Monday Music "If Today Was Your Last Day" By Nickelback

 

I had wanted to post something yesterday, but between doing stuff around the house, some really minor repairs on the F150, and going to the range and cleaning rifles and Pistols yesterday, I didn't get an opportunity to take a picture of an album and build a "Monday Music" around it like I have been doing lately.  But I did hear this song on the way from the range, as I do take a long way home to see if I am being followed and to avoid more congested areas to prevent my getting pinned in especially with several "EBR"'s in the back of the truck, although I have my glock in the console, having to reach for an AR in the event of a gunfight is "difficult", yes I am slightly paranoid, the times are a bit spicy right now, and people following one from the range to "liberate" them from their assorted bullet launchers is a thing apparently.  and some people don't like Nickelback, but there are a few songs that I do like and this is one of them, and it made me think of "If this is was your last day, would you go to Fiddlers Green like a Hero going home" to paraphrase Chief Tecumseh

 

 

Dark Horse is the sixth studio album by the Canadian rock band Nickelback, released on November 17, 2008 in Europe and the next day elsewhere. It is the follow-up to their multi-platinum selling All the Right Reasons (2005). It was co-produced by the band and producer and songwriter Robert John "Mutt" Lange, known for working with such acts as Foreigner, AC/DC, Bryan Adams, Def Leppard and Shania Twain. Dark Horse sold 326,000 in its first week and debuted at number 2 in the US. More than a year after its release, the album did not leave the Top 100 on the Billboard 200. In its 91st week, the album peaked at number 46 for the week of August 28, 2010.  From 9 October, the album stayed at number 71 for 97 consecutive weeks  The album spent 125 consecutive weeks inside the Billboard 200.  On the week of November 29, 2014, Dark Horse re-entered the Billboard 200 at number 195, more than six years after the album's release.

It was ranked at number 191 on Billboard's 200 Albums of the Decade.  It is also the band's fourth straight Multi-Platinum selling album in the United States. As of 2010, the album has sold 3 million copies in the United States and 5 million copies worldwide. The album was originally going to be entitled Burn It To The Ground. 

 

"If Today Was Your Last Day" is the third single from Nickelback's sixth studio album Dark Horse. It was originally planned as the first single, to hit all U.S. radio formats September 30, 2008,but was scrapped as the first single in favour of "Gotta Be Somebody". Instead it was released on March 31, 2009. It was produced by Robert John "Mutt" Lange, who produced the entire album. The song was released as a digital download in the U.S. on November 11. "If Today Was Your Last Day" was released in the UK on June 15. The song was performed live for the first time on May 22 at the Manchester Arena in Manchester, England.

In the US, the song has sold over 1,500,000 downloads, as of February 2010. According to Roadrunner Records UK, the song is "dynamically swelling our bank accounts". The song has also apparently been around with Nickelback for a while, but had never been finished. The song received Gold certification in Australia.

Lead vocalist/guitarist Chad Kroeger has mentioned the song as his personal favorite from Dark Horse. He had described the middle part of the song as "very motivational, and very positive".

The song was used for promotional videos in the Winter Olympics in 2010, and was used as the closing song during NHL Tonight's 2012 Stanley Cup playoffs coverage. 

 

The music video was shot with director Nigel Dick in March 2009. Performance portions of the video were shot at the Qwest Center in Omaha, Nebraska and in New York City. The other portion was shot in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The music video premiered on 23 April. In the beginning, two white teenage boys dressed in black seem to be up to some sort of shady business in Philadelphia. They record their journey on a camcorder. They carry mysterious black bags with them which seem to possibly be filled with illegal stuff. In the end, they stand on top of a bridge ready to carry out their plan. They open the bags, but only harmless colorful pieces of paper with quotes from the song such as "Forgive your Enemy," "It's Never Too Late," "Call a Friend and Reminisce" and "Fall in Love" fall over the people beneath them. This inspires two women to hand out coats with messages similar to those on the colored paper, a well-dressed man to hand money to everyone he meets, an arguing couple make up and a man arguing with presumably his boss to quit. All of the quotes refer to lines in the song "If Today Was Your Last Day". 

