And here’s the 411 on Pancake Mountain from Wikipedia.

Sounds like a very hip bunch of puppet-wielding urchin amusers, and they’ve had quite the honor roll of modern rockers and old New Wavers on the show … including Ocelopotamus idol Wreckless Eric! Now I need to go try to find that clip.

His take on Obama v. Wright is especially trenchant.

I’m not necessarily saying that I absolutely agree with the cartoon’s comically reductive expression of certain religious beliefs, but its portrayal of the double standard regarding what’s considered fair game for criticism is definitely on point.

Also, while I’ve got you, I might as well post the ad that has Republican operatives all in a lather.

Because it’s so incredibly unfair to show footage of John McCain actually saying the things he actually says. How can they possibly fight back against such underhanded tactics? Is nothing sacred?

Finally, just in case there’s anyone you know who doesn’t understand why the phony “gas tax holiday” that Hillary and McCain are pushing is a complete swindle and a huge insult to the intelligence of the public, let me explain it slowly and carefully. Feel free to cut and paste this into emails to obtuse relatives:

The so-called Gas Tax Holiday won’t actually save consumers a single penny at the pump. Instead, it will simply transfer our tax money directly to the oil companies as extra profits.

That’s because if and when the gas tax is suspended, it won’t actually increase the supply of gas, and it may actually raise demand as people start planning longer summer road trips.

Which means that gas prices will simply increase by the same amount as the tax. You’ll pay as much or more for your gas at the pump. But instead of that money going to fix our roads and bridges, it will go right into the pockets of the oil tycoons as a sweet little expression of McCain and Hillary’s love for them.

In other words, the “holiday” in question is April Fool’s — special summer repeat edition.

Or you could think of it as a shell game, where the shell is Shell Oil.

And here’s the real takeaway from this: Given the general wonkishness that Bill and Hillary are famous for, you can’t convince me that Hillary doesn’t understand every nuance of what I just said. She knows exactly how dishonest she’s being in supporting this, and what a shameless bribe and swindle it is. And she doesn’t care. She’s pressing the full-speed-ahead button on this scam.

There is perhaps no better example so far of her willingness to say and do anything to get elected, no matter how shameless and unethical.

Meanwhile, Obama is in the role of the only candidate honest enough to point out the naked emperor. Will the public reward him or penalize him for that? I know what I hope will happen.
 

Roz is brilliant at analyzing the various mechanics and conventions of TV shows and movies, especially the complexities of science fiction and fantasy, and frequently saves me the trouble of figuring out what I want to say about whatever’s happening on Doctor Who by having already said it better herself.

I discovered Roz mainly through my pal Jorjet Harper, who was hosting Roz on this trip. (I think Roz truly won my admiration the day I discovered that she was actually cited in the Wikipedia article on Rose Tyler — although sadly, that citation now seems to have disappeared from the article. Well, that’s wiki-life, I suppose.)

Roz did one appearance at Women and Children First and another at the Center on Halsted, the latter of which I was fortunate enough to attend. In addition to hearing Roz read from her work, the group of us who turned out had a lovely salon-style coversation that included discussions of Doctor Who, Jeanette Winterson, Joss Whedon, Steven Spielberg, and (naturally enough, given those conversational nodes) sex with robots. Roz was charming and fun to talk with, and had lots of great stories to tell. A very lovely evening indeed, complete with mushroom pizza procured from the Whole Foods downstairs.

For those of you who couldn’t be there, you can still read Jorjet’s interview with Roz (extended online remix!), which ran in the Windy City Times the week Roz was here.

And of course, catch up with Roz at Silence Exile and Crumpets.
 

I’ve always been really bad about actually submitting my poems for publication — I always think, here I am fussing around preparing submissions when I could be writing more poems. (And of course, getting poems published in magazines requires a lot of tenacity and perseverance even for poets who already have extensive publication credits, or so I was once told by a certain then-future poet laureate of the Land of Lincoln.)

So … this is actually the first time I’ve had a poem published in a literary journal through a formal submission process. Big milestone for me! Pat me on the head.

My poem is called “We Are Always What We Are Not,” and is the title piece for a group of poems (maybe a chapbook, eventually) that I’ve been working on for a couple of years now.

The Winter 2008 issue (#16) of After Hours is available by mail order … you can order a single copy for $8 or subscribe for $14 (which gets you both issues for the year and saves you $2, Scrooge McDuck). Ordering info is on the Subscribe page at the After Hours site.

