Weiner's Fabulous Retirement Perks
Anthony Weiner may be resigning, but he's entitled—for the rest of his life—to a pension, quality health care, and a parking space on Capitol Hill.
Rep. Anthony Weiner may be resigning in shame, but he’ll leave Capitol Hill with the same golden parachute afforded to all members of Congress who leave public service.
Having been in Congress since 1999 and a staffer in the '80s, Weiner will be eligible for a congressional pension of up to $46,224 each year, according to the National Taxpayers Union, which calculates all congressional pensions. He’ll eventually be eligible to collect the balance of his Congressional Thrift Savings Plan, which is currently $216,011. And he’ll be able to keep his high-quality health-care package, at his own expense, until November 2012.
Congressional pensions are considered extremely generous. A member becomes fully vested after five years, and pays only 20 percent of his own benefits (the other 80 percent comes from taxpayers). At 46, Weiner is not yet eligible for his pension, but he’ll be allowed to access a portion when he turns 56, or the full amount if he waits until he’s 62.
Weiner will also be entitled to other perks and privileges even after stepping down. Former members (except those who become lobbyists) are given access to the House floor during regular business or joint sessions, meaning Weiner could attend speeches by the president or foreign heads of state who address joint sessions.
He’ll have the option to buy his office furniture ($1,000 for desks, $500 for chairs) and all of his tech equipment (phones, fax machines, refrigerators).
For life, Weiner will get free parking on the House side of the Capitol (on a space-available basis, the rules say). For 90 days, he’ll be able to send mail for free, so long as it relates to his congressional duties.
Not to mention that for the rest of his life, Weiner will have access, for a small fee, to the congressional gym where he took photos of himself that he sent to women online.
Of course Weiner may also leave a sizable bill for the state of New York—a bill for a special election to choose his replacement. Election costs depend on local variables, like how many polling stations are needed and whether it can piggy-back on the ballot of a previously planned election.
For the rest of his life, Weiner will have access, for a small fee, to the congressional gym where he took photos of himself that he sent to women online.
The New York special election to replace Rep. Chris Lee, the Republican lawmaker who also resigned after sending half-nude photos online, was expected to cost $1 million.
Rep. Eric Massa's 2010 resignation, also in New York, cost taxpayers about $700,000.
Replacing Rep. Jane Harman (who now sits on the board of the Newsweek/Daily Beast Company) was expected to cost California taxpayers $1.5 million for a special election, according to an estimate by the Los Angeles County Registrar.
Friday, June 17, 2011
Epistemology and the End of the World
Epistemology and the End of the World
The Stone is a forum for contemporary philosophers on issues both timely and timeless.
In the coming weeks, The Stone will feature occasional posts by Gary Gutting, a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, that apply critical thinking to information and events that have appeared in the news.
Apart from its entertainment value, Harold Camping’s ill-advised prediction of the rapture last month attracted me as a philosopher for its epistemological interest. Epistemology is the study of knowledge, its nature, scope and limits. Camping claimed to know, with certainty and precision, that on May 21, 2011, a series of huge earthquakes would devastate the Earth and be followed by the taking up (rapture) of the saved into heaven. No sensible person could have thought that he knew this. Knowledge requires justification; that is, some rationally persuasive account of why we know what we claim to know. Camping’s confused efforts at Biblical interpretation provided no justification for his prediction. Even if, by some astonishing fluke, he had turned out to be right, he still would not have known the rapture was coming.
The recent failed prediction of the rapture has done nothing to shake the certainty of believers.
Of particular epistemological interest was the rush of Christians who believe that the rapture will occur but specify no date for it to dissociate themselves from Camping. Quoting Jesus’s saying that “of that day and hour no one knows,” they rightly saw their view as unrefuted by Camping’s failed prediction. What they did not notice is that the reasons for rejecting Camping’s prediction also call into question their claim that the rapture will occur at some unspecified future time.
What was most disturbing about Camping was his claim to be certain that the rapture would occur on May 21. Perhaps he had a subjective feeling of certainty about his prediction, but he had no good reasons to think that this feeling was reliable. Similarly, you may feel certain that you will get the job, but this does not make it (objectively) certain that you will. For that you need reasons that justify your feeling.
There are many Christians who are as subjectively certain as Camping about the rapture, except that they do not specify a date. They have a feeling of total confidence that the rapture will someday occur. But do they, unlike Camping, have good reasons behind their feeling of certainty? Does the fact that they leave the date of the rapture unspecified somehow give them the good reason for their certainty that Camping lacked?
An entirely unspecified date has the advantage of making their prediction immune to refutation. The fact that the rapture hasn’t occurred will never prove that it won’t occur in the future. A sense that they will never be refuted may well increase the subjective certainty of those who believe in the rapture, but this does nothing to provide the good reasons needed for objective certainty. Camping, after the fact, himself moved toward making his prediction unrefutable, saying that May 21 had been an “invisible judgment day,” a spiritual rather than a physical rapture. He kept to his prediction of a final, physical end of the world on October 21, 2011, but no doubt this prediction will also be open to reinterpretation.
Believers in the rapture will likely respond that talk of good reasons and objective certainty assumes a context of empirical (scientific) truth, and ignores the fact that their beliefs are based not on science but on faith. They are certain in their belief that the rapture will occur, even though they don’t know it in the scientific sense.
But Camping too would claim that his certainty that the rapture would occur on May 21, 2011, was a matter of faith. He had no scientific justification for his prediction, so what could have grounded his certainty if not his faith? But the certainty of his faith, we all agree, was merely subjective. Objective certainty about a future event requires good reasons.
Given their faith in the Bible, believers in the rapture do offer what they see as good reasons for their view as opposed to Camping’s. They argue that the Bible clearly predicts a temporally unspecified rapture, whereas Camping’s specific date requires highly questionable numerological reasoning. But many Christians—including many of the best Biblical scholars—do not believe that the Bible predicts a historical rapture. Even those who accept the traditional doctrine of a Second Coming of Christ, preceding the end of the world, often reject the idea of a taking up of the saved into heaven, followed by a period of dreadful tribulations on Earth for those who are left behind. Among believers themselves, a historical rapture is at best a highly controversial interpretation, not an objectively established certainty.
The case against Camping was this: His subjective certainty about the rapture required objectively good reasons to expect its occurrence; he provided no such reasons, so his claim was not worthy of belief. Christians who believe in a temporally unspecified rapture agree with this argument. But the same argument undermines their own belief in the rapture. It’s not just that “no one knows the day and hour” of the rapture. No one knows that it is going to happen at all.
The Stone is a forum for contemporary philosophers on issues both timely and timeless.
In the coming weeks, The Stone will feature occasional posts by Gary Gutting, a professor of philosophy at the University of Notre Dame, that apply critical thinking to information and events that have appeared in the news.
Apart from its entertainment value, Harold Camping’s ill-advised prediction of the rapture last month attracted me as a philosopher for its epistemological interest. Epistemology is the study of knowledge, its nature, scope and limits. Camping claimed to know, with certainty and precision, that on May 21, 2011, a series of huge earthquakes would devastate the Earth and be followed by the taking up (rapture) of the saved into heaven. No sensible person could have thought that he knew this. Knowledge requires justification; that is, some rationally persuasive account of why we know what we claim to know. Camping’s confused efforts at Biblical interpretation provided no justification for his prediction. Even if, by some astonishing fluke, he had turned out to be right, he still would not have known the rapture was coming.
The recent failed prediction of the rapture has done nothing to shake the certainty of believers.
Of particular epistemological interest was the rush of Christians who believe that the rapture will occur but specify no date for it to dissociate themselves from Camping. Quoting Jesus’s saying that “of that day and hour no one knows,” they rightly saw their view as unrefuted by Camping’s failed prediction. What they did not notice is that the reasons for rejecting Camping’s prediction also call into question their claim that the rapture will occur at some unspecified future time.
What was most disturbing about Camping was his claim to be certain that the rapture would occur on May 21. Perhaps he had a subjective feeling of certainty about his prediction, but he had no good reasons to think that this feeling was reliable. Similarly, you may feel certain that you will get the job, but this does not make it (objectively) certain that you will. For that you need reasons that justify your feeling.
There are many Christians who are as subjectively certain as Camping about the rapture, except that they do not specify a date. They have a feeling of total confidence that the rapture will someday occur. But do they, unlike Camping, have good reasons behind their feeling of certainty? Does the fact that they leave the date of the rapture unspecified somehow give them the good reason for their certainty that Camping lacked?
An entirely unspecified date has the advantage of making their prediction immune to refutation. The fact that the rapture hasn’t occurred will never prove that it won’t occur in the future. A sense that they will never be refuted may well increase the subjective certainty of those who believe in the rapture, but this does nothing to provide the good reasons needed for objective certainty. Camping, after the fact, himself moved toward making his prediction unrefutable, saying that May 21 had been an “invisible judgment day,” a spiritual rather than a physical rapture. He kept to his prediction of a final, physical end of the world on October 21, 2011, but no doubt this prediction will also be open to reinterpretation.
Believers in the rapture will likely respond that talk of good reasons and objective certainty assumes a context of empirical (scientific) truth, and ignores the fact that their beliefs are based not on science but on faith. They are certain in their belief that the rapture will occur, even though they don’t know it in the scientific sense.
But Camping too would claim that his certainty that the rapture would occur on May 21, 2011, was a matter of faith. He had no scientific justification for his prediction, so what could have grounded his certainty if not his faith? But the certainty of his faith, we all agree, was merely subjective. Objective certainty about a future event requires good reasons.
Given their faith in the Bible, believers in the rapture do offer what they see as good reasons for their view as opposed to Camping’s. They argue that the Bible clearly predicts a temporally unspecified rapture, whereas Camping’s specific date requires highly questionable numerological reasoning. But many Christians—including many of the best Biblical scholars—do not believe that the Bible predicts a historical rapture. Even those who accept the traditional doctrine of a Second Coming of Christ, preceding the end of the world, often reject the idea of a taking up of the saved into heaven, followed by a period of dreadful tribulations on Earth for those who are left behind. Among believers themselves, a historical rapture is at best a highly controversial interpretation, not an objectively established certainty.
The case against Camping was this: His subjective certainty about the rapture required objectively good reasons to expect its occurrence; he provided no such reasons, so his claim was not worthy of belief. Christians who believe in a temporally unspecified rapture agree with this argument. But the same argument undermines their own belief in the rapture. It’s not just that “no one knows the day and hour” of the rapture. No one knows that it is going to happen at all.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Can You Guess Which City In America Has The Most Sex?
Trojan has just released the results of its annual "sex census," and good news for the people of Los Angeles -- they're having more sex than anyone else in the country, an average of 135 times per year.
But that doesn't necessarily mean the sex is any good. Philadelphians report the highest levels of sexual satisfaction, with 82% of respondents there saying they are sexually fulfilled. Just 75% of Angelenos said the same.
Regionally, the Northeast comes out on top -- people there have sex an average of 130 times per year, compared to folks in the West, where the average is 120, and the South, where the average is just 114.
Northeasterners are also the safest, with 43% saying they use a condom during sex.
The results of the census are based on two surveys conducted by a market research firm. The first was a national survey of 1,000 adults conducted online, and the second was an online survey of around 2,000 adults in 10 major U.S. cities.
But that doesn't necessarily mean the sex is any good. Philadelphians report the highest levels of sexual satisfaction, with 82% of respondents there saying they are sexually fulfilled. Just 75% of Angelenos said the same.
Regionally, the Northeast comes out on top -- people there have sex an average of 130 times per year, compared to folks in the West, where the average is 120, and the South, where the average is just 114.
Northeasterners are also the safest, with 43% saying they use a condom during sex.
The results of the census are based on two surveys conducted by a market research firm. The first was a national survey of 1,000 adults conducted online, and the second was an online survey of around 2,000 adults in 10 major U.S. cities.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
PROOF RIGHT WINGER GOP HAVE NO HUMOR BONE!
A day of awkwardness with Mitt Romney
MANCHESTER, N.H.
Mitt Romney, the leading contender to become President Obama’s Republican opponent next year, had just finished working the room at Blake’s Creamery here when he paused for a photo with the restaurant’s owner, Ann Mirageas, and decided to tell her a joke.
I saw the young man over there with eggs Benedict, with hollandaise sauce,” he said. “And I was going to suggest to you that you serve your eggs with hollandaise sauce in hubcaps. Because there’s no plates like chrome for the hollandaise.”
The proprietor laughed weakly. “Good luck to you,” Mirageas said.
The hubcap joke must have killed in Michigan in the 1950s, when Romney was a boy. What’s odd is that he’s still making such jokes. What’s odder is that a man who makes such jokes is in a position to become president of the United States.
In formal settings — news conferences, or Monday night’s debate — Romney is confident and competent. But in casual moments, such as Tuesday morning’s retail politics in New Hampshire, his weirdness comes through — equal parts “Leave It to Beaver” corniness and social awkwardness.
He greets a man perusing shelves of a hardware store: “Shopping here today?”
He notes the lack of “guy waitresses” at a diner and says of the long skirts worn by the middle-aged wait staff: “Oh, this is the Hooters equivalent.”
He talks about the weak economy with the proprietors of a feed shop, then abruptly pivots: “Okay, so what do you do about mosquito control? . . . This has been a mosquito-infested year with all the moisture. They flew away with my dog.”
At Mary Ann’s, a retro diner in Derry, N.H., the slogan on the owner’s shirt is “A blast from the past” — and the description suits Romney, too. He admires the Texaco “Fire Chief” gas pump and a jukebox (“You guys hear this music? ‘I want a caveman, I want a caveman.’ ”). Posing for a photo with his arms around the waitresses, he suddenly jumps forward, pretending somebody pinched his bottom. “Oh my goodness gracious!” he exclaims, then, “Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.” He later says the gag is “kind of fun to do.”
That Romney can survive an awkward morning like this is another sign of the luck smiling on his second run for the White House. Everything seems to be coming together for him this time, though not because of any brilliant performance.
Conservatives panned his health-care speech. Rush Limbaugh proclaimed “bye-bye, nomination” after Romney said humans contribute to global warming. Yet Romney has wandered into the lead in the GOP race, and polls show he has pulled even with Obama, thanks to the grim economy. Against his Lilliputian 2012 rivals, he is a fundraising and polling giant.
This week is typical: Romney didn’t do much to distinguish himself in Monday’s debate, but he came away a winner because others did less. Then, the next morning, Romney was back to his strained common-man shtick. He wore black Gap jeans (even his pants size, 34 by 34, is perfectly square) and a checked shirt with the sleeves rolled up.
His struggle to make chitchat with the diner patrons pleaded “regular guy” almost as much as his endorsement on the “Today” show of the “Twilight” vampire series. To a man wearing a “Joe Gauci Landscaping” T-shirt: “You do some landscaping work?” To two older women who just came from the gym: “Are your knees, hips doing okay?” To an old married couple: “You know each other?” Romney seemed to be auditing one man: “What’s happened to your financials the last couple of years?”
