MAN GAVE NAME TO ALL THE ANIMALS IN THE BEGINNING; AN EDITORIAL AND PHILOSOPHICAL DISQUISITION ON MICHAEL VICK AND THE METAPHYSICAL ONTOLOGICAL RELIGIOUS AND LEGAL BASIS OF ANIMAL RIGHTS; IS THERE ANY BASIS FOR ANIMALS TO HAVE RIGHTS COMPARED TO HUMANS?

The Philadelphia Eagles this past week signed former Atlanta Falcons QB Michael Vick, which instantly generated a lot of media controversy.

Because here at the Sophist we like to examine both points of view, lets’s parse for a moment some of the assumptions underlying whether Michael Vick has actually done anything controversial.

I. You aint nothing but a Hound Dog

In the beginning, people think it was Elvis who sang “you aint nothin but a hound dog”, but that isn’t right at all. It was african american blues woman BIG MAMA THORNTON who first sang “you aint nothing but a hound dog” and what she meant by that was something far different than what elvis meant, and it had a lot to do with accusing her man of infidelity.

frankly, that is probably a more serious matter than what michael vick was actually charged with.

Big Mama Thornton later re-recorded “hound dog” on a record she cut live in prison (michael vick not in attendance) and let me say, every track on there is hot, hot, hot.

here’s a live version on youtube with the legendary bluesman buddy guy;

hot hot hot! the guitar licks by buddy guy, the drumming by his band, and the singing by big mama thornton are totally awesome. what a clip! 11 out of 10! this is a legendary blues clip. wow!

now that’s the blues!!!!

they should have the big mama thornton/buddy guy version of this tune play on the jumbotron video at the linc every time michael vick takes the field. eventually it would be his signature song!

big mama thornton was a big influence on Janis Joplin and a great many other singers, especially as Big Mama Thornton was the first to sing “Summertime” and “Ball and Chain” pretty frequently, songs that later became associated with Janis.

In fact, if you really look at Big Mama Thornton, the fact is that white artists stole or misappropriated all of her fine work–Elvis took Hound Dog, the Stones and other bands took Little Red Rooster, Janis took Ball and Chain and Summertime, and so on, and rarely did the white artists mention Big Mama Thornton or pay her the correct royalties or give her the proper dues.

and yet, if you compare Big Mama Thornton to the white artists, it’s clear as a bell who’s better. janis joplin is good, but Big Mama Thornton is amazing. Elvis is good, but Big Mama Thornton is better. and so forth.

here’s Big Mama Thornton doing “Ball and Chain” with Lighting Hopkins, just an amazing version of this tune, a real blues classic, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSNavkeDg54

If you’ve never heard of Big Mama Thornton, go and download her songs right now on youtube and music sites.

here’s her doing “Little Red Rooster” live at Newport with BB King and Muddy Waters. Pretty awesome. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ycw4uaXPRU&feature=related

here’s wikipedia account of big mama thornton’s version of hounddog, but you really have to listen to the song to get it:

at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hound_Dog_%28song%29

Big Mama Thornton version

The blues singer Big Mama Thornton’s biggest hit was Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller’s “Hound Dog,” which she recorded in 1952. Thornton’s “Hound Dog” was the first record Leiber and Stoller produced themselves. They took over the session because their work had sometimes been misrepresented, and on this one they knew how they wanted the drums to sound; Johnny Otis was supposed to produce it, but they wanted him on drums. [5] Otis received a writing credit on all 6 of the 1953 pressings. This 1953 Peacock Records release (#1612) was number one on the Billboard rhythm and blues charts for seven weeks. [6]

Thornton gave this account of how the original was created to Ralph Gleason. “They were just a couple of kids, and they had this song written on the back of a paper bag.” She added a few interjections of her own, played around with the rhythm (some of the choruses have thirteen rather than twelve bars), and had the band bark and howl like hound dogs at the end of the song. In fact, she interacts constantly in a call and response fashion during a one minute long guitar “solo” by Pete Lewis . Her vocals include lines such as: “Aw, listen to that ole hound dog howl.. OOOOoooow”, “Now wag your tail”, Aw, get it, get it, get it”.

Thornton’s delivery has flexible phrasing making use of micro-inflections and syncopations. Over a steady backbeat, she starts out singing each line as one long upbeat. When the words change from “You ain’t nothin’ but a HOUND Dog”, she begins to shift the downbeat around: You TOLD me you was high-class / but I can SEE through that, You ain’t NOTHIN’ but a hound dog. Each has a focal accent which is never repeated..[7]

The other musicians on this recording are Devonia Williams (piano), Albert Winston (bass), and Leard Bell (drums), and are listed as “Kansas City Bill & Orchestra”.[8] Habanera and Habanera-mambo variations can be found in this recording.[9]

II. I Wanna Be Your Dog

in 1969, James Newell Osterberg, Jr., aka Iggy Pop, and the Stooges recorded one of the all time classic rock tunes with “I Wanna Be Your Dog”. It’s been on so many commercials and movie tracks that it would be redundant to re-spell it out here, but suffice it to say that most critics believe this song to be the first genuine song of the punk/new wave movement.

here’s a youtube live performance of iggy pop doing the tune from 1979, and it’s pretty good;

for a really hot 2006 version of the tune on you tube see this link;

this performance is from brussels, 2006 and the band is hot, the audience is so into it, they’re singing every line along with iggy pop. this song is really great. if you can get it on rockband, or learn it on your electric guitar, it’s a winner winner chicken dinner, three chord wonder variety. it’s so elemental that it actually generates energy.

once you watch it, you really get the idea. this song, as well, has little or nothing to do with dogs, but rather about something else far more dark and mysterious.

if you’re still not sure, read wonderland avenue by the late danny sugarman about iggy pop and you’ll get the fuller picture. iggy and the stooges, and iggy solo, one of the greatest rock acts of our time. also, from the great state of michigan, which has brought us Grand Funk, Bob Seger, Kid Rock, the MC5 and other awesome rock acts.

one more version, live in serbia 2004, also good, but not as good as the other two;

enjoy.

the original track from 1969 without video is here;

stripped down like this, it doesn’t sound the same–but as a live track it has had a lot of power over the years. but it still packs power as a studo track. this stooges album is considered a classic.
i find it interesting that europe and especially eastern europe still listen to rock and roll, while american kids waste away on rap, pop and lord knows what. it sort of suggests that their youth are a bit more in tune with normality than ours…and europeans also like classical music as well much more than our people do. they’re far more likely to do a rock/classical/jazz split than americans, who will much more likely do a country/rap/pop split. I’m far more in the jazz/classical/rock camp, so i suppose i’m with the europeans.

III. BLACK DOG BY LED ZEPPELIN

“hey hey mama said the way you move….
GONNA MAKE YOU SWEAT
GONNA MAKE YOU GROOVE….”

“didn’t take too long, till i found out, what people mean, by down and out”

an immortal rock tune, “black dog” by led zeppelin is on their immortal led zeppelin IV, the one with “stairway to heaven,” in fact, on the LP version, it opened the side which famously ended with “stairway to heaven”. this was the subject of a famous discussion in the movie “FAST TIMES AT RIDGEMONT HIGH” (1982), what the perfect record to seduce a woman to is, and the answer of course is, LED ZEPPELIN IV, SIDE ONE, beginning with BLACK DOG and ending with STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN.

