The Cocktailian. Okay, so we can't have The Professor making one of my original cocktails every week, now, can we? (Well, I'd quickly run out of them, and would have to get mighty busy!) This fortnight The Professor offers someone else's new concoction, invented at Arterra Restaurant near the Del Mar race track outside San Diego, a orangey delight fit for a thoroghbred.
The fine art of the dinner party. David shaw offers a terrific article about the perils and joys of throwing a dinner party and how to deal with the inevitable surprises and left turns.
When we call to invite guests, we always ask, "Is there anything you don't eat or drink, anything you are allergic to or have aesthetic, political, religious or any other kinds of objections to?"We do that too -- glad we're on track with the Food Section pros. His adventures include inviting a famous restauranteur over and having him ask if he can bring his friend Wolfgang Puck along, as well as dealing with some increidbly boorish would-be guests:
No-shows or last-minute cancellations are even worse, of course, than late arrivals. And late announcements of dietary restrictions can be especially difficult. One time, a couple called the morning of the day we were expecting them and said they were vegetarians . something they hadn't disclosed when we invited them and asked about dietary preferences and prohibitions. Lucy immediately changed her menu and sent me shopping for the necessary ingredients. Most everything was done when the couple called about 6 p.m. and said they couldn't make it.Y'know, I try to be as flexible and accommodating as possible, but if someone pulled the above scenario, barring an excuse like serious illness or death in the family, it'd likely be a long, long time before they'd be extended another dinner invitation. Yeesh.
The Bush administration is supporting a provision in the House leadership's intelligence reform bill that would allow U.S. authorities to deport certain foreigners to countries where they are likely to be tortured or abused, an action prohibited by the international laws against torture the United States signed 20 years ago.This is shameful.
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The rise of the "bar chefs". The cocktailian revolution continues. The New York Times explores local bartenders who demand only the finest ingredients in both old and new cocktails, taking a culinary approach to drinkmaking (as well they should).
"I take a more culinary approach," said Julie Reiner, who owns the lounge, which is on 19th Street just west of Fifth Avenue, with partners. "Ever since I started bartending, I wanted to take making drinks to a different level. I prefer to make a cocktail with muddled fresh raspberries than to use Stoli raspberry vodka. I think of myself like a chef."Hey, without Stoli raspberry vodka, we woudln't have the Footloose! (We tried it with a homemade vodka infused with fresh raspberries. It was still really good.) As we've been seeing in bars from Los Angeles to Dublin, these drinks often come with a big price tag -- up to $15 or more. But since regular crappy drinks are reaching the $10 mark (including at The Abbey in West Hollywood, where for $10 I received The Worst Manhattan I've Ever Had In My Entir Life, Inexpertly And Indifferently Made And Served), I've developed an attitude of "I'd rather pay $15 for a great cocktail than $10 for a crappy one."
President Eisenhower's son dumps Bush. John Eisenhower, son of President Dwight D. Eisenhower and a lifelong Republican, declares that he is switching to Independent and voting for John Kerry in November.
As son of a Republican President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, it is automatically expected by many that I am a Republican. For 50 years, through the election of 2000, I was. With the current administration's decision to invade Iraq unilaterally, however, I changed my voter registration to independent, and barring some utterly unforeseen development, I intend to vote for the Democratic Presidential candidate, Sen. John Kerry.Republicans, to the lifeboats. Save yourselves (and all of us) while you can.
And this is even richer. The Lone Star Iconoclast, the weekly newspaper in George W. Bush's adopted hometown of Crawford, Texas, has endorsed John Kerry for president. The paper endorsed Bush in 2000, and this time in the course of endorsing Kerry rip Bush a new one (or two or three):
Kerry Will Restore American DignityThis gave me my second-biggest smile of the day.
And what was the biggest smile of the day? Seeing the first big shiny press release (caution, 3.2MB PDF) for Doctors, Professors, Kings and Queens: The Big Ol' Box of New Orleans! And there's a blurb on it, too!
"A hip-shaking, party-making collection of great music -- and more -- from the Big Easy."Okay, so nobody really calls it the "Big Easy". But Blues Revue! It's a start! And you can already pre-order it from Amazon! Release date October 27, less than a month. Woo! Sorry I'm so excitable, but after a year of working on this, I think I get to be excited. So there!
