Update

In my first post, I mentioned the Hand Held Video revolution of the 1990's and that maybe it wasn't such a big deal anymore.

Thanks to my good friend Dave--you can read his blog here, I've been alerted to several people who are making the media their own, as well as adding:

"[D]on't forget, we have something now that we've never had before. We have free distribution of our video on the internets. Now not only do we have the ability to shoot it, we have the ability to spread it without relying on disinterested traditional media outlets."

Search Google Video and YouTube with terms like "Police Abuses". I know there have been several cases lately that have come up thanks to people using their cameraphones, which is fantastic.

I also have to mention, courtesy of the Randi Rhodes Show:
"Refuge of Last Resort": A Hi-Def doc on the aftermath of Katrina shot by the people who would know best: survivors who stuck it out and recorded shocking scenes from the streets of NOLA: before and AFTER the "cavalry" arrived....

Man, I miss my video camera...

Things I know...

Three things I know for sure:

I love my pizza thin and my women thick.

I feel I can confidently point where country music began to suck.

For 92% of the population, "I like all kinds of music" is as big a lie as "The check is in the mail" and "We do not torture".

What is Gonzeaux? What is Journalism?

I wrote this all out in longhand on Sunday night, and I debated putting this up, but in the words of John Lee Hooker, "It's in him, and it's got to come out..."

It's a very weird time in our country. Hunter is dead, Dennis Miller has become a right-wing nut and most people are less concerned about Habeas Corpus than they are about Lindsey Lohan's coke habit.

We have a President who believes he is ordained by God to lead a Crusade for Infinite Justice and a populace who's willing to let him as long as their steady stream of digital cable isn't interrupted.

Even the Fourth Estate has failed us. Journalism nowadays has gone the way of just about everything else nowadays: either entrenched in their respective dogmas or working as a thinly veiled shill for the latest product from their corporate masters.

Now, all of this is obvious to anyone who's been paying attention for at least the last five years. The real question posed to us is, "What now?" Some believe that the so-called "Blogosphere" is the Great Blank Hope of the lost American Voice. The sad truth is that the ones who need the info provided by the bloggers rarely get it, and they get no help from Mainstream Media, who either see them as interlopers or charlatans. So sadly the "Blogosphere" is in danger of going the way of the "Handheld Camera Revolution" from the mid-90's.

So why this blog? This comes not from a need to philosophize or prostlytize, but to execute some form of Socratic Venting. Trying to avoid the empty cry of the 'rant, but at the same time ask (and hopefully answer) the questions no one is willing to say out loud. However, since the personal is political and vice-versa I will occasional post some personal reflections but I promise to avoid the "cheese sandwich" content that pollutes too many blogs out there.

Regarding the name, I like its meta quality; not only is it a tribute to both Hunter Thompson and Frank Zappa (Phydeaux, anyone?), but it's translated as "shining path" which gives a noble sense of hopefulness to things...

Incidentally, Shining Path is also a group of brutal South American terrorists. Oh well. There you go.

Test Message

This is a test of the Blogger remote email posting system.  If this had been an actual post, it would have been more pointless...

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