For obvious reasons, BLACK DOG would make a great tune to play when michael vick is on the field. especially with a rocking led zepp video. even if it’s true that jimmy page sold his soul to the devil….

VIDEO ONE

plays the song with all the lyrics, pretty cool.

live 1973:

this is what 70s arena rock was all about. just about every guy back in the 1970s tried to have the robert plant look for a while. inevitably, it still comes around. chicks dig long hair.

i can’t get over Jimmy Page’s outfit in this clip.

john bonham in this clip is the actual model for the four guys in This is Spinal Tap (1984). Eleven, one louder.

this is one of the classic songs of the 1970s. it’s really a blues tune speeded up to arena rock sound, but it’s still blues rock, and played very well. it’s a great tune. well worth reviving as an eagles fight song for michael vick.

IV. BLACK EYED DOG – NICK DRAKE

this is an obscure one–not even well known by nick drake standards, and not one of nick drake’s best tunes, but still out there.

here’s a link to it;

it’s really more of an outtake than a finished tune, it doesn’t have any of the joe boyd orchestration that characterizes the best tracks off Bryter Later, nor is it as melodic as the best stuff off of Five Leaves Left or Pink Moon, which are the three official and only Nick Drake releases to come out while he was recording. It is in fact, an outtake included in “Time of No Reply,” which is an album of outtakes and alternate takes released posthumously, and which was included in the Fruit Tree compilation.

While this is an interesting “dog” track, i don’t think it’s a good song for a football crowd. I do recommend it to everyone though as a good example of a demo of a song by a brilliant songwriter; and being that it’s an obscure Nick Drake song, an excellent choice for a cover by your band seeking a record deal.

Speaking of Nick Drake, his producer JOE BOYD is one of the most intriguing figures in music history. A harvard grad and producer of most of the top bands of the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s and up to the present day, JOE BOYD is one of the key figures of music history, as well as the custodian of the NICK DRAKE legacy.

here’s his wikipedia bio, which only scratches the surface of this remarkable man’s career;

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joe_Boyd

makes for interesting reading, with great linkouts.

V. WALKING THE DOG BY RUFUS THOMAS 1965

this is an alltime classic, and you can dance to it.

This video linkout is vintage 60s live video feed, A++. with the stax/volt band behind him.

the blues brothers live with rufus thomas walking the dog:

this is from 1988, but amazingly, it’s the same band as from 1965! check it out…you’ll see what i mean….First Blues Brothers Band reunion tour Live in Pistoia (Italy) 1988 Steve Cropper-Guitar Donald Dunn-Bass Matt Murphy-Guitar Booker T Jones-Keyboards Anton Fig-Drums Lou Marini-Sax Alan Rubin-Trump. same guys playing on the 1965 vid for the most part.

VI HONORABLE MENTION

ME AND YOU AND A DOG NAMED BOO – Lobo
BULLDOG – Ventures
HOUND DOG MAN – Fabian
SNOOPY AND THE RED BARON – Royal Guardsmen
ANYTHING BY SNOOP DOOG
DIAMOND DOGS david bowie

Black Dog lyrics:

Hey, hey, mama, said the way you move
Gonna make you sweat, gonna make you groove.
Oh, oh, child, way you shake that thing
Gonna make you burn, gonna make you sting.
Hey, hey, baby, when you walk that way
Watch your honey drip, cant keep away.

*ah yeah, ah yeah, ah, ah, ah., ah yeah, ah yeah, ah, ah, ah.

I gotta roll, cant stand still,
Got a flame in my heart, cant get my fill,
Eyes that shine burning red,
Dreams of you all thru my head.
Ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah ah.

Hey, baby, oh, baby, pretty baby,
Tell me what you do me now.
(repeat)

Didnt take too long fore I found out
What people mean my down and out.
Spent my money, took my car,
Started tellin her friends she wants to be a star.
I dont know but I been told
A big legged woman aint got no soul.

* chorus

All I ask for when I pray,
Steady rollin woman gonna come my way.
Need a woman gonna hold my hand
And tell me no lies, make me a happy man.

VII. Editorial and disquisition on Michael Vick

First of all, according to the Bible and the major religions, God gave Man dominion over the earth and all its living creatures. That pretty much means that man has substantial rights to do what he will with bears, dogs and cats, especially dogs that have been bred for, and exist because of, dogfighting. In short, the metaphysical existence of dogfighting breeds, and hence any of their metaphysical and ethical rights, are dependent upon, and exist by virtue of, their participation in and breeding for, dogfighting.

within of course, the law.

The same arguments of course apply to poodles, thoroughbred horses, cattle and many other animals which man has bred for man’s own needs and enjoyment. 99% of the rats which exist in laboratories today were bred and brought into metaphysical existence, in a word, instantiated, for the simple purpose of being experimented upon in a laboratory. Their rights and ethical/juridical existences are sub-dependent upon their instantive and metaphysical existence as being created to be lab rats.

In short, about 90% of all dogs, cats, cattle and other animals bred and brought into existence by man exist in a sort of BRAVE NEW WORLD existence, where they are actually genetically bred to serve a purpose, like the alphas, betas, and so forth of Aldous Huxley’s famous work.

As such, I can’t get morally excited or revolted about the fact that Michael Vick or his friends engaged in dogfighting with dogs bred to do dogfighting. After all, it’s what the dogs were bred to do, and in China, people eat dogs.

still, there are technical legal violations, but morally, i can equate it to ray lewis killing a man, or michael tyson raping a girl, or kobe bryant raping a girl, or oj simpson killing two people at once. or even to dante stallworth killing someone while driving drunk.

the life and dignity of a person has to be more valuable than the life and dignity of an animal. if that’s not true, our ethical and legal and moral systems are skewed.

In America, we have something like 100 million dogs and cats, and by all reasonably rational accounts, they are better fed and better cared for in terms of food, medical care and housing, than the bottom 100 million of our own population.

Animals have a powerful lobby; the poor do not. Mistreatment of animals usually draws a powerful response and a jail sentence; mistreatment of the poor usually draws a yawn. If a single dog or cat is hurt, the police cannot wait to find the rascal; but five hundred to a thousand poor African American victims of homicide die in our cities each year without any of those cases being solved.

There are no dogs or cats, to my knowledge, that have to sell their bodies for sexual pleasure in order to eat or obtain drugs or housing; yet we have tens if not hundreds of thousands of young women of all colors, races and cultures prostituting themselves on the streets of our cities in order to feed their drug habits, keep themselves fed, clothed and sheltered. The police and authorities don’t care about these women, but the animal lobbies care plenty about those dogs and cats.

Every year in the NFL, NBA and other leagues, you hear of players having illegitimate children, beating their wives, girlfriends, abusing their spouses, girlfriends, and in many cases, being accused of rape, most notably in the case of Kobe Bryant.

Let’s compare Kobe Bryant for a moment to Michael Vick. Kobe Bryant raped a woman (allegedly) in a Colorado hotel room. Michael Vick’s friends ran a dog fighting ring.

Yet, who went to jail and was prosecuted? Michael Vick or Kobe Bryant. I don’t have to tell you the answer. It was Michael Vick.

And you know the reason—because dogs are treated better in this country than women, and especially women who are the victims of abuse, rape and violence against women.