I believe the Mystery Men have an opening. As we plunge boldly forward in the era of the costumed superhero ... move over, Superman! Step aside, Spider-Man! (Although Tom and Tobey can come over to our house for cocktails anytime.) Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you ... Terrifica! Actually, Terrifica performs a valid public service, but her superpowers put her squarely at the level of The Shoveler, Mr. Furious and The Spleen ("Wanna shee my shecret power? Pull my finger." "NO, NO, DON'T!")
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Have no you sense of decency, sirs, at long last? Have you no sense of decency? That question is addressed to the president of the United States and his senior adviser, speaking of despicable politics ... This morning Josh highlighted an article in the forthcoming issue of The Atlantic Monthly specifically focusing on Karl Rove -- George W. Bush's senior political adviser -- and how he conducted several past campaigns. The sources for the article included several former Rove staffers who helped organize what was described. One of the most infamous was a race in Alabama, where Rove "launched a whispering campaign against one Democratic opponent suggesting that the candidate -- a sitting Alabama state Supreme Court Justice, who had long worked on child welfare issues -- was in fact a pedophile ...
When his term on the court ended, he chose not to run for re-election. I later learned another reason why. Kennedy had spent years on the bench as a juvenile and family-court judge, during which time he had developed a strong interest in aiding abused children. In the early 1980s he had helped to start the Children's Trust Fund of Alabama, and he later established the Corporate Foundation for Children, a private, nonprofit organization. At the time of the race he had just served a term as president of the National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse and Neglect. One of Rove's signature tactics is to attack an opponent on the very front that seems unassailable. Kennedy was no exception.Do you think this is right, Bush voters? This is okay with you? You support this means to the end of getting a candidate elected? You approve of this? Go back and look at nearly every campaign Rove has been involved with, from his 19-year-old college Republican days, when he stole letterhead from the local Democratic headquarters and printed false fliers to make the Democrats look bad, to the 2000 presidential election, where his finely orchestrated whisper campaigns during the primaries destroyed John McCain. Josh finishes, "This is just one snippet from the piece. But when you read the whole thing, what happened in South Carolina in 2000 and what's happening now with Kerry and the Swift Boat business will all seem a lot more clear." If Bush had any sense of decency amidst his sense of smirking entitlement, he wouldn't let Karl Rove into the same building with him; instead, he's practically made him co-president, approving of all the techniques Rove used to get him into office, many of which -- like the above -- are simply inhuman.
Republicans eliminate tax relief for the working poor. "Fuck 'em" seems to be the attitude. They're not the rich (we want their money) or the middle-class (we want their votes), so fuck 'em.
Senate Finance Committee Chairman Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) sided with Democratic leaders in pushing for changes in the child tax credit to ensure that millions of poor families would not see their credits shrink or disappear next year.Read this series of articles to see the true impact of the Bush tax cuts. We're plunging into record deficits, and he and his ilk want to make their tax cuts (especially those for the rich) permanent. They must be insane.
A vote for Bush is a vote for his deficit. Have a look at this graph. Does this represent someone who's doing a good job for our economy?
It's happening already. If they're allowed to continue, you can see how much worse it's going to get. (Via Brad DeLong)
Flip-flopper? Via TBogg, who said, "Looks like we're going to have to play some more Follow The Money":
President Bush, under election-year pressure from Democrats and some fellow Republicans over Iraq, promised on Saturday to step up the pace of spending on reconstruction contracts in that country despite the violence."So even administration officials are saying the Bush is lying," sayid TBogg.
Bush on Saturday also touted efforts to train Iraqi security forces. He said nearly 100,000 "fully trained and equipped" Iraqi soldiers, police officers and other security personnel were already working and that the Iraqi government was on track to build a force of over 200,000 security personnel by the end of 2005.TBogg: "Whoops! Lied again! Thank Jeebus he's not a flip-flopper. At least with a liar you know what to expect..."
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N.Y. Times: "This is despicable politics." Yesterday:
President Bush and his surrogates are taking their re-election campaign into dangerous territory. Mr. Bush is running as the man best equipped to keep America safe from terrorists -- that was to be expected. We did not, however, anticipate that those on the Bush team would dare to argue that a vote for John Kerry would be a vote for Al Qaeda. Yet that is the message they are delivering -- with a repetition that makes it clear this is an organized effort to paint the Democratic candidate as a friend to terrorists.What does it say about someone who willingly votes for a person whose politics are so blatantly despicable?