He departed Blake’s with a final plea for support in the New Hampshire primary, scheduled for Feb. 14. “Get out and vote,” he encouraged the diners. “It’s a while, though, I think. What is it, November? . . . It’s not November. It’s January. It’s February!”
Later, at Derry Feed & Supply, Romney stood next to a display of hermit crabs and attempted regular-guy talk with the proprietors but kept inserting exotic phrases such as “we aimed our barbs, if you will, at the president” and “it’s the agonizing reappraisal.”
And yet, it’s working for Romney. “It’s a lot different from how it was” in ’08, Romney remarked as he strolled down Derry’s main street, trailed by 40 journalists. “Then, it was, ‘Who the heck are you?’ I like this a lot better.”
Except for the mosquitoes flying away with his dog. Oh, my goodness gracious! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
Dana Milbank writes a regular column on politics.
MANCHESTER, N.H.
Mitt Romney, the leading contender to become President Obama’s Republican opponent next year, had just finished working the room at Blake’s Creamery here when he paused for a photo with the restaurant’s owner, Ann Mirageas, and decided to tell her a joke.
I saw the young man over there with eggs Benedict, with hollandaise sauce,” he said. “And I was going to suggest to you that you serve your eggs with hollandaise sauce in hubcaps. Because there’s no plates like chrome for the hollandaise.”
The proprietor laughed weakly. “Good luck to you,” Mirageas said.
The hubcap joke must have killed in Michigan in the 1950s, when Romney was a boy. What’s odd is that he’s still making such jokes. What’s odder is that a man who makes such jokes is in a position to become president of the United States.
In formal settings — news conferences, or Monday night’s debate — Romney is confident and competent. But in casual moments, such as Tuesday morning’s retail politics in New Hampshire, his weirdness comes through — equal parts “Leave It to Beaver” corniness and social awkwardness.
He greets a man perusing shelves of a hardware store: “Shopping here today?”
He notes the lack of “guy waitresses” at a diner and says of the long skirts worn by the middle-aged wait staff: “Oh, this is the Hooters equivalent.”
He talks about the weak economy with the proprietors of a feed shop, then abruptly pivots: “Okay, so what do you do about mosquito control? . . . This has been a mosquito-infested year with all the moisture. They flew away with my dog.”
At Mary Ann’s, a retro diner in Derry, N.H., the slogan on the owner’s shirt is “A blast from the past” — and the description suits Romney, too. He admires the Texaco “Fire Chief” gas pump and a jukebox (“You guys hear this music? ‘I want a caveman, I want a caveman.’ ”). Posing for a photo with his arms around the waitresses, he suddenly jumps forward, pretending somebody pinched his bottom. “Oh my goodness gracious!” he exclaims, then, “Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.” He later says the gag is “kind of fun to do.”
That Romney can survive an awkward morning like this is another sign of the luck smiling on his second run for the White House. Everything seems to be coming together for him this time, though not because of any brilliant performance.
Conservatives panned his health-care speech. Rush Limbaugh proclaimed “bye-bye, nomination” after Romney said humans contribute to global warming. Yet Romney has wandered into the lead in the GOP race, and polls show he has pulled even with Obama, thanks to the grim economy. Against his Lilliputian 2012 rivals, he is a fundraising and polling giant.
This week is typical: Romney didn’t do much to distinguish himself in Monday’s debate, but he came away a winner because others did less. Then, the next morning, Romney was back to his strained common-man shtick. He wore black Gap jeans (even his pants size, 34 by 34, is perfectly square) and a checked shirt with the sleeves rolled up.
His struggle to make chitchat with the diner patrons pleaded “regular guy” almost as much as his endorsement on the “Today” show of the “Twilight” vampire series. To a man wearing a “Joe Gauci Landscaping” T-shirt: “You do some landscaping work?” To two older women who just came from the gym: “Are your knees, hips doing okay?” To an old married couple: “You know each other?” Romney seemed to be auditing one man: “What’s happened to your financials the last couple of years?”
He departed Blake’s with a final plea for support in the New Hampshire primary, scheduled for Feb. 14. “Get out and vote,” he encouraged the diners. “It’s a while, though, I think. What is it, November? . . . It’s not November. It’s January. It’s February!”
Later, at Derry Feed & Supply, Romney stood next to a display of hermit crabs and attempted regular-guy talk with the proprietors but kept inserting exotic phrases such as “we aimed our barbs, if you will, at the president” and “it’s the agonizing reappraisal.”
And yet, it’s working for Romney. “It’s a lot different from how it was” in ’08, Romney remarked as he strolled down Derry’s main street, trailed by 40 journalists. “Then, it was, ‘Who the heck are you?’ I like this a lot better.”
Except for the mosquitoes flying away with his dog. Oh, my goodness gracious! Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha.
Dana Milbank writes a regular column on politics.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
ROCK BANDS - Name Origins - Just in case you didn't need to know!
Bands often have unusual names and here are the origins of some popular bands both past and present.
One thing that you will discover if you look into this area is that RUMORS abound! Listings are alphabetical
ABBA - Abba is "father" in Hebrew but the band claims that to be unintentional - rather it is an acronym for the first names of the band members: Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid (Frida).
AC/DC - 1) It is said that one of the band member saw it on an appliance and thought it had something to do with power. (It does mean "alternating current / direct current".) The band used it not realizing it was also slang for a bisexual- the band claims NOT to be bisexual.
2) In the vogue of other anti-everything bands it stands for Against Christ/Devil's Children.
ALICE IN CHAINS - a funny rumor is that they were named after a lost episode from The Brady Bunch series!
AMBOY DUKES - Ted Nugent's original band - taken from the title of a 1940's book about street gangs by Irving Shulman.
ANTHRAX - A dangerous bacteria that used to infect many cattle in Europe & could be used for terrorism.
ASPHALT BALLET - The name came from a motorcycle accident Julius was in where the motion of the bike rolling over on the asphalt road was termed an "Asphalt Ballet."
AQUA - suggested by a Danish AQUArium poster that was hanging in their recording studio.
BIG BAD VOODOO DADDY - this neo-swing band takes its name from what legendary bluesman Albert King wrote as an autograph for the band's leader, Scotty Morris... "To the big bad voodoo daddy."
B-52's - The beehive hairstyle popular in the 1950's (worn by band members) was called a B-52 after a type of large US Air Force bomber plane with that designation.
BACKSTREET BOYS - The Backstreet Market was a store in Florida where the guys used to hang out.
BAD COMPANY - A 1972 modern cowboy movie starring Jeff Bridges.
BAD ENGLISH - One day the band members were playing pool and thinking about a name for the
band. John Waite went to take a shot and missed. Someone made a comment on how bad his "English" was - English referring to the spin you put on a ball according to where on the ball your stick hits.
BAUHAUS - an artsy name, after a style of graphic design and famous school of architecture.
BEASTIE BOYS - According to Michael Diamond, BEASTIE stands for Boys Entering Anarchistic
Stages Towards Internal Excellence.
THE BEATLES - 1) original member Stuart Sutcliffe came up with THE BEETLES , as a play on Buddy Holly's group THE CRICKETS who they loved. They were using the name THE QUARRYMEN and sometimes THE SILVER BEETLES - later it became THE BEATLES emphasizing the BEAT aspect of music (and poetry?). 2) Lennon lists the influence of the film "The Wild One", which featured a motorcycle gang called the Beetles (unconfirmed). John Lennon is generally credited with combining Beetles and Beat to come up with THE BEATLES spelling. Lennon was also fond of saying he had a vision as a child of a flaming pie in the sky that said "You are Beatles with an "A"
JOHN CAFFERTY and the BEAVER BROWN BAND - did the classic soundtrack to the movie Eddie and the Cruisers. The band from the Cranston Rhode Island area was practicing in one of
the band member's garages when they saw a Dutch Boy paint can that was called Beaver Brown.
THE BEE GEES - the 60's soft-rockers now best known for disco. "Saturday Night Fever" - some say the BG comes from "Brothers Gibb" since they were brothers named Gibb... however an article on the group suggests that they used the names of 2 friends that helped them get started: Bill Goode and a DJ named Bill Gates... I'll go with the first version.
BELLE and SEBASTIAN - was a French T.V. series in the early seventies about a little boy and his dog, a Saint Bernard named Belle. Belle was put to sleep after she injured another child.
THE BLACK CROWES - it was originally named Mr. Crowe's Garden, after a favorite children's book. They sang under that name until they signed with Def American Records in 1989. They renamed themselves at the suggestion of a producer.
BLACK SABBATH - from a 1960's cheap horror movie starring Boris Karloff , suggesting a holy day of witchcraft.
BLACK UHURU - Uhuru is Swahili for freedom, therefore "Black Freedom".
BLIND MELON - slang for an out-of-work hippie (Weren't they all?) - they were called that by Shannon H's dad - also recalls an old blues singer, Blind Lemon - Melon being an anagram for Lemon.
BLINK 182 - Blink 182 supposedly has NO meaning at all but the band fosters stories on origins. Sample: used to be just "Blink" but was threatened by a lawsuit from a little known Irish band with the same name, so they added the 182 which is the number of times the f-word was said in one of the members favorite movies.
THE BLOODHOUND GANG - was a segment on the PBS kid's show 3-2-1 Contact! in the 80's
about 3 kids who were detectives, solving mysteries and fighting crime and such.
BLOTTO - source: http://www.blotto.net/ - "Blotto actually began as the Star Spangled Washboard Band, a bluegrass combo with plenty of country corn. With their live show, " Radar Beans " and tracks like "I Get a Charge Out of You" and the medley "The Battle of New Orleans / Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor," the Washboard Band received enough acclaim to appear twice on the televised Mike Douglas Show. Then the group folded. Four alumni from the Washboard Band continued their musical careers by performing monthly at the Saratoga club "17 Maple Avenue". They later added a bass player, a drummer and a female vocalist, and renamed their band Blotto, after the dog in the 1930's novel Nightlife of the Gods." 2) the word is also slang for being totally drunk.
BLUE CHEER - 60's nickname for high-quality LSD, and coincidentally a brand of laundry detergent (the band used the detergent idea on their album cover with "New, Improved, Blue Cheer" - surprised they didn't get sued for it.
BON JOVI - from the New Jersey bandleader Jon Bon Jovi, whose real name is John Bongiovi, Jr.
BOOKER T. & THE M.G.'S - Booker T. led the band and M.G. stands for Memphis Group not the once-popular car.
DAVID BOWIE - born David Jones, he changed his name to avoid confusion with David (Davy) Jones of THE MONKEES.
BUCK CHERRY - possibly a goof on the often heard speaking disorder wherein the speaker will interchange the first letter{s} in two successive words i.e. "I have just received a Blushing Crow
{crushing blow} Metallica uses such a device in their album entitled "Cunning Stunts." Buck Cherry would then equal Chuck Berry, famous classic rocker.
CHERRY POPPIN' DADDIES - the leader of this modern big band, Steve Perry, says it comes from an old R&B record and that it "sounded sexy."
WENDY / WALTER CARLOS - Walter Carlos was a synthesizer composer who had a big hit with "Switched on Bach", after getting a sex change operation, he became she and goes under the name Wendy. http://www.wendycarlos.com/
CASSANDRA COMPLEX - an allusion to Greek mythology; Cassandra had the gift of prophecy with the curse of no one ever believing her
CHEAP TRICK - they say the band members asked a Ouija Board what they should call themselves.
CHICAGO - Their first album was released as "Chicago Transit Authority", but the city of Chicago sued them because Chicago Transit Authority is the name of Chicago's public transportation department so they shortened it. Don't record companies check these things before they release them?
CHUBBY CHECKER - the host of American Bandstand (once the most popular American music TV show) Dick Clark's wife thought up the name as a take off on singer Fats Domino. Chubby "invented" the dance called "the twist"
CHUMBAWAMBA - In a band member's dream, he didn't know which door to use in a public toilet because the signs said "Chumba" and "Wamba" instead of "Men" and "Women"
COLLECTIVE SOUL - a term used in the popular novel "The Fountainhead", by Ayn Rand.
COLOR ME BADD - Sam Watters said the name was an attempt to remove racial, sexual and musical overtones - "If you want to color us as anything, color us as badd." Originally called TAKE 1 (but another group was using the name), Jon Bon Jovi asked them to open a Bon Jovi / Skid Row concert with "Daddy's Home" sung a capella. Jon said, "You guys think you're pretty bad. Let's see how bad you are in front of 15,000 people."
COUNTING CROWS - Comes from old English nursery rhyme which had to do with predicting the future from the numbers of birds seen. Originally the rhyme was about magpies, but as people came over to America, crows were used instead. From the song "A Murder of One" one of the versions of the rhyme goes "one for sorrow, two for joy, three for girls, four for boys, five for
silver, six for gold, seven for a secret never to be told..." Adam Duritz liked the rhyme...
THE CRANBERRIES - originally called Cranberries Saw Us ( a joke on Cranberries SAUCE) they changed it to the shorter form later.
CREED - This popular Florida band was named after former bassist Brian Marshall's
earlier band Mattox Creed. www.creednet.com
CREEDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL - unconfirmed origin: after Norvel Creedence, a friend of John Fogerty's . His favorite beer was called Clearwater, after a brief absence from the marketplace it was re-introduced by another brewery - hence Creedence Clearwater Revival.
THE CULT - Goth/Rock band 'The Cult' were once known as 'The Sudden Death Cult', then
shortened to 'Death Cult', then finally just 'The Cult'.
DEACON BLUE - took their name from a song of the same name by STEELY DAN.
DEF LEPPARD - Joe Elliot, lead singer, wanted to use the idea provided by the band Led Zeppelin's logo and transformed what he originally had as deaf leopard.
THE DEFTONES - Because when they started out, people thought they were so bad
that they called them tone deaf - transposed to def tones.
DEPECHE MODE - from the name of a fashion magazine, meaning hurry up fashion
DEVO - shortened form of "de-evolution" - the opposite of evolution - expressing the band's opinion on what the planet is going through.
DEXY'S MIDNIGHT RUNNERS - named themselves after the slang term for a pep pill called DEXEDRINE even though the band themselves had a policy of no drink or drugs!
DION AND THE BELMONTS - BELMONTS after a street in their Bronx, New York neighborhood where they would hang out & sing street corner harmonies.
DMX - Dark Man X
DOOBIE BROTHERS - a doobie was 60's slang for a marijuana joint.
THE DOORS - Jim Morrison read poet William Blake who said "if the doors of perception are cleansed, everything would appear to man as it truly is, infinite. "He was also influenced by author Aldous Huxley who referred to the same line when he titled his book on drug experimentation The Doors of Perception. "There are things known and things unknown and in between are the doors" Official Doors web site is at http://www.thedoors.com/
DURAN DURAN - named after a character in the Jane Fonda movie Barbarella.
