“Gimmie Shelter” is a song about fear; it probably serves better than anything written this year as a passageway straight into the next few years. The band builds on the dark beauty of the finest melody Mick and Keith have ever written, slowly adding instruments and sounds until an explosively full presence of bass and drums rides on over the first crest of the song into the howls of Mick and a woman, Mary Clayton.
It’s a full-faced meeting with all the terror the mind can summon, moving fast and never breaking so that men and women have to beat that terror at the game’s own pace. When Mary Clayton sings alone, so loudly and with so much force you think her lungs are bursting, Richard’s frames her with jolting riffs that blaze past her and take it back to Mick. Their answer and their way out matches the power of the threat: “It’s just a shot away, it’s just a shot away … it’s just a kiss away, it’s just a kiss away.” The truly fearful omen of the music is that you know just a kiss won’t be enough. This song, caught up in its own momentum, says you need the other too.
I bet I’ve listened to this song ten thousand times, but it still gives me chills…
Caterpillar Inc. says it plans to lay off more than 460 employees this June at its plant in Decatur.
Rachel Potts is a spokeswoman for the Peoria-based company. She said Friday that Caterpillar is laying off the employees as part of an ongoing series of production cuts.
Caterpillar has said those cuts are in response to reduced global demand for mining equipment. The plant in Decatur builds products used in mining.
Cuts in some other locations have been temporary. Potts said the Decatur cuts are permanent.
As if Decatur doesn’t have enough problems already…
Decatur had the state’s highest jobless rate. It spiked from 10.9 percent in February 2012 to 13.7 percent.
It really looks like this state is going backwards.
* As noted below, the governor was quite pleased with himself for raising half a million dollars last month. Well, Lisa Madigan just filed an A-1 today totaling $740,315.
It’s on, campers.
…Adding… For perspective, AG Madigan raised $797,231 in the first six months of 2009.
* These two Chicago concert dates mean I won’t be able to go. Spring session will be in full swing…
The Rolling Stones, who rocked London and New York in 2012, announced that they will kick off their “50 AND COUNTING” Tour in LA and come to Chicago on Tuesday, May 28, and Friday, May 31, 2013. […]
Tickets for The Rolling Stones “50 AND COUNTING” Tour will go on sale on Monday, April 8 at 10:00 AM at the United Center Box Office, Ticketmaster Outlets, online at Ticketmaster.com or by phone at (800) 745-3000.
A bit of advice from Jimmy M.: Maximum cycle characteristics and frequency response at high decibel level have been set according to standards suggested in the GUY STEVENS Producer Manual, chart R-357, in index, page 304. These recommended standards were compiled by the same authority having recently measured audible damage created by supersonic aircraft – if for any reason you do not agree with the standards, turn it up.
And I did. Oh, man, did I ever.
Sure, this is probably just a nostalgia tour, but Mick Taylor is worth the price of admission. Wish I could go.
* The Question: Your favorite Rolling Stones song? Explain.
* Doc Herrin claims that he might not have been the SIU Board of Trustees Chairman this week had an actual vote taken place…
Herrin told The Southern Illinoisan Thursday he didn’t go to Wednesday’s board meeting under the assumption he would be elected chairman. The bylaws of the board of trustees, he added, dictated it was time for the group to decide on a slate of officers.
“We were simply following the bylaws. The bylaws are clear,” Herrin said. “I have no idea who they were going to elect as chairman. I didn’t try to get appointed; I showed up for a meeting.”
The Board shall, at its first regular meeting following the third Monday in each January, elect by roll call vote from its own membership and by a majority vote of those voting members present, a Chair, a Vice-Chair, and a Secretary, who shall hold office until their successors are elected and qualified. If only one person is nominated for an office the nominee may be elected by acclamation.
* But the two trustees who walked out of the meeting had been blocked when they tried to elect temporary officers…
Wiley moved to elect only temporary officers to serve for the duration of Wednesday’s meeting, which is allowed under the bylaws of the board.
The rest of the board, which includes Roger Herrin of Harrisburg, Don Lowery of Golconda and Donna Manering of Makanda instead began to call for a vote that would have seated a chairman, vice chairman and secretary for a full year.