Bush's "flip-flopping" charge unsupported by facts. Typical, isn't it? Via Josh: Marc Sandalow, Washington bureau chief of the San Francisco Chronicle, decided to investigate Bush's charges "that John Kerry has waffled on Iraq policy by actually going back and reviewing his record as expressed in policy statements, speeches and votes. Not surprisingly, he found Kerry has had pretty much the same position since the whole Iraq debate started ..."
NEWS ANALYSISU.S. killing more Iraqi civilians than insurgents are. Via Kos:
Coalition fatalities in Iraq: 1183Things are going really well, though.
Pakistan's Musharraf: Iraq war has made world "more dangerous ... not safer." Via AmericaBlog, where John says, "Somebody get on the bat-phone to the Kerry people RIGHT NOW. THIS is their next TV commercial."
CNN: PAULA ZAHN NOW 8:00PMHey, he's a trusted ally, right? Trust him.
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Wednesday night's dessert. Our friends Gregg and Mike were kind enough to bring us some nummy stuff back from their trip to San Francisco as their thanks for taking care of their house and bunny rabbit whilst they were away. I decided to use it for a dessert rather than a savory dish, and about 30 seconds of Googling helped me make it into a wonderful dessert the other night.
Oh my God, it was good.
Editorial cartoon of the day. by Jeff Danziger, via Atrios, who says, "Yep. This is the modern Republican Party."
 France, Germany: "They're crazy." Josh Marshall wrote yesterday:
In a startling development late in the presidential campaign cycle, editors of the satirical magazine The Onion have taken over the Bush-Cheney '04 Communications Office and seized at least operational control of Winger Central (WC), the office in downtown Washington near the corner of 17th and M, which sends out marching orders to conservative columnists.I sometimes wonder if I'm asleep, and the last almost-four years have been a long, drawn-out fever dream. Surely situations this surreal and bizarre can't really be happening.
Isn't it romaaaaaaantic ... Yet again, Britney Spears stands as a shining beacon of the sanctity of marriage.
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Recipe of the day. I must try this immediately. (Via Galway blog Smoke Signals.)
Guinness Stout Ice CreamJaysus.
If the war were in the U.S. ... Professor Juan Cole, one of the most knowledgeable and astute observers of Middle Eastern affairs, wrote this article on his website last Wednesday, and today it was reproduced in his entirety in the Los Angeles Times. In the wake of "interim Prime Minister" Iyad Allawi's Bush-parroting speech to the Congress yesterday, I feel the need to reproduce it in its entirety:
President Bush said Tuesday that the Iraqis are refuting the pessimists and implied that things are improving in that country.Sure, Messrs. Allawi and Bush, we're really succeeding in Iraq.
Unconstitutional and un-American. What Jason said: "I see that now, our country has upped the ante, moving from shitting on people's basic rights to trying to prevent the Supreme Court from defending people's basic rights. Americans can complain all they want about the downward trajectory this place is on, but when push comes to shove, all these policymakers were either elected by us or appointed (and approved) by the people we elected. And if we continue to elect and approve asshats who'd rather pillage the Constitution than read it -- or worse, not vote, and let others choose our fate for us — then we're to blame." Couldn't have said it better myself. My feeling for those who would write and vote for a bill to unconstitutionally attempt to restrict the Supreme Court from hearing cases challenging the inclusion of "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance is the same that I had for Ku Klux Klansman David Duke. During Duke's sole term in the Louisiana legislature he only authored one bill -- to reduce the penalty for assault to a $25 fine for anyone convicted of assaulting someone who was burning a flag.
The definition of irony? Via Brian (and thanks!), an article in the Washington Post containing a link to the full text of Bush's speech to the U.N. in which he says:
We know that dictators are quick to choose aggression, while free nations strive to resolve differences in peace.Says Brian, "If I remember right from grade school english, that's the literary device known as irony, right?" Right.
