The Biters

Well, so long, liberty.....From Brit-Pop To (OUCH!!!)

"A nation that is afraid to debate it's issues in a public forum, is a nation that is afraid of it's people." (-JFK )

“To radically shift regime behavior we must think clearly and boldly for if we have learned anything, it is that regimes do not want to be changed. We must think beyond those who have gone before us, and discover technological changes that embolden us with ways to act in which our forebears could not. Firstly we must understand what aspect of government or neocorporatist behavior we wish to change or remove. Secondly we must develop a way of thinking about this behavior that is strong enough carry us through the mire of politically distorted language, and into a position of clarity. Finally must use these insights to inspire within us and others a course of ennobling, and effective action.” (-Julian Assange, “State and Terrorist Conspiracies”)

"Many of the measures enacted by fascists were frighteningly similar to those enacted today: They include the privatization of state owned enterprises, reduction of corporate taxes and inheritance taxes, defeat of unions, and the suspension of civil liberties." (-Michael Parenti)

"A recent Harvard Medical School study found that nearly 45,000 Americans die each year—one every 12 minutes—largely because they lack health insurance. But for the insurance lobby, the only tragedy is the prospect of TRUE health care reform." (–Amy Goodman)

"Many, if not most, covert operations deserve to be disclosed by a free press. They are often covert not only because they are illegal but because they are wildly ill-conceived and reckless. Sensitive and covert are often synonyms for half-assed, idiotic, and dangerous to national security, as well as criminal." (-Daniel Ellsberg)

"The germs of fascism infest both parties, thriving among Republican and Democratic hosts, alike. Barack Obama’s 2008 victory was also a new lease on life for George Bush’s foreign wars and strangulation of domestic civil liberties, most recently in the assault on travelers bodies at airports. The first Black president rules very much like the last white president, and the absence of outrage directed in the right direction makes us more endangered now than in the days when Bush occupied the White House. (-Margaret Kimberly)

"It's hard for me to believe that it came down by itself...I am gratified to see that people across the board are interested. I think twenty years from now, people will look at 9-11 the way we look at the assassination of JFK today. It couldn't possibly have been done the way the government told us." (-Andrew Napolitano)

"I think a lot of us are increasingly recognizing that the dominant culture is killing the planet. And we can argue about whether, you know, there will be a few bacteria left or whatever, but when 90 percent of the large fish in the oceans are gone, when there’s six to ten times as much plastic as phytoplankton in parts of the ocean, when there’s dioxin in every mother’s breast milk, when background rates—or rates of extinction are a thousand to ten thousand times background rates, you know, it’s sort of just playing with numbers to talk about whether it’s killing the planet or simply mortally wounding it. And I think it’s very important for us to start to build a culture of resistance, because what we’re doing isn’t working, clearly." (-Derrick Jensen)

"The very word "secrecy" is repugnant in a free and open society; and we are as a people inherently and historically opposed to secret societies, to secret oaths and to secret proceedings. We decided long ago that the dangers of excessive and unwarranted concealment of pertinent facts far outweighed the dangers which are cited to justify it. ... And there is very grave danger that an announced need for increased security will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of official censorship and concealment. ... And no official of my Administration, whether his rank is high or low, civilian or military, should interpret my words here tonight as an excuse to censor the news, to stifle dissent, to cover up our mistakes or to withhold from the press and the public the facts they deserve to know. ... No President should fear public scrutiny of his program. For from that scrutiny comes understanding; and from that understanding comes support or opposition. And both are necessary." (-JFK)

Crime Families, Secret Societies, Opium-Kingpins, And Other Law Makers...