Dogs have a lobby, dogs provoke popular outrage, and dogs get police protection.

But abused women get nothing, except perhaps “she lied” or “her testimony is questionable” or “she’s of questionable moral character”.

In philosophical academic and legal circles today, there is a growing and popular movement centering on “animal rights”—the notion that animals are sentient beings entitled to the full panoply of civil and social rights that humans enjoy. There’s really well-read people at Ivy League universities making those arguments, which probably proves that they’re bs deconstruction communist arguments intended to undermine capitalism (e.g. if we give all animals rights, the capitalist superstructure will collapse of its own weight).

in fact, i even hear rumors from dc that a major figure appointed to the obama administration faces problems being confirmed–because he once wrote an article critical of animal rights.

the republican party is attempting to stop his nomination by claiming the man in question is a dog hater.

never mind that the guy is on his third wife and never sees his kids–those aren’t issues at all. what’s important is how he treats his dogs, not how he treats his wives.

are you kidding me? how have we gone in this country to judging a man by how he treats his pets, rather than by whether he can stay in a marriage or not?

Notwithstanding the commonsense fact that these are collectively the most ridiculous theories ever conceived by professors in the history of academia, this animal rights movement is actually gaining a lot of steam, which goes to show that any stupid gropundless theory can gain traction, as was the case for year with marxism.

Then again, a great many European lawyers in the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries made a terrific living specializing in criminal defense of women accused of witchcraft. Pretty much everyone in Europe in that time was unanimous in the believe that around 25% of all women were witches or possessed by demons. That belief even crawled over, famously, to Salem Massachusetts for a while in the 1690s (see “The Crucible”).

Meanwhile, the womans’ rights movement to pass an Equal Rights Amendment and to obtain relief from violence against women continues to go nowhere. Maybe people still think many women are witches still, while cats and dogs can’t be possessed by evil spirits. (in fact, the New Testament flatly states that Jesus cast out an evil spirit from a human into an animal, more than once, I believe, so this is not true).

In fact, soon gay lesbian transgendered persons, along with cats and dogs, may all soon enjoy more constitutional and legal protections than women. Ted Olson, Esq., a prominent conservative republican attorney, is working with others to overturn the defense of marriage act signed into law by president bill clinton in 1996. they want federal courts to overturn the prop 8 process and issue a federal constitutional ruling.

so much for democracy, i suppose.

I’m not opposed to these other groups enjoying protections, but shouldn’t we fully address the equality of women before the law before we tackle the issues of other groups? Isn’t this fair and just? Obama has been strangely silent on women’s rights after being nominated over Hilary despite having fewer votes and fewer large states won than Hilary (he won due to technicalities in the apportionment formulas in the Democratic party which favored the small states; under the 1988 and prior rules, Hilary would have been the clear winner of the nomination).

though he did say he wanted to overturn the defense of marriage act. he didn’t say anything about enacting the ERA or helping battered women, though. i supposed by the end of the day, african americans, gays, transgendered and lesbians will have more rights than women, along with dogs and cats.

Women are the mother of us all (and I only mention this because August 15th is the saint day of the Holy Virgin Mary in the Greek Orthodox Church) and therefore deserve our saintly attentions as well as our full legal constitutional and law enforcement protections, before we bestow a drop of attention on dogs or cats, or other allegedly disadvantaged groups, especially groups that don’t have to raise kids or shop for groceries or both work and change diapers and also take care of a husband and a kid or three.

Animals were used by the pagan Roman Empire to eat the Christians in the arenas during the many persecutions of Christians before St. Constantine made Christianity the state religion @ 330 A.D. and moved the capital of the Roman Empire from Rome to Constantinople (where it remains to the present day). maybe its just for us to get back a little at animals for eating us.

Hercules had to slay a lion to prove he was a god. Samson had to kill a lion to prove he was the strongest of men. Killing animals in both greek myth and the bible was tantamount to sainthood and deification. In ancient times, you killed animals and sacrificed them to the gods, if you were an ancient greek, or to GOD, if you were in ancient Israel. How many sheep, goats, rams, etc. were sacrificed in the Old Testament to God? About a zillion, by my count.

Animals, in GOD’s view, were pretty much expendable. They didn’t have rights. Not only didn’t they have rights, but they were the COMMUNION of the ancient service. In the ancient service, there wasn’t just wine and a wafer (or wine and bread as we do it in the eastern Byzantine rite); no, what you got was a dead animal, which you put on the altar, and you BURNED IT FOR GOD along with prayers and incantations.

Imagine trying to do that today in modern America. They’d try and put you in jail for five years. Just for obeying the will of God.

I would argue that the juridical, moral and ethical status of animals has not changed in 12,000 years. We’ve killed more HUMANS in the 20th century than in all prior centuries; and there are more humans and animals alive in the 20th and 21st century than ever before; consequently, it stands to reason that while we might aspire to more ethical protections for humans, animals do not deserve any additional or heightened ethical protections.

Even assuming the status quo, animals, specifically dogs, are routinely mistreated everywhere in the United States. Not twenty minutes from Harvard University, my alma mater, there was a stop on the boston t called “Wonderland”, where they ran dog races back in the 1970s, and where I believe they continue to do so. Not horses, although horse racing is just as barbaric (how many horses have we seen break a leg and then be “sacrificed”), greyhound dogs are bred to run, chasing a mechanical rabbit along the inside of the track to exhaustion. These dogs, once they are done racing, do not make for good pets, and must often be put to sleep once they are done, unless they can be put to stud. Their lives are pretty awful; kept in bad kennels, fed poorly and kept poorly.

The conditions at Wonderland over the last thirty years, and Wonderland is a Massachussets sanctioned facility, would make the treatment of animals at the Michael Vick home seem wonderful.

I won’t even get into all the nutty dog and cat owners who have twenty or thirty cats or dogs. Or celebrity or politician dog or pet owners, who have four or five “rescue animals”, but don’t have the time to take care of them and hand them off to the maid or butler. I’m sure those dogs and cats are having a wonderful time full of love and attention.

In California, a lot of people don’t have kids but keep dogs and cats. In this wacky state, people are a little pathological about their pets, because they do the Freudian slip thing and sublimate, switching their displaced normal maternal/paternal instincts to the dog/cat pet from the child they were intended by biology and nature to have, so they actually commit the (1) sin and (2) error, of giving a humanity to their dog/cat pet(s).

It’s important to note that in God’s eyes, your dog or cat is NOT the same as your son or daughter. The bible commands you to GO FORTH AND MULTIPLY. It doesn’t say anything about being a shepherd and tending flock, except to describe lots of shepherds tending flocks. A person with pets is just a shepherd tending their flock.

Unless of course your pet happens to be the LAMB OF GOD, agnus dei.

But that’s a story for another day.

bottom line, i can’t get too worked up over michael vicks alleged acts of animal cruelty. while a little weird, they’re not exactly directed at people, and that’s the bottom line.

ART KYRIAZIS philly south jersey
home of the world champion phillies
posted august 22 2009

A GREAT TV DAY YESTERDAY AUG 16TH

WHAT A DAY FOR TV YESTERDAY AUGUST 16TH.

1) AN ELVIS MARATHON ON TCM, INCLUDING ‘KID CREOLE’.