Also, I personally have seen it on the stands at Women & Children First Books here in Andersonville, so if you’re in the hood, you can pick up a copy next time you’re in there.

Even better, you can hear me read this particular poem at the After Hours reading this Friday night, May 2nd, at the DvA Gallery. I, Dave Awl, will be featured along with several other contributors to the issue:

Daniel Godston
Bronmin Shumway
Mary Blinn

I’ve performed with Daniel Godston at Molly Malone’s, so I can attest to the fact that he in particular rocks (he punctuated his poetry reading with some expert trumpet playing that night!) and I’m looking forward to reading with him again.

The evening is part of DvA’s first Friday of the month poetry series, hosted by Charlie Newman.

Here are all the specs:

After Hours reading, First Friday series
Friday, May 2, 2008
8 - 9:30 pm
DvA Gallery
2568 N. Lincoln, Chicago

Oh, and it’s free, you cheapskate.
 

First up, a brilliant post by Hunter on Daily Kos:

Things I have learned during this campaign season:

In a race that includes a former First Lady of the United States and a multimillionaire Republican senator rumored to share up to eight residences with his wife, the black guy from Chicago is unforgivably elitist.

Racism in America is caused primarily by black Chicago preachers.

The guy who keeps getting confused over the relationship between Iraq, Iran, and al Qaeda is the foreign policy expert.

The guy who goes to campaign stops on his wife’s private jet aircraft is the most down-to-earth.

Go read the whole thing.

Moving from the mushroom puffs to the crudites …

• New NBC/WSJ poll says voters find McCain’s relationship to Bush is a bigger problem than Obama’s relationship to Wright. That’s right, Bush is much more unpopular than J-Wright. (Keep it up, voting public, and you might start to restore my faith in you.) Only 32 percent of the country even cares about Jeremiah Wright … which is pretty much the same percentage of the country that believes the Vietnam War was a great idea, masturbation is immoral, Jews have horns, and global warming is the biggest hoax since they faked the moon landing.
• Also, George W. Bush has succeeded in turning a generation of young voters Democratic … go look at the glorious visual evidence. It’s the prettiest thing I’ve seen so far this week, if you don’t count the dandelions.
• This is the kind of stuff that keeps me from enthusiastically supporting the Human Rights Campaign (above and beyond their shamefully lackluster support for trans rights, I mean). Their judgment is just terrible so much of the time. I’d much rather support the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, who don’t have a track record of endorsing evil Republicans.
• As the founder of the Pansy Kings, I would be remiss if I did not note this week’s flap over North Carolina Governor Mike Easley’s derogatory pansy remark. Here’s Dan Savage’s take on it (appropriate since we were both on the “Sissies” episode of This American Life talking about this very subject all those years ago), as well as some commentary from Pam at Pam’s House Blend.
• Monsanto’s moneymaking myth — that genetic modification increases the yield of crops — is obliterated by a new study.
• The post office’s inexplicable and inexcusable war on small magazines.
• A first glimpse of the US version of Little Britain.
• Brilliant: “John Ashcroft yelled at me.”
• If I had Keith Olbermann’s ear, I’d nominate Daphne Beasley, the principal of Hollis F. Price Middle College High School in South Memphis, Tennessee, as the Worst Person in the World for an entire week. Maybe longer.
• Bless Tim Gill.
• Oh, my stars. Chair-sniffing in the news! What wacky, kinky perversion will the heterosexual demimonde come up with next?
• On a related note, avoid going to hell by rejecting immoral underthings.

Finally … in case you haven’t seen it, what Hillary would have to do to win the nomination.
 

I’m ganking this video from Don, who posted it before the Pennsylvania primary. Hillary didn’t do nearly as well there as the video stipulates she would have needed to, so keep in mind that her odds of getting the nom at this point are even worse than the video implies.

Maybe the Doctor could help her out. Or, more likely, the Master, who would have a better sympathy for her recent campaigning style.

Previously on Ocelopotamus:

• Death by Flirting

Having done all that (and gotten sawdust all over the Ocelopotamus so that I had to hose it down and then rub soothing emollients and jellies into its hide), I figured I might as well introduce the new kids in the class.

In the CHICAGO section I’ve added long-overdue links to a couple of my compatriots from The Nod last fall: Clever Title by not-a-fourteen-year-old-girl Nat Topping, and Lindsay Lives Here, written by the fabulous Lindsay Muscato of the fabulous Neo-Futurist administrative team gear fab. (Lindsay consistently cracks me up with stuff like this post.)

