Journal Archive - September, 2008

ok, financial markets and bailout.
this might not make me very popular, but although i don't like it, i support the $700,000,000,000.00 bailout.
why?
because it will prop up our banks and investment houses long enough for real reform
to implemented and it will keep the u.s and global economy from sliding into depression.
if more banks and investment houses fail you'll see a severe recession and possibly
a depression.
and this effects everyone.
the reason that people start businesses and create jobs is because they have access
to capital.
the reason that people buy houses or renovate houses is because they have access
to capital.
if people close businesses or stop buying or renovating houses they will stop
creating jobs.
people will be fired. unemployment will skyrocket. retirement accounts will dry up.
more mortgages will be foreclosed on.
and the world will head towards severe recession or depression.
this bailout isn't bailing out fat-cats on wall street, it's protecting local businesses
in iowa and kansas and sacramento.
it's protecting shakey mortgages in idaho and florida.
it's protecting retirement accounts in alaska and maine.
it's protecting your job. it's protecting your neighbors job.
wall st screwed up. seriously. the collusion between the different financial service
providers has been disgraceful and dangerous.
and securitizing high-risk mortgages was, in hindsight, a disastrous idea.
wall street screwed up.
but to let the banks and investment houses fail and to let the dow and the nasdaq(and the ftse
and the dax and nikkei, etc)plummet is to create a crisis that will effect every person on
the planet(the global depression of the 20's and 30's, resulting from protectionist trade practices, caused world war 2, for example).
the republicans(and some democrats) in the house of representatives(most of whom know nothing about global
markets and finances)have made a huge mistake in not supporting the bailout.
to be clear, no one likes the bailout, and no one is happy at the thought of having
to use taxpayers money to buy up crummy securities.
but it's a necessary evil, and to let the banks and investment houses continue to fail
would have deleterious consequences that people can't even begin to imagine.
again, not just for bankers and brokers, but for you and your friends and your grandparents
and your children.
the markets do not exist in a bubble, and to pretend that they do is to exhibit a dangerous lack of understanding of how the global economy actually works.
if the gop in the house don't pass the bailout they won't be punishing wall street, they'll
be punishing you and your friends and your family.
moby

this is interesting. this newspaper, the stockton record, hasn't endorsed a democrat for president in over seventy years. even though it's essentially a conservative, republican newspaper today they came out with an endorsement for barack obama.

-moby

The Stockton Record, Obama Is Our Choice For President

He has demonstrated time and again he can think on his feet. More importantly, he has demonstrated he will think things through, seek advice and actually listen to it.

Obama is a gifted speaker. But in addition to his smarts and energy, possibly his greatest gift is his ability to inspire.

For eight years, American politics has been marked by smears, fears and greed. For too long, we've practiced partisanship in Washington, not politics. The result is a cynicism every bit as deep as that which infected the nation when Richard Nixon was shamed from office and when Bill Clinton brought shame to the office.

This must end, but John McCain can't do it. He can't inspire, nor can he really break from a past that is breaking this nation.

McCain is an American hero, and he has served this country in the Senate with determination. He has gone against his party, but the fact is his ties to the Bush administration and its policies are deep. Americans know we cannot keep going down this path.

McCain, who has voted consistently for deregulation, started off two weeks ago declaring the U.S. economy fundamentally sound but ended the week sounding like a populist. Who is he really?

He tends to shoot from the hip and go on gut instinct. The nation cannot go through four more years of literally and figuratively shooting now and asking questions later.

But the fact is, we worry he won't have four years. If elected, at 72, he would be the oldest incoming president in U.S. history. He's in good health now, we're told, although he has withheld most of his medical records. That means Gov. Sarah Palin could very well become president.

And that brings us to McCain's most troubling trait: his judgment.

While praiseworthy for putting the first woman on a major-party presidential ticket since Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, his selection of Palin as a running mate was appalling. The first-term governor is clearly not experienced enough to serve as vice president or president if required. Her lack of knowledge is being covered up by keeping her away from questioning reporters and doing interviews only with those considered friendly to her views.

We're not suggesting Obama is without faults. He, like McCain, has demonstrated a marked lack of knowledge in recent days about the financial mess facing this nation.

But unlike McCain, who is trying to position himself as a born-again regulator, Obama would increase the oversight of our markets and demand accountability. He would actually put regulators in the oversight agencies that were systematically dismantled by the Bush administration.

While the blame doesn't all accrue to the Bush administration, the past eight years have been marked by looking the other way. McCain aided and abetted that behavior.

Republicans have tried repeatedly to paint Obama as an elitist. Hardly. He grew up in a single-parent home and, by the sheer force of his desire and cerebral horsepower, ended up at Harvard Law School, where he became the first African-American president of the Harvard Law Review.