BOB DYLAN - His real name is Robert Zimmerman - he liked the poet Dylan Thomas.
DYNAMITE HACK- A line in the movie Caddyshack describing marijuana.
THE EAGLES - originally called TEEN KING AND THE EMERGENCIES , they liked the American sound of Eagles and the way it was aligned with THE BYRDS who had a great influence on them.
ELTON JOHN - Real name: Reginald Dwight. Created from two other British musicians: Elton Dean and Long John Baldry.
EMINEM - from his real name Marshall Mathers he took M&M and rewrote it phonetically as Eminem.
EVERCLEAR - Named after the "Everclear" brand of 190 proof grain alcohol used to make dangerous alcoholic drinks.
EURYTHMICS - a method of music instruction from the 1890's that emphasizes physical response to the music..
EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL - from an ad for a British clothing store that would sell you "Everything but the Girl" that you saw in the ad.
EVE 6 - a phrase they heard in an X FILES episode.
FASTBALL - from a porno film the band saw - Mike Zuniga says it was "a typical porno movie but about baseball. It's like a really raunchy Bull Durham."
FOO FIGHTERS - a term used by World War II pilots to describe strange flying fireballs they sometimes saw.
FLEETWOOD MAC - a simple one. They just took the last name of drummer Mick Fleetwood and a form of bassist John McVie's last name.
FAITH NO MORE - named after a race horse they saw listed on a racing form.
FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE - the name of a garden center on Route 46 in Wayne, New Jersey. http://home.earthlink.net/~johncw/fow/html/gen_info.html
GARBAGE - Either lead singer Shirley Manson's father yelled down to the band at one of their basement practice sessions, "Play more quietly - you sound like garbage." or from a friend of Butch Vig (the drummer of Garbage), who said "This stuff sounds like garbage!" check their site at http://www.garbage.com/
GENESIS - The first book in the Bible - their first album's title was "From Genesis to Revelation"
GIN BLOSSOMS - slang for the "blossoms" (burst blood capillaries) on the face particularly the nose from drinking too much alcohol - in the late 1800's gin was a popular cheap alcoholic drink.
GODSMACK - The metal band "Godsmack" was much thought to be named after the Alice in
Chains song of the same name. But according to the band they arrived at the name after one band member made a particularly inappropriate comment and another remarked "God will smack you for that one". Hence forth one would receive a "Godsmack" for bad behavior.
GO BETWEENS - from a film directed by Joseph Losey.
GOO GOO DOLLS - used to be called the Sex Maggots, and when they were told that local newspapers wouldn't print that name, Jonny Rzeznik picked up a magazine from the early 60's with an ad for a doll that cried Goo Goo when you turned it upside down.
GOLDFINGER - after the James Bond movie.
GRAND FUNK RAILROAD - a version of "The Grand Trunk Railroad" ; a Michigan landmark.
THE GRATEFUL DEAD - originally called The Warlocks, Jerry Garcia found out that another band had the same name. Supposedly, he looked in a reference book at random and found a folk tale about a troubled soul who is put to rest by a traveler. The spirit then helps the traveler with his own quest.
GREEN DAY - 1) It may have come from the sci-fi movie Soylent Green when they said "Tuesday is soylent green day." Soylent green was a food produced by a corporation to feed the way overpopulated masses; turns out they were also making it from the masses! 2) Another story is that when they dropped out of school to be musicians, their principal said "It'll be a green day in hell before you make anything of yourselves". 3) Some say that in drug slang - if you smoked pot and goofed off all day, it was a "Green Day."
GUNS 'N' ROSES - originally two bands L.A. GUNNS and HOLLYWOOD ROSES. Hollywood Roses was headed by Axl Rose, Tracii Guns headed the other band which also featured Slash. The two frequented clubs and played there and were friends.
HEAVEN 17 - took their name from a group mentioned in the novel A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess that was made into a popular film by Stanley Kubrick. In a scene in Kubrick's film Alex is browsing in a futuristic record shop and checks out an album by the 'Heavenly 17'.
HOOTIE AND THE BLOWFISH - from the nicknames of two friends of singer/guitarist Darius Rucker - one with owl-like eyes (Hootie), another with the puffy "Blowfish" cheeks.
JANE"S ADDICTION - The band got it's name from a girl (Jane) that Perry Farrell knew back in L.A who was a prostitute and called it her addiction.
JETHRO TULL - popular 70's band that is named after the rather obscure inventor of the farmer's seed drill.
JUDAS PRIEST - originally a mild curse said to avoid saying "Jesus Christ" - also from the Bob Dylan song "The ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest".
KMFDM - KEIN MEHRHEIT FÜR DIE MITLEID, loosely translates as "no sympathy for the majority." Founded by SASCHA KONIETZKO from Germany. When Englishman RAYMOND "PIG" WATTS joined the band he never pronounce the name so he just started calling it by the initials.
KING CRIMSON - from the official website http://www.elephant-talk.com The band's original lyricist, Peter Sinfield, created it as a synonym for Beelzebub, which is derived from the Arabic phrase "B'il Sabab", meaning "the man with an aim." (Another, more common etymology of "Beelzebub" is that it is Hebrew for "Lord of the Flies.") In John Milton's 'Paradise Lost', Beelzebub was Satan's chief lieutenant among the fallen angels. Often seen as a red (crimson) figure, he is King of the underworld.
KING MISSILE - is a popular Japanese comic book character.
KISS - According to Paul Stanley, Kiss just sounded dangerous (kiss of death) and sexy at the same time. Kiss denies the rumors that the name stands for "Kids In Service of Satan" or the saying "Keep It Simple Stupid."
KORN - There are many stories as to how the name originated, however the most believable is that Korn starts with Kern County which is where Jonathan worked as a Coroner. From that came "KoRn". It was then decided that it would be written like a child would write it, hence the K
instead of a C, and the backwards R.
LED ZEPPELIN - Jimmy Page was drinking with Moon and Entwhistle, who were bitching about their band mates Daltrey and Townshend. They joked about the two of them starting a band with Jimmy, and one of them said "Yeah, that will go over like a lead balloon". When Jimmy formed his own band, he remembered this and thought "Lead Zeppelin" would be good, both from that conversation and the heavy/light contradiction similar to the band named IRON BUTTERFLY. They decided to drop the "a" so Americans wouldn't mispronounce it.
LEMONHEADS - a type of candy.
LEVEL 42 - 1) From the supercomputer in the great & hilarious novel The Restaurant at the end of the Universe, (part of the "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" series) computed the meaning of life to be 42 2) Also a possible reference to a sign in the strange film Brazil that says "Level 41".
LIMP BIZKIT - Got the idea from Fred Durst's dog Biscuit who has a limp.
LL COOL J - for "Ladies Love Cool James".
LOVE AND ROCKETS - a popular comic book title.
LOVIN' SPOONFUL - 1) from the lyrics of the old song "Coffee Blues". Possibly a drug reference to the spoon used to heat & melt drugs such as heroin for use. 2) Also that the amount of the sperm ejaculated by the average male is about a spoonful (see also the band 10cc
LOS LOBOS - Spanish for "The Wolves"
LYNYRD SKYNYRD - Named after Leonard Skinner, an annoying gym teacher/coach some of the members had in high school. Leonard is said to have moved on to sell real estate in Jacksonville, Florida.
MARCY PLAYGROUND - frontman John Wozniak would look out the window of his third grade classroom and see that playground and wish he could play there - but he didn't because there were bullies there that would beat him up... must have been traumatic.
MEGADETH - Dave Mustane was inspired by a government pamphlet he saw after leaving METALLICA. A Megadeath is a military term for one million dead (making World War II an 80 Megadeath)
MELVINS - You give someone a melvin by approaching from behind, and yanking up on the waistband of their underwear as hard as you can (also popularized on SEINFELD as a "wedgie" A "Melvin" was also a nerd synonym.
METALLICA - Lars Ulrich was helping a friend think of a name for a metal fanzine. The choices were Metal Mania and Metallica. Metal Mania was chosen for the magazine & he used Metallica for his band.
THE MIGHTY MIGHTY BOSSTONES - This ska/punk band from Boston originally called themselves the BOSSTONES in tribute to their hometown. An ad for one of their gigs called them "The Mighty Mighty Bosstones" and it stuck.
MIND BENDERS - This 60's band that appeared as themselves in the film "To Sir, With Love" was named after a 1962 British horror movie.
MISFITS - A 1961 movie starring Clarke Gable and Marilyn Monroe.
MONSTER MAGNET - 1) Dave Wyndorf, lead man in Monster Magnet, collects sci-fi/Horror collectibles, one is a model called "The Monster Magnet" 2) The Mothers of Invention's first LP Freak Out has that title as its first track.
MOTHERS OF INVENTION - Frank Zappa's highly experimental band was originally just called the Mothers, their record label asked them to change it (because it could be taken as an obscenity) and out of necessity they added "of Invention" since "Necessity is the mother of invention."
MÖTLEY CRÜE - A friend said "What a Motley looking Crew" - motley meaning "of great variety" and once describing the appearance of a court jester. The re-spelling was their own invention using the umlauts (those funny dots over letters) came to them while they were partying & drinking Lowenbrau beer.
MOTORHEAD - British slang for a drug user who uses a lot of speed
NIRVANA - In Buddhism it means the state of perfect blessedness attained through the annihilation of the self.
'NSYNC- Justin's mother came up with the name. N is the last letter in Justin, S is the last letter in Chris, Y is the last letter in Joey. N is actually from James Lance Bass because Chris gave him the nickname 'Lansten'. Since Lance doesn't end with a N, they used his nick name,
Lansten. C is from J.C. That's how they came up with 'NSYNC. (info from T.J. Gernon, Illinois & Andrea in San Diego) The whole thing is, of course, a play on In Sync - a term which comes from the movie industry - meaning when the picture & soundtrack are properly aligned or synchronized.
NO DOUBT - a favorite phrase of John Spence, it became the name of the band prior to his suicide.
NOBODY'S ANGELS - inspired by the U.S, TV series and later film Charlie's Angels.
OASIS - local British origins: a Manchester cab company, a chain of women's clothing stores, a local Indian restaurant and more likely a local club that The Beatles played in during their early years (the band are avowed Beatles fans)
OUR LADY PEACE - The band took their unusual name from a 1943 poem by American poet Mark Van Doren. link to information
PANTERA - Spanish for Panther and also a pretty cool car.
PEARL JAM - 1) Eddie's grandma supposedly made a peyote (hallucinogenic drug) jelly/jam , which as kids they called pearl jam. 2) I've heard a couple of times that "Pearl Jam" comes from NBA player Mookie Blaylock -- it's his nickname. Band members Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament
were huge fans of Blaylock, loved his peculiar name and wished to just call their band "Mookie Blaylock" but Blaylock protested, so they used his nickname "Pearl Jam" instead.
PHISH - A play on drummer John Fishman's last name... altered spelling as in THE BEATLES.
PINK FLOYD - taken from the names of two Georgia bluesmen Pink Anderson and Floyd Council - from the early days when the band saw itself as a blues band.
PORNO FOR PYROS - 1) Perry Farrell was reading a fireworks catalog on tour when a friend said the magazine looked like "porno for a pyro(maniac)" - a pyromaniac being one who loves fire. 2) Perry Farrel was up one night late watching the TV coverage of the LA riots and the fires and
couldn't take his eyes off the screen. He said it was like "porno for pyros".
PORTISHEAD - The name of their home town in England.
PROCOL HARUM - terrific art rock band was named by lyricist Keith Reid - a term he thought to be Arabic for "beyond that which is" - also the name of his cat.
QUICKSILVER MESSENGER SERVICE - Some of the band members were into astrology,
and noted that one or more of them were born under the House of Mercury. As Mercury
is the name for both the messenger of the gods and the liquid metal, the latter of which is also called quicksilver, Quicksilver Messenger Service was born.
RADIOHEAD - Named after a Talking Heads' song called "Radio Head."
RAMONES - Paul McCartney used to call himself Paul Ramone. The Ramones all use the last name Ramone even though it's not their given name.
REO SPEEDWAGON - the name of a fire engine made by Oldsmobile in the 1930's. "R.E.O." was the initials of Ransom Elliot Olds, the founder of the Oldsmobile Car Company.
THE REPLACEMENTS - Legend has it that they were given a gig after another band failed to show - when asked who they were they replied "We're the Replacements".
R.E.M. - in the study of dreams, the abbreviation refers to rapid eye movement or that time during sleep when an observable movement of the eyeball occurs indicating that the person is in a dream state. Band member Michael Stipe has said that this is not why the band picked the name.
THE RIGHEOUS BROTHERS - The Righteous Brothers supposedly changed their name when a fan at one of their appearances yelled "That's righteous, brothers." I don't know what they called themselves before. Righteous being a late 1950's slang for great, cool etc.
THE ROLLING STONES - from the Howlin' Wolf blues song "Rolling Stone" - Keith Richards was a fan of the version recorded by Muddy Waters.
SAMHAIN - The Celtic New Year, which has evolved into Halloween - the spirit of Halloween sometimes Americanized to Sam Haines.
SAVAGE GARDEN - a phrase from an Anne Rice novel "Interview With The Vampire"
SAVE FERRIS - a sign you'll see if you watch the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
SEPULTURA - the Brazilian death metal band Sepultura name is the Portugese/Spanish word for a grave or burial tomb.
SEVEN MARY THREE - a police radio code for 7M3, it was also one of the motorcycle cops radio name on the old TV show C.H.I.P.S. (California Highway Patrol ) mid-70's.
SILVERCHAIR - 1) The Silver Chair is one of the titles in C.S. Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia" in which Prince Rilian of Narnia is held captive under the spell of the witch who killed his mother.
During brief moments of returning sanity he is restrained in a silver chair. He is rescued when two children magically transported from earth, and a dour resident of Narnia find him and destroy the chair thereby lifting the curse. 2) A combination of "Sliver" by Nirvana and "Berlin Chair" by You Am I. They were requesting the songs from a radio station and the name was inspired by notes a band member made to himself to remember the song titles while he was calling the station. * Original name of band: Innocent Criminals.
SIMPLE MINDS - taken from a line in the David Bowie song "Jean Genie".
SISTERS OF MERCY - A tribute to the Leonard Cohen song of same name; also an order of nuns.
SKID ROW - Slang for a rundown inner city neighborhoods where alcoholics, junkies, street people can afford to live.
THE SMITHEREENS - Inspired by the cartoon character Yosemite Sam's classic line, "I'll blow you varmints to smithereens".
SOFT MACHINE - The name of a William Burroughs novel.
SOUNDGARDEN - A garden of kinetic sculptures that makes music when wind blows through them... a sculpture in Seattle called "Sound Garden".
