Because KMTV sucks. . . .

Unfortunately, the benighted television viewers of Omaha have to rely on folks like me -- and folks who put this stuff up on YouTube -- to see the rest of Sir Paul's "Golden Slumbers/Carry That Weight/The End" medley that closed the 2012 Grammy Awards on CBS.

This is because of the degree to which corporate ownership has destroyed local television, no station more than KMTV, Channel 3 in Omaha. See, the Grammys ran a few minutes long; the computer than runs Channel 3's master control (one must assume) didn't run 3 minutes long.

So in the middle of the medley -- featuring a guitar jam by McCartney, Bruce Springsteen, Joe Walsh and Dave Grohl -- Channel 3 dumps out at precisely 10:30 p.m. to bring us Action 3 News . . . which led with a Whitney Houston reaction story that was nothing more than a thinly disguised promo for sister radio station Channel 94-1.

Oh . . . I forgot the weather alert about the 2 inches of snow on the way today. And the investigative report about the dog wedding.

Why do you think we call it Channel 3rd?

At any rate, let's hope the copyright police leaves this vid up on YouTube at least until Omaha can see what it missed. While Owen Saddler -- somewhere -- gently weeps.


UPDATE: OK, let's try Metatube, now that the YouTube video has gone away.

Because someone had to do it

Some of the language here is NSFW. But Dad is just reading
what his 15-year-old wrote about him on Facebook.

This is the best reason I've ever seen for not enacting stringent gun control.

Personally, though, I would have gone for either buckshot or slugs in a 12-gauge shotgun. At least three shells' worth, maybe more. Sometimes, you need to kick a little ass -- or blow up a laptop -- to stem the rising tide of entitled barbarianism.

Oh . . . save the .45 and the hollow-points for the little princess' smart phone. That would be AWESOME.

Take this party and shove it

I used to be a Democrat.

More precisely, as soon as my change-of-registration form reaches the Douglas County Election Commission, I will be a former Democrat. Since there's no provision to register as "Catholic and the Lot of You Can Go to Hell," I will have to make do with being "non-partisan," which is what they call independent in Nebraska.

And what was my last straw, the one that drove me from disaffected Democrat to political independent and all the electoral exile that implies? Oh, just the outrage of the day from my former political party.

IT'S ALL on the ABC News website:

President Obama “reinforced” his stance on the controversial contraception mandate while speaking at the Democrats’ annual retreat at Nationals Park in Washington, D.C. today, Senate Democrats said.

The retreat was closed to media.

Following President Obama’s speech at the retreat, a small group of Senate Democrats, mostly women, left the retreat early in order to hold a news conference on Capitol Hill to counter the Republicans’ news conference today at which they called for the mandate to be overturned.

Democrats said they will “fight strongly” to keep the mandate in place.

“It is our clear understanding from the administration that the president believes as we do, and the vast majority of the American women should have access to birth control,” Sen. Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., said pointing out that 15 percent of women use birth control for medical issues. “It’s medicine, and women deserve their medicine.”

Democrats today called on Republicans to stop using women as a “political football,” and stop defining this debate, as Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., did earlier in the day, as a religious issue.

“It’s time to tell Republicans ‘mind your own business,’” said Sen. Frank Lautenberg, D-N.J. ”Ideology should never be used to block women from getting the care they need to lead healthier lives.

“The power to decide whether or not to use contraception lies with a woman – not her boss,” said Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y. “What is more intrusive than trying to allow an employer to make medical decisions for someone who works for them?”

I CAN THINK of one thing. And the Democrats are doing it right now.

And I want to be in the same party as such people about as much as I would have wanted to be in the National Socialist party in 1933 Germany.

I can haz apostrophe?

Molly the Dog can't believe it. She thought the humans were supposed to be the smart ones.

Silly dog.

I suppose it would be too much to assume that the canine on the Milk-Bone box is named Mini. I suppose it's too much to assume that both dogs on the boxes of Milk-Bone "Mini's" answer to Mini.

And I suppose it would be a really gigantic stretch, at this point, to assume the United States hasn't become a nation of blithering illiterates.

OR THAT in another 20 years, as Americans devolve into communicating by a series of grunts and clicks, creatures such as my little friend Molly will come to be known as "the articulate ones."

For all I know, she already may have better mastery of the difference between possessives and plurals than your average U.S. high-school graduate.