He could have gone for the money. He didn't. He went to Chicago, where he worked to give a voice to those who didn't have one.

That's hardly the mark of an elitist.

He hasn't lost touch with regular people, whereas McCain doesn't even know how many homes he owns.

Obama rose quickly through the Illinois Legislature and propelled himself into the U.S. Senate.

After winning the Democratic nomination against a large and highly experienced field of candidates, Obama picked one of them, Joe Biden, as his running mate. Biden brings to the ticket the vast foreign affairs experience and knowledge that Obama lacks.

Obama has been accused of being an empty suit, all talk and no action. There's no "there" there, his detractors say.

The charge is no more credible than that of him being an elitist.

Obama can inspire, and our nation desperately needs an inspirational leader. And he does not carry the deep scars of Vietnam, as do many of McCain's generation.

He offers hope. A new way of doing business. And a belief that our system of government can be made to work.

He's the clear choice.

i'm writing this as a sort-of open letter to the people at emi.
i'm signed to mute records(for the last 15 years, actually), and as mute is owned
by emi that makes me an emi artist.
as some of you might know, the record business is falling apart.
revenues are down, cd sales are plummeting, people are losing their jobs, etc.
things at the record companies, especially the major labels, aren't looking so good.
one bright spot in this dismal retail firmament is the sale of music on-line through
portals like i-tunes.
the dance music equivalent of i-tunes is a site called beatport.
beatport, and other similar sites, enables you to preview dance tracks and then, if you like, buy them.
the average cost for a track on beatport is twice or three times the cost of a track on i-tunes(which
makes sense, as the tracks are a lot longer).
emi happily allow their music to be sold on i-tunes, but they don't allow their(and, by extension, my)music
to be sold on portals like beatport.
for over a year now i've been asking people at emi why they won't allow their electronic
dance music to be sold on beatport and i still haven't received a good answer.
one might think that in a time of rapidly dwindling revenues that a viable
and proven outlet like beatport might be greeted ecstatically at emi and the major labels.
but no.
very simply, i don't know why emi won't allow their(and my) dance tracks to be sold on beatport(for
an average cost of around $2.00 per track), but i do know that by not allowing their
electronic dance music to be sold on beatport that emi have denied themselves
very considerable revenue and have limited the audience for their electronic
dance artists(not to mention remixes done for their non-electronic dance artists, like
radiohead and coldplay).
many dj's live in urban areas with great indie-dance shops, and many dj's buy vinyl
and cd's on-line from great indie-dance shops, but there are thousands and thousands
of dj's who pretty much only buy their music from sites like beatport.
and with emi refusing to allow beatport(and similar sites)to sell their music it basically
means that tens of thousands of dj's around the world don't have access to any of
the dance records being released by mute and emi artists.
so this is my letter to anyone at emi who might be reading: by not allowing your music to be
sold on sites like beatport you are losing money daily and seriously compromising the careers
of your electronic artists(like, for example, the chemical brothers, me, massive attack, etc).
i can't see why you(the people at emi)wouldn't remedy this immediately and allow
people to buy your records on beatport and similar sites.
thanks
moby

from a friend in Wyoming:

A doctor in Cheyenne was talking to a patient of his, a 75 year old rancher. They started talking about politics and the doctor asked the rancher his thoughts on Sarah Palin.
The old rancher said,

"Well, ya know, Palin is a 'Post Turtle'".

Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him what a 'post turtle' was. The old rancher said,

"When you're driving down a country road you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that's a 'post turtle".

The old rancher saw the puzzled look on the doctor's face so he continued to explain.

"You know she didn't get up there by herself, she doesn't belong up there, and she doesn't know what to do while she's up there, and you just wonder what kind of dummy put her up there to begin with".

hi, i'm not sure if you're registered to vote or not, but here's a link to a site that will help
you to find out your status and to register to vote if you're not already registered.
thanks,
moby

http://my.barackobama.com/vfc

here's sarah palin defending her 'i know foreign policy cos alaska is sort of near the eastern border of russia' statement.
can anyone take her seriously?
moby

http://gawker.com/5054861/palin-stop-making-fun-of-me

thanks to everyone who came to degenerates on thursday night and the little
death show on saturday night.
hopefully everyone's fully recovered.
i'm taking a sort-of news-fast, but i just checked the election news to see that in the last week:

1-john mccain confused the army with the national guard
2-got confused about his running mates children
3-confused his running mate(palin)with his opponent(obama)
4-confused the sec with the fec
5-got further confused about who hires/fires the head of the sec
6-called the economy 'fundamentally strong' when wall street had it's biggest
crisis in a generation

add this to his earlier confusion about sunni vs. shi'ite and his confusion
about the country of czechoslovakia(which hasn't been a country for 15 years).