SPEEDBALL - A deadly drug cocktail mix of heroin and cocaine.
SQUIRREL NUT ZIPPERS - an oddly titled type of candy.
SMASH MOUTH - football players use this slang term in any game with a lot of blocking or tackling.
STEELY DAN - taken from William Burrough's book Naked Lunch. In it Steely Dan is the nickname given to a giant steam-powered dildo (see cover photo on their first album)
STEPPENWOLF - in the words of band leader John Kay "Steppenwolf was originally a book written by Herman Hesse, (a German author) and it was a book I was totally unfamiliar with when the band that became Steppenwolf was in its infancy. The young man who lived next door to where Steppenwolf started to rehearse (by the name of Gabriel Mekler, born and raised in Israel) he had read the book. When it came time to put a name on the demo box that was going to go to the first label, he said "Well, what is the band called?" and aside from the obvious joke names and other obscene suggestions which were not marketable, he finally said, "Well look, how about Steppenwolf'? I think it's a word that looks good in print, and it denotes a certain degree of mystery and power and you guys are kind of rough and ready types." Everybody said that sounds pretty interesting and if we don't get a deal we can always scrawl another name on the box and send it to somebody else, so let's go with that for now. Well, that's what it's been now for many years and, to be honest, it's been a very good name." source John Kay & Steppenwolf
STYX - named after the river of death found in Greek mythology and in Dante's Inferno.
10,000 MANIACS - extension of an old horror movie called "2000 Maniacs".
10 CC - the average amount of ejaculate from a healthy male.
TALKING HEADS - probably from the video jargon for a camera shot showing only the head & shoulders of a person. Newscasters are usually shown this way and it makes for boring TV. Another story says they were inspired by a military experiment involving talking mannequin heads.
TESLA - from the largely unknown but important inventor Nikola Tesla who did important research in alternating current, radio, fluorescent lights, X-rays, microwaves...
THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS - named after the cult film favorite starring George C. Scott about "loonies." The film is also referencing Don Quixote, by Miguel Cervantes. In the book, the title character says "they might be giants" when referring to the windmills he attempts to fight.
THIRD EYE BLIND - Our third eye is the imagined one that gives us a kind of sixth sense (telepathy, ESP, etc.) and the band felt that most of us are blind in that sense. There is also a symbolic third eye (all knowing eye) that appears on the back of a U.S. dollar bill.
THOMSON TWINS - two characters in the Tintin comics by the late Belgium artist Herge.
THREE DOG NIGHT - Inspired by an Australian Aboriginal custom of sleeping with a dog for warmth on a cold night - a three dog night would be very cold, plus the band had 3 lead singers.
TLC - nicknames of band members: Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez and Rozonda is "Chilli" Actually Crystal was going to be the C of TLC, but when they auditioned for Laface, an exec didn't like Crystal's voice, so they replaced her with "Chilli". TLC was going to originally stand for Tionne, Left Eye and Crystal. The idea of "Tender Loving Care" must have worked for them too.
TOAD THE WET SPROCKET - A skit from Monty Python's Flying Circus which is about a weird rock band.
311 - "One of P-Nut's friends (Jim Watson) was arrested, cuffed (naked) and taken home to his parents. He was issued a citation for a code 311 (indecent exposure). We thought this was funny, so we took it as our band name. After the humor of the name wore off - we still kept it because we liked that it was just abstract and that it did not define us in anyway. The name did not describe our sound or our politics, it just let the music speak for itself. Since most interviewers always ask us "What does 311 mean?", we have come up with lots of different answers over the years. Some include.... Nick - "five friends making music", Tim - "a number dictated to me by a higher intelligence", P-Nut - "knowing a little numerology and studying a little magic, which I do; in some factions, three is man and 11 is magic. So 311 is like male magic." from their official site http://www.311music.com
T PAU - after a high priestess from the planet VULCAN in the American TV series STAR TREK
U2 - Three possibilities: 1) A type of spy plane used by the United States in the 1960's - made famous when Gary Powers' U2 plane was shot down over Russia and he was taken as a
prisoner during the Cold War. 2) U2 as in "you too" referring to the audience and its role in the musical experience 3) a U2 is an unemployment form in Ireland (see UB40)
UB40 - Code number of a form people in Britain have to fill out to receive public assistance or welfare. Known in the UK as a signing-off form when you get a job. Hence the title of their first album Signing Off.
ULTRAVOX - Latin for "the greatest amount of voice"
URGE OVERKILL - The name of a Parliaments' funk song.
VAN HALEN - after Alex and Eddie Van Halen - suggested by David Lee Roth as being better than their original name "Mammoth." They might have been called 'Daddy Longlegs' if Gene Simmons of KISS had gotten his way - he partially financed and produced one of their original demo records and suggested names and artwork.
VERUCA SALT - from a female character in the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ( AKA Willy Wonka) played by Julie Dawn Cole (who is not in the band)
THE VELVET UNDERGROUND - 60's experimental band associated with pop artist Andy Warhol, they took their name from a paperback book they found on the street - the book was about sex in America.
WEEZER - Band member Rivers Cuomo had the nickname Weezer in school because of a breathing problem.
WHITE SNAKE - from a white albino ball python snake owned by David Coverdale while in DEEP PURPLE.
WHITE ZOMBIE - An old horror "B" movie.
WINGS - Paul McCartney's band - 1) in the Paul/Beatles song "Blackbird" you'll hear "Take these broken wings and learn to fly" which is what he did in his next album - a solo effort. 2) When Linda McCartney was giving birth to their daughter Stella, Paul was pacing around hoping everything was going well and he was praying and started thinking of angels and wings. Wings just stuck in his mind.
YO LA TENGO -translates to "I have it" from Spanish - said to be the phrase called out by Hispanic baseball players when fielding a pop fly ball. Singer/guitar player Ira Kaplan got the expression from a book he was reading about baseball called The Five Seasons.
ZZ TOP - taken from the name of a Texas Blues man ZZ Hill. Though a rumor is that they got their name by combining Zig Zag and Top, two well known brands of "cigarette" rolling papers.
One thing that you will discover if you look into this area is that RUMORS abound! Listings are alphabetical
ABBA - Abba is "father" in Hebrew but the band claims that to be unintentional - rather it is an acronym for the first names of the band members: Agnetha, Björn, Benny and Anni-Frid (Frida).
AC/DC - 1) It is said that one of the band member saw it on an appliance and thought it had something to do with power. (It does mean "alternating current / direct current".) The band used it not realizing it was also slang for a bisexual- the band claims NOT to be bisexual.
2) In the vogue of other anti-everything bands it stands for Against Christ/Devil's Children.
ALICE IN CHAINS - a funny rumor is that they were named after a lost episode from The Brady Bunch series!
AMBOY DUKES - Ted Nugent's original band - taken from the title of a 1940's book about street gangs by Irving Shulman.
ANTHRAX - A dangerous bacteria that used to infect many cattle in Europe & could be used for terrorism.
ASPHALT BALLET - The name came from a motorcycle accident Julius was in where the motion of the bike rolling over on the asphalt road was termed an "Asphalt Ballet."
AQUA - suggested by a Danish AQUArium poster that was hanging in their recording studio.
BIG BAD VOODOO DADDY - this neo-swing band takes its name from what legendary bluesman Albert King wrote as an autograph for the band's leader, Scotty Morris... "To the big bad voodoo daddy."
B-52's - The beehive hairstyle popular in the 1950's (worn by band members) was called a B-52 after a type of large US Air Force bomber plane with that designation.
BACKSTREET BOYS - The Backstreet Market was a store in Florida where the guys used to hang out.
BAD COMPANY - A 1972 modern cowboy movie starring Jeff Bridges.
BAD ENGLISH - One day the band members were playing pool and thinking about a name for the
band. John Waite went to take a shot and missed. Someone made a comment on how bad his "English" was - English referring to the spin you put on a ball according to where on the ball your stick hits.
BAUHAUS - an artsy name, after a style of graphic design and famous school of architecture.
BEASTIE BOYS - According to Michael Diamond, BEASTIE stands for Boys Entering Anarchistic
Stages Towards Internal Excellence.
THE BEATLES - 1) original member Stuart Sutcliffe came up with THE BEETLES , as a play on Buddy Holly's group THE CRICKETS who they loved. They were using the name THE QUARRYMEN and sometimes THE SILVER BEETLES - later it became THE BEATLES emphasizing the BEAT aspect of music (and poetry?). 2) Lennon lists the influence of the film "The Wild One", which featured a motorcycle gang called the Beetles (unconfirmed). John Lennon is generally credited with combining Beetles and Beat to come up with THE BEATLES spelling. Lennon was also fond of saying he had a vision as a child of a flaming pie in the sky that said "You are Beatles with an "A"
JOHN CAFFERTY and the BEAVER BROWN BAND - did the classic soundtrack to the movie Eddie and the Cruisers. The band from the Cranston Rhode Island area was practicing in one of
the band member's garages when they saw a Dutch Boy paint can that was called Beaver Brown.
THE BEE GEES - the 60's soft-rockers now best known for disco. "Saturday Night Fever" - some say the BG comes from "Brothers Gibb" since they were brothers named Gibb... however an article on the group suggests that they used the names of 2 friends that helped them get started: Bill Goode and a DJ named Bill Gates... I'll go with the first version.
BELLE and SEBASTIAN - was a French T.V. series in the early seventies about a little boy and his dog, a Saint Bernard named Belle. Belle was put to sleep after she injured another child.
THE BLACK CROWES - it was originally named Mr. Crowe's Garden, after a favorite children's book. They sang under that name until they signed with Def American Records in 1989. They renamed themselves at the suggestion of a producer.
BLACK SABBATH - from a 1960's cheap horror movie starring Boris Karloff , suggesting a holy day of witchcraft.
BLACK UHURU - Uhuru is Swahili for freedom, therefore "Black Freedom".
BLIND MELON - slang for an out-of-work hippie (Weren't they all?) - they were called that by Shannon H's dad - also recalls an old blues singer, Blind Lemon - Melon being an anagram for Lemon.
BLINK 182 - Blink 182 supposedly has NO meaning at all but the band fosters stories on origins. Sample: used to be just "Blink" but was threatened by a lawsuit from a little known Irish band with the same name, so they added the 182 which is the number of times the f-word was said in one of the members favorite movies.
THE BLOODHOUND GANG - was a segment on the PBS kid's show 3-2-1 Contact! in the 80's
about 3 kids who were detectives, solving mysteries and fighting crime and such.
BLOTTO - source: http://www.blotto.net/ - "Blotto actually began as the Star Spangled Washboard Band, a bluegrass combo with plenty of country corn. With their live show, " Radar Beans " and tracks like "I Get a Charge Out of You" and the medley "The Battle of New Orleans / Does Your Chewing Gum Lose Its Flavor," the Washboard Band received enough acclaim to appear twice on the televised Mike Douglas Show. Then the group folded. Four alumni from the Washboard Band continued their musical careers by performing monthly at the Saratoga club "17 Maple Avenue". They later added a bass player, a drummer and a female vocalist, and renamed their band Blotto, after the dog in the 1930's novel Nightlife of the Gods." 2) the word is also slang for being totally drunk.
BLUE CHEER - 60's nickname for high-quality LSD, and coincidentally a brand of laundry detergent (the band used the detergent idea on their album cover with "New, Improved, Blue Cheer" - surprised they didn't get sued for it.
BON JOVI - from the New Jersey bandleader Jon Bon Jovi, whose real name is John Bongiovi, Jr.
BOOKER T. & THE M.G.'S - Booker T. led the band and M.G. stands for Memphis Group not the once-popular car.
DAVID BOWIE - born David Jones, he changed his name to avoid confusion with David (Davy) Jones of THE MONKEES.
BUCK CHERRY - possibly a goof on the often heard speaking disorder wherein the speaker will interchange the first letter{s} in two successive words i.e. "I have just received a Blushing Crow
{crushing blow} Metallica uses such a device in their album entitled "Cunning Stunts." Buck Cherry would then equal Chuck Berry, famous classic rocker.
CHERRY POPPIN' DADDIES - the leader of this modern big band, Steve Perry, says it comes from an old R&B record and that it "sounded sexy."
WENDY / WALTER CARLOS - Walter Carlos was a synthesizer composer who had a big hit with "Switched on Bach", after getting a sex change operation, he became she and goes under the name Wendy. http://www.wendycarlos.com/
CASSANDRA COMPLEX - an allusion to Greek mythology; Cassandra had the gift of prophecy with the curse of no one ever believing her
CHEAP TRICK - they say the band members asked a Ouija Board what they should call themselves.
CHICAGO - Their first album was released as "Chicago Transit Authority", but the city of Chicago sued them because Chicago Transit Authority is the name of Chicago's public transportation department so they shortened it. Don't record companies check these things before they release them?
CHUBBY CHECKER - the host of American Bandstand (once the most popular American music TV show) Dick Clark's wife thought up the name as a take off on singer Fats Domino. Chubby "invented" the dance called "the twist"
CHUMBAWAMBA - In a band member's dream, he didn't know which door to use in a public toilet because the signs said "Chumba" and "Wamba" instead of "Men" and "Women"
COLLECTIVE SOUL - a term used in the popular novel "The Fountainhead", by Ayn Rand.
COLOR ME BADD - Sam Watters said the name was an attempt to remove racial, sexual and musical overtones - "If you want to color us as anything, color us as badd." Originally called TAKE 1 (but another group was using the name), Jon Bon Jovi asked them to open a Bon Jovi / Skid Row concert with "Daddy's Home" sung a capella. Jon said, "You guys think you're pretty bad. Let's see how bad you are in front of 15,000 people."
COUNTING CROWS - Comes from old English nursery rhyme which had to do with predicting the future from the numbers of birds seen. Originally the rhyme was about magpies, but as people came over to America, crows were used instead. From the song "A Murder of One" one of the versions of the rhyme goes "one for sorrow, two for joy, three for girls, four for boys, five for
silver, six for gold, seven for a secret never to be told..." Adam Duritz liked the rhyme...
THE CRANBERRIES - originally called Cranberries Saw Us ( a joke on Cranberries SAUCE) they changed it to the shorter form later.
CREED - This popular Florida band was named after former bassist Brian Marshall's
earlier band Mattox Creed. www.creednet.com
CREEDENCE CLEARWATER REVIVAL - unconfirmed origin: after Norvel Creedence, a friend of John Fogerty's . His favorite beer was called Clearwater, after a brief absence from the marketplace it was re-introduced by another brewery - hence Creedence Clearwater Revival.
THE CULT - Goth/Rock band 'The Cult' were once known as 'The Sudden Death Cult', then
shortened to 'Death Cult', then finally just 'The Cult'.
DEACON BLUE - took their name from a song of the same name by STEELY DAN.
DEF LEPPARD - Joe Elliot, lead singer, wanted to use the idea provided by the band Led Zeppelin's logo and transformed what he originally had as deaf leopard.