Thanksgiving eve, out of the corner of my eye, I was watching the police arresting the neighborhood drunk, scaring-off the homeless people, who loiter in front of the corner liquor store, daring anyone to make eye-contact, or observe them too obviously, as they manhandled the drunkard. These are dark times, we're living in. As an old friend of mine says, "If they killed a shit-load of people, and destroyed the Gulf, and the fawning corporate-media didn't report it, did it even happen?" While Obama extends tax cuts for the super-rich, and bails out the white-collar Wall Street crooks, more and more Americans are being evicted everyday, by greedy property-owners, and nefarious banking mobsters. There are, at least, five, over-qualified, jobless people for every job opening. The forty-something woman, shivering, at the stop-light, holds a cardboard sign. "NEED PROPANE AND CATFOOD!" If you don't eat meat, watch tv, or like sports; or you don't have any money, it's just another day. Thanksgiving. As Glen Ford from The Black Agenda Report Dot Com, recently commented, "if the airport is a police-state, what is the ghetto?" Each day, we wake up to more news of infinite war, and aggressive clampdowns on our most basic freedoms. Radio is a bamboozling, blizzard of bogus bullshit. Channel, after channel, of rightwing hate-talk, and pro-war, rightwing, evangelical, fear-mongering. Creed, Nickelback, Huey Lewis And The News, Lady fuggin Gaga. I'm reading a book on nineties Brit-Pop, a scene that meant very little to me, back then, but it reminds me how long it's been, since there was any truly vital, real music movements. All the Spin magazine hype in the world never really launched electro-banging very far off the ground. Karen O. and M.I.A. are the only stars to emerge from Spin's decades-long crusade to push electro-trash on the American university class. I never got into the White Stripes novelty-rock, and they failed to popularize any real garage rockers. The Strokes hardly qualify, as a garage band. I guess some synthetic new wave is still trendy. The Killers, and shit like that. Mostly, the airwaves are still full of miserable grunge-lite and bullshit country, bullshit boy-bands, commercial rap. Every genre now sounds exactly like Missy Elliot...Eminem and his girl problems. Brit-Pop had so many fantastic characters, songs, color, and soul. Every time I turn on my radio, there ain't nothin' happenin' at all...Not at all...'Last radio song I remember liking was Buck Cherry's "For The Movies", like, ten years ago. Or "Common People" by Pulp. I get inflicted with pictures of this Katy Perry chick, every time I flip through a magazine, so I finally youtubed her "California Gurls" song. It was awful, like a bad chewing gum, or soft drink commercial, or that band, Aqua, with their "Barbie World" song. Made Gwen Stefani seem substantial. Get your daily dose of Sonic-Aspartame. Thanks, but, no thanks. I was somewhat dismissive of the Brit-Popsters, aside from Oasis, the big Verve song, and a cuppla bands from Wales, called Sixty Ft. Dolls, and Manic Street Preachers, I kind of ignored the rest. "Pumping On Your Stereo", by Supergrass, was pretty fab and gear. I've just discovered the joys of Justine F., from Elastica. 'Kinda still turned off by uppity, posh, Damon from Blur/Gorillaz, though a few Blur songs, Youtubed, were mildly entertaining, in a very English, campy, sorta way, vaguely reminiscent of Madness. So that's been my entertainment, lately. Brit-Pop...and OH YEAH! Out of Canada...the 222's reunion concerts. 70's punk band-played Max's, toured with Teenage Head, reunites, in their late forties, early fifties, they're still cool, still a blast, still worth seeing. I went 'round the block, for a smoke, yesterday, a guy handed me a flyer: Judgement Day scheduled for March 21st, 2,011, apparently, which leaves us not much time, to get things right with the God in the sky, and his vengeful wrath. YIKES!