Come to think of it, that may explain why, after giving the box of treats a good going over, Molly looked at me, cocked her little head and asked "What the hell, Dad?"

At 1560 on your dial, Radio Oom Pa Pa

You got your Germans, and you got your Czechs, and you got your Poles. In the Midwest, that means you got your polka. 

Somewhere on the radio dial every weekend, there are two beats in a measure, with a quarter note getting a beat. Except when there are three -- Oom, his brother Pa, and his other brother Pa.

Back in 1950, there was even more of it in the air . . . and over the airwaves. This part of the country was plumb polka crazy. Polka bands. Polka dances. Polka records. Polka programs.

Some people were so polka crazy, they'd record it off the air onto 10-inch, 78 rpm transcription discs with something called a Recordio. It's a radio . . . it's a record player . . . it's a disc recorder!

That's exactly what the Campagna family was doing one fine spring Sunday in south Omaha -- 11:15 in the morning, to be exact, June 11, 1950. You see, it was Polka Time, live and direct from the palatial Strand Theater studios of KSWI, the radio voice of the Daily Nonpareil in beautiful Council Bluffs, Iowa!

Polka Time is brought to you by Modern Appliance Co., at 24th and N streets in south Omaha. Your host . . . Frank Urban. And in the studio, live music by Ed Svoboda and the Red Raven Orchestra.

Vítáme Vás!

Arrogance that surpasseth all understanding

In her latest Wall Street Journal column, Peggy Noonan clearly sees that which Barack Obama couldn't due to the arrogance that blinds.

The president will pay for his lack of vision, as well as his particularly tricky blend of pride and political incompetence. The White House is the wrong place to get a bad case of Big Head, take two stupid pills and expect to get re-elected in the morning.

What am I talking about? Let Ms. Noonan explain:

But the big political news of the week isn't Mr. Romney's gaffe, or even his victory in Florida. The big story took place in Washington. That's where a bomb went off that not many in the political class heard, or understood.

But President Obama just may have lost the election.

The president signed off on a Health and Human Services ruling that says that under ObamaCare, Catholic institutions—including charities, hospitals and schools—will be required by law, for the first time ever, to provide and pay for insurance coverage that includes contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs and sterilization procedures. If they do not, they will face ruinous fines in the millions of dollars. Or they can always go out of business.

In other words, the Catholic Church was told this week that its institutions can't be Catholic anymore.

I invite you to imagine the moment we are living in without the church's charities, hospitals and schools. And if you know anything about those organizations, you know it is a fantasy that they can afford millions in fines.

There was no reason to make this ruling—none. Except ideology.

The conscience clause, which keeps the church itself from having to bow to such decisions, has always been assumed to cover the church's institutions.

Now the church is fighting back. Priests in an estimated 70% of parishes last Sunday came forward to read strongly worded protests from the church's bishops. The ruling asks the church to abandon Catholic principles and beliefs; it is an abridgment of the First Amendment; it is not acceptable. They say they will not bow to it. They should never bow to it, not only because they are Catholic and cannot be told to take actions that deny their faith, but because they are citizens of the United States.

If they stay strong and fight, they will win. This is in fact a potentially unifying moment for American Catholics, long split left, right and center. Catholic conservatives will immediately and fully oppose the administration's decision. But Catholic liberals, who feel embarrassed and undercut, have also come out in opposition.

The church is split on many things. But do Catholics in the pews want the government telling their church to contravene its beliefs? A president affronting the leadership of the church, and blithely threatening its great institutions? No, they don't want that. They will unite against that.

The smallest part of this story is political. There are 77.7 million Catholics in the United States. In 2008 they made up 27% of the electorate, about 35 million people. Mr. Obama carried the Catholic vote, 54% to 45%. They helped him win.

They won't this year. And guess where a lot of Catholics live? In the battleground states.

RULE NO. 1 of politics: Don't push people too far on issues they're willing to go to jail over. Or die for. That's a fight you cannot win, because you can't jail or kill enough of your opponents, assuming even that the law allowed it and your country had the stomach for it.

If a Catholic is even halfway serious about what he or she professes to believe, this is that issue -- freedom of conscience and the sacred obligation to do what one believes God demands of him . . . or die trying.

