Friday, January 19, 2024

Best Metal Albums 2023

…and Oceans – As in Gardens, So in Tombs
3Teeth – EndEx
Acid King – Beyond Vision
Angra – Cycles of Pain
Anubis Gate – Interference
Ashbringer – We Came Here to Grieve
Asinhell – Impii Hora
Atreyu – The Beautiful Dark of Life
August Burns Red – Death Below
Babymetal – The Other One
Bell Witch – Future's Shadow Part 1: The Clandestine Gate
Blackbraid – Blackbraid II
Blut Aus Nord – Disharmonium – Nahab
Bongzilla – Dab City
Brujeria – Esto Es Brujeria
Cannibal Corpse – Chaos Horrific
Cattle Decapitation – Terrasite
Chelsea Grin – Suffer in Heaven & Suffer In Hell
Cirith Ungol – Dark Parade
Cryptopsy – As Gomorrah Burns
Dethklok – Dethalbum IV & Metalocalypse: Army of the Doomstar
DevilDriver – Dealing with Demons Vol. II
Dopelord – Songs for Satan
Dying Fetus – Make Them Beg for Death
Dying Wish – Symptoms of Survival
Full of Hell & Nothing – When No Birds Sang
Full of Hell & Primitive Man – Suffocating Hallucination
Godflesh – Purge
Gorod – The Orb
Green Lung – This Heathen Lan
Hellripper – Warlocks Grim & Withered Hags
Horrendous – Ontological Mysterium
Immortal – War Against All
Jesus Piece – …So Unknown
King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – PetroDragonic Apocalypse
Metallica – 72 Seasons
Ne Obliviscaris – Exul
Obituary – Dying of Everything
Omega Infinity – The Anticurrent
Ov Sulfur – The Burden ov Faith
Panzerchrist – Last of a Kind
Periphery – Periphery V: Djent Is Not a Genre
Primordial – How It Ends
Profanatica – Crux Simplex
Queens of the Stone Age – In Times New Roman…
Sanguisugabogg – Homicidal Ecstasy
Satan's Fall – Destination Destruction
Signs of the Swarm – Amongst the Low & Empty
Sleep Token – Take Me Back to Eden
Smoulder – Violent Creed of Vengeance
Soen – Memorial
Sortilège – Apocalypso
Spirit Adrift – Ghost at the Gallows
Stoned Jesus – Father Light
Suffocation – Hymns from the Apocrypha
Suicide Silence – Remember… You Must Die
Sunrot – The Unfailing Rope
Svalbard – The Weight of the MaskSylosis – A Sign of Things to Come
Taake – Et Hav Av Avstand
Tesseract – War of Being
The Ocean – Holocene
Thy Art Is Murder – Godlike
Tomb Mold – The Enduring Spirit
Uada – Crepuscule Natura
Unearth – The Wretched; The Ruinous
Veil of Maya – Mother
Vile Ritual – Caverns of Occultic Hatred
VoidCeremony – Threads of Unknowing
Voivod – Morgöth Tales
Vomitory – All Heads Are Gonna Roll
Warmen – Here for None
Wayfarer – American Gothic
Witch Ripper – The Flight After the Fall
Within Temptation – Bleed Out
Wormhole – Almost Human
Wytch Hazel – IV

Wednesday, July 12, 2023

American Psycho

Donald Trump's docket: All the legal cases and investigations Trump faces including federal charges over classified documents
The lawsuits and prosecutions involving Donald Trump are piling up.

The ex-president — who has officially launched his 2024 presidential bid — now is indicted in two separate prosecutions, the first former White House occupant to ever be charged. In New York, he stands charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records. And in Florida, the Justice Department brought 37 counts against him for his handling of classified documents after leaving the White House, making him the first president to face federal criminal charges.

Beyond that, Trump remains the subject of at least three major investigations relating to the election, the insurrection, and his finances.

A state prosecutor in Georgia is weighing if Trump broke laws in attempts to overturn the 2020 election results in that state. The Justice Department is also looking into the 2020 election.

Sunday, February 19, 2023

The Neverending Grift

How dare workers expect more than $7.25 per hour! Don't count on a decent retirement or health care plan from your employer either. Fix poisonous lead pipes? Gonna have to wait. Repair potholes and crumbling bridges? Not this decade. Strengthen Social Security and Medicare? Not a chance! Maybe we should phase them out. 

More money for private, billionaires' sport stadiums? No problem. There's always hundreds of millions in public dollars for private playgrounds and speculation.

Milwaukee's Miller Park (now American Family Field) baseball stadium (for the Milwaukee Brewers) opened in 2001. Total cost to taxpayers was estimated over a billion dollars. Already, twenty years later, the Brewers need nearly $300 million more from taxpayers.

The same old myth is playing out in this greed and grift saga, wrapped in the contrived cloak of economic development and jobs. As the fairy tale goes, sports have a significant economic impact, spurring other developments, and creating jobs. And, as always, there's the threat of leaving. The Brewers may find a new host city if Milwaukee and Wisconsin don't fork over the cash.