 I was looking for something else and ran across this and thought it was worthy of a repost.  This cuts to something that is a core to what makes us as honorable men, we fight for our country, for our family, and our comrades, and if necessary we will cash that blank check because to refuse will be an insult to what makes us men.  The phrase "A brave Man dies but once but a coward does a thousand times" is truth in those words.  We always know when the time comes we face it with steel in our spine and go as honorable men should.  Because all men die, it is the truth of our existence, how we die is the decision we make.

  I decided to repost it because it is a really good post.  

I had "borrowed"this from a fellow blogger, "Stormbringer" A.K.A. Sean Linnae.  His blog is still on my blogroll although he hasn't posted since 2020, I still leave him on my blog roll, hoping that he will return.

 

  or in the 13th warrior when the Norsemen recited this:

 
"Lo there do I see my father. Lo there do I see my mother and my sisters and my brothers. Lo there do I see the line of my people, back to the beginning. Lo, they do call to me, they bid me take my place among them, in the Halls of Valhalla, where the brave may live forever."

“So live your life that the fear of death can never enter your heart. Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours. Love your life, perfect your life, beautify all things in your life. Seek to make your life long and its purpose in the service of your people. Prepare a noble death song for the day when you go over the great divide.

Always give a word or a sign of salute when meeting or passing a friend, even a stranger, when in a lonely place. Show respect to all people and grovel to none.

When you arise in the morning give thanks for the food and for the joy of living. If you see no reason for giving thanks, the fault lies only in yourself. Abuse no one and no thing, for abuse turns the wise ones to fools and robs the spirit of its vision.

When it comes your time to die, be not like those whose hearts are filled with the fear of death, so that when their time comes they weep and pray for a little more time to live their lives over again in a different way. Sing your death song and die like a hero going home.”


~ Chief Tecumseh (Poem from Act of Valor)

The Berlin Wall and my experiences.

 

This  is a repost of a post that I did back in 2014, it did talk about the fall of the Berlin Wall and my experiences.  When I was talking about the petulant "Boy King" I was referring to President Obama who was president in 2014 not to President Trump who is president now in 2025

I have Blogged about Berlin a lot since I started blogging back in 2011.  I have a connection to that city as I have for Stuttgart.  I remember walking around the city from the West Berlin part to the East Berlin part and how different they were, the vibrant West and the Dour East. 

When the Second World War was finally over, Germany was divided up into four occupation zones among the Allied forces. Berlin was also divided up into four sectors between the USA, the UK, France, and the Soviet Union. Tensions between the Soviets and America, the UK, and France grew strong over the following two years which culminated in the latter three uniting the non-Soviet controlled zones of the city into one to promote reconstruction in post-war Berlin

   As many of y'all that visit my little corner of the internet know that I spent 5 years in Germany, I got there in mid 1986, and DEROS's back to the world in 1991 where I mustered out.  I spent the first 18 months attached to the 1st Infantry Division (FWD) at Cooke Barracks in Geoppingen Germany.  I then transferred to a corp level asset in 1988 at Echterdingen or SAAF(Stuttgart Army Airfield). That is where I was when we got deployed to the Persian Gulf for Desert Shield then Desert Storm.  But I was stationed in Germany when they unified in 1989.
     I will intersperse my experiences with some photo's I took of my souvenirs.  You know what they say about G.I's...."We souvenir anything long time".  My first time in Berlin was in 1987 while I was attached to Wobeck a station near Helmstedt a part of Field Station Berlin. 

          Not My Mustang, but I found a pic of one like it, (Shocked me) In Germany they based your car insurance on the cubic displacement of your car motor, yeah, my insurance was more than my car note.  I was car poor until my time in service and time in grade caught up.  Least I didn't marry a stripper, LOL
 I took my Mustang down the Helmstedt autobahn, The Helmstedt Autobahn is the only land route that we as Americans can drive through East Germany to Berlin.  We have to use "Flag Orders" to traverse the Autobahn to Berlin.  We would have to stop at 2 Soviet checkpoints.  We would be in class "A's" uniform, get out of the vehicle, present our flag orders to the soviet representative  at Magneburg and at Potsdam.

 This is a copy of a set of flag orders, Mine has my SSN on it and for obvious reasons, I ain't posting that one......