A lot of us didn't agree with the president's social agenda, and we didn't vote for him, either. (Then again, neither did I vote for John McCain.) But we were supportive where conscience allowed, respected the office and respected the democratic process. And we didn't automatically assume ill will on his part while avoiding it on ours.

Obama and his administration mistook civility for passivity and a lack of non-negotiable principles and loyalties. That's the kind of arrogance born of pride that always goeth before a fall.

IT'S A PITY the Republican presidential candidates suck so. But, as Mick Jagger said, "You can't always get what you want."

Continued national decline, I guess we can live with. Freedom to worship God and live as He requires, that's the kind of freedom of conscience we can't live without.

Member of Idiotplex falls for Abortionplex

Louisiana has a brain-drain problem, OK?

It happens. And in the Gret Stet, it's been happening for a while now.

But even accounting for the dumbass-politician statistical deviation, the cogno-normal population of Louisiana probably wouldn't be overreacting if it threw up its hands, began to run wildly around and scream in complete panic at U.S. Rep. John Fleming's posting of an item from The Onion on his official Facebook page as a serious news item.

The item: Planned Parenthood Opens $8 Billion Abortionplex.

Here's just a sample from the article, which Fleming or someone on his staff thought was legitimate:

"We really want abortion to become a regular part of women's lives, especially younger women who have enough fertile years ahead of them to potentially have dozens of abortions," said Richards, adding that the Abortionplex would provide shuttle service to and from most residences, schools, and shopping malls in the region. "Our hope is for this facility to become a regular destination where a woman in her second trimester can whoop it up at karaoke and then kick back while we vacuum out the contents of her uterus."

"All women should feel like they have a home at the Abortionplex," Richards continued. "Whether she's a high school junior who doesn't want to go to prom pregnant, a go-getter professional who can't be bothered with the time commitment of raising a child, or a prostitute who knows getting an abortion is the easiest form of birth control—all are welcome."

Nineteen-year-old Marcy Kolrath, one of the Abortionplex's first clients, told reporters that despite her initial hesitancy, she was quickly put at ease by staff members who reassured her that she could have abortions over and over for the next decade before finally committing to motherhood. Kolrath also said she was "wowed" by the facility's many attractions.

"I was kind of on the fence in the beginning," she said. "But after a couple of margaritas and a ride down the lazy river they've got circling the place, I got caught up in the vibe. By the time it was over, I almost wished I could've aborted twins and gotten to stay a little longer."

"I told my boyfriend we had to have sex again that very night," Kolrath added. "I really want to come back over Labor Day."

LISTEN, I think Planned Parenthood is a despicable organization that not only is in love with abortion, but almost treats it as some sort of deadly sacrament for women. It was an evil, eugenic undertaking when Margaret Sanger founded it, and it's no less so today.

But for someone to think this article was real is kind of frightening. That this person -- whether it be Fleming or a staffer -- has access to the levers of national power is, at a bare minimum, dispiriting with the potential for despair.

Besides, even the darkest estimate of Planned Parenthood's mastery of the dark arts has the organization at least five years from pulling off construction and operation of even a modest $3 billion "Abortionplex."

I almost forgot. Did I mention that Fleming is a physician?

The Hill has the story. Read it, weep, then book your passage to New Zealand:

The article, which is months old, was reposted on the paper's website last week amidst controversy over the Susan G. Komen Foundation's announcement — later retracted — that it wouldn't provide grants to Planned Parenthood because it was under congressional investigation. The breast cancer charity had previously provided funding for cancer screenings at Planned Parenthood clinics. Ensuing criticism from abortion rights and women's health advocates led to a reversal of that decision.

The Onion's article was a satire aimed at opponents of Planned Parenthood, who often denounce the organization for performing abortions.

"Although we've traditionally dedicated 97 percent of our resources to other important services such as contraception distribution, cancer screening, and STD testing, this new complex allows us to devote our full attention to what has always been our true passion: abortion," the article facetiously quotes Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards as saying.

But Fleming — or whoever on his congressional staff is responsible for updating his Facebook page — took the article at face value. The post has since been removed, but not before being posted on Literally Unbelievable, a blog that chronicles instances of Facebook users who believe Onion stories are real.

"More on Planned Parenthood, abortion by the wholesale," Fleming's comment reads.