Also new in CHICAGO is Shoeless James, who you might recognizes as frequent Ocelopotamus comment-section dandy “James S.” James is one of my old dancing pals from Planet Earth, possibly the biggest Steven Patrick Morrissey fan EV-er, and these days he writes for the Sun-Times. Right near him is Instant Comma, a blog about writing by my friend Marck Bailey who technically is in Evanston not Chicago, but hey, it’s Earth Day so let’s not get too hung up on arbitrary man-made geographical boundaries.

In NEWS & POLITICS I’ve added Informed Comment by the terrifyingly smart Juan Cole (don’t really know why I didn’t have him there all along, but have been meaning to add him at least since he paid Theater Oobleck a visit last fall).

Tales of the Freeway Blogger is always good for a vicarious thrill or two.

Living Cruelty Free is a blog I discovered last year when I was scouting for info on pet food. It’s a great resource for info on animal-friendly products and businesses. In fact, thanks to LCF, yesterday I learned all about the CCIC (Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics) and the Leaping Bunny logo, which I’d seen on products but didn’t know all the ramennoodlefications of.

New in CULTURE is Read Roger, a blog by Roger Sutton who is the editor of The Horn Book and a very clever man. He blogs about children’s lit from a very grown-up perspective, as well as books and publishing in general, all with a snappy wit and a fresh lavender scent, and I’ve been getting a huge kick out of his blog since Jane Hyde pointed it out to me. (Thanks, Jane!)

Also in CULTURE is One Joy, One Sorrow by Genevra Gallo, alumnus of The Neo-Futurists, whom I would have liked to put up in CHICAGO with the other various blogging Neo-Futurists except these days she’s in Carbondale which is just too dang far away, regardless of what I wrote about Earth Day above.

And just below Genevra is Memory Machine by my old pal Scraps (who has turned up in the comments here once or twice), whom I bonded with on the Neo-Futurists’ 1995 tour to NYC (well, actually the launch of the first NYC production) when he turned up in the audience wearing a Bone t-shirt.

In the NEW WAVE category I’ve added a link to the new Lost in the 80’s feature at Popdose.com, just above the link to the original Lost in the 80’s which is still worth visiting because John rotates out stuff from the archives every week and freshens up those Mavis Pickles III links.

Down at the bottom I have added a new category. Being the big silly New Wave drama club queen that I am, I love having a music category with the tres defiant heading NEW WAVE, but there are some music bloggity links I just can’t really force into that construct. So below it I have added the MORE MUSICAL MUSIC category.

First up under that heading is Mike Scott’s MySpace blog, which he constantly updates with magical meditations on all sorts of topics, from Bowie lyrics to poetry and politics to Waterboys touring stories, and the whole thing is just as charming and entertaining as the man himself, whom you might recall me mentioning a few times on this blog before.

Partly Dave Show favorites Even in Blackouts were on the blogroll before but I moved them into this category since it seemed like a better home for them.

The above-mentioned Popdose is just an amazingly prolific source of interesting music blogging and Mavis Pickles goodness and I can hardly keep up with the place they crank it out so fast, but I try, I try.

Just below Popdose is Brooklyn Vegan, whom you probably don’t need me to tell you about. Apparently whoever is behind this blog lives in Brooklyn and is vegan, which yay for that, but what you’ll mainly notice is that they’re just all over the contemporary music scene, daddy-o, and I usually learn something when I go there.

In general these categories of mine are pretty flimsy — just a way to break up a long blogroll. Lots of things could easily go into more than one category or other and sometimes the ocelot and the potamus get into a slapfight over whether a given blog more truly belongs in NEWS or POLITICS or CULTURE.

Within those shaky categories things are arranged kind of like my bookshelves at home — I’m just trying clump things together that I might reach for in a similar mood, and the system probably doesn’t make a lot of sense to anyone else — but let’s face it, Ocelopotamus will always be more like one of those musty old labyrinthine used bookstores with the cats and the tottery ladder and the stacks of dire chaos and the grumpy guy up front (remember those? Farewell, 20th century!) than say, a well-run modern library on the Dewey Decimal System.

Lastly, down under the FOOFARAW heading, I’ve added a Google Reader button. During the recent long period of notsomuchblogging, I noticed (via the magic palantir known as Sitemeter) that a lot of the folks who were still showing up here when I did post something were arriving via Google Reader, and though I’d never really gotten my head around the whole RSS thing before, I figured that if it could be used to effectively stalk the wild and capricious Ocelopotamus, then this must be powerful magic indeed.