THE DEFTONES - Because when they started out, people thought they were so bad
that they called them tone deaf - transposed to def tones.
DEPECHE MODE - from the name of a fashion magazine, meaning hurry up fashion
DEVO - shortened form of "de-evolution" - the opposite of evolution - expressing the band's opinion on what the planet is going through.
DEXY'S MIDNIGHT RUNNERS - named themselves after the slang term for a pep pill called DEXEDRINE even though the band themselves had a policy of no drink or drugs!
DION AND THE BELMONTS - BELMONTS after a street in their Bronx, New York neighborhood where they would hang out & sing street corner harmonies.
DMX - Dark Man X
DOOBIE BROTHERS - a doobie was 60's slang for a marijuana joint.
THE DOORS - Jim Morrison read poet William Blake who said "if the doors of perception are cleansed, everything would appear to man as it truly is, infinite. "He was also influenced by author Aldous Huxley who referred to the same line when he titled his book on drug experimentation The Doors of Perception. "There are things known and things unknown and in between are the doors" Official Doors web site is at http://www.thedoors.com/
DURAN DURAN - named after a character in the Jane Fonda movie Barbarella.
BOB DYLAN - His real name is Robert Zimmerman - he liked the poet Dylan Thomas.
DYNAMITE HACK- A line in the movie Caddyshack describing marijuana.
THE EAGLES - originally called TEEN KING AND THE EMERGENCIES , they liked the American sound of Eagles and the way it was aligned with THE BYRDS who had a great influence on them.
ELTON JOHN - Real name: Reginald Dwight. Created from two other British musicians: Elton Dean and Long John Baldry.
EMINEM - from his real name Marshall Mathers he took M&M and rewrote it phonetically as Eminem.
EVERCLEAR - Named after the "Everclear" brand of 190 proof grain alcohol used to make dangerous alcoholic drinks.
EURYTHMICS - a method of music instruction from the 1890's that emphasizes physical response to the music..
EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL - from an ad for a British clothing store that would sell you "Everything but the Girl" that you saw in the ad.
EVE 6 - a phrase they heard in an X FILES episode.
FASTBALL - from a porno film the band saw - Mike Zuniga says it was "a typical porno movie but about baseball. It's like a really raunchy Bull Durham."
FOO FIGHTERS - a term used by World War II pilots to describe strange flying fireballs they sometimes saw.
FLEETWOOD MAC - a simple one. They just took the last name of drummer Mick Fleetwood and a form of bassist John McVie's last name.
FAITH NO MORE - named after a race horse they saw listed on a racing form.
FOUNTAINS OF WAYNE - the name of a garden center on Route 46 in Wayne, New Jersey. http://home.earthlink.net/~johncw/fow/html/gen_info.html
GARBAGE - Either lead singer Shirley Manson's father yelled down to the band at one of their basement practice sessions, "Play more quietly - you sound like garbage." or from a friend of Butch Vig (the drummer of Garbage), who said "This stuff sounds like garbage!" check their site at http://www.garbage.com/
GENESIS - The first book in the Bible - their first album's title was "From Genesis to Revelation"
GIN BLOSSOMS - slang for the "blossoms" (burst blood capillaries) on the face particularly the nose from drinking too much alcohol - in the late 1800's gin was a popular cheap alcoholic drink.
GODSMACK - The metal band "Godsmack" was much thought to be named after the Alice in
Chains song of the same name. But according to the band they arrived at the name after one band member made a particularly inappropriate comment and another remarked "God will smack you for that one". Hence forth one would receive a "Godsmack" for bad behavior.
GO BETWEENS - from a film directed by Joseph Losey.
GOO GOO DOLLS - used to be called the Sex Maggots, and when they were told that local newspapers wouldn't print that name, Jonny Rzeznik picked up a magazine from the early 60's with an ad for a doll that cried Goo Goo when you turned it upside down.
GOLDFINGER - after the James Bond movie.
GRAND FUNK RAILROAD - a version of "The Grand Trunk Railroad" ; a Michigan landmark.
THE GRATEFUL DEAD - originally called The Warlocks, Jerry Garcia found out that another band had the same name. Supposedly, he looked in a reference book at random and found a folk tale about a troubled soul who is put to rest by a traveler. The spirit then helps the traveler with his own quest.
GREEN DAY - 1) It may have come from the sci-fi movie Soylent Green when they said "Tuesday is soylent green day." Soylent green was a food produced by a corporation to feed the way overpopulated masses; turns out they were also making it from the masses! 2) Another story is that when they dropped out of school to be musicians, their principal said "It'll be a green day in hell before you make anything of yourselves". 3) Some say that in drug slang - if you smoked pot and goofed off all day, it was a "Green Day."
GUNS 'N' ROSES - originally two bands L.A. GUNNS and HOLLYWOOD ROSES. Hollywood Roses was headed by Axl Rose, Tracii Guns headed the other band which also featured Slash. The two frequented clubs and played there and were friends.
HEAVEN 17 - took their name from a group mentioned in the novel A CLOCKWORK ORANGE by Anthony Burgess that was made into a popular film by Stanley Kubrick. In a scene in Kubrick's film Alex is browsing in a futuristic record shop and checks out an album by the 'Heavenly 17'.
HOOTIE AND THE BLOWFISH - from the nicknames of two friends of singer/guitarist Darius Rucker - one with owl-like eyes (Hootie), another with the puffy "Blowfish" cheeks.
JANE"S ADDICTION - The band got it's name from a girl (Jane) that Perry Farrell knew back in L.A who was a prostitute and called it her addiction.
JETHRO TULL - popular 70's band that is named after the rather obscure inventor of the farmer's seed drill.
JUDAS PRIEST - originally a mild curse said to avoid saying "Jesus Christ" - also from the Bob Dylan song "The ballad of Frankie Lee and Judas Priest".
KMFDM - KEIN MEHRHEIT FÜR DIE MITLEID, loosely translates as "no sympathy for the majority." Founded by SASCHA KONIETZKO from Germany. When Englishman RAYMOND "PIG" WATTS joined the band he never pronounce the name so he just started calling it by the initials.
KING CRIMSON - from the official website http://www.elephant-talk.com The band's original lyricist, Peter Sinfield, created it as a synonym for Beelzebub, which is derived from the Arabic phrase "B'il Sabab", meaning "the man with an aim." (Another, more common etymology of "Beelzebub" is that it is Hebrew for "Lord of the Flies.") In John Milton's 'Paradise Lost', Beelzebub was Satan's chief lieutenant among the fallen angels. Often seen as a red (crimson) figure, he is King of the underworld.
KING MISSILE - is a popular Japanese comic book character.
KISS - According to Paul Stanley, Kiss just sounded dangerous (kiss of death) and sexy at the same time. Kiss denies the rumors that the name stands for "Kids In Service of Satan" or the saying "Keep It Simple Stupid."
KORN - There are many stories as to how the name originated, however the most believable is that Korn starts with Kern County which is where Jonathan worked as a Coroner. From that came "KoRn". It was then decided that it would be written like a child would write it, hence the K
instead of a C, and the backwards R.
LED ZEPPELIN - Jimmy Page was drinking with Moon and Entwhistle, who were bitching about their band mates Daltrey and Townshend. They joked about the two of them starting a band with Jimmy, and one of them said "Yeah, that will go over like a lead balloon". When Jimmy formed his own band, he remembered this and thought "Lead Zeppelin" would be good, both from that conversation and the heavy/light contradiction similar to the band named IRON BUTTERFLY. They decided to drop the "a" so Americans wouldn't mispronounce it.
LEMONHEADS - a type of candy.
LEVEL 42 - 1) From the supercomputer in the great & hilarious novel The Restaurant at the end of the Universe, (part of the "The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy" series) computed the meaning of life to be 42 2) Also a possible reference to a sign in the strange film Brazil that says "Level 41".
LIMP BIZKIT - Got the idea from Fred Durst's dog Biscuit who has a limp.
LL COOL J - for "Ladies Love Cool James".
LOVE AND ROCKETS - a popular comic book title.
LOVIN' SPOONFUL - 1) from the lyrics of the old song "Coffee Blues". Possibly a drug reference to the spoon used to heat & melt drugs such as heroin for use. 2) Also that the amount of the sperm ejaculated by the average male is about a spoonful (see also the band 10cc
LOS LOBOS - Spanish for "The Wolves"
LYNYRD SKYNYRD - Named after Leonard Skinner, an annoying gym teacher/coach some of the members had in high school. Leonard is said to have moved on to sell real estate in Jacksonville, Florida.
MARCY PLAYGROUND - frontman John Wozniak would look out the window of his third grade classroom and see that playground and wish he could play there - but he didn't because there were bullies there that would beat him up... must have been traumatic.
MEGADETH - Dave Mustane was inspired by a government pamphlet he saw after leaving METALLICA. A Megadeath is a military term for one million dead (making World War II an 80 Megadeath)
MELVINS - You give someone a melvin by approaching from behind, and yanking up on the waistband of their underwear as hard as you can (also popularized on SEINFELD as a "wedgie" A "Melvin" was also a nerd synonym.
METALLICA - Lars Ulrich was helping a friend think of a name for a metal fanzine. The choices were Metal Mania and Metallica. Metal Mania was chosen for the magazine & he used Metallica for his band.
THE MIGHTY MIGHTY BOSSTONES - This ska/punk band from Boston originally called themselves the BOSSTONES in tribute to their hometown. An ad for one of their gigs called them "The Mighty Mighty Bosstones" and it stuck.
MIND BENDERS - This 60's band that appeared as themselves in the film "To Sir, With Love" was named after a 1962 British horror movie.
MISFITS - A 1961 movie starring Clarke Gable and Marilyn Monroe.
MONSTER MAGNET - 1) Dave Wyndorf, lead man in Monster Magnet, collects sci-fi/Horror collectibles, one is a model called "The Monster Magnet" 2) The Mothers of Invention's first LP Freak Out has that title as its first track.
MOTHERS OF INVENTION - Frank Zappa's highly experimental band was originally just called the Mothers, their record label asked them to change it (because it could be taken as an obscenity) and out of necessity they added "of Invention" since "Necessity is the mother of invention."
MÖTLEY CRÜE - A friend said "What a Motley looking Crew" - motley meaning "of great variety" and once describing the appearance of a court jester. The re-spelling was their own invention using the umlauts (those funny dots over letters) came to them while they were partying & drinking Lowenbrau beer.
MOTORHEAD - British slang for a drug user who uses a lot of speed
NIRVANA - In Buddhism it means the state of perfect blessedness attained through the annihilation of the self.
'NSYNC- Justin's mother came up with the name. N is the last letter in Justin, S is the last letter in Chris, Y is the last letter in Joey. N is actually from James Lance Bass because Chris gave him the nickname 'Lansten'. Since Lance doesn't end with a N, they used his nick name,
Lansten. C is from J.C. That's how they came up with 'NSYNC. (info from T.J. Gernon, Illinois & Andrea in San Diego) The whole thing is, of course, a play on In Sync - a term which comes from the movie industry - meaning when the picture & soundtrack are properly aligned or synchronized.
NO DOUBT - a favorite phrase of John Spence, it became the name of the band prior to his suicide.
NOBODY'S ANGELS - inspired by the U.S, TV series and later film Charlie's Angels.
OASIS - local British origins: a Manchester cab company, a chain of women's clothing stores, a local Indian restaurant and more likely a local club that The Beatles played in during their early years (the band are avowed Beatles fans)
OUR LADY PEACE - The band took their unusual name from a 1943 poem by American poet Mark Van Doren. link to information
PANTERA - Spanish for Panther and also a pretty cool car.
PEARL JAM - 1) Eddie's grandma supposedly made a peyote (hallucinogenic drug) jelly/jam , which as kids they called pearl jam. 2) I've heard a couple of times that "Pearl Jam" comes from NBA player Mookie Blaylock -- it's his nickname. Band members Stone Gossard and Jeff Ament
were huge fans of Blaylock, loved his peculiar name and wished to just call their band "Mookie Blaylock" but Blaylock protested, so they used his nickname "Pearl Jam" instead.
PHISH - A play on drummer John Fishman's last name... altered spelling as in THE BEATLES.
PINK FLOYD - taken from the names of two Georgia bluesmen Pink Anderson and Floyd Council - from the early days when the band saw itself as a blues band.
PORNO FOR PYROS - 1) Perry Farrell was reading a fireworks catalog on tour when a friend said the magazine looked like "porno for a pyro(maniac)" - a pyromaniac being one who loves fire. 2) Perry Farrel was up one night late watching the TV coverage of the LA riots and the fires and
couldn't take his eyes off the screen. He said it was like "porno for pyros".
PORTISHEAD - The name of their home town in England.
PROCOL HARUM - terrific art rock band was named by lyricist Keith Reid - a term he thought to be Arabic for "beyond that which is" - also the name of his cat.
QUICKSILVER MESSENGER SERVICE - Some of the band members were into astrology,
and noted that one or more of them were born under the House of Mercury. As Mercury
is the name for both the messenger of the gods and the liquid metal, the latter of which is also called quicksilver, Quicksilver Messenger Service was born.
RADIOHEAD - Named after a Talking Heads' song called "Radio Head."
RAMONES - Paul McCartney used to call himself Paul Ramone. The Ramones all use the last name Ramone even though it's not their given name.
REO SPEEDWAGON - the name of a fire engine made by Oldsmobile in the 1930's. "R.E.O." was the initials of Ransom Elliot Olds, the founder of the Oldsmobile Car Company.
THE REPLACEMENTS - Legend has it that they were given a gig after another band failed to show - when asked who they were they replied "We're the Replacements".
R.E.M. - in the study of dreams, the abbreviation refers to rapid eye movement or that time during sleep when an observable movement of the eyeball occurs indicating that the person is in a dream state. Band member Michael Stipe has said that this is not why the band picked the name.
THE RIGHEOUS BROTHERS - The Righteous Brothers supposedly changed their name when a fan at one of their appearances yelled "That's righteous, brothers." I don't know what they called themselves before. Righteous being a late 1950's slang for great, cool etc.
THE ROLLING STONES - from the Howlin' Wolf blues song "Rolling Stone" - Keith Richards was a fan of the version recorded by Muddy Waters.
SAMHAIN - The Celtic New Year, which has evolved into Halloween - the spirit of Halloween sometimes Americanized to Sam Haines.
SAVAGE GARDEN - a phrase from an Anne Rice novel "Interview With The Vampire"
SAVE FERRIS - a sign you'll see if you watch the movie Ferris Bueller's Day Off.
SEPULTURA - the Brazilian death metal band Sepultura name is the Portugese/Spanish word for a grave or burial tomb.
SEVEN MARY THREE - a police radio code for 7M3, it was also one of the motorcycle cops radio name on the old TV show C.H.I.P.S. (California Highway Patrol ) mid-70's.