That’s when Wiley left, followed by Hamilton. That left the board without a quorum and unable to do business.
To be clear here, Herrin and two other board members wanted to elect a permanent chairman with just three votes. There are supposed to be eight board members.
* And if this isn’t a foreshadowing of what was designed to transpire this week, I don’t know what was…
“I apologize to all of you for what’s about to happen,” warned Trustee Don Lowery as the meeting began.
* Lowery, by the way, was appointed to the SIU board of trustees by Gov. Quinn a couple of years ago. He was a tea party darling when he ran against US Sen. Mark Kirk in the GOP primary…
Most of the crowd’s disdain was aimed at the Obama administration, seen by TEA Party organizers as moving the country toward socialism. Loud applause greeted mention of Rep. John Shimkus, R-Collinsville, and Rep. Joe Wilson, R-S.C. Shimkus walked out of a presidential address to congress last week. Wilson famously called President Barack Obama a liar during the same speech. […]
Several speakers referred to Wilson, including Don Lowery, a retired Pope County judge running for U.S. Senate.
“Joe Wilson is telling it like it is,” Lowery said.
TEA Party speakers all expressed frustration and anger with the direction of federal government under the Obama administration, saying the administration’s proposals on health care, energy, corporate bailouts, cash-for-clunkers and spending generally are running the country into socialism and bankruptcy.
“The goal of the Obama administration is to gut private industry and create a government that will control every aspect of your life,” Lowery said.
* Meanwhile, Carbondale-area legislators aren’t thrilled with Democratic Sen. Bill Haine’s plan to dump all the trustees and start from scratch…
“My problem with that bill – and I think even (Haine) understands this – it sets a precedent I’m not even sure the legislature wants to go down,” state Sen. Dave Luechtefeld, R-Okawville said. “What I mean by that, if you can do that at SIU Carbondale, then any legislator in the future, who is unhappy with what is going on at their university, would have the right to do what they think ought to be done.”
State Rep. Brandon Phelps, D-Harrisburg, said he’d have to talk more with Haine before making a decision on it, but expressed some concerns about singling out SIU’s governance with a piece of legislation.
State Rep. Mike Bost, R-Murphysboro, said the SIU board’s problem is a result of politics in the system. You don’t solve that, he added, by introducing more politics.
“The reality is it shouldn’t be about the politics…it should be about the betterment for the students and the system as a whole,” Bost said. “We’ve been drawn into a fight that goes way beyond SIU.”
There is a real danger that the more this fight amps up, the more likely it’ll be that the General Assembly will finally accede to the wishes of Metro East legislators and split that university in two. And if that happens, the struggling Carbondale campus will be in deep trouble.
If we had a governor interested in moving this state forward instead of participating in crud like this, maybe we could get a solution to the problem. But Quinn has refused to meet with Metro East legislators about the controversy for months. That’s a real slap in the face. Appointments are made with the advice and consent of the Illinois Senate. He needs to come to terms with that. He’s the top dog, so because he stuck his nose into this it’s all on him, like it or not.
President Obama assessed the beauty of California’s attorney general Kamala Harris, calling her “the best looking attorney general,” during remarks at a fundraiser in Atherton, California.
“You have to be careful to, first of all, say she is brilliant and she is dedicated and she is tough, and she is exactly what you’d want in anybody who is administering the law, and making sure that everybody is getting a fair shake. She also happens to be by far the best-looking attorney general in the country — Kamala Harris is here.”
“It’s true! C’mon,” he said as the crowd laughed, according to a report provided by a print reporter at the home of John Goldman, an heir to the Levi-Strauss fortune.
“And she is a great friend and has just been a great supporter for many, many years. She’s brilliant and she’s dedicated,” Obama said at a luncheon fundraiser benefiting the DNC.
AG Harris…
* I asked Attorney General Lisa Madigan’s spokesperson for comment. Unfortunately, AG Madigan is tied up in meetings, so we may not get a response.
Imagine that.
This is one of the better photos I could find of AG Madigan…
Discuss.