2) THE RETURN OF DON DRAPER AND MAD MEN FOR SEASON THREE.

3) THE PHILS DESTROY THE BRAVES ON NATIONAL TV SUNDAY NITE BASEBALL ON RYAN HOWARDS TWO ENORMOUS HOMERS, SOLO AND THREE RUN SHOTS, AND WIN 4-1 AS JA HAPP WINS 9TH OF YEAR AGAINST 2 LOSSES.

Is it just me, or watching Elvis and Don Draper, do I get the feeling that back in 1961, smoking, drinking, and driving drunk, were GOOD for you?

That chasing women, even if you were married, was what men were supposed to do no matter what? and that this was ok as long as you came back to your wife at the end of the road trip or whatever?

the flip side of all this is getting inside of don draper’s creative process, which seems to require that 1) he gets a new account 2) he can’t think of an idea 3) he needs to bed down some new conquest not his wife in a seedy motel 4) the plane ride back or in his office later, he suddenly and brilliantly spits out the ad idea of the century for the account.

i’d think it was a crock, except my brother in law is an ad guy and i’ve seen his creative side work like this (except for all the wild sex) (I’m joking, he actually made don draper look like a monk back in the day) (that would be the chiat day).

speaking of monk, he’s back, and they’ve announced it’s his final season. this is rare for a tv show to say “that’s all folks”.

so the question begins, how many episodes will they devote to solving trudy’s murder before they wrap it all up? It’s been what, seven, eight years, and Monk has one case, one huge case, he’s never solved–the case of his wife Trudy’s murder.

It has to be solved.

Finally, a word about Elvis. “kid creole” is actually a very fine movie. the early elvis movies, from before 1962, are pretty good, and even the vintage ones, from the 60s, have fine qualities about them.

–art kyriazis
philly home of the world champion phillies

RIP GEORGE RUSSELL THE JAZZ WORKSHOP

George Russell, one of the Jazz Legends, died last week in New York City, a death that went all but unnoticed except in the New York Times, which had a fitting obit to the jazz legend.

Russell’s album “The Jazz Workshop” from 1956 is a legendary work, and for years commanded very high collectors’ prices in mint first edition, usually more than a hundred dollars. It was an amazing work.

Russell, as the NYT obit noted, invented modal dissonant jazz—dense harmonic dissonant chord changes which he described in his “bible of modal jazz”, The Lydian Chromatic Concept of Tonal Organization for Improvisation, published in 1953 and again in 1959. (thanks to the New York times 7/30/09 for this).

The effect on the jazz world was dramatic. Miles Davis and John Coletrane immediately picked up on modal jazz, starting with the album “Milestones” in 1958 (they were still in the same band) and then Davis struck gold with his all time classic “Kind of Blue” a year later in 1959 (the fifty year legacy edition was recently released by Columbia in a two cd edition).

From here to the wild modal jazz explorations of miles and coletrane of the 50s and 60s, and to the free jazz of ornette coleman, and the fusion jazz of the 60s and 70s, was but a short step. Dissonance and freedom from tonality was all the rage for the next 25 years.

The movement raged on into rock and blues. Ray Manzarek explained “Light My Fire” as a “modal chromatic inversion” of Coletrane’s “My Favorite Things”; the Grateful Dead and other groups began to improvise and jam along modal jazz lines each and every night, as did more blues-based groups like Eric Clapton and Cream. By the 1970s, modal jazz and jazz-rock fused into jazz-fusion and groups like Mahavishnu Orchestra led by John McLaughlin produced stupendous works like “The Inner Mounting Flame,” while more mainstream artists like Al DiMeola, Jean Luc-Ponty and Weather Report experimented with jazz fusion and modality throughout the decade.

Perhaps my favorite modal work was 1967′s “Nefertiti”, by the legendary Miles Davis lineup which included Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock, Ron Carter & Tony Williams. Sublime and spectacular.

George Russell was completely forgotten by then, but he was the father of it all. No one remembered that Russell was the composer of Dizzy Gillespie’s “Cubano Bop” and “Cubano Be Cubano Bop” in the late 1940s, or that Russell continued to teach and play in the new york area for years, or that Russell received a McArthur Fellowship in 1988.

George Russell was one of my favorite jazz figures precisely because he was obscure but influential and brilliant. He never sought out the spotlight, fame, money, fast cars or the attention of pop stardom. He was, to the end, a musician’s musician. He will be missed.

–art kyriazis, Philadelphia, PA
the birthplace of dizzy gillespie & john coletrane

In Memoriam: David Carradine, RIP 2009

The late David Carradine was an amazing actor. Not only for the influential TV Series “Kung Fu”, which was the #1 TV series for several years in the early 1970s, and probably spawned more interest in the martial arts than almost any other single influence or other factor; but also for many other roles he played, such as playing Woody Guthrie in Hal Ashby’s minor classic “Bound for Glory”, which plays on TCM from time to time.

I had an acquaintance once here in Philly who was a lawyer, this was in the 90s, who had come here from LA, who had been Robert Altman’s personal attorney in LA during the 1970s. He told me some interesting stories about Bob Altman, David Carradine, Barbara Hershey and Altman’s son, who was the composer of the “MASH” theme, “Suicide is Painless.”

It seems that the Mash theme was so successful, that Altman’s son made far more money than his dad, and that he, Carradine and Hershey were inseparable during the 1970s, and they all lived more or less in Topanga Canyon in a commune like arrangement, living like hippies more or less, and getting into all kinds of trouble back in those days. My friends’ job back then was, from time to time, to bail out David Carradine, Barbara Hershey, and Bob Altman’s son, from jail, or get them out of whatever situation they were in, and then hush it up quietly and make it go away.

David Carradine lived a life of Riley. He slept with the lovely Barbara Hershey when she was young and beautiful, living as young and carefree LA hippies in the hills of LA in the free days of the 1970s, and they even had a love child out of wedlock.

In addition to Hershey, Carradine was married FIVE times and had children by most of those wives as well. He had a productive love life, to say the least.

Quentin Tarantino was brilliant to cast Carradine in the Kill Bill Vol I and Vol II series, and seeing Carradine playing the flute, barefoot, in black and white, as Kwai Chang Caine incarnate on the big screen in Kill Bill II was one of the most incredible screen moments I will ever remember. Sheer brilliance. And then to turn that character inside out into a monstrous killer from the peaceful shaolin monk that he was on TV in the 1970s–that was really something. A masterpiece of cinema homage to a wonderful TV show.

I don’t need to add that Carradine was fantastic in Kill Bill Vol 2.

Here again is a post I previously posted at http://pedrofeliz3b.wordpress.com/2008/12/01/the-sayings-of-kung-fu-the-first-season/

These are from the actual Kung Fu Show, carefully transcribed from episodes and scripts, and are the actual sayings of either Kwai Chang Caine or his Master.