Seems everywhere I go, I encounter multiple men with black eyes, severely bruised faces. Lots of street fightin' goin' on, at night, amidst the down and out folks. One day, I encountered MULTIPLE couples arguing, three different couples, arguing on the same four-way stop, downtown intersection. Crazy. In many towns, the only businesses still thriving are the bars, churches, jails, hospitals, and Wal-Mart, in other places, the no smoking, and relentless DWI enforcement, has even killed the bar business. No one has money to drink in pubs, anymore. So there's fewer and fewer places to get together, almost nowhere for little bands to play. Cops even send multiple vehicles to respond to house party "noise complaints", threatening home-owners with their ever-present tasers. You can tell the editors and so-called journalists, are all bought-off, or self-censor, out of fear for their comfy jobs, by the simple fact that abusive cops with tasers, warrantless wiretaps, "free-speech zone" veal pens, street x-ray backscatter machines, assassination teams, drone attacks, torture camps like Guantanamo Bay, "fracking", seizure of peace activist's personal belongings, spying on enviornmental groups, reading our e-mails, school closings, and "geo-engineering" chem-trails, aren't stories covered by the corporate media. Bill O'Reilly, the patron saint of bad cops, thinks whistle blowers, and human rights activists should be executed, for inconveniencing the State Department. 'Scary world we live in. Obama has been a better tool for the rightwing-agenda than W., or Reagan ever were. Silenced the yuppies, expanded all the wars, class-war, police state, etc.

STATE VIOLENCE...STATE CONTROL...

Over 53 percent of the American people understand the government is operating way outside the Constitution, according to polls, but where other nations, like Greece, England, and Ireland, rise and fight the bankers, for stealing away the rights of the people to quality educations, etc. , Americans remain terrifyingly submissive, fearing the police, and Obama's new secret-police apparatus. Obama's supposedly a Constitutional lawyer, but one looks at his TSA and warrant-tap policies, and they are all clearly, contrary to the Fourth Amendment. We see another false flag patsy in the media every six months, entrapped by a various agency, thwarting their own false flag attack, the head-lines scream, "TERROR", but most of this is always government psy-ops, creating boogeymen, so Americans will be cowed by the Big Sister police-state. Midwesterners are mislead by the relentless Beck/Palin/Faux Fraudcasting misinformation campaigns, pumping out corporate propaganda, and pro-war terror-threats, 24/7. They characterize all truth speakers as "terrorists" and "domestic extremists", while duping under-educated poor people into believing Monsanto, B.P., Halliburton, the arms manufacturers, and Wal-Mart share-holders, somehow, represent their best interests. The governing elites are even designating, Wiki-Leaks, as a "Foreign Terrorist Group", and all those who speak out against the Chertoff-radiation machines, and TSA gropings, as "Domestic Extremists". Sadly, the Democrat Party is every bit as authoritarian, and owned, as the Republicans. Two wings of the same Hawk. The Big Media keeps everyone stupid and misdirected. Even in the commercial, glossy, Reagan eighties, there were still anti-war, pro-freedom messages heard on corporate tv: U2 "Sunday Bloody Sunday", Men At Work "It's A Mistake", Culture Club "War Song", Eurythmics "1984", Public Enemy. Not anymore. Maybe Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young's "Ohio", on an oldies station, but that's it. Most rubes in the fly-over states still believe there are two political parties, debating the issues, on behalf of the regular Joes, in America. Not true. There are only the obedient puppets of big business. The insurance companies, banksters, and multi-national corporations. The big-media, law-makers, judges, police, and military do their bidding. An actor named Mark Ruffalo, was put on a "Terror Watch" List, by your supposedly Democrat, Obama's Homeland Security appointees, for organizing screenings of a documentary, critical of big-energy companies, called "GASLAND". Land Of The Free. Keep reciting that, robo-cops, Beck-zombies, Obama-bots, Palin-groupies. These politicians are interchangable. Obama expanded almost every insidious Cheney policy, under the cover of being such a "leftist". Remember when "Democrats" muddied the name of Ralph Nader, during a stolen election, supposedly, a contest between two big- business, Ivy-League, billionaire oil tycoons? Oh yeah, there were TWO stolen elections. From Julian Assange to Michael Moore, from Malcolm X to John Trudell, from Daniel Ellsberg to Arundhati Roy, anyone who tells the truth, or stands-up for the common-good in America will be smeared, slandered, spied on, or "pushed from a cliff", to paraphrase internal insurance company operatives. Cable-dumb, Wal-Mart shoppers seem to think the proper role of the media is to cover-up the crimes of big business, like they have in the Gulf region, or to save the corrupt and powerful military industrial complex from embarrassment. I hear that ex-prez, W., is supposedly, still gloating in his book, for getting Dan Rather, fired. Remember what happened to Phil Donahue, the Dixie Chicks, and Helen Thomas. I'm so bored with the "Don't Ask Don't Tell" debate, it's just a side-show to satiate rightwing homophobics. No one, gay or straight, should willingly be fighting these bullshit wars of occupation. The whole "War On Terror" is bullshit. Obama is just Bush, Rebranded.There is no real difference between the Bush/Cheney/Palin hard-right, uptight, phony, racist wingnuts and the Clinton/Gore/Kerry/Obama/ apologists. The oligarchy/elites/plutocracy of this country have been incredibly effective at brainwashing the public, post 9/11. The aging kids I grew up with, are so hard-pressed to hold on to their middle school, social status, even though they've all achieved substantially, far, far, less then their parents, they still find themselves grovelling at the feet of symbolic power, BRAGGING, about their affinity for Rush Limbaugh, and Glen Beck. Personally, I think some of this is just for attention--to shock their college educated, literate, ex-girlfriends, but much of it is just a brazen sucking up to their straight parents, local military people, cops, midwestern judges, and other rich people. Sad. These were my town's Violent Femmes and Lenny Kravitz fans, the ska-skankin' skins, and MC5 covering garage rockers, who now bluster on about some rightwing shock-jock's latest authoritarian, pro-war jag. Pathetic. I do consider it a personal failure, that so many of my boyhood chums have plainly succombed to fascism. Well, okay, becoming cheerleaders of fascism. Rah-Rah enablers. Bumper-stickers. Limbaugh Listeners. I am stunned and ashamed. The Great Jayne County "outs" a bunch of closeted bigots, classist creeps, and right-wing war-pigs in her monthly "Rant And Raves" column, for PUNK GLOBE. Yep, corporate rock'n'roll's absolutely INFESTED with these sold-out aresholes! Jayne County is STILL an absolutely true, PUNK ROCK heroine, STILL on the front-lines, fighting for truth and justice, after all these years! A CAPED CRUSADING ICON OF PURE ROCK'N'ROLL INTEGRITY! LONG LIVE JAYNE COUNTY!

