Suddenly...

A lot of people in the world of iTunes have (re-)discovered the Beatles since their music, originally recorded in a studio named Apple Records, is now finally available on Apple's music service.

Now their is a bombardment of playlists of the Beatles Most Psychedelic Songs, The Beatles Evolution, The Best Beatles Songs to Cook By, Beatles Songs for your next Garden Party, Beatles Songs to Make Baby Smart, etc. Neat.

Now I love the Beatles as much as a rock-fan needs to, but I'm having my post-Christmas Day grouchies and so I'm working on a playlist called Worst Beatles Songs and Covers, Volume 1. I will post a link to it when I'm done. In the meantime please relate any submissions in the combox. Don't bother with Wild Honey Pie, You Know My Name or the monstrous Revolution 9. They're on the list already. Revolution 9 will be at the end—the grand finale. (A friend of mine used to refer to the White Album as "the height of the Beatles' drug abuse.")

The thing is that if you are wildly successful you can produce some pretty awful stuff, and it gets released because, well, after all you're the Beatles or "Paul and the boys were having a laugh" or "John was high" or "Wow, they're pushing the boundaries!", etc. Yes, but it's still awful.

I will also include little known Beatles covers by people who obviously thought if they performed a popular song by a popular band it would be GREAT. I remember how difficult it was to maintain my poker face back in my band days when someone spoke in awe of a local band who could "cover the Beatles AND Pink Floyd". OK, sure, man.... The fact is these guys wrote songs, and good musicians can play them and they will sound good if they are good songs. (For instance...) In other words, if they are not the songs on my list. Again—the claim that "awe, you can tell he/she/they was/were joking" will be summarily dismissed.



Love that analog delay and reverb, man.

Maybe I will do a Worst of Pink Floyd playlist sometime. But I don't know if there's a time limit on playlists. I might have to get out the editing software and do one called First 45 seconds of the Worst Pink Floyd Songs.

Should conservatives take a bite out of Apple?

Bite this

Full disclosure: I own no Apple products and probably never will. Nor am I an orthodox Christian; as I've mentioned before, at best I'm a bad, lapsed libertarianish Methodist. Not only will my ox not be gored in anything I have to say further in this post, it probably won't even be nudged academically. And I've already ridiculed Rod Dreher for getting on his high horse about religious liberty while still enjoying subsidizing Tim Cook's lifestyle.

This said, why would any conservatives not immediately boycott Apple products? Wouldn't that still be a valid response even if made by my avatar while gazing into a jungle cam?

Apple's CEO Tim Cook blithely made a high profile splash for himself and his company with a sanctimonious, lying Op-Ed which helped fuel a boycott of Indiana in general and the reigning down of Hell itself upon the owners of Memories Pizza.

Why should that cost him absolutely nothing at all while he continues to rake in exorbitant profits on his Chinese slave labor-built devices from the very conservatives whose freedom of expression he cheerfully stomped upon?

If, like me, you don't already own Apple products there's admittedly not much boycotting you can do. And if you do, throwing away a device that still delivers good service is also a step that many without a Rod Dreher income just couldn't justify.

But, in the wake of Indiana's RFRA and Tim Cook's involvement (instead of just making electronics, like a good boy) why would any conservative now buy a new Apple product or service or spend money to repair a failing one?

It's not as if there were not now a vast market of products comparable or superior to Apple's. Does Apple cachet really weigh in that much on the scale opposite religious liberty among conservatives?

Why am I, full-disclosured above, even the one raising this? Why isn't it already being exhorted on every conservative outlet? Why is Tim Cook jauntily bringing a gun to the gunfight while conservatives are merely spitting in resentment into the potato salad they've decided they'll bring instead as their most appropriate offering there? That'll show him. Ptui! Giggle!

Because Barack Obama is supposed to be fighting these battles instead? Because there will always be room in Rod Dreher's Benedict Option for refugees with chubby little potato salad-smeared fingers?

Instead of mooning for the Sweet Meteor of Death (SMOD) to sweep away the corrupt GOP - Ace, and others - this situation is really pretty cut and dried: sacrifice a marginal bit of habit-comfort in exchange for demonstrating what gratuitously treading on religious liberty really costs. It's really just that get off your lazy ass simple.

Make what Tim Cook did hurt Tim Cook right now and in the future, and make others fear doing the same thoughtlessly stupid thing if it happens to be percolating in their dim little heads.

Because it really isn't turning the other cheek to turn in one's Christian card and make a potato salad for cheap demagogues instead. It's demonstrating that one might not be worth very much as anything at all.

Has Rod Dreher dumped his Apple products yet? Why not?

In a recent Washington Post editorial, Apple CEO Tim Cook claimed Indiana's recent RFRA law says

"...individuals can cite their personal religious beliefs to refuse service to a customer or resist a state nondiscrimination law..."

False. A lie. But a high profile lie then used to inflict painful and costly boycotts on Indiana individuals and businesses.

Make no mistake, Rod Dreher is shaking the collection tambourine to high Heaven outside the seal tent, trying make a fast buck on Indiana's troubles here, here, here, and here, troubles massively compounded and accelerated by Tim Cook's high profile lies.

And maybe Dreher is also suffering along with Indiana by working up to seven hours a day blogging, the brutal Victorian labor burden that finally did in his role model, Andrew Sullivan.

Except, of course, when that mono and other stress Dante didn't save him from kicks back in - see, Dante saved him from that other mono and stress, not this current mono and stress - and all he can manage is maybe a couple hours a day between naps and delicious meals.

Even so, though, if Dreher has any genuine interest in anybody's religious freedom, why is Dreher still buying and using lying homosexual Tim Cook's expensive Apple products, products whose purchase drove Apple not long ago to replace AT&T on the Dow and will shortly make it the first trillion dollar company in history?

Dreher's laptop. His wife's laptop. Their kids' laptops. Their Apple TV streaming service. Their iPhones. Their kids' iPhones. Their Apple Store service. Any of it. All of it.

Because the religious freedom problems of Indiana and everyone else are for them to suffer and for Dreher to make money from without the slightest inconvenience to his own swinish material or moral sloth.

It will not surprise readers here to learn that I (do not impute this to other writers here) find the following quote a useful, if not strictly Christian parable:

Malone: You wanna know how to get Capone? They pull a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.

When Tim Cook pulls a knife, though, does Dreher even just pull an equivalent knife and inconvenience himself by boycotting Cook's pricy products and depriving Cook of their revenue? Nope.

Does he pull a gun? Heavens, nope.

Does he pull out a recipe and whip up a fabulous chocolate mousse cheesecake for Cook? Nopey-nope.

Well, what, then, does he pull?

Well... here's a hint.

Because surely at the bottom of all this inconvenience and loss Indiana and others must suffer from Tim Cook for Dreher's religious freedom there will be another, heart-rending book to be written. About Rod Dreher's suffering.



[Update: I edited this a tad. -Pauli]