Quote of the day. I'd love to hear Peter Jennings say something like this:
"As of yesterday, the Bush administration still hadn't found the source of the White House leak that outed a woman as a CIA operative. To recap, here are the things President Bush can't find: The source of the leak, weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, Osama bin Laden, the link between Saddam and Osama bin Laden, the guy who sent the anthrax through the mail, and his own butt with two hands and a flashlight."Bad, bad bunnies. When I was a kid, the ultimate punishment (short of a spanking) was the dreaded ... Tabasco On The Tongue! This was reserved for those rare occasions when I dared to use a "bad word" or, horror of horrors, mouth off at my parental units. It's the New Orleans equivalent of Washing Your Mouth Out With Soap. Eventually I began to feel really sorry for all those other kids all over the world; when they said "fuck" in front of their mommas they had to taste soap, but I got to taste Tabasco. From my perspective of hindsight I can say that Tabasco tastes far, far better than soap. I must have had a sassy little mouth, because I seem to have developed quite an affinity for Tabasco, and nowadays I go through it by the gallon (I mouth off a lot less, but I swear a lot more). Fortunately for Danish farmers, Danish bunnies seem to have not developed this affinity.
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Bush lies about what Kerry said, and Peter Jennings calls him on it (QuickTime video clip). Here's the transcript:
JENNINGS: We were struck today by a very pointed attack by President Bush on John Kerry. First of all, this is what Mr. Bush said:Bush is a cold, calculated, practiced, pathetic liar. Good job, Peter. Keep it up.
Another New Orleans musician leaves us. Legendary jazz trombonist Waldren "Frog" Joseph, Sr. passed away in New Orleans on Sunday, aged 86. He played in Papa Celestin's and Paul Barbarin's bands, among others, and was the father of sousaphonist extraordinaire Kirk Joseph of the Dirty Dozen Brass Band and trombonist Charles Joseph. If you're in New Orleans, you may wish to know that the public is invited to attend a viewing Friday from 7 p.m. until 10 p.m. at Tharp Funeral Home at 600 Moss St. On Saturday, a jazz funeral Mass will be held at Corpus Christi Catholic Church at 2022 St. Bernard Ave. Viewing will be from 8 a.m. until 10 a.m., followed by the Mass. Burial will be in St. Louis Cemetery No. 3 at 3421 Esplanade Ave. And the Dirty Dozen strikes up "Just A Closer Walk With Thee" ...
May the wind take your troubles away. Very good news ... Jay Farrar is reforming Son Volt after a five-year hiatus:
Midwest-based Son Volt, with songwriter Jay Farrar at the helm, will begin recording their fourth full length album at the end of September. Following a five-year hiatus, with the exception of the April 2004 recording of "Sometimes" for the Alejandro Escovedo tribute album, multi-instrumentalist Dave Boquist, bassist Jim Boquist and drummer Mike Heidorn will reconvene at Farrar.s St. Louis studio.At this point I was beginning to think it'd be Jay solo for good, as the last interview I read with Heidorn said he was done with the music biz (and especially with touring). I'm very, very happy to hear this. (That track on the Escovedo tribute is great, too.) The webcam thing is fascinating, although I expect I'd get bored with it pretty quickly without audio.
The L.A. Times discovers food blogging. Well, better late than never. The article's not too bad, catches a few great individual pages (such as The Table of Condiments that Periodically Go Bad, which is printed out and magneted to our refrigerator) and a couple of great weblogs, Sauté Wednesday and Chocolate and Zucchini, but misses or ignores tons of others. Her really good find, however, which I kinda forgot about, was The Julie/Julia Project, in which blogger and home cook Julie Powell chronicled her year of cooking her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking, making every single recipe during that year. I should go back and read that whole thing (although the article says Julie got a book contract, so maybe I can just get it then). The article makes its best point here:
The dullness of everyday life is an inescapable fact of the blogosphere. What set Powell apart from many food bloggers is that her story had an arc: a beginning, a middle and a satisfying, Cinderella-like ending. After she chronicled her cooking of 536 recipes in 365 days, she got a book contract and gave up her weblog. The majority of food bloggers, whether they are professional writers or talented amateurs or semi-insane ranters, offer no narrative apart from what they cooked and what they ate.Really good food writers place their chronicles of cooking and dining into the context of a life, which (for instance) is one of the reasons why I always enjoy reading the columns by my friend Meredith Brody, former food writer for the Los Angeles New Times and currently for the SF Weekly. (Read her stuff, then go up to the city and eat!) Also, I'll go through my library tonight and later this week I'll post a list of some food-related titles that I enjoyed, and that you might enjoy too.