So I set up a Reader account and have in fact found it very useful for keeping track of unpredictably updated blogs such as my own. Thanks, OcPot readers! And for anyone else who wants to try out this newfangled science, you can now automatically subscribe to the OcPot RSS feed just by clicking that “+ Google” button. I encourage you to make use of it. It will help us stay close, like sisters.

P.S.: Happy birthday to Bite and Smile by Joe Janes, one year old today and a close contemporary of Ocelopotamus (which turned one year old last month).
 

• Tom the Dancing Bug’s Super-Fun-Pak Comix.

… T’Aint no evolution!

• Matt Bors: Let’s ask a multi-millionaire who sounds like a redneck!

… Ya follow?

• Opus: What to take if your nipples shoot sparks.

• Tom Toles: Constructing the angry tea-drinking elitist.

• Dinosaur Comics: literally kind of funny.

• I liked this one the elastic sister linked to a while back.

• And because (almost) everybody cooler than me links to Cat and Girl, Cat and Girl.

BONUS: Not a comic, but it is comical: article on black-footed ferrets gets plagiarized … in a romance novel. (h/t Jorjet.)

And seriously — it’s beyond tragic that this sort of thing even needs to be said, but clearly it does.

Via this diary.

I like the parallel Mr. Schieffer draws here between public displays of religiosity and public displays of patriotism. And I’m thinking, didn’t Jesus say something about people who make big show-offy public displays of how pious they are, versus those who practice their religion sincerely in private?

I don’t exactly have the complete bible memorized, so I looked it up, and here’s the relevant passage. Matthew 6:5-6, King James version:

Jesus’ Teaching on Prayer
Lk. 11.2-4
5 ¶ And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men. Lk. 18.10-14 Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.

Right before that he says pretty much the same thing about the giving of alms:

Jesus’ Teaching on Almsgiving
1 Take heed that ye do not your alms before men, to be seen of them: Mt. 23.5 otherwise ye have no reward of your Father which is in heaven.
2 ¶ Therefore when thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you, They have their reward.
3 But when thou doest alms, let not thy left hand know what thy right hand doeth:
4 that thine alms may be in secret: and thy Father which seeth in secret himself shall reward thee openly.

In other words, showing off about something in public is a reason to question a person’s sincerity about it, rather than a reason to find them credible.

I think Jesus had a pretty good point there. And I think the same principle applies to people who think wearing a show-offy pin on their lapel is the essence of patriotism.

And of course there’s John Prine’s classic take on it:

But your flag decal won’t get you
Into Heaven any more.
They’re already overcrowded
From your dirty little war.
Now Jesus don’t like killin’
No matter what the reason’s for,
And your flag decal won’t get you
Into Heaven any more.

Amen.

Anyway, this enthusiastic review in the Boston Globe suggest it’s gonna be a very good evening indeed, calling it a “fresh, funny, and inventive show”:

But the new stuff was some of the strongest material. The most inspired sketch of the night had Foley confessing to McDonald his suspicions that his imaginary girlfriend was cheating on him. McCulloch’s song tracing his dancing technique from eighth to 11th grade was a wonderful bit of silliness, and a three-sketch arc about a time machine helped tie the night together. The Kids were confident enough in one of their new characters to start the merchandising early - you could buy a beer cozy for “Super Drunk” in the lobby.

Best of all, it was obvious the five Kids still enjoy writing and performing together. Several times during the evening they cracked one another up, flubbing lines or improvising to throw someone off. When Thompson’s headset mike wouldn’t stay on in one scene, it became a running gag - Foley, McKinney, and McDonald imitating Thompson’s attempt to keep his mike close to his mouth with a fingers-on-the-cheek Jack Benny posture.

The 90-minute show moved quickly and ended at the perfect length - and on the perfect note, with McKinney’s Headcrusher dispatching the audience and the troupe. The Kids do have plans to continue working together after this tour ends in June, possibly on a film project. And if they’re still having this much fun, it will certainly be worth watching. It always has been.

Oh, and hooray film project. I’m enough of a die-hard fan to have enjoyed Brain Candy, even though I recognize it wasn’t their finest hour.

But I also think they learned a lot from that experience, and won’t repeat some of the mistakes that hobbled that project creatively. ( “Everyone has to agree on every page of the script” system, I’m looking at you.*) Plus, they’ve got lowered expectations on their side this time! You can’t buy that sort of advantage.
 

——————
* “Having Brendan Fraser in the movie but not having him take off his shirt,” I am also looking at you.