As seen only on colorful Channel 2

There's a reason this Super Bowl ad Will Ferrell did for Old Milwaukee beer ran only on KNOP in North Platte, Neb. And, really, it's the funniest thing.

Let me explain something about Channel 2 -- and, really, this is rich. See, back when I lived in North Platte in the early 1980s, KNOP had this really


UPDATE: The editors at Deadspin are such a bunch of tools. They entice the entire media universe to link to their YouTube video . . . then, after everyone does, they make it private, thereby breaking every embed. Watch fast. We expect them to copyright-flag this YouTube version any second now, concerned as they are about the legal rights of Old Milwaukee.

Stay classy, Gawker Media.

Twinkle, twinkle little bat-s***. . . .

This is how you run a state today. Please take notes.

First, you buy a copy of Through the Looking Glass. Pay for it with a check from a bank you just made up in your head last week. Sign the check "Alice."

Then commit yourself to believing "six impossible things before breakfast" every day, nine days a week, and twice on Gloopday.

Third, vow never to make sense again. Coherence, consistency and commonweal are the three K's to avoid at all costs -- they will just mess you up when, as The Man, you're trying to gin up popular outrage against The Man as a means of sucking up to the booboisie.

Fourth, if the public pays for it, the public owns it and the public benefits from it, convince the public that's just "socialism," a nefarious plot conjured up by pointy-headed geeks to steal taxpayers' money.

And finally, tell people there is such a thing as a free lunch, that they can get something for nothing . . . and that nothing is really Something, because when you're paying for something, that's not as good as getting nothing, which is Something, for nothing. Make this point to voters twice every Gloopday.

NOW THAT we've completed our overview of Political Science 1001, I think we're ready for a look at the latest public-policy pronouncements by Nebraska Gov. Dave Heineman, the Pillsbury Doughmagogue. (Envision the Mad Hatter, only closer in appearance to Poppin' Fresh and prone to go "Hoo hooooooooo!" every time a state employee gets his pink slip.)

In today's edition of the Omaha World-Herald we observe Flippin' Nuts (which I think is the governor's Twitter handle, but I could be wrong) compare the state university to "a wealthy 'special interest group' with its hand out for taxpayer dollars while the state's citizens want tax relief."

Heineman, in an interview Friday, said that his top priority remains passage of his proposed tax-cut package and that the university needs to reprioritize its spending or use private dollars from its foundation to finance the $91 million in new construction spending it is requesting from the state.

The university is seeking funds to expand nursing classroom space in Lincoln and Kearney, do design work on a new veterinary laboratory in Lincoln, and build a $370 million cancer research tower at the Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.

"Here's what the average Nebraskan tells me: 'The university has over a billion dollars in their foundation, and they can't afford $400 million to $500 million to afford that (cancer tower) project?' " Heineman said. "They're offended, and they have a right to be offended," he told The World-Herald.

THAT'S BECAUSE there's nothing more offensive than cancer research. Unless, of course, it's the resulting economic development that would plague Omaha as a result of any major enhancement of the med center.

Everybody making money long-term -- or lives saved through cancer research -- doesn't change the fact that nothing says "socialized medicine" like a state med school and a state hospital run by a state university. Go Big Red, indeed!


MEANTIME, to borrow a quote from next semester's POLI 1002 required text, "Pay no attention to that comsymp behind the curtain!"

Ron Withem, an NU spokesman, said the university has worked well with the governor in the past and hopes to do so again this year. Withem said, however, that 30 "average Nebraskans" were among those testifying Thursday in support of NU's spending priorities before the budget-writing Appropriations Committee.

"There were nurses, students, medical professionals and cattle producers telling legislators that they should invest in economic development and health initiatives at the university," he said. "We think the average Nebraskans did speak yesterday."

Withem added that the state's largest business groups, including the Greater Omaha Chamber of Commerce, also support the NU requests.

Several members of the Appropriations Committee have voiced support for the university project, although they doubted NU would get the entire $91 million. Much, they said, would depend on the health of the state economy and competing demands for state dollars, including the governor's tax-cut proposal.

IT'S A TERRIBLE thing when the chamber of commerce has been infiltrated, I'll tell you what.

Some people just don't get -- to put it mildly -- that today's best practices for state governance do not include investing taxpayer money in public institutions. Especially education.

The most recent literature in political science clearly indicates that the only message Nebraskans need to hear is "Lie back, have another cigarette, and think of Reagan."