SILVERCHAIR - 1) The Silver Chair is one of the titles in C.S. Lewis' "Chronicles of Narnia" in which Prince Rilian of Narnia is held captive under the spell of the witch who killed his mother.
During brief moments of returning sanity he is restrained in a silver chair. He is rescued when two children magically transported from earth, and a dour resident of Narnia find him and destroy the chair thereby lifting the curse. 2) A combination of "Sliver" by Nirvana and "Berlin Chair" by You Am I. They were requesting the songs from a radio station and the name was inspired by notes a band member made to himself to remember the song titles while he was calling the station. * Original name of band: Innocent Criminals.
SIMPLE MINDS - taken from a line in the David Bowie song "Jean Genie".
SISTERS OF MERCY - A tribute to the Leonard Cohen song of same name; also an order of nuns.
SKID ROW - Slang for a rundown inner city neighborhoods where alcoholics, junkies, street people can afford to live.
THE SMITHEREENS - Inspired by the cartoon character Yosemite Sam's classic line, "I'll blow you varmints to smithereens".
SOFT MACHINE - The name of a William Burroughs novel.
SOUNDGARDEN - A garden of kinetic sculptures that makes music when wind blows through them... a sculpture in Seattle called "Sound Garden".
SPEEDBALL - A deadly drug cocktail mix of heroin and cocaine.
SQUIRREL NUT ZIPPERS - an oddly titled type of candy.
SMASH MOUTH - football players use this slang term in any game with a lot of blocking or tackling.
STEELY DAN - taken from William Burrough's book Naked Lunch. In it Steely Dan is the nickname given to a giant steam-powered dildo (see cover photo on their first album)
STEPPENWOLF - in the words of band leader John Kay "Steppenwolf was originally a book written by Herman Hesse, (a German author) and it was a book I was totally unfamiliar with when the band that became Steppenwolf was in its infancy. The young man who lived next door to where Steppenwolf started to rehearse (by the name of Gabriel Mekler, born and raised in Israel) he had read the book. When it came time to put a name on the demo box that was going to go to the first label, he said "Well, what is the band called?" and aside from the obvious joke names and other obscene suggestions which were not marketable, he finally said, "Well look, how about Steppenwolf'? I think it's a word that looks good in print, and it denotes a certain degree of mystery and power and you guys are kind of rough and ready types." Everybody said that sounds pretty interesting and if we don't get a deal we can always scrawl another name on the box and send it to somebody else, so let's go with that for now. Well, that's what it's been now for many years and, to be honest, it's been a very good name." source John Kay & Steppenwolf
STYX - named after the river of death found in Greek mythology and in Dante's Inferno.
10,000 MANIACS - extension of an old horror movie called "2000 Maniacs".
10 CC - the average amount of ejaculate from a healthy male.
TALKING HEADS - probably from the video jargon for a camera shot showing only the head & shoulders of a person. Newscasters are usually shown this way and it makes for boring TV. Another story says they were inspired by a military experiment involving talking mannequin heads.
TESLA - from the largely unknown but important inventor Nikola Tesla who did important research in alternating current, radio, fluorescent lights, X-rays, microwaves...
THEY MIGHT BE GIANTS - named after the cult film favorite starring George C. Scott about "loonies." The film is also referencing Don Quixote, by Miguel Cervantes. In the book, the title character says "they might be giants" when referring to the windmills he attempts to fight.
THIRD EYE BLIND - Our third eye is the imagined one that gives us a kind of sixth sense (telepathy, ESP, etc.) and the band felt that most of us are blind in that sense. There is also a symbolic third eye (all knowing eye) that appears on the back of a U.S. dollar bill.
THOMSON TWINS - two characters in the Tintin comics by the late Belgium artist Herge.
THREE DOG NIGHT - Inspired by an Australian Aboriginal custom of sleeping with a dog for warmth on a cold night - a three dog night would be very cold, plus the band had 3 lead singers.
TLC - nicknames of band members: Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins, Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez and Rozonda is "Chilli" Actually Crystal was going to be the C of TLC, but when they auditioned for Laface, an exec didn't like Crystal's voice, so they replaced her with "Chilli". TLC was going to originally stand for Tionne, Left Eye and Crystal. The idea of "Tender Loving Care" must have worked for them too.
TOAD THE WET SPROCKET - A skit from Monty Python's Flying Circus which is about a weird rock band.
311 - "One of P-Nut's friends (Jim Watson) was arrested, cuffed (naked) and taken home to his parents. He was issued a citation for a code 311 (indecent exposure). We thought this was funny, so we took it as our band name. After the humor of the name wore off - we still kept it because we liked that it was just abstract and that it did not define us in anyway. The name did not describe our sound or our politics, it just let the music speak for itself. Since most interviewers always ask us "What does 311 mean?", we have come up with lots of different answers over the years. Some include.... Nick - "five friends making music", Tim - "a number dictated to me by a higher intelligence", P-Nut - "knowing a little numerology and studying a little magic, which I do; in some factions, three is man and 11 is magic. So 311 is like male magic." from their official site http://www.311music.com
T PAU - after a high priestess from the planet VULCAN in the American TV series STAR TREK
U2 - Three possibilities: 1) A type of spy plane used by the United States in the 1960's - made famous when Gary Powers' U2 plane was shot down over Russia and he was taken as a
prisoner during the Cold War. 2) U2 as in "you too" referring to the audience and its role in the musical experience 3) a U2 is an unemployment form in Ireland (see UB40)
UB40 - Code number of a form people in Britain have to fill out to receive public assistance or welfare. Known in the UK as a signing-off form when you get a job. Hence the title of their first album Signing Off.
ULTRAVOX - Latin for "the greatest amount of voice"
URGE OVERKILL - The name of a Parliaments' funk song.
VAN HALEN - after Alex and Eddie Van Halen - suggested by David Lee Roth as being better than their original name "Mammoth." They might have been called 'Daddy Longlegs' if Gene Simmons of KISS had gotten his way - he partially financed and produced one of their original demo records and suggested names and artwork.
VERUCA SALT - from a female character in the movie Charlie and the Chocolate Factory ( AKA Willy Wonka) played by Julie Dawn Cole (who is not in the band)
THE VELVET UNDERGROUND - 60's experimental band associated with pop artist Andy Warhol, they took their name from a paperback book they found on the street - the book was about sex in America.
WEEZER - Band member Rivers Cuomo had the nickname Weezer in school because of a breathing problem.
WHITE SNAKE - from a white albino ball python snake owned by David Coverdale while in DEEP PURPLE.
WHITE ZOMBIE - An old horror "B" movie.
WINGS - Paul McCartney's band - 1) in the Paul/Beatles song "Blackbird" you'll hear "Take these broken wings and learn to fly" which is what he did in his next album - a solo effort. 2) When Linda McCartney was giving birth to their daughter Stella, Paul was pacing around hoping everything was going well and he was praying and started thinking of angels and wings. Wings just stuck in his mind.
YO LA TENGO -translates to "I have it" from Spanish - said to be the phrase called out by Hispanic baseball players when fielding a pop fly ball. Singer/guitar player Ira Kaplan got the expression from a book he was reading about baseball called The Five Seasons.
ZZ TOP - taken from the name of a Texas Blues man ZZ Hill. Though a rumor is that they got their name by combining Zig Zag and Top, two well known brands of "cigarette" rolling papers.
Friday, June 10, 2011
What's Wrong With Adult Sexting? Weiner weird or just stupid? I'm starting a new Website "WEINER's WEINER!"
Experts on adult sexting were in demand all week, as details continued to emerge about Representative Anthony Weiner's online sexual communications with at least six women. While research into teenagers' exchange of sexually explicit messages or photographs of themselves has gained a lot of attention, there is less information on sexting among adults.
A Pew Research Center poll found that 6 percent of Americans over 18 reported having sent a nude or near-nude image of themselves to someone else and 15 percent said they had received one. In Mr. Weiner's 30- to 49-year-old demographic, 17 percent reported receiving such a message.
Can adult sexting simply be considered a new form of pornography? When is it harmless and when is it damaging and even dangerous? Is it different for people in their 20's as opposed to older adults?
A Pew Research Center poll found that 6 percent of Americans over 18 reported having sent a nude or near-nude image of themselves to someone else and 15 percent said they had received one. In Mr. Weiner's 30- to 49-year-old demographic, 17 percent reported receiving such a message.
Can adult sexting simply be considered a new form of pornography? When is it harmless and when is it damaging and even dangerous? Is it different for people in their 20's as opposed to older adults?
Gates: Prospects for U.S.-NATO alliance "dim"
BRUSSELS - America's military alliance with Europe — the cornerstone of U.S. security policy for six decades — faces a "dim, if not dismal" future, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday in a blunt valedictory address.
In his final policy speech as Pentagon chief, Gates questioned the viability of NATO, saying its members' penny-pinching and lack of political will could hasten the end of U.S. support. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed in 1949 as a U.S.-led bulwark against Soviet aggression, but in the post-Cold War era it has struggled to find a purpose.
"Future U.S. political leaders — those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me — may not consider the return on America's investment in NATO worth the cost," he told a European think tank on the final day of an 11-day overseas journey.
Gates has made no secret of his frustration with NATO bureaucracy and the huge restrictions many European governments placed on their military participation in the Afghanistan war. He ruffled NATO feathers early in his tenure with a direct challenge to contribute more front-line troops that yielded few contributions.
Even so, Gates' assessment Friday that NATO is falling down on its obligations and foisting too much of the hard work on the U.S. was unusually harsh and unvarnished. He said both of NATO's main military operations now — Afghanistan and Libya — point up weaknesses and failures within the alliance.
NATO pounds Tripoli, ponders post-Qaddafi Libya
Gates: U.S. won't "rush to the exits" in Afghanistan
Video: Where is the Afghan war headed?
"The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress — and in the American body politic writ large — to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," he said.
Without naming names, he blasted allies who are "willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."
"He's spent the last four and a half years begging NATO to contribute their fair share," says CBS News chief national security correspondent David Martin. "Now, with just three weeks left... he's just speaking his mind."
Gates, a career CIA officer who rose to become the spy agency's director from 1991 to 1993, is retiring on June 30 after 4½ years as Pentagon chief. His designated successor, Leon Panetta, is expected to take over July 1.
Panetta to inherit Afghan dilemma
Martin stressed the point Gates made about dwindling Cold War memories in the minds of America's body politic, noting that, already, most American politicians - including the president - aren't old enough to remember the "glory days of NATO", and they're likely to wonder increasingly, "what's in it for us?"
The U.S. has tens of thousands of troops based in Europe, not to stand guard against invasion but to train with European forces and promote what for decades has been lacking: the ability of the Europeans to go to war alongside the U.S. in a coherent way.
Hacker group "Anonymous" threatens NATO
The war in Afghanistan, which is being conducted under NATO auspices, is a prime example of U.S. frustration at European inability to provide the required resources.
"Despite more than 2 million troops in uniform, not counting the U.S. military, NATO has struggled, at times desperately, to sustain a deployment of 25,000 to 45,000 troops, not just in boots on the ground, but in crucial support assets such as helicopters, transport aircraft, maintenance, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and much more," Gates said.
For many Americans, NATO is a vague concept tied to a bygone era, a time when the world feared a Soviet land invasion of Europe that could have escalated to nuclear war. But with the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO's reason for being came into question. It has remained intact — and even expanded from 16 members at the conclusion of the Cold War to 28 today.
But reluctance of some European nations to expand defense budgets and take on direct combat has created what amounts to a two-tier alliance: the U.S. military at one level and the rest of NATO on a lower, almost irrelevant plane.
Gates said this could spell the demise of NATO.
"What I've sketched out is the real possibility for a dim, if not dismal future for the trans-Atlantic alliance," he said. "Such a future is possible, but not inevitable. The good news is that the members of NATO — individually and collectively — have it well within their means to halt and reverse these trends and instead produce a very different future."
Gates has said he believes NATO will endure despite its flaws and failings. But his remarks Friday point to a degree of American impatience with traditional and newer European allies that in coming years could lead to a reordering of U.S. defense priorities in favor of Asia and the Pacific, where the rise of China is becoming a predominant concern.
To illustrate his concerns about Europe's lack of appetite for defense, Gates noted the difficulty NATO has encountered in carrying out an air campaign in Libya.
"The mightiest military alliance in history is only 11 weeks into an operation against a poorly armed regime in a sparsely populated country, yet many allies are beginning to run short of munitions, requiring the U.S., once more, to make up the difference," he said.
His comment reflected U.S. frustration with the allies' limited defense budgets.
"To avoid the very real possibility of collective military irrelevance, member nations must examine new approaches to boosting combat capabilities," he said.
He applauded Norway and Denmark for providing a disproportionate share of the combat power in the Libya operation, given the size of their militaries. And he credited Belgium and Canada for making "major contributions" to the effort to degrade the military strength of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.
"These countries have, with their constrained resources, found ways to do the training, buy the equipment and field the platforms necessary to make a credible military contribution," he said.
But they are exceptions, in Gates' view.
A NATO air operations center designed to handle more than 300 flights a day is struggling to launch about 150 a day against Libya, Gates said.
On a political level, the problem of alliance purpose in Libya is even more troubling, he said.
"While every alliance member voted for the Libya mission, less than half have participated, and fewer than a third have been willing to participate in the strike mission," he said. "Frankly, many of those allies sitting on the sidelines do so not because they do not want to participate, but simply because they can't. The military capabilities simply aren't there."
Afghanistan is another example of NATO falling short despite a determined effort, Gates said.
He recalled the history of NATO's involvement in the Afghan war — and the mistaken impression some allied governments held of what it would require of them.
"I suspect many allies assumed that the mission would be primarily peacekeeping, reconstruction and development assistance — more akin to the Balkans," he said, referring to NATO peacekeeping efforts there since the late 1990s. "Instead, NATO found itself in a tough fight against a determined and resurgent Taliban returning in force from its sanctuaries in Pakistan."
He also offered praise and sympathy, noting that more than 850 troops from non-U.S. NATO members have died in Afghanistan. For many allied nations these were their first military casualties since World War II.
He seemed to rehearse his position in the coming debate within the Obama administration on how many troops to withdraw from Afghanistan this year.
"Far too much has been accomplished, at far too great a cost, to let the momentum slip away just as the enemy is on his back foot," he said.
He said the "vast majority" of the 30,000 extra troops Obama sent to Afghanistan last year will remain through the summer fighting season. He was not more specific.
In a question-and-answer session with his audience after the speech, Gates, 67, said his generation's "emotional and historical attachment" to NATO is "aging out."
He said he is not sure what this means in practical terms. But if Europeans want to keep a security link to the U.S. in the future, he said, "the drift of the past 20 years can't continue."
