Easy Rider (1969)

As long as I'm posting about favorite movies, here's one of my all time favorites.

Libertarian biker types in New Mexico...hmmmmm. I'm picking up on a trend here.

Easy Rider 1969

Wyatt and Billy are two motorcycle riders (bikers) on their way to Mardis Gras, and encounter hitchhikers, a drunken lawyer, a jail cell, a whorehouse and the death of a friend. Written by Aaron Horne

Two young "hippie" bikers, Wyatt and Billy sell some dope in Southern California, stash their money away in their gas-tank and set off for a trip across America, on their own personal odyssey looking for a way to lead their lives. On the journey they encounter bigotry and hatred from small-town communities who despise and fear their non-conformism. However Wyatt and Billy also discover people attempting 'alternative lifestyles' who are resisting this narrow-mindedness, there is always a question mark over the future survival of these drop-out groups. The gentle hippie community who thank God for 'a place to stand' are living their own unreal dream. The rancher they encounter and his Mexican wife are hard-pushed to make ends meet. Even LSD turns sour when the trip is a bad one. Death comes to seem the only freedom. When they arrive at a diner in a small town, they are insulted by the local rednecks as weirdo degenerates. They are arrested on some minor pretext by the local sheriff and thrown in jail where they meet George Hanson, a liberal alcoholic lawyer. He gets them out and decides to join them on their trip to New Orleans in time for Mardi Gras.

Written by alfiehitchie

Off The Map

OK, so I'm not a film critic and this is a little out of the norm for this site, but............. A movie about a family living off the grid? They just don't make'em like this.

Set in the stunning landscape of rural New Mexico near Taos, this movie is worth a look just for the visuals. Art, sustainable living and great acting make this movie a real gem for folks with these interests.

Movie Overview - Holedigger Studios

It's 1974 and the harshly beautiful wilds of Taos are home to 11-year-old Bo Groden (Valentina de Angelis) and her free-thinking family. While constantly yearning for escape from her sparse environment, Bo passes the time with flair and imagination. She's a crack shot with a rifle and a bow and arrow, an artful plunderer of wallets and briefcases, and the compelling mistress of ceremonies for a moonlit three-ring circus of her own invention. Bo's home is an entrancing, challenging place that she will one day transcend to become the woman she was destined to be. Arlene (Joan Allen), Bo's warm, earthy, and eccentric mother, raises most of the family's food in her vegetable garden -- which she prefers to tend in the nude. Meanwhile, Bo's father, Charley (Sam Elliott), the embodiment of Old West masculinity, is losing the battle with his inner demons. When William Gibbs (Jim True-Frost) arrives, a hapless IRS agent with demons of his own, he soon proves to be a catalyst in the lives of the family during this watershed summer. Embraced by the Grodens' idyllic, peculiar world, Gibbs eventually abandons an investigation into the Groden's tax history and realizes he has fallen in love with both the place and its people. In a surge of creative energy, Gibbs dips a brush in paint and pours his feelings out on canvas, discovering a long hidden talent for artistic expression. The Grodens, too, make their own discoveries over the course of this memorable season -- the mysteries of love and loss, the power of family unity, and the eternal truth that in New Mexico, the Land of Enchantment, anything is possible.

Lloyd's Prayer

I received this in an e-mail. I'm not sure who penned it


In honor of Lloyd Blankfein, Chairman at Government Sachs:

Our Chairman
Who Art At Goldman
Be They Name

The Rally's Come, God's Work Be Done
We Have No Fear Of Correction.

Give Us This Day Our Daily Gain
And Bankrupt Our Nearest Competitors,
Leaving No One Left Standing Against Us.
And Bring Us Not Under Indictment.

For Thine Is The Treasury
And The House And The Senate
Forever and Ever,
Goldman.

Honoring Our Veterans

Here are a few images that I have taken in the past year in my other job as a photojournalist for the New York Army National Guard.

God Bless our Veterans!

New York State Is So Broke - Tyler Durden

New York State Is So Broke It Steals From Itself To Pay Off Unapproved Debt
Submitted by Tyler Durden on 10/29/2009 15:50 -0500




The surrealities of a "healthy" economy never end. The latest indication of the new banrkupt normal is New York State itself. A new report by NY state comptroller Thomas DiNapoli entitled "Highway Robbery: State's ailing road and bridges robbed; State siphoned money to pay for operations and debt service" tells you all you need to know about just how prosperous the ailing economy really is. According to DiNapoli, "only one-third of the money in the Highway and Bridge Trust Fund has actually been used to pay for highways and bridges. The rest has been siphoned off to pay for debt service on back-door borrowing and to fund operational costs for the DMV and the state Department of Transportation." Is that lack of stolen pocket change Mr. DiNapoli can believe in? Apparently not - Mr. DiNapoli's words: "I think outrage and anger is certainly appropriate; we need to channel that into thoughtful public policy." Yet anger is so September 2008. Welcome to the Xanax highs of the new credit bubble.

“This money should be going toward keeping our roads and bridges safe, not to fund state agency operations. The bridge closing in Crown Point is just one more example of why this is so important. If this trend continues, the state will have to transfer nearly $4 billion into the Trust Fund over the next five years. Using this dedicated capital money to pay for operations and debt service is just one more gimmick on the list of New York’s bad fiscal choices.”

Should one cry or laugh here? New York State is stealing from itself, and its own comptroller is bitching against this practice, seemingly powerless to do anything to prevent it in the first place. Perhaps the state's transportation trust fund should put all its stimulus money in CIT stock or whatever the HFT megavol stock de jour is and hope and pray. These days the market has odds that are just a little better than Craps (although the likelihood of being comped by your broker when the ponzi market loses all your money, are still slim to none).