Thought experiment: Can a business (sport team) claim to be infinitely successful and astoundingly economically impactful if, every twenty years or so, said entity must bribe and blackmail to be able to afford, supposedly, needed upgrades for their place of work (the sport arena)? 

Or, sadly, is that just how this blackmail song-and-dance shakes out, each and every time, in city after city? [Spoiler - yes, this is how it plays out in city after city, year after year.]

The boondoggles march on.

For Further Reading:
Site Selection Shenanigans

Saturday, January 7, 2023

Another American Revolution Needed

The United States has 13 of the world's top 20 billionaires. 

Let's stop pretending welfare, social programs, minimum wage, retirement plans, etc. are the true American budgetary issues. Living wages, health care, and pension plans are NOT the problem.

It's the fact that we've allowed a privileged few to avoid paying their fair share whilst amassing grotesque fortunes. 

It's time to start taxing these kings and queens and return the United States to a shared prosperity instead of the current plutocracy.

Thursday, December 8, 2022

Best Metal Music of 2022

-(16)- - Into Dust
Abhorrent Expanse - Gateways To Resplendence
Acephalix - Theothanatology
Acid Witch - Rot Among Us
Aenimus - Sacrificial
Aethereus - Leiden
Allegaeon - Damnum
Alunah - Strange Machine
Amon Amarth - The Great Heathen Army
Amorphis - Halo
An Abstract Illusion - Woe
AngelMaker - Sanctum
Animals As Leaders - Parrhesia
The Antichrist Imperium - Volume III: Satan In His Original Glory
Antropofagus - Origin
Artificial Brain - Artificial Brain
Author & Punisher - Krüller
Autophagy - Bacteriophage
Autopsy - Morbidity Triumphant
Baest - Justitia
Bastard Noise / Merzbow - Retribution By All Other Creatures
Bastions - Acres Of Love
Begrime Exemious - Rotting In The Aftermath
Behemoth - Opvs Contra Natvram
Black Lava - Soul Furnace
Bleed From Within - Shrine
Bleeding Through - Rage
Blood Incantation - Timewave Zero
Candlemass - Sweet Evil Sun
Carrion Vael - Abhorrent Obsessions
Castrator - Defiled In Oblivion
Catalyst - A Different Painting For A New World
Cave In - Heavy Pendulum
Clutch - Sunrise On Slaughter Beach
Come To Grief - When The World Dies
Corpsessed - Succumb To Rot
De Profundis - The Corruption Of Virtue
Deathspell Omega - The Long Defeat
Decapitated - Cancer Culture
Devil Master - Ecstasies Of Never Ending Night
Devin Townsend - Lightwork
Doldrum - The Knocking. or the Story of the Sound that Preceded Their Disappearance
Drudkh - All Belong To The Night
Electric Callboy - Tekkno
Full Of Hell - Aurora Leaking From An Open Wound
Gaerea - Mirage
Ghost - Impera
Goatwhore - Angels Hung From The Arches Of Heaven
Hällas - Isle Of Wisdom
Hath - All That Was Promised
HEALTH - Disco 4: Part II
Horndal - Be Evil
Imperial Triumphant - Spirit Of Ecstasy
Ingested - Ashes Lie Still
Inhuman Condition - Fearsick
Jungle Rot - A Call To Arms
Lamentations - Passion Of Depression
Liturgy - As The Blood Of God Bursts The Veins Of Time
Lorna Shore - Pain Remains
Mass Worship - Portal Tombs
Massacre - Mythos
Meshuggah - Immutable
Midnight - Let There Be Witchery
Misery Index - Complete Control
Molder - Engrossed In Decay
The Monolith Deathcult - V4 - Verbittering
Nebula - Transmissions From Mothership Earth
Nekrogoblikon - The Fundamental Slimes and Humours
Oceans Of Slumber - Starlight And Ash
Origin - Chaosmos
The Otolith - Folium Limina
Primitive Man - Insurmountable
Primus - Conspiranoid
Psycroptic - Divine Council
Rammstein - Zeit
Revocation - Netherheaven
Ripped To Shreds - 劇變 (Jubian)
Rolo Tomassi - Where Myth Becomes Memory
Savage Master - Those Who Hunt At Night
Septicflesh - Modern Primitive
Slugcrust - Ecocide
SOEN - Atlantis
Spirit Adrift - 20 Centuries Gone
Stray From The Path - Euthanasia
Sumerlands - Dreamkiller
Sylvaine - Nova
Tómarúm - Ash In Realms Of Stone Icons
Tombs - Ex Oblivion
Trial - Feed The Fire
Tzompantli - Tlazcaltiliztli
Witchery - Nightside
Zeal & Ardor - Zeal & Ardor

Tuesday, November 29, 2022

Thursday, October 27, 2022

How To Solve (Mostly) All Our Problems

 TAX THE RICH!!!


