Portrait was one of those bands that had one GREAT CD then … not so much. Artist: Portrait Tune: Honey Dip ...

Matt Damon’s latest movie, Green Zone, is an entertaining tale about the beginning of the Iraq war. Unfortunately, the commercials sell this as another Bourne Supremacy movie. It is not. Those of us who’ve kept up with the small minute details of how we got into the war and how the Bush administration sold the war may be disappointed because all of the names are changed. The details are compressed. Nonetheless, I found this extremely enjoyable movie. Matt Damon plays a soldier whose job it is to find weapons of mass destruction. The movie picks up as Damon and his crew ...

I like this rule. From HuffPo: New Rule: Let’s not fire the teachers when students don’t learn – let’s fire the parents. Last week President Obama defended the firing of every single teacher in a struggling high school in a poor Rhode Island neighborhood. And the kids were outraged. They said, “Why blame our teachers?” and “Who’s President Obama?” I think it was Whitney Houston who said, “I believe that children are our future – teach them well and let them lead the way.” And that’s the last sound piece of educational advice this country has gotten – from a ...

St George Cross the real National Flag of England is a post from: Diary of a British Expatriate Blogger in Helsinki,Finland St George Cross the real National Flag of England is a post from: Diary of a British Expatriate Blogger in Helsinki,Finland There have been many repeats of the British film”This is England”” on Finnish television lately.I know as a true Brit myself the importance of our National Flags,however it got me to thinking of The Union Jack [...] ...

I still can't get over the fact that I actually have a collection of science fiction, fantasy and such out there - or that the book is out from the very-great folks at Renaissance ebooks/Futures-Past! Check out this announcement they've sent out about Love Without Gun Control: Futures-Past Publisher Jean Marie Stine announces the publication of M. Christian's e-book collection Love Without Gun Control & Other Fantasy, Horror and Science Fiction Stories. The collection features "the cream of Christian's fantasy, horror, and science fiction stories. Only M. Christian ...

The Board of Education in Texas has been a place were conservatives beat their conservative agenda into the heads of our youth. Now, this is taking ideology too far. This is simply wrong. From TP: The Texas Board of Education has been meeting this week to revise its social studies curriculum. During the past three days, “the board’s far-right faction wielded their power to shape lessons on the civil rights movement, the U.S. free enterprise system and hundreds of other topics”: – To avoid exposing students to “transvestites, transsexuals and who knows what else,” the Board struck the curriculum’s reference to “sex ...

My father was listening to Taj Mahal in the late 70’s and early 80’s. Taj Mahal is still around and playing great music. Artist: Taj Mahal Tune: Queen Bee ...

Listen to Errington Thompson on Blog Talk Radio Today at 5 pm EST. I’ll have Heidi Shierholz from the Economic Policy Institute. I will also have Andy Coates from Physicians for a National Healthcare Program. This is going to be a GREAT show. Now, this is truly Progressive Radio. ...

As everybody knows by now representative Eric Massa resigned on Monday. The reasons for his resignation have changed over the week. Initially, he was resigning because of health reasons. Then the Dems were pushing him out over his healthcare vote (he voted against it). As the week unfolded, more and more allegations of sexual inappropriateness and groping with male staffers have come to light. Republicans saw this as an opening and immediately tried to blame Nancy Pelosi and stated that she knew more than she let on and tried to cover it up. ...

Do you remember Morris Day, the lead singer of one of the ultimate party groups, The Time? From the darkness, Morris Day would shout, “What Time Is It?” The music would start blaring and the party was on. It is time for health-care reform. It is time for us to have a universal program which covers everybody. We are currently spending 16% of our gross domestic product on health care. Personally, I think spending $2.3 trillion on health care is plenty of money. We should not have to spend any more to get everything that we want. We want access ...

He is trying to stop all abortions with his bill, at least abortions that aren’t paid for in cash. Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy From C&L: The Rachel Maddow Show did some digging and it appears that Bart Stupak may not actually have all the votes he’s claiming he has to stop the health care bill from being passed in the House. As Rachel also notes, since Stupak’s requests for changes to the bill are either impossible to get passed under reconciliation or just based on lies about what’s even in the ...