Of course, it's an entirely different thing if we're merely not putting money into state coffers in the name of non-socialistic private economic development. I mean, that money wasn't there in the first place, right?

Not putting money in isn't the same as spending taxpayers' money, right? It's just giving a tax cut to future corporate citizens. Tax cuts are good. And if we have enough tax cuts, maybe more state employees will get pink slips.

"Hoo hooooooooo!"

STILL, one has to have standards and procedures -- even when it involves not making future corporate citizens pay taxes . . . so that Nebraska is the state to which they won't be paying taxes.

For one thing, you have to recognize the devil you know (like the University of Nebraska), you know damned well is a devil. The devil you don't know -- like a secretive bunch of investor types who may or may not be from the West Coast -- you don't know is the devil at all. Really, they're probably great guys.

But we can't talk about it. Hell, we can't even know it. "N" stands for Nebraska, but it also stands for "no nowlege," which is always the best policy because "noing nothing" means there's one less thing you have to lie about.

In running a state's affairs, honesty, remember, is always the best policy. Unless, of course, it isn't.

And before we can move heaven and earth in the Legislature to give secretive investors massive tax breaks so that it's here they come to not pay taxes and build this really cool thing that might or might not be something that's really big and really high-tech, we have to know a few things. Like, we need to know that we only know their first names.

This, again, is consistent with best practices in the state-government racket. (See "no nowlege" above.)

We also need to make sure that the 30-something executives who want to not pay taxes here don't leave any business cards with anybody. And, like I said, we need to know that we don't know where they're from -- that's important.

Then, we need a fancy code name for whatever it is they won't be paying taxes on. The World-Herald said something about "Project Edge." Ooh! That's got kind of a certain je ne sais quoi to it!

Again, it's pretty important that je ne sais squat about quoi. Except that We Don't Know Who from We Don't Know Where are promising us a lot of Mystery Quoi.

But the potential economic impact of their project is no secret among state leaders: a projected $1.2 billion data center that could grow even larger.

It could bring a major high-tech business, one that would become the single-largest consumer of electricity in Nebraska.

The state is in hot pursuit of Project Edge, which is looking at breaking ground in May with an initial investment of $500 million.

State lawmakers are acting quickly to land the economic big fish, swiftly advancing two bills from committees last week in hopes of sweetening Nebraska's tax and electric-rate incentives to better compete with the reported main competitor for the project, neighboring Iowa.

"It's quite an extraordinary investment," said Gov. Dave Heineman, who has been involved in the recruitment effort. "We're one of the finalists, and I think we have an outstanding opportunity to have this occur." [Emphasis mine.]

State Sen. Abbie Cornett of Bellevue, who is championing one of the data center bills, used the words "huge" and "unprecedented" to describe the business opportunity.

The first phase of the proposed Project Edge data center would be nearly three times larger than the $140 million, 175-job Yahoo data center lured to La Vista in 2009.

Project Edge is projected to become twice as large as the $600 million center that Google located in Council Bluffs in 2007. Nebraska officials say the proposed new center comes with the potential to expand even more than the $1.2 billion projection used by state officials.

WHAT WE can take away from this is the absolute importance of distinguishing between a wealthy special-interest group with its hand out for taxpayer dollars and a wealthy special-interest group with its hand out for taxpayer dollars.

Providing state funds for a wealthy special-interest group affiliated with the people of Nebraska is bad -- offensively bad -- when it would further medical education, target a deadly disease that kills millions, enhance the prestige of the state university, eventually add to the state's tax revenues and be an economic windfall for the state's largest city.

Indirectly providing state funds for a wealthy special-interest group affiliated with men who (as far as we know) have no last names and (as far as we know) have no permanent address is good -- the best thing ever!!! -- when whatever the hell it is they're promising just might be big. Really big. Bigger than that Google thing those damned Iowans have.

We think.

At least that's what they're saying. You know . . . them.

But at least these Them aren't greedy public-university thems. And that's good.

Because the guy who runs the state -- the guy in charge of the government -- says government is bad. And we believe him because he's a good guy.

Go ask Alice. I think she'll know.

I hate it when that happens

TV flashback -- 1978.