And, by "rich", I mean millionaires. Which, for the U.S., is about 9% of the entire population. This isn't a call for increased taxation on low-income, working families, or the middle-class. It's a call to tax those that have clawed, cheated, and stolen the wealth and productivity gains of the past few decades. No, not all millionaires have clawed, cheated, and stolen. But those who have clawed, cheated and stolen, and who have bought politicians to get legislation and tax laws in their favor, need to be taxed more.

Income has been steadily redistributed upward since the 1980s. Millionaires are reaping more and more of the gains of workers. This is not sustainable. It's time to reverse this. Tax the rich! 

Sunday, September 11, 2022

Turn That Frown Upside Down

An overarching theme for Republicans, regarding the next election cycle, is this idea that things are an economic mess. Times are tough, everyone is struggling. 

Yet, in many metrics, a reasonable, non-partisan observer would most likely conclude that times are, generally, good. 

Unemployment

The current unemployment rate is under 4% (3.7% as of today for the U.S.; 3% for Wisconsin). And, despite an historically low unemployment rate, wages are rising.

Interest Rates

Historically speaking, interest rates are low. In the 1970s, rates were mid-7 percent. The 1980s saw rates rise to mid-9 percent. The 1990s started around 10 percent, and finished around 8 percent. From 2000 through the 2010s, rates fell from 8 percent to 3 percent. The 2020s have seen rates rise from high-3 percent to the current mid-5 percent.

Inflation Rate

The majority of noise in the inflation rate hangs on the energy sector. A better descriptor for this phenomenon is price-gouging. The energy sector doubled gasoline prices and laughed all the way to the bank as Republicans and their accomplices manufactured the price-gouging into a Joe Biden spending (inflation) problem. It's no coincidence that as the energy sector has gouged less (gas prices have come down), inflation has fallen.

Saturday, June 4, 2022

United States: Guns & Gun-Related Deaths

30 years of mass shootings by country: between 1983 to 2013, 119 mass shootings took place around the world—66% were in the U.S.


Mass shootings: US the worst in the world by far


There’s a new global ranking of gun deaths. Here’s where the U.S. stands




America's gun culture - in charts




On gun violence, the United States is an outlier


Spare Me The Bullshit!

Screenshots of Wisdom


Whiskey

Companies Keep Hiring

Nonfarm payrolls increased by 390,000 in May, above the 328,000 Dow Jones estimate.

The unemployment rate held at 3.6%, while a more encompassing jobless rate edged higher to 7.1%.

Average hourly earnings rose slightly less than expected but were still up 5.2% from a year ago.

Leisure and hospitality led gains, followed by professional and business services then warehousing and transportation. [source]

Fox News thinks all of this is bad. The delusion continues. Being contrarian for the sake of being contrarian continues. 

Monday, May 30, 2022

Corporate Profits and Inflation


For Further Reading:
Ignoring the role of profits makes inflation analyses a lot weakerThe future of work depends on stopping Amazon’s union busting

Ron Johnson: International Embarrassment

Fred Guttenberg Corrects Ron Johnson's Idiocy


Holiday Reading

Monarch butterflies bounce back in Mexico wintering groundsWhen I First Saw Elon Musk for Who He Really Is'Big Short' investor Michael Burry compares the market slump to a plane crash — and hints tumbling stocks and home sales remind him of the housing bubble burstingThe Southern Baptist Horror

No Right

Here's What GOP-Nominated Justices Said About Roe v. Wade During Their Senate Hearings
The Most Extreme Abortion Ban In The Country Was Just Signed Into Law In Oklahoma




Spineless, Selfish, Murderous Cowards: Republicans & The NRA

The NRA Convention Begins Today. You Can’t Bring Your Gun.Ted Cruz Stops Interview Rather Than Answer Why America Has So Many Mass ShootingsNationwide Protests Demanding Gun Control Planned By Youth-Led MovementMichael Moore Tells MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, “It’s Time To Repeal The Second Amendment”Why Steve Kerr's comments on Uvalde should stop you in your tracksThe Onion Calls Out Inaction Over Mass Shootings With Classic ResponseLatest Elementary School Massacre Not Enough For GOP To Reconsider Gun ControlGun map: Ownership by state
















Reduce The Number Of Guns


Wednesday, May 4, 2022

Vote Democrat

If you were on the fence, if you were thinking of voting Republican, if you were thinking of not voting at all, here is a glaring example of why the majority of Americans should vote Democrat.

Protests Erupt Nationwide To Support Abortion Rights After SCOTUS Draft Leak
Wisconsin Abortion Rights Could Be Set Back Nearly 200 Years

Republicans only care about power and cronyism. And, this latest Supreme Court leak shows they definitely do not give a shit about women. 

Upcoming Elections:

Fall Primary - Tuesday, August 9

General Election - Tuesday, November 8