The Real McCain

Now that it's very likely that the name of the next president of the United States is John McCain, agit-documentarian Robert Greenwald's new website The Real McCain is definitely worth a visit. Like most die-hard lefties he's got a rather awkward sense of irony and stiff timing, but contentwise he's right on the mark.

Howl

Turns out Allen Ginsberg didn't read his seminal poem "Howl" in California for the first time, but for students at Reed College in Portland, Oregon, while hitchhiking from Berkeley to the Pacific Northwest. So history has to be rewritten! They do have a recording over at the Reed College website.

More Advertising For Myself

Legendary philosopher Jürgen Habermas thinks it's a great loss to my paper that I don't report from the US anymore. He complained to a colleague of mine over dinner that he misses my writing about America. Well, if that's not something to brag about! I wish he'd told that to my editor in chief.

Advertising For Myself

I'm gonna interview Jeremy Scahill live on stage tonight. He wrote the incredibly enraging book about the private military contractor Blackwater. Promising to be an equally enraging evening.

8 PM at the Werkraum of the Kammerspiele, Hildegardstr. 1 in Munich.

Brooklyn Nostalgia

Bipolar New York's always been caught between nostalgia and euphoria. Nothing illustrates this better than the changing of Coney Island. On the one side the movers and shakers (i.e. Bloomberg and his cronies) get all excited about the new development opportunities. On the other side New York's hippest get all maudlin about another remnant of faded Amerikana glory getting a corporate facelift. Kinetic Carnival ist a great blog following the development. And the Brooklyn Museum has a show called 'Goodbye Coney Island'.

New Hampshire and beyond

Everybody in Europe's super hyped up about Barack Oabama and Hillary Clinton. Which proves the short sighted reflexes of Europeans when it comes to America. First they're always rooting for Democrats no matter what, because the Democrats' domestic policy fit European mentality of solidarity and sharing. Mostly missing the point that it's foreign policy that matters to us. Neither Carter's maneuvering with the Sovjets nor Clinton's Balkan bullying have been particularily good for Europe.

Secondly they still see America through the eyes of Europe of the 50s and 60s, when the US was the global torchbearer of societal change. Somehow Europeans missed the massive backlash that's been going on since 1968. So Clinton and Obama are definitely European dream candidates, symbolizing progress and change. No matter that John Edwards might be the only electable Democrat, because he's Southern and the only Democrats coming to power since 68 have been Southerners. Partly because Southern liberalism is steeped in faith, not in leftist thinking.

Well and then there's the fact, mostly missed in Europe, that these are primaries. Nobody's winning anything yet. And the most likely Republican candidate - he's good. Really good (see video). He's reviving the silent majority. Right on!

...and a happy new year.

I Like Ike

A rather belated shoutout to Ike Turner (R.I.P.), who I had once spent three days of crazed fun. When he proved his drug credentials to me by sticking my pen through his perforated septum. When he raced me down to Tijuana in his ivory colored Lincoln. When he took me on a search for the bar, where he married Tina by signing some novelty marriage license he bought from a street hawker. When he took me to hotel lobby Karaoke bars in the suburbs of San Diego to show me his still happening vocal chops. When he flew in his quarterback buddy who tried to squeeze ten grand out of me. For that exclusive interview. When he told me that he never beat up Tina, that he never raised his fist against her, that he only used his open hand and only if she pushed his buttons, which she knew, so she wouldn't have to have pushed them. When he respected me solely on the base that I had played with some of his former musicians, who had jumped ship in Munich when they were on his tour with Tina, just like some communist country basketball players.

Full obituary in German here

P.S.: Turns out Ike died from a cocaine overdose after all.