughter
Behind all the shutters and doors
What was all of it for
Who needs friends
There's barely a minute for breathing
Everyone here works so hard
There's no party
When I reach my doorstep
I struggle to pull out my key
Where's the meaning for me
You see but you're unaware
There's life on the other side
But there's no bridge to cross
I'm looking through the fog
For some way out of here
I've baggage here to toss
Bless my soul
I've read about you in the paper
I've seen your picture somewhere
When you speak it's in volumes and volumes
I can't hear a word that you say
Funny it happens that way
I've been told that envy's the thing I've been feeling
For your kind of work and your play
But to tell you the truth
That it's only a wish
For a new kind of day
When worry and fear melt away
Could be
That a day will come
When you just might understand
But there's no bridge to cross
I'm looking through the fog
For some way out of here
I've baggage here to
I've baggage here to
I've baggage here to toss
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
(from http://www.jazzwax.com/2009/05/charles-mingus-fables-of-faubus.html)
Why the lyrics (to Charles Mingus' Fables of Faubus) weren't recorded the first time around on Mingus Ah Um isn't clear. Most likely the omission came at the behest of Columbia executives, who at the time didn't want to overly inflame the label's Southern markets. Writes Gene Santoro in Myself When I Am Real: The Life and Music of Charles Mingus:
"[The group recorded] Fables of Faubus, but Columbia, Mingus said, wouldn't let them record the lyrics."
When Mingus wrote the song in late 1957, the Little Rock standoff had been the most shocking and dramatic episode in the Civil Rights Movement. The event marked the first time that Southern racism was exposed on network television, and the news story unfolded slowly in September 1957. The sight of armed National Guard soldiers preventing nine students from attending a public school and the federal government's slow reaction was harrowing. The month-long televised drama deeply affected jazz musicians and people throughout the country who had heard about unjust conditions in the South but had never seen them in action.
Ultimately, the Justice Department sought and was granted an injunction against Faubus' order, and the governor had to withdraw National Guard troops. But the move offered little protection for the students or assurance that the community wouldn't riot or bar them from the school. So on September 24th—20 days after the incident's start—President Eisenhower finally federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent the army's 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock enforce integration and safeguard the African-American students.
- See more at: http://www.jazzwax.com/2009/05/charles-mingus-fables-of-faubus.html#sthash.wzbbqq8Y.dpuf
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
. . . from Doug Alan Wilcox; articulate, evocative and engaging singer songwriter
and good friend. . .
(from http://www.dawilcox.com/doug_alan_wilcox_true.html)
On the making of “True”
I had been through a particularly crappy Winter - bouts of depression and malaise had kept me fairly off-kilter for months. Fortunately, I was able to use that pain to write a couple of new songs and had yet a few more tunes that were in the live show rotation but hadn't been recorded so figured it was time to get into the studio. In hindsight, the activity of recording probably saved me many more weeks of ugly mood. Things do happen for a reason.
Along about this same time, my friend and fellow singer/songwriter Rick Windon asked if I would be willing to to take a lyric he had rattling around and try to put my spin on things. The result, "It Only Feels Like Love", while not at all a happy song, is still perhaps my favorite on "True" (btw, this IS a mostly POSITIVE album, really..........).
Now, I've never spoken to other artists to see if their experience is the same but the recording process always takes on a life of it's own for me. I invariably go in with a plan that disintegrates into dust within days. However SOMETHING GOOD always happens in place of that plan.
In this case, the two brand-new songs that I was sure were going to be on this record ended up being set aside for another day - they just didn't fit the flow that was taking shape for "True". I got the idea to write a couple of instrumental, sound-scape-type pieces - not quite songs but bits to tie other songs together.
Another great friend, pianist Ray Jozwiak, had offered his services earlier on and I threw two of the instrumentals his way. One gained lyrics in the meantime and became the title track and first cut on the CD. These "sounds-capes" really mark a departure for me and I think lend a whole different tone to the collection.
This is what I mean by a project "taking on a life of it's own". Things tend to happen very organically and it's always an intriguing and surprising adventure (for me at least) to see what I end up with.
So in the end, it all came along well in the course of just over two months. My lovely wife helped with production duties (a woman with a very good ear!)
and didn't fuss when I was locked up in the studio or spending time glued to the computer with headphones - listening over and over to mixes.
As you can see other places on this site, all my current recorded work is posted at BandCamp.com. Everything there streams for free so please feel free to drop by - no commitment. I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed making this, and all, my records - and if you like what you hear, you know what to do............. :)
Of "True", Betsy Burnam says: "......... It's beautiful; almost Zen-like lyrics and feeling but with humor and gentle passion. Doug opens his heart........."
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
Marc J.
Randazza, a Las Vegas-based First Amendment attorney and managing partner of the Randazza Legal Group, has in interesting take on the recent media storm NBA Clippers' owner Donald Sterling.
First, many have questioned whether or not Sterling's First Amendment rights were violated. Randazza says his First Amendment rights remain intact. The First Amendment
protects you from punishment by the government because of your speech.
The NBA is a private club, and it can discipline Sterling all it wants. The government is not imposing the punishment in this situation. Neither does the First Amendment
insulate you from criticism. In fact, that's the First
Amendment in action.
Going one further though, Randazza says that what happened to Sterling may
have been illegal and was morally wrong. In
California, you can't record a conversation without the knowledge or
consent of both parties. The recording featuring Sterling and V.
Stiviano may be the result of a crime. We all say things in
private that we might not say in public. Conversely, Nevada rancher Cliven
Bundy made his own stupid and bigoted statements to
the world by choice. He deserves every ounce of obloquy heaped upon him. Complain about the National Security Agency spying on all of us yet we condone giving our closest friends the ability to do worse.
"The Sterling story is about how there is no
more privacy. We live in a world where you can share your intimate
photos with your lover, and they will wind up on a "revenge porn"
website.
We live in a world where
our intimate conversations will be recorded and blasted to billions of
listeners. We live in a world where, say a gold digger can spy on her
sugar daddy, and the world says that the creepy old guy is the bad guy."
OHO's
"Ocean City Ditty," the
CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
(and, if
you're in town, at Trax On Wax on Frederick Rd. in Catonsville, MD)
My latest solo release, '2014', can be downloaded digitally at:
(or you can copy-and-paste this URL directly to
your browser: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/rayjozwiak4)
