Jungle Cat/American Idiot/Talking Points Memo (Friday Cat/Concert/Better Know a Blog Blogging #4)

Friday Catblogging

Karina, believing herself camouflaged, lays in wait for the legendary balcony squirrel.

Friday's Concert Clip

If you had asked me a few years ago who the musical conscience of our generation would be, I would not have really considered answering Green Day (note: my generation doesn't include Bruce Springsteen, who would otherwise qualify). Still, American Idiot really may be the most popular album from Generation X/Y/Next to really come out strongly against the war in a way that's still fun to listen to. The album may not have the gritty punk ethic that some of their more hardcore fans prefer, but it's damn catchy.

We'll go with three videos from the album, none of which are the über-ubiquitous "When September Ends", itself not even one of the more memorable songs on the album. Instead we'll go with video clips of

• The title track, American Idiot, from which I got the title of one of my first posts at this here blog.


• The nine minute-long medley track Jesus of Suburbia. Did I mention that this is actually a concept album? Yup.


• The song Holiday, the most clear anti-war song on the album, as evidenced by it's intro when played live and the lyrics.

By the way, one of the most frustrating experiences in looking for song lyrics is the numerous ads and popups most of those sites run (the popups can be blocked by FireFox, of course). Let me strongly suggest LyricWiki to y'all to alleviate this problem. It's run by Wikipedia, so you can trust it.

Better Know a Blog

Today's blog is Talking Points Memo, which started as the blog of Joshua Micah Marshall. He began his career as a writer at The American Prospect, whose blog we featured last week. Unlike the bloggers we've covered previously, he is not a flaming liberal by temperament, rather more of a moderate, though developments over the past few years have certainly driven him to occasional shrillness. Given his journalistic background, his take on things is often a bit more factual and a bit less pure opinion then some out there, especially in the sources he links to. As a result, his blog is rarely the place you'll find partisan outrage, but it is a great place to find links to scholars and journalists covering important stories on both foreign and domestic policies. Among the idiosyncrasies is an occasional campaign to get politicians on the record for important issues, first used on the effort to fight privatization of Social Security. Today, he's been figuring out where Republican Senators stand on escalation (7 against, 9 wavering). Needless to say, all the Democrats are against and the CT for Liebermanites are for.

One unique feature of TPM, as it's known, is a series of expansions into new territory in the blogosphere. First was TPMCafe, a discussion forum with "tables" covering foreign and domestic policy, from some of the leading voices on the left. This led to a spinoff of it's own, Election Central, which featured polls and campaign items leading up to the elections, and has kept functioning in that role since. Another side project, TPM Muckraker, is one of the more innovative projects in the blogosphere. Two full-time researchers collect stories of how money influences politics, both legally and illegally. The latter is a Republican specialty; at last count, 29 Congressmen, administration officials, and key lobbyists have a place on the Grand Old Docket. It also features the Daily Muck, a recounting of news stories in the morning's papers dealing with the day's most blatant corruption and malfeasance.

For those who want serious discussion of policy and politics, this is the blog for you.