BRUSSELS - America's military alliance with Europe — the cornerstone of U.S. security policy for six decades — faces a "dim, if not dismal" future, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Friday in a blunt valedictory address.
In his final policy speech as Pentagon chief, Gates questioned the viability of NATO, saying its members' penny-pinching and lack of political will could hasten the end of U.S. support. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was formed in 1949 as a U.S.-led bulwark against Soviet aggression, but in the post-Cold War era it has struggled to find a purpose.
"Future U.S. political leaders — those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me — may not consider the return on America's investment in NATO worth the cost," he told a European think tank on the final day of an 11-day overseas journey.
Gates has made no secret of his frustration with NATO bureaucracy and the huge restrictions many European governments placed on their military participation in the Afghanistan war. He ruffled NATO feathers early in his tenure with a direct challenge to contribute more front-line troops that yielded few contributions.
Even so, Gates' assessment Friday that NATO is falling down on its obligations and foisting too much of the hard work on the U.S. was unusually harsh and unvarnished. He said both of NATO's main military operations now — Afghanistan and Libya — point up weaknesses and failures within the alliance.
NATO pounds Tripoli, ponders post-Qaddafi Libya
Gates: U.S. won't "rush to the exits" in Afghanistan
Video: Where is the Afghan war headed?
"The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress — and in the American body politic writ large — to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense," he said.
Without naming names, he blasted allies who are "willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets."
"He's spent the last four and a half years begging NATO to contribute their fair share," says CBS News chief national security correspondent David Martin. "Now, with just three weeks left... he's just speaking his mind."
Gates, a career CIA officer who rose to become the spy agency's director from 1991 to 1993, is retiring on June 30 after 4½ years as Pentagon chief. His designated successor, Leon Panetta, is expected to take over July 1.
Panetta to inherit Afghan dilemma
Martin stressed the point Gates made about dwindling Cold War memories in the minds of America's body politic, noting that, already, most American politicians - including the president - aren't old enough to remember the "glory days of NATO", and they're likely to wonder increasingly, "what's in it for us?"
The U.S. has tens of thousands of troops based in Europe, not to stand guard against invasion but to train with European forces and promote what for decades has been lacking: the ability of the Europeans to go to war alongside the U.S. in a coherent way.
Hacker group "Anonymous" threatens NATO
The war in Afghanistan, which is being conducted under NATO auspices, is a prime example of U.S. frustration at European inability to provide the required resources.
"Despite more than 2 million troops in uniform, not counting the U.S. military, NATO has struggled, at times desperately, to sustain a deployment of 25,000 to 45,000 troops, not just in boots on the ground, but in crucial support assets such as helicopters, transport aircraft, maintenance, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, and much more," Gates said.
For many Americans, NATO is a vague concept tied to a bygone era, a time when the world feared a Soviet land invasion of Europe that could have escalated to nuclear war. But with the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO's reason for being came into question. It has remained intact — and even expanded from 16 members at the conclusion of the Cold War to 28 today.
But reluctance of some European nations to expand defense budgets and take on direct combat has created what amounts to a two-tier alliance: the U.S. military at one level and the rest of NATO on a lower, almost irrelevant plane.
Gates said this could spell the demise of NATO.
"What I've sketched out is the real possibility for a dim, if not dismal future for the trans-Atlantic alliance," he said. "Such a future is possible, but not inevitable. The good news is that the members of NATO — individually and collectively — have it well within their means to halt and reverse these trends and instead produce a very different future."
Gates has said he believes NATO will endure despite its flaws and failings. But his remarks Friday point to a degree of American impatience with traditional and newer European allies that in coming years could lead to a reordering of U.S. defense priorities in favor of Asia and the Pacific, where the rise of China is becoming a predominant concern.
To illustrate his concerns about Europe's lack of appetite for defense, Gates noted the difficulty NATO has encountered in carrying out an air campaign in Libya.
"The mightiest military alliance in history is only 11 weeks into an operation against a poorly armed regime in a sparsely populated country, yet many allies are beginning to run short of munitions, requiring the U.S., once more, to make up the difference," he said.
His comment reflected U.S. frustration with the allies' limited defense budgets.
"To avoid the very real possibility of collective military irrelevance, member nations must examine new approaches to boosting combat capabilities," he said.
He applauded Norway and Denmark for providing a disproportionate share of the combat power in the Libya operation, given the size of their militaries. And he credited Belgium and Canada for making "major contributions" to the effort to degrade the military strength of Libya's Moammar Gadhafi.
"These countries have, with their constrained resources, found ways to do the training, buy the equipment and field the platforms necessary to make a credible military contribution," he said.
But they are exceptions, in Gates' view.
A NATO air operations center designed to handle more than 300 flights a day is struggling to launch about 150 a day against Libya, Gates said.
On a political level, the problem of alliance purpose in Libya is even more troubling, he said.
"While every alliance member voted for the Libya mission, less than half have participated, and fewer than a third have been willing to participate in the strike mission," he said. "Frankly, many of those allies sitting on the sidelines do so not because they do not want to participate, but simply because they can't. The military capabilities simply aren't there."
Afghanistan is another example of NATO falling short despite a determined effort, Gates said.
He recalled the history of NATO's involvement in the Afghan war — and the mistaken impression some allied governments held of what it would require of them.
"I suspect many allies assumed that the mission would be primarily peacekeeping, reconstruction and development assistance — more akin to the Balkans," he said, referring to NATO peacekeeping efforts there since the late 1990s. "Instead, NATO found itself in a tough fight against a determined and resurgent Taliban returning in force from its sanctuaries in Pakistan."
He also offered praise and sympathy, noting that more than 850 troops from non-U.S. NATO members have died in Afghanistan. For many allied nations these were their first military casualties since World War II.
He seemed to rehearse his position in the coming debate within the Obama administration on how many troops to withdraw from Afghanistan this year.
"Far too much has been accomplished, at far too great a cost, to let the momentum slip away just as the enemy is on his back foot," he said.
He said the "vast majority" of the 30,000 extra troops Obama sent to Afghanistan last year will remain through the summer fighting season. He was not more specific.
In a question-and-answer session with his audience after the speech, Gates, 67, said his generation's "emotional and historical attachment" to NATO is "aging out."
He said he is not sure what this means in practical terms. But if Europeans want to keep a security link to the U.S. in the future, he said, "the drift of the past 20 years can't continue."
Thursday, June 09, 2011
Our Wasteful Health Care System PAUL KRUGMAN NYTimes
The Economist’s “Democracy in America” blog has a very good illustration of the reasons our privatized, market-based system is so much more expensive, for no better results, than everyone else’s:
A medical technology company is going public to generate the money it needs to advertise its products to hospital directors and insurance-company reimbursement officers. This entails significant extra expenditures for marketing, the new stocks issued to fund the marketing will ultimately have to pay dividends, banks will have to be paid to supervise the IPO that was needed to generate the funds to finance the marketing campaign (presumably charging the industry-cartel standard 7%)…and all this will have to be paid for by driving up the price the company charges to deliver its technologies. But beyond the added expense, why would anyone think that a system in which marketing plays such a large role is likely to be more effective, to lead to better treatment, than the kind of process of expert review that governs grant awards at NIH or publishing decisions at peer-reviewed journals? Why do we think that a system in which ads for Claritin are all over the subways will generate better overall health results than one where a national review board determines whether Claritin delivers treatment outcomes for some populations sufficiently superior to justify its added expense over similar generics? What do we expect from a system in which, as ProPublica reports today, body imaging companies hire telemarketers to sell random people CT scans over the phone?
Furthermore,
The other key thing to pay attention to is who this marketing campaign was targeted at: key decisionmakers at providers and insurance companies. Those are the people who decide whether medical procedures get ordered. It’s not patients. Patients aren’t going to experience a loss of freedom or satisfaction because an expert reviewer at the Independant Payment Advisory Board makes the call as to whether a procedure is medically beneficial, rather than the corresponding bureaucrat at their insurance provider or at the for-profit clinic they’re attending.
None of this is particularly new — but it needs to be repeated, over and over again; maybe some of it will leak through the ideological armor of Very Serious People.
The Economist’s “Democracy in America” blog has a very good illustration of the reasons our privatized, market-based system is so much more expensive, for no better results, than everyone else’s:
A medical technology company is going public to generate the money it needs to advertise its products to hospital directors and insurance-company reimbursement officers. This entails significant extra expenditures for marketing, the new stocks issued to fund the marketing will ultimately have to pay dividends, banks will have to be paid to supervise the IPO that was needed to generate the funds to finance the marketing campaign (presumably charging the industry-cartel standard 7%)…and all this will have to be paid for by driving up the price the company charges to deliver its technologies. But beyond the added expense, why would anyone think that a system in which marketing plays such a large role is likely to be more effective, to lead to better treatment, than the kind of process of expert review that governs grant awards at NIH or publishing decisions at peer-reviewed journals? Why do we think that a system in which ads for Claritin are all over the subways will generate better overall health results than one where a national review board determines whether Claritin delivers treatment outcomes for some populations sufficiently superior to justify its added expense over similar generics? What do we expect from a system in which, as ProPublica reports today, body imaging companies hire telemarketers to sell random people CT scans over the phone?
Furthermore,
The other key thing to pay attention to is who this marketing campaign was targeted at: key decisionmakers at providers and insurance companies. Those are the people who decide whether medical procedures get ordered. It’s not patients. Patients aren’t going to experience a loss of freedom or satisfaction because an expert reviewer at the Independant Payment Advisory Board makes the call as to whether a procedure is medically beneficial, rather than the corresponding bureaucrat at their insurance provider or at the for-profit clinic they’re attending.
None of this is particularly new — but it needs to be repeated, over and over again; maybe some of it will leak through the ideological armor of Very Serious People.
Tuesday, June 07, 2011
FLY ON THE WALL!?
Imaginary Eavesdropping on Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin
Three years ago, we imagined a conversation between Silda Wall Spitzer and Hillary Clinton. At that time, we didn't know that there was such a conversation, but this time around, we can be almost certain Hillary Clinton has had a consoling conversation with Huma Abedin, the newish wife of Congressman Anthony Weiner. For over a decade she's been Clinton's "body woman," i.e. the aide-de-camp that basically takes care of Hillary's life. There's pretty much no chance this hasn't come up, and you know us, we can't resist an imaginary conversation, so.
[The Scene: Backstage at the Women's World Cup Initiative Monday morning, just outside the Benjamin Franklin Room at the Department of State. Huma Abedin enters, talking on the phone. Hillary sits expectantly, awaiting her usual prespeech Altoids.]
Huma: [Into phone.] If you had nipped this in the bud over the weekend and just said that was a picture of you somebody must have sent from your computer as a joke, this would have all ended!
Clinton: Is that Anthony on the phone? Tell him I told him not to go to Bill for advice. Why would anyone go to Bill for advice?? They don't call him "Bubba" because it doesn't sound like the name you'd give a pervert.
Huma: Hillary, will you let me handle this? I'm an adult. Now, open wide. [Hillary pouts for a moment, then opens her mouth.] Here's your Altoid.
Hillary: Thank you.
Huma: [Back on phone.] What? There are shirtless pictures of you now? Are they the ones you sent me after you got your chest waxed? WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN'T SAY WITH CERTITUDE?
[Hillary spits out her Altoid and snatches away the phone.]
Hillary: Listen here, pencil neck: If it comes out that any of this is real, you're going to wish you were hiding in a bunker in Tripoli. DO YOU COPY? [She throws phone across the room, where it ricochets violently behind a couch. Huma watches it despondently.]
Huma: That was my third smartphone this month.
Hillary: Anything that's smart enough to fuck you is not worth replacing for $499.
[Hours later, in Hillary's office in the state department.]
Hillary: [Consolingly] I watched the press conference. I'm so sorry, Huma. Here, I got you a new iPhone and had the staff program it for you.
Huma: Thank you, that was very sweet.
Hillary: I'm so glad you weren't there. Did he ask you to go up to New York and do the Silda Spitzer thing?
Huma: [Laughs bitterly.] No. He knows better than to want to be around me today. For Hanukkah he gave me krav maga classes.
Hillary: Good. When Bill asked me and Chelsea to hold hands with him while we walked into the helicopter that day back in 1998, I almost told him to take a high jump.
Huma: God, I remember how bad that was. Have we really been together that long?
HIllary: Much longer than your marriage, that's for sure.
Huma: Anthony said there have been half a dozen women. What do I do? And don't say that thing about "accidentally" leaving one of Madeleine Albright's brooches in his office chair. I'm not doing that.
Hillary: Oh, I wasn't being serious about that, obviously. It probably wouldn't even puncture a testicle. So what did you say to him?
Huma: I told him I was mad and that it was a very dumb thing to do. My parents are so conservative, they'll never get over it. But I also told him I loved him and I wanted him to pull through this. He was so upset, he was crying, and I just had this instinct to fix what was happening right now and leave the rest for later.
Hillary: Okay, the good thing about that strategy is that it will not only help him through the hardest part, it will help you. Finding an outside enemy rather than worrying about the one on your doorstep will give you something constructive to focus on, temporarily. I call it the "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" approach.
Huma: Did that even work for you?
Hillary: I wasn't sure at the time, but parts of that strategy — like when I very kindly arranged for a half-million-dollar line of credit at Tiffany a couple of years ago — have recently panned out.
Huma: But it's not much of a permanent solution, huh?
Hillary: Well ... I hesitate to put everything in the context of the Clintons ... [Pause. They both burst out laughing.] Okay, That was a good one. But seriously, if you compare this to me and Bill, this is really nothing. Men flirt. That's what they've always done. Now they can share photos of their junk with floozies they've never met. Can you imagine the nasty trail that would have been left if Bill could have direct-messaged that chubby intern? Forget the blue dress ...
Huma: But it still feels like cheating, what Anthony did.
Hillary: Well, it is a kind of cheating. And he shouldn't have done it. But you're a beautiful, influential woman. As you grow in politics, men are going to flirt with you that way. And then you're going to have to decide what you would do. In the meantime, you need to do some serious thinking about how you feel about this particular situation — and how the press glare is going to affect you.
Huma: Working at the State Department isn't the kind of spotlight Anthony has, thank God.
Hillary: Oh, honey, don't you see? Now you can run for office.
Huma: You say that to everybody.
Hillary: At least start by being my campaign manager for 2016. I promise I won't pull a Solis Doyle.
Huma: [Laughs.] You say that to everybody.
Hillary: Seriously, you have your whole life ahead of you. I know this feels right now like this will define you, but it really won't. The great thing is, it'll define him.
Huma: That doesn't sound so hot either.
Hillary: Oh, he can take it. There's a reason why they invented the word cocky. But what I'm saying is, you can do whatever you want with your life, you have a clean slate. You can be anything.
Huma: Aw. Don't stop thinkin' about tomorrow, right?
Hillary: [Laughs.] I've always hated that fucking song.