*** UPDATE *** From Attorney General Lisa Madigan…
“Kamala is terrific. But if you ask me, I’d vote for Jack Conway. But let’s be honest, there’s not a lot of competition—there’s a reason people say elected office is ‘Hollywood for ugly people.’ Have you seen some of my predecessors??!?”
Oddly enough, Daley and Rauner may be the only two establishment candidates [for governor] who know enough about how business does business to actually govern Illinois.
* I told subscribers about this earlier in the week…
With a late-March surge of fund-raising, Gov. Pat Quinn’s campaign chest amassed more than $550,000 in the first three months of 2013, narrowing the substantial lead in funds of potential 2014 Democratic gubernatorial challenger Attorney General Lisa Madigan.
Quinn, who had just more than $1 million in campaign funds - a relatively scant sum for a mid-term governor - by the end of 2012, received more than $490,000 in contributions on three consecutive days in the last week of March, according to Illinois State Board of Elections data.
“It shows that Gov. Pat Quinn has a lot of support and will continue to have a lot of support as he gears up for re-election,” a Quinn campaign spokesperson said. “The governor will continue to make money as needed.”
Nearly three-quarters of Americans (72%) say that in general, government efforts to enforce marijuana laws cost more than they are worth. And when it comes to the question of whether the federal government should enforce marijuana laws in states that have approved marijuana use, a majority (60%) says it should not.
There is agreement across partisan and demographic groups that federal government enforcement of marijuana laws is not worth the cost. Fully 78% of independents, 71% of Democrats and 67% of Republicans say government enforcement efforts cost more than they are worth.
Similarly, there is substantial opposition to the federal government enforcing marijuana laws in states that permit the legal use of marijuana: 64% of independents say the federal government should not enforce federal marijuana laws in such states, as do 59% of Democrats and 57% of Republicans.
By 77% to 16%, most say that marijuana does have legitimate medical uses. In an ABC News survey in 1997, a smaller majority (58%) said it had legitimate medical uses, while 34% said it did not.
There are only modest partisan differences in views of the medical uses of marijuana: 82% of independents, 76% of Democrats and 72% of Republicans say it has legitimate medical uses. Age is also a factor in these views, but even among those 65 and older – who oppose legalizing marijuana use by nearly two-to-one – a majority (60%) says that marijuana has legitimate medical uses.
And we don’t have medical marijuana in Illinois… why?
Over the past three decades, there has been a substantial decline in the percentage saying that for most people marijuana leads to the use of hard drugs. Just 38% express that view currently; in a 1977 Gallup survey, 60% said marijuana led to the use of hard drugs. […]
The percentage of Americans who say that smoking marijuana is morally wrong also has declined dramatically since 2006. A survey earlier this year found that 32% of Americans say that smoking marijuana is morally wrong, down 18 points since 2006. Over the same period, the percentage saying it is not a moral issue has increased by 15 points (from 35% to 50%).
The bottom has almost completely fallen out from under prohibition supporters. The public is no longer with them. Now if only our state and federal legislators would start listening we could stop this insane drug war.
* An appendix…
Only medical marijuana is legal:
AZ, DE, DC, HI, MI, MT, NJ, NM, VT
Marijuana is decriminalized:
MN, MS, NE, NY, NC, OH
Medical marijuana is legal and marijuana decriminalized:
AK, CA, CO, CT, ME, MA, MS, NV, OR, RI, WA
Not decriminalized or medical:
AL, AR, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, IA, KS, KY, LA, MD, MO, NH, ND, OK, PA, SC, SD, TN, TX, UT, VA, WV, WI, WY
* Methodology…
Most of the analysis in this report is based on telephone interviews conducted March 13-17, 2013, among a national sample of 1,501 adults, 18 years of age or older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia (750 respondents were interviewed on a landline telephone, and 751 were interviewed on a cell phone, including 385 who had no landline telephone). The survey was conducted by Abt SRBI. A combination of landline and cell phone random digit dial samples were used; both samples were provided by Survey Sampling International. Interviews were conducted in English and Spanish. Respondents in the landline sample were selected by randomly asking for the youngest adult male or female who is now at home. Interviews in the cell sample were conducted with the person who answered the phone, if that person was an adult 18 years of age or older.