BEAT ME LIKE A STAR....

Against this wretched backdrop of poverty, misery, and totalitarian violence and repression, comes Atlanta's glorious, young, new, cool as hell, power-popsters, dreaming big, and pitching heroic poses, THE BITERS! The Biters have that vintage, black-haired, "Now Wave", glamour punk thing goin', they look a bit like The Star-Spangles, Cool Christine, Slash City Daggers, Red Invasion, Fishnet Stalkers, Napoleon Blownaparts, Beat Angels, the Throbs, and Candy...AND they have loads of catchy, commendable songs, reminiscent of Exploding Hearts, Barroom Angels, Pure Rubbish, and Dimestore Haloes. Pretty neat little group. It's been quite some time, since I've discovered a new kid band, that looks this ace, AND writes good songs. Fans of punk, and power pop, are going to really go ga-ga for these kids. They are young, tattooed, skinny, and they list all your favorite bands, like the BOYS and SLADE, as their influences. I dedicated twenty five years of my life to putting-together a band like this, failing, spectacularly. Just miserably, totally ruining my life, in the process. Meanwhile, these dashing youngsters make it look so damn easy! If I wasn't already so heartbroken, for years now, I'd hate them, out of pure jealousy. As it stands, I'll be rooting for 'em. America needs a young and hungry, real rock'n'roll band. AT LAST!

www.myspace.com/thebiters