[They hug. Behind Huma's back, Hillary pushes a button on her BlackBerry. On the desk, Huma's phone lights up. It begins to play the chorus to Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive."]
Huma: Much better. Thanks.
Three years ago, we imagined a conversation between Silda Wall Spitzer and Hillary Clinton. At that time, we didn't know that there was such a conversation, but this time around, we can be almost certain Hillary Clinton has had a consoling conversation with Huma Abedin, the newish wife of Congressman Anthony Weiner. For over a decade she's been Clinton's "body woman," i.e. the aide-de-camp that basically takes care of Hillary's life. There's pretty much no chance this hasn't come up, and you know us, we can't resist an imaginary conversation, so.
[The Scene: Backstage at the Women's World Cup Initiative Monday morning, just outside the Benjamin Franklin Room at the Department of State. Huma Abedin enters, talking on the phone. Hillary sits expectantly, awaiting her usual prespeech Altoids.]
Huma: [Into phone.] If you had nipped this in the bud over the weekend and just said that was a picture of you somebody must have sent from your computer as a joke, this would have all ended!
Clinton: Is that Anthony on the phone? Tell him I told him not to go to Bill for advice. Why would anyone go to Bill for advice?? They don't call him "Bubba" because it doesn't sound like the name you'd give a pervert.
Huma: Hillary, will you let me handle this? I'm an adult. Now, open wide. [Hillary pouts for a moment, then opens her mouth.] Here's your Altoid.
Hillary: Thank you.
Huma: [Back on phone.] What? There are shirtless pictures of you now? Are they the ones you sent me after you got your chest waxed? WHAT DO YOU MEAN YOU CAN'T SAY WITH CERTITUDE?
[Hillary spits out her Altoid and snatches away the phone.]
Hillary: Listen here, pencil neck: If it comes out that any of this is real, you're going to wish you were hiding in a bunker in Tripoli. DO YOU COPY? [She throws phone across the room, where it ricochets violently behind a couch. Huma watches it despondently.]
Huma: That was my third smartphone this month.
Hillary: Anything that's smart enough to fuck you is not worth replacing for $499.
[Hours later, in Hillary's office in the state department.]
Hillary: [Consolingly] I watched the press conference. I'm so sorry, Huma. Here, I got you a new iPhone and had the staff program it for you.
Huma: Thank you, that was very sweet.
Hillary: I'm so glad you weren't there. Did he ask you to go up to New York and do the Silda Spitzer thing?
Huma: [Laughs bitterly.] No. He knows better than to want to be around me today. For Hanukkah he gave me krav maga classes.
Hillary: Good. When Bill asked me and Chelsea to hold hands with him while we walked into the helicopter that day back in 1998, I almost told him to take a high jump.
Huma: God, I remember how bad that was. Have we really been together that long?
HIllary: Much longer than your marriage, that's for sure.
Huma: Anthony said there have been half a dozen women. What do I do? And don't say that thing about "accidentally" leaving one of Madeleine Albright's brooches in his office chair. I'm not doing that.
Hillary: Oh, I wasn't being serious about that, obviously. It probably wouldn't even puncture a testicle. So what did you say to him?
Huma: I told him I was mad and that it was a very dumb thing to do. My parents are so conservative, they'll never get over it. But I also told him I loved him and I wanted him to pull through this. He was so upset, he was crying, and I just had this instinct to fix what was happening right now and leave the rest for later.
Hillary: Okay, the good thing about that strategy is that it will not only help him through the hardest part, it will help you. Finding an outside enemy rather than worrying about the one on your doorstep will give you something constructive to focus on, temporarily. I call it the "Vast Right Wing Conspiracy" approach.
Huma: Did that even work for you?
Hillary: I wasn't sure at the time, but parts of that strategy — like when I very kindly arranged for a half-million-dollar line of credit at Tiffany a couple of years ago — have recently panned out.
Huma: But it's not much of a permanent solution, huh?
Hillary: Well ... I hesitate to put everything in the context of the Clintons ... [Pause. They both burst out laughing.] Okay, That was a good one. But seriously, if you compare this to me and Bill, this is really nothing. Men flirt. That's what they've always done. Now they can share photos of their junk with floozies they've never met. Can you imagine the nasty trail that would have been left if Bill could have direct-messaged that chubby intern? Forget the blue dress ...
Huma: But it still feels like cheating, what Anthony did.
Hillary: Well, it is a kind of cheating. And he shouldn't have done it. But you're a beautiful, influential woman. As you grow in politics, men are going to flirt with you that way. And then you're going to have to decide what you would do. In the meantime, you need to do some serious thinking about how you feel about this particular situation — and how the press glare is going to affect you.
Huma: Working at the State Department isn't the kind of spotlight Anthony has, thank God.
Hillary: Oh, honey, don't you see? Now you can run for office.
Huma: You say that to everybody.
Hillary: At least start by being my campaign manager for 2016. I promise I won't pull a Solis Doyle.
Huma: [Laughs.] You say that to everybody.
Hillary: Seriously, you have your whole life ahead of you. I know this feels right now like this will define you, but it really won't. The great thing is, it'll define him.
Huma: That doesn't sound so hot either.
Hillary: Oh, he can take it. There's a reason why they invented the word cocky. But what I'm saying is, you can do whatever you want with your life, you have a clean slate. You can be anything.
Huma: Aw. Don't stop thinkin' about tomorrow, right?
Hillary: [Laughs.] I've always hated that fucking song.
[They hug. Behind Huma's back, Hillary pushes a button on her BlackBerry. On the desk, Huma's phone lights up. It begins to play the chorus to Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive."]
Huma: Much better. Thanks.
Sunday, June 05, 2011
NOW CUT THAT OUT!
Efforts to Ban Circumcision Gain Traction in California
By JENNIFER MEDINA
SANTA MONICA, Calif. — When a group of activists proposed banning circumcision in San Francisco last fall, many people simply brushed them aside. Even in that liberal seaside city, it seemed implausible that thousands of people would support an effort to outlaw an ancient ritual that Jews and Muslims believe fulfills a commandment issued by God.
But last month, the group collected the more than 7,100 signatures needed to get a measure on the fall ballot that would make it illegal to snip the foreskin of a minor within city limits. Now a similar effort is under way in Santa Monica to get such a measure on the ballot for November 2012.
If the anticircumcision activists (they prefer the term “intactivists”) have their way, cities across the country may be voting on whether to criminalize a practice that is common in many American hospitals. Activists say the measures would protect children from an unnecessary medical procedure, calling it “male genital mutilation.”
“This is the furthest we’ve gotten, and it is a huge step for us,” said Matthew Hess, an activist based in San Diego who wrote both bills.
Mr. Hess has created similar legislation for states across the country, but those measures never had much traction. Now he is fielding calls from people who want to organize similar movements in their cities.
“This is a conversation we are long overdue to have in this country,” he said. “The end goal for us is making cutting boys’ foreskin a federal crime.”
Jewish groups see the ballot measures as a very real threat, likening them to bans on circumcision that existed in Soviet-era Russia and Eastern Europe and in ancient Roman and Greek times. The circumcision of males is an inviolable requirement of Jewish law that dates back to Abraham’s circumcision of himself in the Book of Genesis.
They say the proposed ban is an assault on religious freedom that could have a widespread impact all over the country. Beyond the biblical, there are emotional connections: checking for circumcision was one of the ways Jewish children could be culled from their peers by Nazis and the czar’s armies.
“People are shocked that it has reached this level because there has never been this kind of a direct assault on a Jewish practice here,” said Marc Stern, associate general counsel for the American Jewish Committee, an advocacy group. “This is something that American Jews have always taken for granted — that something that was so contested elsewhere but here, we’re safe and we’re secure.”
Mr. Hess also writes an online comic book, “Foreskin Man,” with villains like “Monster Mohel.” On Friday, the Anti-Defamation League issued a statement saying the comic employed “grotesque anti-Semitic imagery.”
Jena Troutman, the mother of two young boys who is promoting the ballot measure in Santa Monica, said she did not think of herself as a crusader against religion. Instead, she views her work as a chance to educate would-be parents against a procedure that “can really do serious damage to the child.”
“I am just a mom trying to save the little babies,” Ms. Troutman said. “I’d rather be on the beach, but nobody is talking about this, so I have to.”
Ms. Troutman has run the Web site wholebabyrevolution.com for two years, and she is fond of rattling off sayings like “Your baby is perfect, no snipping required.” Well versed in the stories of circumcisions gone awry, she said the recent death of a New York City toddler who was circumcised at a hospital convinced her that she should push for the ballot measure.
Ms. Troutman, who has worked as a lactation educator and a doula, said she often approached women on the beach to warn them about the dangers of circumcising, but she has declined to answer questions about her own children.
Although precise numbers are not known, several studies have indicated that circumcision rates have been declining in the United States for the past several years and now range from 30 percent to 50 percent of all male infants.
Many medical groups take a neutral approach, saying that the practice is not harmful and that there is not enough scientific evidence to conclude that it is necessary, and leave the decision to parents and their doctor. Several studies have linked circumcision with a reduction in the spread of H.I.V. Roughly half of the 694 baby boys born in the Santa Monica-U.C.L.A. Medical Center and Orthopaedic Hospital in 2010 were circumcised before they left the hospital, officials there said.
Dr. David Baron, a family physician, certified mohel — someone who performs ritual circumcision — and former chief of staff at Santa Monica-U.C.L.A., said that he would not press any parent to circumcise a son but that he viewed the effort to ban the procedure as “ridiculous and dishonest.”
“To say it is mutilation is wrong from the get-go,” Dr. Baron said. “It is a perfectly valid decision to say that it is not what you want for your child. Any doctor who says it is needed is not being honest, but to say that it needs to be banned is shocking.”
If the ballot measure passed, it would certainly face legal challenges. But several legal experts said it was far from certain that it would be struck down in a court. Ms. Troutman said she considered putting religious exemptions in the measure, but then decided, “Why should only some babies be protected?”
Rabbi Yehuda Lebovics, an Orthodox mohel based in Los Angeles who says he has performed some 20,000 circumcisions over several decades, said he often had to soothe nervous mothers.
“I am now doing the sons of the boys I did 30 years ago,” Rabbi Lebovics said. “So I turn to the new mother and ask, ‘Do you have any complaints in the way it turned out?’ ”
By JENNIFER MEDINA
SANTA MONICA, Calif. — When a group of activists proposed banning circumcision in San Francisco last fall, many people simply brushed them aside. Even in that liberal seaside city, it seemed implausible that thousands of people would support an effort to outlaw an ancient ritual that Jews and Muslims believe fulfills a commandment issued by God.
But last month, the group collected the more than 7,100 signatures needed to get a measure on the fall ballot that would make it illegal to snip the foreskin of a minor within city limits. Now a similar effort is under way in Santa Monica to get such a measure on the ballot for November 2012.
If the anticircumcision activists (they prefer the term “intactivists”) have their way, cities across the country may be voting on whether to criminalize a practice that is common in many American hospitals. Activists say the measures would protect children from an unnecessary medical procedure, calling it “male genital mutilation.”
“This is the furthest we’ve gotten, and it is a huge step for us,” said Matthew Hess, an activist based in San Diego who wrote both bills.
Mr. Hess has created similar legislation for states across the country, but those measures never had much traction. Now he is fielding calls from people who want to organize similar movements in their cities.
“This is a conversation we are long overdue to have in this country,” he said. “The end goal for us is making cutting boys’ foreskin a federal crime.”
Jewish groups see the ballot measures as a very real threat, likening them to bans on circumcision that existed in Soviet-era Russia and Eastern Europe and in ancient Roman and Greek times. The circumcision of males is an inviolable requirement of Jewish law that dates back to Abraham’s circumcision of himself in the Book of Genesis.
They say the proposed ban is an assault on religious freedom that could have a widespread impact all over the country. Beyond the biblical, there are emotional connections: checking for circumcision was one of the ways Jewish children could be culled from their peers by Nazis and the czar’s armies.
“People are shocked that it has reached this level because there has never been this kind of a direct assault on a Jewish practice here,” said Marc Stern, associate general counsel for the American Jewish Committee, an advocacy group. “This is something that American Jews have always taken for granted — that something that was so contested elsewhere but here, we’re safe and we’re secure.”
Mr. Hess also writes an online comic book, “Foreskin Man,” with villains like “Monster Mohel.” On Friday, the Anti-Defamation League issued a statement saying the comic employed “grotesque anti-Semitic imagery.”
Jena Troutman, the mother of two young boys who is promoting the ballot measure in Santa Monica, said she did not think of herself as a crusader against religion. Instead, she views her work as a chance to educate would-be parents against a procedure that “can really do serious damage to the child.”
“I am just a mom trying to save the little babies,” Ms. Troutman said. “I’d rather be on the beach, but nobody is talking about this, so I have to.”
Ms. Troutman has run the Web site wholebabyrevolution.com for two years, and she is fond of rattling off sayings like “Your baby is perfect, no snipping required.” Well versed in the stories of circumcisions gone awry, she said the recent death of a New York City toddler who was circumcised at a hospital convinced her that she should push for the ballot measure.
Ms. Troutman, who has worked as a lactation educator and a doula, said she often approached women on the beach to warn them about the dangers of circumcising, but she has declined to answer questions about her own children.
Although precise numbers are not known, several studies have indicated that circumcision rates have been declining in the United States for the past several years and now range from 30 percent to 50 percent of all male infants.
Many medical groups take a neutral approach, saying that the practice is not harmful and that there is not enough scientific evidence to conclude that it is necessary, and leave the decision to parents and their doctor. Several studies have linked circumcision with a reduction in the spread of H.I.V. Roughly half of the 694 baby boys born in the Santa Monica-U.C.L.A. Medical Center and Orthopaedic Hospital in 2010 were circumcised before they left the hospital, officials there said.
Dr. David Baron, a family physician, certified mohel — someone who performs ritual circumcision — and former chief of staff at Santa Monica-U.C.L.A., said that he would not press any parent to circumcise a son but that he viewed the effort to ban the procedure as “ridiculous and dishonest.”
“To say it is mutilation is wrong from the get-go,” Dr. Baron said. “It is a perfectly valid decision to say that it is not what you want for your child. Any doctor who says it is needed is not being honest, but to say that it needs to be banned is shocking.”
If the ballot measure passed, it would certainly face legal challenges. But several legal experts said it was far from certain that it would be struck down in a court. Ms. Troutman said she considered putting religious exemptions in the measure, but then decided, “Why should only some babies be protected?”
Rabbi Yehuda Lebovics, an Orthodox mohel based in Los Angeles who says he has performed some 20,000 circumcisions over several decades, said he often had to soothe nervous mothers.
“I am now doing the sons of the boys I did 30 years ago,” Rabbi Lebovics said. “So I turn to the new mother and ask, ‘Do you have any complaints in the way it turned out?’ ”
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