 Well when I went to Berlin, it was  a surreal experience, this is a link of my travels and various postings, West Berlin was a 24 hour party and east Germany was very subdued.  We exercised our rights of travel in East Berlin on a regular basis.  I would walk around and explore the sights.  I saw scaffolding everywhere, like they were rebuilding, but the wood for the scaffolding was dry rotted.  the buildings still had bullet pock marks in the wall when the Soviets took the city in 1945.  If we were hassled by the east Germans we would ask or demand "Ich murste mit eine Soviet Officer mit zum sprechen".  I want to speak to a Soviet officer.  Since the Soviets were in charge of East Berlin and the Western powers were responsible for West Berlin.
     I remembered President Reagan speech in 1987 in West Berlin.

   This is when we had a President that behaved like a President rather than the petulant boy-king we have now.  But when the East Germans were going through Czechoslovakia and Hungary to get to the West and the East German Government started cracking down and we increased out alert status because we had doubts on what the Soviets will do, for in the past they did interfere with protest like they did in East Germany in 1953, Hungary in 1956, and Czechoslovakia in 1968.  Poland almost got invaded by the "Warsaw Pact" in the early 80's during the Solidarity Protest but the Polish government declared martial law and other draconian measures to basically placate the soviets so they didn't get the "assistance" from the Warsaw pact like the other places did.

        When the unrest grew, we increased our surveillance  to see what the Soviets would do.  when the wall started to come down, we were confined to garrison for 2 reasons, one to prevent an incident with an American near the border and in case the Soviets attacked, we would be able to ramp up to a wartime footing.   Luckily such things didn't happen.  But watching the party and celebration on AFN was like being in the twilight zone, we were watching history before our eyes and all we could do was hold on for the ride and hope for the best.

       We started seeing the ""Trabbi's" on the autobahns and nothing like doing 130 MPH's and seeing a trabbi doing 50 mph packed full of "Osters" going to the west to see the sights.
     Well I did collect some souvenirs of my time after the wall fell.

Beer Stein

My flag orders and a "DDR" country tag

A picture of the Brandenburg Tor with British Tanks in front of it.  A "SMLM" ID tag in front of it.

A bunch of my Soviet and East German hats, I got a lot of stuff with some dollars and Western Pron magazines.

The Sector sign that is immortalized.

 East German hat and helmets.

Yes that is a Soviet and East German flag.   My "man-cave" has a lot of stuff from my travels.

    I do want to go back to Berlin and Germany to  see how things have changed.   I hope to do this journey fairly soon and take my son with me and he can see how things were and how things have changed.   We saw some exciting times and were on the fore front of history

"Folklore Law and the Death of Equality"

 

Something that I had noticed from the "Urban Denizens" and their "AAAAACTIVIST", is that they want a 2 tier justice system, for example, if the defendant is sub-Saharan nubian American, they want an all black Jury as to understand the "African American Experience here in America".  and if the victim is black, they want the jury to be all black because only they can understand the feelings of the victim and have empathy for them.  I remember way back when Justice was colorblind, that is why she wears the blindfold and holds the scale. now they want to put the thumb on the scale and permanently tilt the scales in favor of one group over all others because of past transgressions.  The problem is that they expect the people of today to pay for the sins of their ancestors while not holding their progeny accountable for their own sins. eventually the others will get tired and the balkanization of the United States will be complete.  Right now Ireland is getting spicy because some migrant tried to decapitate some local and when you get the catholics and protestants on the same side and they are trashing migrant hotels and businesses because they have a case of the ass because they know that their "betters" have sold them out and they are pissed.

Karmelo Anthony was found guilty of murder.

And even though the “only good cracker is a dead cracker” chorus immediately cast the case as just another example of white unfair “white” jurisprudence putting down the black man, it was not because Anthony is a black teenager and four hundred years ago black Africans were enslaved and shipped to the Western Hemisphere as chattel to satisfy a rapidly growing need for labor.

Anthony was found guilty because he was guilty. He murdered another 17-year-old student, Austin Metcalf, who was white.

Anthony’s case was an overt example of trying to defend the indefensible. Based on accounts I read overnight, his defense did more to confirm his guilt than exonerate him, appearing to a great extent to corroborate the prosecution’s positions.

I have followed with a high degree of interest my friend, Jefferson Knight, and his analysis of law versus what he calls “folklore law”, the process wrapped around an invented metanarrative that, in the Anthony case, meant that the white kid was an oppressor, little different than a slave master, and the black kid was just seeking to escape the oppression of a white society and therefore justified in his actions.