SATURDAY: DICK TRACY LERNS TO SPEL

SATERDAY: DICK TRACY LURNS TO SPEYL

SATURDAY: DIK TRACEY LEANS TO SPELD

SATURDAY: DYCK TRACY LOYNS TO SPAYL

SATURDAY: DICK TRACY SEZ JUST @#$! IT

3 Chords & the Truth: Snowed in

The show is in the can. The weather's in the toilet.

It is snowing outside. I am inside. Easy decision.

Winter . . . so now you show up?

Well, the weatherman says we're going to have roughly a foot of this stuff on the ground by Sunday, so I'm betting we're not going to be out and about much. No sleigh . . . or horse, don't you know? That's OK. We're all stocked up on the essentials, and we're good to go.

Of course, 3 Chords & the Truth is included as an essential on the snowed-in list. In fact, you can put it on your list of essentials on the not-snowed-in list, too.

SEE, if it's all cold and snowy out, there's enough hot music on the Big Show to warm things up quite nicely. Alternatively, if it's warmish where you are this weekend, there's plenty of cool on the program to keep things comfortable.

No matter what, it's always nice curling up with the latest episode . . . and all the wonderful -- and wonderfully eclectic -- music.

That is all. I'm going to get a hot cup of something now.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.

Love. Peace. Sooooooooul Traaaaaain!

"The hippest trip in America" is no more, and now the hippest tripper, Don Cornelius, is dead by his own hand.

Our present sadness keeps giving folks reasons to really miss the Seventies. I'm even starting to miss the clothes -- at least the kind of threads one might see on Soul Train.

Listen, I'm a white guy from the Deep South, born in the year of our Lord Jim Crow, Nineteen Hundred and Sixty-One. In the early '70s as they existed in my corner of the world, could there have been a more subversive -- wonderfully, funkily, groovily, terrifyingly (to some) subversive -- program on television?

If 1973 had been 1963 and Baton Rouge had been Birmingham, a TV transmitter would have been blowed up good.

An NPR blog post by Dan Charnas sums up Why Don Cornelius Matters quite nicely:

It was the Godfather of Soul's first appearance on Cornelius' then-nascent syndicated TV show — designed to do for soul music and black audiences what American Bandstand had long done for pop music and mainstream audiences. Brown marveled at the professionalism of the production, the flawlessness of its execution.

He turned to Cornelius and asked, "Who's backing you on this, man?"

"It's just me, James," Cornelius answered.

Brown, nonplused, acted as if Cornelius didn't understand the question. He asked it two more times, and Cornelius answered twice again: "It's just me, James."

That the man who wrote the song "Say It Loud — I'm Black and I'm Proud" and who recorded the soundtrack to the Black Power movement could scarcely comprehend that a black man like Cornelius both owned and helmed this kind of enterprise without white patronage is a testament to the magnitude and the improbability of Cornelius' achievements.

REST IN LOVE, peace and soul, Don Cornelius.

July 13, 1950: Ricky is 5

Today is July 13, 1950. It's a Thursday.

And you're just in time for Ricky's birthday party. C'mon in! All his little friends are already here.

Of course, you know that Ricky's actual birthday was last week, but the family was in Kansas City, so here we are. Make sure you say something for the record Mom and Dad are making.

Yeah, they've already been fooling around with the disc recorder -- something tells me not every kid's birthday-party record starts with "Les Toreadors" from Carmen. Ricky should get a chuckle out of that in 20 or 30 years. Can you imagine? 1980.

Make sure you enunciate for the microphone, though. Janet already got fussed at for being a mushmouth, poor kid. But you should have heard Ricky singing "Jesus Loves Me." He kind of mangled the lyrics, but it was just the cutest thing ever.


OH, YES. Put a microphone in Mom's hand and she launches into her cabaret act -- "I Don't Care If the Sun Don't Shine" this time.

Let's see, Aunt Donna and Aunt Helen are already here. And . . . ummmmmmm . . . Alice, Mildred . . . all the kids . . . there goes little Bobbie and Judy. And Danny, and Mary Lou . . . Cathy, Stevie, Diana, Jenny, Jackie, Baby . . . and Happy. Can't forget Happy.

Uh oh. Looks like the record is getting toward the end of the side. Get in there quick and say hello to Ricky. Maybe he'll be listening to you when he's old and retired someday -- way past the year 2000!