Frosty beverage of the day. Today's L.A. Times Food Section also featured a recipe for a yummy looking drink, non-alcoholic no less, kinda of like a virgin Mojito, that's a signature cooler at Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken's restaurants Ciudad and Border Grill. It looks like just the thing to help take the edge off the beastly hot and dry Santa Ana winds, which are supposed to start blowing in the next day or so. (I hate da Sanna Anas ... too dry! I miss da humidity!)
These'll look great in our new Mignon Faget Fleur-de-Lis Tumblers, too. (Um, I'm sure a few lil' squoits o' rum wouldn't hoit, now, would it?)
Voter terrorism. From Salon: "For decades, Republicans have mounted highly organized operations to discourage minorities from voting. Experts say there's no reason to believe this year's presidential campaign will be any different."
[During the 2003 Philadelphia race between John Street, the African-American incumbent Democrat, and Sam Katz, the white Republican challenger,] in an attempt to intimidate African-Americans and deter them from showing up at the polls, the Katz campaign, or one of its associates, put together a team of men dressed in official-looking attire -- dark suits, lapel pins bearing insignia of federal or local law-enforcement agencies -- and sent them into areas of the city with large black populations. According to Sherry Swirsky, a local antitrust attorney who is active in Democratic politics and who worked as an election monitor that day, the men carried clipboards and drove around in unmarked black vans.If you're not a Salon Premium member, sit through the commercial and read this one.
The Rise of Pseudo Fascism, Part 1. Last Sunday journalist David Neiwert began what's shaping up to be an excellent six-part series. Here's his first article, "The Morphing of the Conservative Movement". An excerpt:
When trying to make sense of the seemingly inextricable political morass into which we.ve descended, one of the real keys to understanding our situation is realizing that conservatism and the "conservative movement" are in fact two entirely different things.[ Link to today's entries ]
Everything tastes better when wrapped in bacon. Tom Fitzmorris posted a recipe for Chicken Livers with Bacon and Pepper Jelly in the New Orleans Menu Daily the other day, and although I'm not the world's biggest liver fan, this looks so good that I can't resist trying it, and will soon. The idea of tossing the chicken livers in pepper jelly, purloined from The Praline Connection, sounds great. Wrapping them in bacon instantly makes them good, right? Then he said, "This is absolutely spectacular served over a plate of red beans and rice", as an alternative to sausage." Intriguing!
Taking the Footloose to another level? We tried a fabulous infused vodka last night. I've been meaning to try the three vodkas produced by St. George Spirits under the Hangar One label -- "Buddha's Hand" Citron, Kaffir Lime and Mandarin Blossom. There's one out now that I hadn't seen before: Fraser River Raspberry, which will be an annual release in limited editions. They only infuse the vodka with the berries in the spring when they're at the height of their season, distill and then add more fresh juice to the finished product. The resulting vodka is beautifully reddish, unlike the clear Stolichnaya Razberi, with an intense, very fresh aroma and flavor. It's quite different from the Stoli product, and we couldn't wait to see how it worked in a Footloose Cocktail. It works beautifully, with the nose being very similar to a classic Footloose (if a little more fresh berrylike), a deeper color and a clean, powerful flavor. It's still recognizably a Footloose, yet it's different -- perhaps a Top Shelf Footloose. We'll definitely be trying it again, but as this stuff is nearly $40 as compared to about $16 for the Stoli product (which makes a perfectly fine Footloose), we probably won't use it all the time.
Tom Tomorrow's "This Modern World". What if there'd been a Democrat in the White House on 9/11?
What is Bush hiding? E. J. Dionne, in The Washington Post:
It is to be welcomed that President Bush wants to clear up questions about his National Guard service. He wants more details out there, and good for him. This story should be laid to rest, and the one person who can do it is named George W. Bush.There are a lot of authenticated documents that beg these questions as well.
Politics first, Americans last. With yet another execution of an American in Iraq by al-Zarqawi, one must look back at this story from last March and wonder why it didn't get more attention in the press and from the public -- it seems The Regime seems to be more interested in their own political agenda than in protecting Americans and fighting terrorism.
With Tuesday's attacks, Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant with ties to al-Qaida, is now blamed for more than 700 terrorist killings in Iraq.Read on ... more plans made, more plans spiked by the White House. Do you feel safer?
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Ciudada Minty Lime Cooler