Grasshopper, we will miss you…

The Sayings of Kung Fu, the First Season
By pedrofeliz3b

From the Crane, we learn grace and self-control.
The Snake teaches us suppleness and rhythmic endurance.
The Praying Mantis teaches us speed and patience.
And from the Tiger, we learn tenacity and power.
And from the Dragon, we learn to ride the wind.
All creatures, the low and the high, are one with nature.
If we have the wisdom to learn, all may teach us their virtues.
Is it good to seek the past? If a man dwells on the past, then he robs the present; but if a man ignores the past, he may rob the future. The seeds of our destiny are nurtured by the roots of our past.
When you can take the pebble from my hand, it will be time for you to leave.
You must walk the rice paper without leaving any marks. This will signify that you can walk without making any sounds.
The outer strength, the strength of the body, withers with age. The inner strength, the Chi, remains and grows stronger with age.
The right of vengeance belongs to no man.
A Shaolin priest can walk through walls.
A man cannot live his whole life in fear. To hide such feelings is to increase them 1000 times.
If you tell a man he is less than a man often enough, he will come to believe it.
All life is sacred. I would not take pleasure in the death of any man.
Fear is the enemy. He who conquers himself is the greatest warrior.
To hate is like drinking salt water; it only makes the thirst worse.
I have seen the silkworm; it spins a thread that it may be seen. Hate is the thread and the tomb you weave; it will not save you from your suffering.
The mind and the body and the spirit are one. When the body expresses the desires of the mind and the spirit, the body is in tune with nature, the act is pure and there is no shame. Love is harmony.
Each journey begins and also ends. Life is such a journey, yet it is full of journeys within which begin and end.
Seek always peace. To endanger one, endangers all. In such times, the soul must be the warrior. The soul sees always. What the soul sees cannot be denied.
Discipline your body that you may find greater strength. Be one with all that is without one’s self.
Where the tiger and the man are one, there is no fear, there is no danger.

Part II

I have three treasures which I hold and keep: the first is mercy, for from mercy comes courage; the second is frugality, from which comes generosity to others; the third is humility, for from it comes leadership.
How shall I hold these treasures, Master? In memory?
Not in memory, but in your deeds.
Peace lies not in the world but in the man who walks the peaceful path.
To reach perfection a man must develop equally compassion and wisdom.
Shall I treat every man the same? Yet the flower beneath the water knows not the sun. Other men, not knowing me, will find me hard to understand.
As far as possible, be on good terms with all. Accept the ways of others; respect first your own.
Look beneath the surface of the pool to see its depths.
Rock crushes scissors. Paper covers rock. Scissors cuts the paper. Each in turn conquers the other; there is no stronger or weaker. This is the harmony of nature.

Part III

Ten million living things have as many different worlds. Do not see yourself as the center of the universe, wise and good and beautiful. Seek, rather, wisdom and goodness and beauty, that you may honor them everywhere.
A man may tell himself many things, but is a man’s universe made only of himself?
If a man hurts me and I punish him, perhaps he will not hurt another.
And if you do nothing?
He will believe he may do as he wishes.
Perhaps. Or perhaps he will learn that some men receive injury but return kindness.
If you sow rice, you will grow rice. If you sow fear, you will grow fear.

THE SAYINGS OF KUNG FU THE FIRST SEASON STARRING DAVID CARRADINE CLASSIC TV SERIES AVAILABLE ON DVD THIS OR ANY OTHER HOLIDAY SEASON

–art kyriazis philly/south jersey
home of the world champion philadelphia phillies

Tags: Art Kyriazis, arthur j kyriazis, Arthur Kyriazis, Clasic TV Series, David Carradine, DVD, Kung Fu, Kyriazis, Sayings of Kung Fu, Sayings of Kung Fu the First Season

Simulacra and Simulation by Baudrillard – One Source of the Matrix

Most of you probably know this already, but one of the main theorists of semiotics and deconstruction, the French theorist Baudrillard, and his famous 1985 (published in the 1990s in english) work SIMULACRA AND SIMULATION is a key reference point for both the movie and the shooting script of both the film THE MATRIX, and many of the underlying ideas of THE MATRIX.

I’ll just reprint what the wikipedia has to say, but just note that many of Baudrillard’s ideas are not too different from Susan Sontag’s ideas–Sontag thinks that the proliferation of images and signs in modern culture obscure reality, while Baudrillard feels that they obliterate it. THE MATRIX of course presents a science fiction allegory in which reality is a computer generated fiction present only in our minds, which is somewhat different than what Baudrillard is saying, leading to paths of noumenalism and idealism and radical Rorty-ism, but it is worth noting that in the very first scene of the MATRIX, when Neo is holding a book that is hollowed out, and pulling out some disks to give to the folks knocking on his door in the middle of the night, that book is in fact, a copy of Baudrillard’s SIMULACRA AND SIMULATION. One small step for neo, one giant step for semiotics.

I note here specifically that I am anti-marxist and anti-communist, and pro-capitalist, and dissassociate myself from those aspects of the deconstructionist critique which are plainly recycled and rehashed marxism. The failures of that system and that philosophy are too numerous to mention here, except to say that the Gulag Archipelago documented hundreds of millions of deaths in the Soviet system, including 500,000 priests who died in 1937-39 for the crime of being priests. Nonetheless, this is an interesting way of looking at the world, so here goes.

so here’s the wiki entry;

Simulacra and Simulation
Cover of English translation
Author Jean Baudrillard
Original title Simulacres et Simulation
Translator Sheila Glaser
Country France
Language French
Subject(s) Philosophy
Genre(s) Non-fiction
Publisher
Galilée (Editions) (French) & University of Michigan Press (English)
Publication date 2 April 1985
Published in
English February, 1996
Media type print (paperback)
Pages 164 pp
ISBN
ISBN 2718602104 (French) & ISBN 0472065211 (English)

Simulacra and Simulation (Simulacres et Simulation in French) is a philosophical treatise by Jean Baudrillard that discusses the interaction between reality, symbols and society.

Contents

• 1 Overview
• 2 Criticism
• 3 The Matrix
• 4 Footnotes

[edit] Overview
“ The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth–it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.[1]
”
Simulacra and Simulation is most known for its discussion of images, signs, and how they relate to the present day. Baudrillard claims that modern society has replaced all reality and meaning with symbols and signs, and that the human experience is of a simulation of reality rather than reality itself. The simulacra that Baudrillard refers to are signs of culture and media that create the perceived reality; Baudrillard believed that society has become so reliant on simulacra that it has lost contact with the real world on which the simulacra are based.

Simulacra and Simulation identifies three types of simulacra and identifies each with a historical period:

1. First order, associated with the pre-modern period, where the image is clearly an artificial placemarker for the real item.

2. Second order, associated with the industrial Revolution, where distinctions between image and reality breaks down due to the proliferation of mass-produced copies. The items’ ability to imitate reality threaten to replace the original version.

3. Third order, associated with the postmodern age, where the simulacrum precedes the original and the distinction between reality and representation break down. There is only the simulacrum.[2]
Baudrillard theorizes the lack of distinctions between reality and simulacra originates in several phenomenon:

1. Contemporary media including television, film, print and the Internet, which are responsible for blurring the line between goods that are needed and goods for which a need is created by commercial images.

2. Exchange value, in which the value of goods is based on money rather than usefulness.

3. Multinational capitalism, which separates produced goods from the plants, minerals and other original materials and the process used to create them.

4. Urbanization, which separates humans from the natural world.

5. Language and ideology, in which language is used to obscure rather than reveal reality when used by dominant, politically powerful groups.