THAT IS, if the transcription disc doesn't get thrown in some box in the attic and end up getting sold at a garage sale or an estate sale in 60-something years. HELLO, FUTURE OMAHAN . . . WHOEVER YOU ARE! Ha ha!

Can you just picture that little 5-year-old Ricky when he's 66 or something?

I wonder what Omaha will be like then? I sure would like to live long enough to see Ricky's flying jet car (click) jet car (click) jet car (click) jet car (click) jet car (click) jet. . . .

The Onion: Tomorrow's news today

Brain-dead teen, only capable of rolling eyes and texting, to be euthanized

This is a joke, right?

Is this a joke?

It has to be a joke, right?

Right?

Right?

I'm pretty sure it's a joke.

Damn, it's hard living in a satire-resistant culture.

Livingston Parish, I presume?

Looks like they got two new cast members on Swamp People this season.

Dat's jus' great . . . new reasons for my Damn Yankee wife to make fun of my Louisiana culture -- especially since the new alligator hunters are from Livingston Parish. I practically grew up in Livingston Parish. In the swamp, no less.

The Livingston Parish jokes are going to be coming fast and furious. And then Mrs. Favog will get started.

I hate it when that happens. If I didn't live with the woman, I'd have to burn her out over that.

I told you I practically grew up in rural Livingston Parish.

ANYWAY, here's the news item from the Channel 9 website in Baton Rouge:

Blake McDonald and Austyn Yoches who are from Livingston Parish are the newest alligator hunters to join the cast of Swamp People, and they represent yet another way 21st century Louisianans have figured out how to get back to their bayou roots.

A "Debut Party" will be held at 8 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 9. The new season premieres at 9 p.m. The young men invite everyone to come out to Big Mike's Sports Bar and Grill in Denham Springs.

McDonald and Yoches currently reside on their houseboat in Bayou Pigeon full time. They truly make a living off the swamp. They hunt every season and sell the animals to make money from frogging, crawfishing, alligator hunting and raccoon hunting just to name a few. Their grandfather started this with them when they were little bitty boys. He would take them to the swamp, put them on his shoulders and take them coon hunting. Then he taught them to be commercial fisherman from the swamp.

Instead of putting their boat on a trailer hitched to a pickup that tows it back to a comfortable house built on solid ground, McDonald and Yoches roll right out of bed and into their swampy workplace. These cousins live on a houseboat in the middle of the swamp . . . off the grid. They don’t just work in the swamp, they live there. The young men don’t have another job. If they want to eat, they have to hunt.

WHY DO I have the feeling that if I want to eat tonight, I'm going to have to hunt?


NOW . . . did I ever tell you about my Uncle George's dog, Tootsie?

Uncle George had a Boston terrier just like Swamp People's new alligator hunters. And ol' Tootsie could be mean sometimes, but I ga-ron-damn-tee you that she wasn't as mean as that snapping turtle she got just a little too curious about once when I was a kid.

Of course, this happened in Livingston Parish.

Anyway, I remember Uncle George and Daddy were out at camp on the Petite Amite River, sitting on the bank and drinking beer. I was there not drinking beer -- and so was Tootsie the Dog.

Oh . . . there was a snapper there, too, sunning himself on the bank.

Of course, this was too much for a normal dog to stand -- at least not without giving the turtle a good sniffsploration as part of the whole Danger? Or maybe FOOD?!?! decision-making process. And the turtle was having none of it.

Next thing we knew, ol' Tootsie was running around in circles, screaming like a woman -- I'll bet you didn't know a Boston terrier could scream like a woman. The snapping turtle was hanging from her bottom lip, which was securely in its jaws.

I know you animal-rights people will find this sick and disturbing . . . but it was one of the funniest things I've ever seen in my life. It was a grand spectacle. I may have been rolling on the ground, I was laughing so hard.

Daddy and Uncle George may have been, too. In fact, everybody was laughing so hard at this poor, hapless, overly inquisitive dog running in circles and screaming like a woman with a damned snapping turtle hanging on her lip that it took a while for Uncle George to compose himself enough to go grab a shovel. With which he knocked the turtle off Tootsie's lip.

I COULD be wrong, but I think Tootsie may have lived the rest of her days rather chastened after getting her ass -- or at least her lip -- whipped by a turtle.

But that's my story . . . and my culture . . . and I'm sticking to it. Just don't make fun of it.