Said it before but have to say it again ... and again ... and again: I have some truly amazing friends. My great pal, Ralph Greco, Jr, has just posted a quickie interview with yours truly on the Short And Sweet NYC site. Thanks so much, Ralph!Here's a teaser. You can, of course, read the whole thing here. If you don't know the name M. Christian, then you're really not reading enough, now are you? The San Francisco-based scribe is a writer, anthologist, editor, blog-ist in contemporary genre fiction, with a heavy emphasis on cross-genre dirty stories ...

New Facelook for Diary of a British Expatriate in Finland is a post from: Diary of a British Expatriate Blogger in Helsinki,Finland New Facelook for Diary of a British Expatriate in Finland is a post from: Diary of a British Expatriate Blogger in Helsinki,Finland As some have noticed Diary of a British Expatriate has under gone a change with the theme and header recently being Re-Designed and updated. I hope that those readers who follow and subscribe to nectareal.com [...] ...

Since I'm still all-a-twitter (even though I don't twitter) over Kathleen Bradean's review of my Coming Together Presents M.Christian collection, I thought I might as well share this over review she did for Chroma, of my queer/quasi-vampire novel Running Dry - especially since it was just reprinted by the great folks at Camel Books.Shelly manages an art gallery in Los Angeles, a job that's lost its appeal for her. A handsome stranger comes in and asks for contact information for an artist who had a showing in her gallery a year before, Doud. The stranger ...

I think it is kind of amusing that there are a large group of people who question the science of global warming (climate change secondary to man burning hydrocarbons). So, I thought the best way to illustrate the craziness of the deniers would be to ask, how do you know oxygen exists? Almost all of us had some sort of biology and chemistry in high school. We did some sort of experiment and hopefully did not blow up the lab. I think that most of us remember experiment that we did using a technique called electrolysis. Somehow we ...

I’m changing my comment system, again. Echo just hasn’t worked out. I’m moving to Disqus. There may be some bumps in the road but hopefully, everything will be stable by early this afternoon.  Thanks for your patience. ...

The Obama administration is making a new effort to protect barrier islands and other coastal areas in the Gulf of Mexico area. Mississippi and Louisiana seem to be a specific focus of this program. (Above–A picture of Ship Island off the Mississippi coast. In the background you see Fort Massachusetts. The federal government controlled the island in the Civil war and used the island as a prison for Confederate soldiers. Black combat units were also trained on Ship Island. Here are facts about Ship Island.) From the Associated Press article on the Obama Gulf Coast effort— “Since the 1930s, the Mississippi River ...

Have you ever had a moment when you wished your high heels would part the sidewalk beneath your feet just long enough to envelop you? A moment when time seemed to draw out like the never ending strands of your favorite silk blouse, and all you could hear was a wave of laughter slowly washing over you? It’s perhaps at times like this you wished, hoped, dared to believe that crossdressing would forever remain in your past. I’ve been quite fortunate in my crossdressing career (my transgendered life?) to have had few moments of outright crossdressing embarrassment. Most people I meet ...

Sometimes I wonder about being a writer ... how I feel about it, I mean. It just means a lot - maybe too much - to hear that people like my work. That's why reviews like this one, by Kathleen Bradean for the Erotica Writers & Writers site, means so much to me. You made my week, Kathleen ... thanks!If you’re lesbian, heterosexual, heteroflexible, bisexual, or gay; vanilla, or into leather; and you read much erotica, you’ve probably read an M Christian story. Few writers shift as comfortably, and convincingly, between genders and sexualities as he does. Add ...

The great pianist and songwriter Billy Preston once sang, “nothing from nothing leaves nothing.” Although over 15 to 16 months, I’ve seen the promise of health care reform start with single-payer and then morph into some sort of public option which, were it robust, should be able to contain health-care costs. This is kind of what the House passed. The Senate, on the other hand, is one confusing mess. Senator Max Baucus was given the keys to the city. I’m not sure what exactly he came up with. As chairman of the finance committee, he was ...