do you see a pattern?
confusion.
it's dangerous to pretend that john mccain's age isn't an issue. he's not a bad guy.
he's a war hero. he's got a good sense of humor. but he's showing potential signs
of dementia and early-onset alzheimer's(memory loss, confusion, irrational outbursts, rage, etc).
regardless of one's party alliance i really don't know how anyone can make the case that the united states
would be well served by a president with dementia/early-onset alzheimers and a vice-president
who has only left north america once in her life and who believes that dinosaurs
and humans co-existed.

moby

here's information regarding an event i'm doing with ellen degeneres and portia de rossi and carole king in l.a on september 28th.
it's to raise money for the yes-prop 2 campaign.
even if you eat eggs or chickens or pork or veal you are probably horrified by the way animals
are housed and treated in the factory farming system.
to be clear, although i'm a vegan this is not about getting people to stop eating eggs or meat, it's about ending
abhorrent and inhumane factory farming practices in california.
here's the information:

Ellen DeGeneres and Portia de Rossi invite you to:
Sunday, September 28th in Bel Air, California.
Reception, gourmet dinner, presentation and entertainment
Special musical performances by Carole King and Moby(acoustic set).
In support of the YES! on Prop 2 campaign
For more information or tickets, contact leigh@hsushollywood.org or call 818.501.2275
For more info on YES! on Prop 2, visit www.yesonprop2.com and help us help farmed animals

hopefully see you there/then.
moby

p.s-please feel free to send this to anyone who might be interested.

i want to stop writing about politics for a while, really i do.
but i just read that when sarah palin was a mayor in alaska she passed
legislation that billed rape victims for the 'rape kits' used to collect forensic evidence at the scene of the crime.
so, a woman is raped in sara palin's town, and the rape victim, thanks to sarah palin's
legislation, has to pay the cost of the evidence collection.
it amazes me that women support sarah palin when palin opposes abortions
for rape and incest victims and also passed legislation billing rape victims
for the police/forensic work done at the scene of the crime.
it's a terrible time here in the u.s when an unqualified and deeply unethical(not
to mention crazy, as sarah palin also believes that dinosaurs and humans
walked the earth at the same time)woman like
sarah palin could be an inch away from being president of the united states.
moby

for a change, a non-political update.
instead here's a full-blown narcissistic self-promoting update.
some things:

- disco lies is out today in the u.s and u.k with great remixes by freemasons, dusty kid, spencer and hill, diskokaine, jaques renault, eddie thoneick
- degenerates at hiro ballroom this thursday with: bloc party dj's, and brazilian girls dj's, and me(dj'ing).
-the little death at mercury lounge this saturday night for beer fueled blues and rock

and some other upcoming dj dates here in the u.s and a(and canada, o' canada).

Saturday, Oct 25
Meltdown [Moby DJ Set] @ Lizard Lounge, Dallas
Friday, Oct 31
Freaknight 08 [Moby DJ Set] @ WAMU Theater, Seattle
Saturday, Nov 1
The Plaza Club [Moby DJ Set] @ The Plaza Club, Vancouver

i think that's it for now.
oh, as we have so many great remixes from 'last night'(none done by me, that's why they're so good)i think we might
put out 'last night: remixed' at some point this year.
i'll let you know more as i know more.
one good thing about the demise of the record business is that you can actually be more spontaneous, in a 'hey, let's put out
a record in a month or two' way.
it's hard not to write about politics, but i'm exercising restraint.
see?
restraint.
moby

in establishing sarah palin's foreign policy credentials the mccain camp have listed:

a-that she lives a few hundred miles from russia's barely populated eastern border(which happens to be about 4,000 miles
from moscow...)

b-that she travelled to iraq

c-that she travelled to ireland

d-that she travelled to canada and mexico(on vacation)

now it turns out that they lied about her trip to iraq. huh, how about that. she never actually went to iraq.
they said she went to iraq. and she never went to iraq.
and it turns out that they even stretched the truth about her going to ireland. her plane
touched down in ireland to refuel, but she didn't actually get off the plane.
to quote the obama camp: 'is there anything that john mccain HASN'T lied about?'
i mean, at this point how can anyone believe anything coming out of mccain's or palin's mouth?
they lie.
and lie.
and then when they get tired from all the lying they take a break and lie some more, just for fun.
at least the rest of the country seem to be waking up and recognizing that mccain and palin are, essentially
and basically, liars.
even when i was in elementary school we knew that liars were the lowest of the low.
if you were 6 years old and got caught lying you had to take a time-out and sit by yourself for a while.
maybe john mccain and sarah palin should be given a time-out to sit and think about all of
the lies that they've been telling?
moby

look, barry o. is funny!
moby

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/09/10/obama-appears-on-letterma_n_125...