Hey, I'm not married to you, and I don't live with you, either. I will burn your ass out if you mess with me.

A Bradypus is a girl's best friend

Show-business people: They ain't like you and me.

No, they're not.

Take Kristen Bell, for example. That is, if you're properly certified to deal with people who are properly certifiable.

"The day of my birthday, we're sitting in the living room and I hear a knock at the door. He says, 'Your present is here. Why don't you grab the dogs and go in the back room?'" Bell tells Ellen DeGeneres on her eponymous talk show (airing Tuesday). "I was immediately overcome and I thought, 'There is a sloth near! There is a sloth here! It's close! It's gonna happen!'"

I MEAN, I'm minding my own business, checking out the latest news on MSNBC's website, and I see the headline "Kristen Bell cries hysterically over sloth gift." What was I supposed to do?

I did what you would do -- I clicked it.

My God, Hollywood people really, really, really ain't like you and me.

Bell explains: "I didn't know how to process that because my entire life had been waiting for this moment where I would get to interact -- I'm serious! -- with a sloth."

OHMYGAWD! Ohmygawdohmygawdohmygawdohmygawdohmygawd!

Now you know.

The song remains the same

A little more than 97 years ago, a young man -- a noted American composer and pianist, in fact -- sat down at a keyboard instrument called a celesta and played a heavenly version of "Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht" . . . "Silent Night" to you and me.

The young man and his glockenspiel-sounding contraption were in a Victor Talking Machine Co., studio in Camden, N.J., and they sat in front of a large horn that would capture the music and funnel those vibrations to a diaphragm connected to a needle. The needle would cut grooves into a blank wax disc -- the master recording.

And that recording became a side of this record, released in December 1915. Someone bought it for 75 cents that Christmas, and it came down through generations until it landed in a box of old records Sunday at an Omaha estate sale.

I bought it and some others for 50 cents a piece, and what began in Camden when the Great War wasn't yet "great" and America was still at peace, Sunday night spun on a record changer in my little studio in Omaha. Alas, this occurred many wars after "the war to end all wars."

THE YOUNG MAN, all of 25 at the time, was Felix Arndt. Around this time, Arndt, despite his own youth, was becoming a mentor to a teenager eager to make his mark in the music business.

A decade later, George Gershwin made quite the mark, indeed.

By the middle of October 1918, though, Felix Arndt would lose his life to the Spanish influenza epidemic. He was 29, survived by his wife, Nola, and his music.

That music, generations later, lives still within the grooves of an almost century-old record and emerges to touch a world that, in 1914, surely would have been almost unimaginable. A world whose music was changed by a certain young kid who hung out with, and was influenced by, Felix Arndt.

No man is an island. Neither is any man's music.

It's rather like the communion of saints, isn't it? Just in the grooves of ancient 78s.

Sometimes, when I'm in an old church, if I try hard enough, I can visualize all the generations of believers who sat there before me, all of us present -- across time and defying the grave -- each generation singing a verse of a never-ending hymn. Likewise, when I find an ancient record and place the needle into a well-worn groove, I hear a long-ago verse of a song still sung, and I realize that I am not my own . . . and neither are you.

We stand upon the shoulders of our forebears, all of us bought and paid for with the blood of a long-dead savior Who lives still, conducting this symphony of the generations, world without end.

Felix Arndt's rendition of Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht,
Victor 17842-B, as archived by the Library of Congress.
My copy actually might sound a little better than this.

3 Chords & the Truth: Grab an LP and be

You say you want a revolution?

Well, you know, we all want to change the world.

Maybe you should just stop trying. Well, you know, that's when you might change the world.

So welcome to the 3 Chords & the Truth Used Record Shop. Where we know it's gonna be all right, all right, all right.

GRAB A CUP of coffee, and I'll put a record on. We'll work our way through the vinyl, and maybe you'll find a new fave song.

We'll talk and put new some stuff on the turntable, so pull up a chair. The Big Show is specializing in "being," which is when greatness just might arise. We'll make the most of these moments . . . and that just might change our lives.

It's comfy here amid the albums, and the 45s and the CDs. Just the perfect spot to settle down and just be.

On the Big Show and at the ol' record shop, vinyl lives, and radio occupies a soft spot in our hearts. The coffee's free, and we have hot tea, too.

It's 3 Chords & the Truth, y'all. Be there. Aloha.