A specific analogy that Baudrillard uses is a fable derived from On Exactitude in Science by Jorge Luis Borges. In it, a great Empire created a map that was so detailed it was as large as the Empire itself. The actual map grew and decayed as the Empire itself conquered or lost territory. When the Empire crumbled, all that was left was the map. In Baudrillard’s rendition, it is the map that people live in, the simulation of reality, and it is reality that is crumbling away from disuse.

The transition from signs which dissimulate something to signs which dissimulate that there is nothing, marks the decisive turning point. The first implies a theology of truth and secrecy (to which the notion of ideology still belongs). The second inaugurates an age of simulacra and simulation, in which there is no longer any God to recognize his own, nor any last judgement to separate truth from false, the real from its artificial resurrection, since everything is already dead and risen in advance. [3]

Thus, Baudrillard further distinguishes three orders of simulacra associated with three historical periods: first order simulacra belong to the pre-modern era in which images were clearly copies or representations of some original; second order simulacra arise with the industrial revolution, photography and mass reproduction technologies in the nineteenth century – the image obscures (dissimulates) and threatens to displace the real; third order simulacra are part of our postmodern era; the image is said to completely precede and determine the real, such that it is no longer possible to peel away layers of representation to arrive at some original.

It is important to note that when Baudrillard refers to the “precession of simulacra” in Simulacra and Simulations, he is referring to the way simulacra have come to precede the real in the sense mentioned above, rather than to any succession of historical phases of the image. Referring to “On Exactitude in Science”, a fable written by Borges, he argued that just as for contemporary society the simulated copy had superseded the original object, so, too, the map had come to precede the geographic territory (c.f. Map–territory relation), e.g. the first Gulf War (see below): the image of war preceded real war.

Henceforth, it is the map that precedes the territory – precession of simulacra – it is the map that engenders the territory and if we were to revive the fable today, it would be the territory whose shreds are slowly rotting across the map. [4]

[edit] Criticism

With such reasoning, he characterised the present age — following Ludwig Feuerbach and Guy Debord — as one of “hyperreality” where the real object has been effaced or superseded, by the signs of its existence.

Such an assertion — the one for which he is most criticised — is typical of his “fatal strategy” of attempting to push his theories of society beyond themselves. Rather than saying, that our hysteria surrounding pedophilia is such that we no longer really understand what childhood is anymore, Baudrillard argued that “the Child no longer exists”.[5]

Similarly, rather than arguing — as did Susan Sontag in her book On Photography — that the notion of reality has been complicated by the profusion of images of it, Baudrillard asserted: “the real no longer exists”. In so saying, he characterised his philosophical challenge as no longer being the Heidiggerian/Leibnizian question of: “Why is there something, rather than nothing?”, but, instead: “Why is there nothing, rather than something?”[6]

[edit] The Matrix
The Matrix makes many connections to Simulacra and Simulation. In an early scene, the original French Simulacres et Simulation is the book in which Neo hides his illicit software. In the film, the chapter ‘On Nihilism’ is in the middle, rather than the end of the book.

Morpheus also refers to the real world outside of the Matrix as the “desert of the real”, which was directly referenced in the Slavoj Žižek work, Welcome to the Desert of the Real. In the original script, Morpheus referenced Baudrillard’s book specifically.

Keanu Reeves was asked by the directors to read the book, as well as Out of Control and Evolution Psychology, before being cast as Neo.[7]

In an interview, Baudrillard claimed that The Matrix misunderstands and distorts his work.[8]

[edit] Footnotes
1. ^ Poster, Mark; Baudrillard, Jean (1988). Selected writings. Cambridge, UK: Polity. ISBN 0-7456-0586-9.
2. ^ Hegarty, Paul (2004). Jean Baudrillard: live theory. London: Continuum. ISBN 0-8264-6283-9.
3. ^ Ibid.
4. ^ Ibid.
5. ^ In the essay “The Dark Continent of Childhood” in the essay collection Screened Out, 2002.
6. ^ In The Perfect Crime.
7. ^ Oreck J (director). (2001). The Matrix Revisited [DVD]. Warner Home Video.
8. ^ “Le Nouvel Observateur with Baudrillard”. Le Nouvel Observateur. 2004-10-15.

http://www.empyree.org/divers/Matrix-Baudrillard_english.html. Retrieved on 2007-12-07.

Retrieved from “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simulacra_and_Simulation”

Categories: Postmodernism | Publications about hyperreality | Philosophy books | Metaphysics literature

–art kyriazis, philly south jersey
home of the world champion phillies

IS THIS THE END FOR AI?

John Smallwood in yesterday’s Philly Daily News (tuesday march 3 2009) p. 62 writes in his column “Firing on Fewer Pistons: Aging Iverson Becoming Shell of His Former Dynamic Self”, basically, that Allen Iverson, the Answer, AI, is done and should retire and get on with his life.

In support of this thesis Smallwood cites three basic arguments:

1) Detroit has been 22-28 with Iverson, 3-1 when Iverson doesn’t start and 6-0 when AI doesn’t play.

2) Denver and Philly got the better of the last two Iverson trades.

3) AI is posting the worst numbers of his career this year, below 20 ppg and only 5.1 assists per game.

As you know, here at the Sophist, we think there are two sides to every question, and so we’re going to examine the other side of this argument. Is AI really done? Should we put a fork in him? Is he old? Should we start mailing the NBA pension checks to his mansion?

Well, we don’t think so, and here’s why.

Let me start by addressing the last argument first. It’s true that Allen Iverson is posting the worst numbers of Allen Iverson’s career. Allen Iverson, career, is a 27.1 ppg scorer, and career has averaged 6.2 assists, 2.2 steals and 3.6 turnovers. This year with Detroit, he has averaged 18.0 points, 5.0 assists, 1.6 steals and 2.5 turnovers.

This is where we point out something that Bill James and all the other statheads in the world have been saying for years. THE DECLINE PHASE OF A GREAT PLAYERS CAREER WILL BE GREATER THAN THE DECLINE PHASE OF AN AVERAGE PLAYER’S CAREER. Allen Iverson, even in decline, is still a great NBA player.

Let’s look at the 76ers. Andre Iguodala, who is in his prime as a player, is averaging only 18.0 ppg. Iguodala is 25 years old. Iverson is 34 years old, and averaging also 18 ppg. What is a terrible season for Iverson, is the very best that Iguodala can do.

Think about that for a second. Why did Wilt Chamberlain play until he was 40? Why did Elgin Baylor play until he was 40? Why did Jerry West play until he was 40? Why did Hal Greer play so many years?

It’s because great scorers like Allen Iverson, like Hal Greer, like Elgin Baylor, like Dr. J, even in their decline phase of their careers, are still more effective than the very best players in the NBA who are very gifted.

Looking at win shares, Iverson has 2.7 win shares this year for Detroit, but last year he had 12.6 win shares for Denver. The top two guys for the Sixers, Iguodala and Miller, have 6.5 and 7.1 win shares each, and that’s about as good as they get. Neither of them will get 12 win shares in a good year. On the Pistons, no one has more than 4.3 win shares, and that’s Tayshoun Prince. the win shares on Detroit are very evenly distributed because Prince, Wallace, Hamilton, McDyess, AI, Stuckey, Maxiell and Johnson all have 2 or more win shares, and they all score, rebound, hand out assists or play a lot of defense. They have a team concept in Detroit.