did you watch the sarah palin interview on abc?
or john mccain on the view?
mccain and palin are liars.
in general the republicans are way too comfortable with lying.
henceforth when you talk about republicans or mccain or palin use the word 'liars', ok?
this is how we win: make 'republican' synonymous with 'liar'.
luckily for us it's easy, as almost every time a republican opens his/her mouth they're lying.
lets make 'republican' the dirty word it deserves to be.
moby

thank you for all of the birthday wishes, they're really nice.
i didn't even need my bi-focals to read them, which is encouraging.
yesterday i moved into a new apartment, and i went to the local
deli to buy shower soap.
i bought what i thought was soap(the vague text was mainly in mandarin), and found
out as i was showering that it was actually hand lotion.
my sagacious birthday advice: don't shower with hand lotion. it just makes for a greasy
shower and doesn't do much to improve cleanliness and/or smell.
hopefully see you next thursday at hiro for 'degenerates' with bloc party and the brazilian girls, and also
next saturday at mercury lounge for the little death show.
and really, thank you for the birthday wishes.
i honestly thought that my adulthood would be spent working at the post office
and making music in my spare time that no one would ever actually listen to(maybe i could've
ended up as a sub-par musical version of henry darger).
so, thank you for the birthday wishes and for occasionally being willing to listen to the music
that i make.
see you soon,
moby

lipstick on a pig?
it's a completely fake controversy.
and, for the record, john mccain used the same analogy describing hillary clinton's health-care
policies just a few months ago.
why haven't the media mentioned this?

moby

ah, finally the democrats are fighting back.
for years the republicans have lied.
and lied.
and lied.
and ruined the country in the process.
and the democrats said nothing.
now the same republicans who lied and ruined the country are trying to run
as 'mavericks' or 'agents of change'.
which are just more pernicious lies.
now at least the democrats are fighting back.
about time.
moby

look ma, no politics.
instead, a couple of upcoming things:

on thursday september 18th we're having another 'degenerates' night where i'll be dj'ing with some of the guys from bloc party and the brazilian girls at hiro ballroom in nyc.
i don't know if tickets are available on line yet or not.
i think it'll go from 11pm - 4 or 5 a.m.

http://degenerates-nyc.com

and then on saturday september 20th i'm playing with the little death at
mercury lounge.
if you want tickets you can get them here:

http://www.mercuryloungenyc.com/calendar/show/1997/

also dj'ing sunday at virgin fest here in toronto(yay canada), with tickets
available anywhere you get tickets in canada.
so, hopefully see you soon!
moby

here's the integrity of the gop in full effect.
nice consistent messaging by gop pundits...

http://blogs.cqpolitics.com/politicalinsider/2008/09/the-case-against-ta...

moby

ok, sorry, but i just got back from a brief trip to the desert and now i'm headed
to toronto and i see that sarah palin lied her way through her rnc speech.
what the hell is it with republicans and their complete ease and comfort with
lying?
do they not think they'll be found out?
this is how sarah palin chooses to present herself to the world, by lying?
the day after her speech abc ran a fact check on her speech and found that she knowingly
lied/misrepresented the truth 5 different times in one speech.
i'd love to stop writing about politics, but how do you just sit back quietly while
the opposition party openly lies about your chosen candidate?
why aren't republicans comfortable running a campaign on issues and positions?
why do they feel the need to blatantly lie and misrepresent the truth?
ugh, disgusting.
ok, off to nice, sane canada.
moby

ah boy, sorry, but another political one.
the more i find out about sarah palin the more repulsed i am by the gop.
some fun facts about sarah palin(from the new york times and washington post)-

a-when she was first elected mayor she tried to have 'morally questionable'
books banned from her towns library

b-she fired the town librarian for being too moderate, and had to re-hire her
when the people of the town wanted her back.

c-she's currently under investigation for firing a police commissioner who refused
to fire a policeman who sarah pallin didn't like. not a policeman who'd broken the law
or been bad at his job, but a policeman who was sarah palin's brother in law, and whom
she didn't like. she's also under investigation for taking $100,000 in tax-payer
money to pay her legal bills.

d-the pastor of her church(where she was baptised and where she's worshipped for
most of her life)said that anyone voting for john kerry wasn't going to get into
heaven and that people who criticize president bush are going to hell.
literally, that's what he said.

e-a few months ago sarah palin was leading a prayer to god that went:
"I think God's will has to be done in unifying companies to get that gas line built, so pray for that," .
yes, she was praying to god to get oil companies to build a pipeline for natural gas.

who the hell is this person, and how in any way is she qualified to be vice-president
or, god forbid, president?
eesh, what are the republicans thinking? and now the mccain camp and the republicans are
threatening to not talk to the media because they don't like the questions the media are
asking about sarah palin, like, 'how is someone who has literally no foreign policy experience
qualified to be president of the united states?'
ok, now i promise, no more politics for a while.
moby