AI’s numbers in Detroit, therefore, reflect an ADAPTATION to the game as played in Detroit, which is a defensive game, low offensive production, a much slower pace and team play.

Next, AI has played by far the most minutes of any of the Pistons, except for Tayshoun Prince; Prince has played 2214 minutes, while Iverson has played 1913 minutes; Wallace has played 1831 minutes, while Stuckey has played 1785 minutes, and Hamilton 1702 minutes.

It’s obvious that the coach in Detroit has not played his players evenly. He’s taken two hundred minutes away from Stuckey and Hamilton and given them to Iverson, even though Stuckey is younger and Hamilton is taller and can play better defense.

Part of the problem here is that Iverson, Stuckey and Hamilton all play the 2 guard; Stuckey can play the point, and should play the point, but even then Hamilton and Iverson both play the 2 guard.

If I was coaching the team, I’d start Hamilton and bring Iverson in with the second unit, because Iverson against the second unit of the other team would cause chaos and destruction, and also the three guard set up with Stuckey, Hamilton and Iverson can run with some opposing lineups and wear them down.

But clearly, the detroit coach has run Iverson into the ground by playing him too many minutes.

The result has been injuries to Iverson, and at 34, he is no longer indestructible, which is why he is being evaluated for back injuries this late in the season.

If I had an Iverson, I’d have played him less in the regular season and saved him for the playoffs, where we know he excels.

Furthermore, if Iverson has been hurt, and we know he plays hurt quite often, that would explain some of the decline in his numbers. He’s had some dreadful nites this year–and perhaps he’s been tired, hurt and not able to be AI. When he’s been rested, ready and healthy, he’s had some great nights this year for Detroit. He’s dropped 25 or more points on the Lakers and on many other qualify opponents in key wins during this year. And frankly, he’s looked at times much like the AI of old.

I’d say, rest him, keep his minutes down, and you’ll have AI of old always.

Per 36 minutes, Iverson is scoring 17.2 points, which is very productive. But Hamilton is scoring 18.9 points per 36 minutes, which suggest that Hamilton is the more efficient two guard.

Detroit needs to move one of them, and since Iverson’s contract is up, AI probably should go.

The Sixers should pick up AI (and Rasheed Wallace if possible) and make their run at the Eastern Division Crown, and dump Elton Brand. AI is the short term Answer to the Sixers 3 point and scoring issues in close games.

Also, in close games, AI can be the go-to guy with under a minute left. Finally, if AI teamed up with Andre Miller, they’d be fantastic. Andre Miller would be the best point guard AI ever played with, and Andre would get AI the ball where he could work with it, especially out on the break. I think Iguodala and AI would both be scorers in this system, while Dalembert, Young and Speights would all play defense and work the boards.

If Wallace could be added, he could play defence, work the board, and shoot the three. Then I think the Sixers could even keep Elton Brand and see if they had a monster team.

Turning to whether Denver got the better of the Billups-Iverson deal, at the time the deal was made, it looked even steven.

In 2007-08, Iverson earned 12.6 win shares for Denver, and had a monster season for them. Billups led the Pistons in 2007-08 with 12.8 win shares, while Hamilton Wallace and Prince each had 7.3, 7.2 and 7.1 win shares each. But there’s one other issue here, and that’s Billups salary–he was earning like 60 million over several years, while AI was only getting about 15-20 million for one more season.

So basically, the trade was even in terms of talent and win shares, but Detroit unloaded a boatload of cap room.

Let’s say hypothetically that Detroit wants to sign a big free agent in 2009-2010 or thereabouts–they would want AI and/or Wallace got–older players, along with Billups, who is also an older player–and want the cap room gone.

In that event, they could sign a LeBron James, a Kobe Bryant, or whoever is a big free agent to turn the franchise into a premier franchise for the long haul.

While it looks as if currently denver is getting the long end of the stick, Detroit will eventually get the better of this trade.

Some side points on Denver: Carmelo Anthony isn’t what he’s cracked up to be. Billups is leading the team with 7.7 win shares. Nene is second with 7.3 win shares. Then comes Chris Anderson with 3.6 WS, and Kenyon Martin with 3.5 WS, and guess who’s 5th most valuable player with only 3.1 win shares?

That’s right, Carmelo Anthony. By the way, AI got .2 win shares for Denver while he was there, so adding that to the 2.7 he has for Detroit, AI has 2.9 win shares for the season.

So AI has 2.9 win shares, while Carmelo has 3.1. Carmelo is 25 years old averaging about 21 ppg (last year it was 25 ppg) and yet he’s having about the same season, statistically, as Allen Iverson, 34 years old, who Smallwood of the Daily News says is washed up.

But last year, playing with AI, Carmelo had 8.9 win shares, and the Denver Nuggets played a beautiful uptempo offense, where AI and Carmelo played really well together–and Carmelo had a great season, averaging nearly 26 ppg and more than 7 rebounds a game, and more than 3 assists a game.

the fact is that Carmelo doesn’t fit with Chauncey Billups at all, whereas Iverson and Carmelo were a match made in heaven. Together, Carmelo and Iverson had 12.6 and 8.9, or 21.5 win shares together.

this year, Billups and Carmelo have 7.7 and 3.1 win shares together, or 10.4. The real reason Denver is winning is 1) Billups is scoring a lot 19 ppg and 2) Nene is scoring 14 ppg and 3) nene is playing defense and rebounding inside. Also, Smith, Martin and Kleiza are all scoring because Billups is getting them the ball.

Now let’s look at the last issue, did the Sixers get better by getting Andre Miller?

The Sixers had Allen Iverson ten years, from 1996-2006. During that time, AI was the #1 road draw in the NBA, had the world’s most popular sneaker, led the NBA in scoring four times, and the Sixers made the playoffs six of the ten years that he was here. Moreover, the Sixers advanced past the first round of the playoffs three of those years, and got to the NBA finals one of those years.

You’d have to say, that was pretty darn good for a guy that was 5 foot 9 dripping wet.

Oh, and he scored about 20,000 points or so while he was here.

AI was MVP of the league, All Star MVP twice, led the league in minutes played twice, and kept the stands filled in Philly.

He led the league in free throw attempts twice, and is on the career list there. He’s on the career list for a lot of things, including minutes played, free throws attempted, and points scored, and he’s third alltime in ppg during the playoffs.

we sat and watched him drop 50 ppg more than once during the playoffs. Spike Lee would have given anything to see this guy play for the Knicks, right?

I know that the other day was the 100th anniversary of Wilt Chamberlain scoring 100 points at Hershey, PA in March of 1962 against the New York Knicks. The Big Dipper averaged 50 points, 25 rebounds and more than 48 points a game that year for the Philadelphia Warriors and Eddie Gotlieb.

I met Wilt in LA at the Bar Marmont in LA with some friends in the VIP section. There were a lot of important types there like Rick Rubin and some SNL actors, but I only wanted to meet Wilt. My mom had been a teacher of his back in the 50s at Overbrook HS as a trainee when she first started in the school system, and always told me how tall he was, and how nice he was.

Well, Wilt was extremely nice. He was much taller than 7 foot 1, more like 7 foot 5, and he had two girls with him and a couple of lawyer types. I’m sure he really did sleep with 20,000 women, and that circular house of his is famous, it was in a brian dipalma film once. Wilt lived the life of riley, he hung out at the playboy mansion, slept with any girl he wanted, and was noted for being a conservative and careful stock investor. He was very wealthy when he died, a bachelor to the end. He was frugal, intelligent and careful with his money.

I mention Wilt because we never thought we’d see a scorer like Wilt again, and then there was AI, who dazzled this town for ten years with his exploits. On any given night, AI could put up 50, 60 points. He wasn’t Wilt, but he had Wilt’s attitude that no one could stop him, and he ATTACKED the basket like Wilt used to do. AI was a lot like Wit–he existed to score, and scoring was his reason for existence.

I thought for a while that AI might score a hundred points in a game. On February 12, 2005, he lit up Orlando for 60 points. I mention this because that was barely four years ago. And he only made two three pointers in that game. 17 field goals and 24 free throws–Wilt made 28 free throws and 36 field goals in the 100 point game. It’s hard to believe that the Sixers could have traded AI just a year and a half after this incredible performance–the greatest single game performance by a 30+ athlete in the NBA in my humble opinion, and I remember watching the game on cable–but there you go.

So Smallwood thinks the Sixers did better getting Andre Miller? Well, let’s see. Since the trade, the Sixers have made the playoffs once in three years. they missed the year they traded Iverson, 06-07, they made it the next year, 07-08, and they may make it this year.

Iverson, on the other hand, made the playoffs immediately with Denver his first year there, 2006-07, made it the next year 2007-8, while having a spectacular comeback season (as did Carmelo Anthony, see above), and this year, even having an offyear with Detroit, will probably make the playoffs with the Pistons as the #7 or #8 seed. The way the Sixers are going the second half, the Pistons will probably pass them and reach the #6 or #5 seed, actually, so the Sixers are not even a lock for the playoffs.

On December 5, 2007, playing for Denver, Iverson dropped 51 on the Lakers. Iverson was now 32 years old. What a performance. It was on national TV, of course.

On December 23, 2005, Iverson dropped 53 on Atlanta in Atlanta, surely pleasing all the rappers in attendance down there. He was 30 years old.

None of this, of course, sounds like a guy who was, is or will be washed up at age 34, 35 or whatever.

Let’s look at AI this year.

On December 19, 2008, AI dropped 38 on Utah at home in Detroit for the Pistons.

On February 19, 2009, not a week ago, AI dropped 31 on the San Antonio Spurs, his second best game of the year.

On November 11, 2008, AI dropped 30 on the Sacramento Kings.

AI has had 17 games of 20 or more points for the Pistons this year. In only five games did he fail to score in double figures. He is now 33 years of age.

Getting back to Andre Miller, Miller’s win shares for Denver had declined from 9.1 to 7.2 to 6.4 in the three seasons leading up to the Miller for Iverson trade. In short, Miller looked to be declining in an age-related fashion.

AI had gone 9.4, 10.9, 6.5 Win Shares the same three seasons. It was not clear that he was in age-related decline at all. What we do know about Iverson is that his win shares and seasons follow no predictable pattern, that he has off years followed by great ones;

1996-97 4.3 WS
1997-98 9.0 WS
1998-99 7.2 WS
2000-01 6.9 WS
2001-02 11.7 WS (MVP)
2002-03 6.8 WS
2003-04 9.2 WS
2004-05 2.7 WS (injured, played 48 G)
2005-06 10.6 WS
2006-07 6.5 WS (Phila, Denver)
2007-08 12.6 WS
2008-09 2.9 WS (Denver, Detroit)
Total 100.1 WS

What you see here is a great player, because seasons over ten win shares are MVP seasons. Iverson has had several of these, and the MVP voting has reflected this.

Also, you can see he needs a season to adjust to a new team before he can come back. His second season in Denver, he was brilliant. If he has a second season in Detroit, he should be better. When he was injured in Philly, he came back and had a monster year.

Also, we see that the Sixers must be idiots, because they traded him the year after he had a monster year, 2005-06, 10.6 win shares. So there was no logic in trading him, he was not only a good player, but a great one.

Basically, the sixers were looking to clear salary cap room, and that’s all.

The next season, after the trade, 2007-08, AI had 12.6 win shares, as we know from above.

Miller has had 8.1 and 7.1 win shares with the Sixers the last two season, so he’ll probably end up with around 8 win shares this year. He’s by far the most valuable Sixer. And yet the Sixers have not signed a contract with Miller and seem to want to let him leave.

As for the salary cap room, the Sixers wasted it on Elton Brand.

Elton Brand is 30 years old. He had 10.3, 15 and 11.4 win shares for the Clippers in 2004-05, 05-06 and 06-07, but the last two years, he’s played 8 games and 29 games due to injury, last year with an ACL and this year with a torn labrum and bad shoulder.

The last time Elton Brand scored 30 or more more points in a game was April 12, 2007 for the Clippers.

The last time Elton Brand scored 40 or more points in a game was February 10, 2006 for the Clippers.

The guy who’s become a “shell of his former dynamic self” is not Allen Iverson, but Elton Brand.

After earning 11.4 win shares in 2006-2007, Brand earned .4 win shares in 2007-2008, and then the Sixers paid him all of the cap room they had (a gazillion dollars) even though he was hurt and damaged goods, and old and shot, and no evidence he could come back from injury (i’d have given him a one year deal), and he promptly came out, played badly, got hurt and is back on the shelf.

Brand earned 1.1 win share this year.

AI is 300% better than that this year, and AI is having a bad year for AI. Last year, we know that AI had 12.6 win shares, while Brand had hardly any.

So did the Sixers make out better with the Miller for AI trade? I think not. While Miller fits the team better because they needed a point guard, the Sixers could have found a point guard other than Miller.

First, they should never have traded Eric Snow so early.

Second, they could have worked out a deal for Delonte West, who is making money feeding the ball to LeBron James.

Third, Bibby was on the market and Atlanta got him.

Fourth, Jason Kidd was on the market, and is now at Dallas. He’s still on the market.

Fifth, there’s always point guards of quality available. The key is, AI is not a point guard, he’s a two guard.

So this is not the end for AI.

I know one team that would covet AI, and that’s the Knicks. They need an exciting presence there.

If they signed Andre Miller and AI, they’d have a team right away with the young players they’ve developed this past year.

The sixers have to be careful. The people they don’t sign will go to their competition in the NBA East, and they will regret their non-moves.

AI should retire in a Sixers Jersey. It’s appropriate to bring him home.

–art kyriazis philly/south jersey
home of the world champion philadelphia phillies

NEW SONG (FOR THE MORNING) © Jorma Kaukonen/Hot Tuna 1970

Looked outside my window
Fog came up today
That grey outside is round my head
Looks like it’s there to stay
Looks like it’s there to stay
Looks like it’s there to stay

Can’t you see I love you
I want you more and more
I see you here most every day
But I don’t know where you are
But I don’t know where you are now
But I don’t know where you are

(break)

Time goes on and I get older
What am I going to do
My mirror’d face keeps getting colder
My eyes still look for you
My eyes still look for you
My eyes still look for you

(break)

Sun came out this morning
Highway showed my way
Tracks in the sand pulled me into the sea
Washed my cares away
Washed my cares away
Washed my cares away

You know I want to touch you
My vacuum gives me pain
Your smile releases all my life
Like flowers under rain
Like flowers under rain
We start to live again