Thomas Sowell, one of the most underappreciated public intellectuals of our times, once noted that blacks were not forced into slavery because they were black, they were made slaves because they were available.

There is considerable evidence supporting Thomas Sowell’s observation. Slavery existed throughout human history long before modern concepts of race emerged. Romans enslaved Europeans, Arabs enslaved Europeans and Africans, and African kingdoms enslaved rival tribes. In most cases, the determining factors were military defeat, vulnerability, geography, or economic opportunity rather than skin color. The Atlantic slave trade developed in part because existing African slave-trading networks could supply large numbers of laborers to meet the demands of plantation economies in the Americas.

That said, European societies generally viewed sub-Saharan African cultures as less technologically and organizationally advanced than their own. This perception was not based on skin color alone but on differences in political institutions, military technology, literacy, industrial development, and economic organization. Throughout history, civilizations have often equated cultural differences with civilizational superiority, whether Greeks describing outsiders as “barbarians” or other societies drawing distinctions between the civilized and the uncivilized. Such attitudes can easily evolve into viewing other peoples as less fully human.

The crucial distinction is that racial inferiority was not necessarily the original cause of African slavery, but it became an increasingly important justification for it. As the plantation economies of the New World grew dependent on African labor, a moral and political problem emerged: how do you defend the permanent enslavement of millions of people and their descendants? One answer was the development of racial theories that portrayed Africans as naturally suited for servitude or inherently inferior. Those ideas helped reconcile the contradiction between Western ideals of liberty and the reality of slavery.

Africans entered the Atlantic slave system largely because they were available through existing trade networks because the economics of the era demanded a large labor force. As the institution of slavery continued, economic interests and racial theories reinforced one another, transforming slavery from a common human institution into a distinctly race-based system.

Race was less the original cause of slavery than the rationale developed to sustain it, but that racialization has, over centuries, led to a tension between two competing concepts of equality that have been battling for dominance in American life for decades.

This is where Knight’s concept of “folklore law” enters the picture. Globally, there is no shortage of people who intentionally cast Western culture and its morality as a predominant evil and the cause of the world’s problems—but that requires ignoring the bulk of human history and how unequal treatment of each other was based on real and imagined differences.

Race is just a useful sociopolitical tool right now.

It seems evident that if Karmelo Anthony is a victim, he was not a victim of white racism but of black racism which promotes a narrative that blacks must never allow a white person to challenge them. He was also the victim of a set of terrible parents and a culture that taught it was acceptable to take a deadly weapon to a high school track meet and then use that weapon to stab another teenager to settle a meaningless high school dispute.

In the scope of this specific event, there is no larger context here other than a murder—but there surely is one in the aftermath and it has to do with a collision between two principles: individual equality and group equity. One treats the individual as the fundamental unit of society; the other views individuals through the lens of group membership and historical disparities. Supporters of the latter argue that ignoring group differences perpetuates inequality. Critics argue that assigning benefits, burdens, or moral standing based on identity undermines equality before the law and revives the very distinctions the civil rights movement sought to eliminate.

The traditional American understanding of equality, rooted in the Declaration of Independence and reflected in the Constitution, holds that individuals possess equal moral worth and equal standing before the law. Under that framework, race, class, religion, and ancestry are irrelevant to justice. People are judged by their actions and character, not by the groups to which they belong.

Over the past several decades, a competing view has gained influence. Rather than focusing primarily on equal treatment, it seeks more equal outcomes among groups. Under this approach, race, ethnicity, sex, and class become relevant considerations in public policy, education, employment, and even the interpretation of social conflicts.

The question is not whether Americans still believe that all men are created equal, the question is what that phrase means. Does equality require treating people equally regardless of identity, or does it require treating people differently in a futile attempt to produce more equal outcomes?

The former is the basis for what is perhaps the most equal society and culture in history, the irony of the second is that it produces inequality through a series of cascading intended and unintended consequences, but which is chosen may well decide our fate as a nation.

"Observable Cues and Taking a Prat Fall"

 

I have heard people on the left side of the aisle complaining about *Orange Man bad* and the reflecting Pool, and that he trashed the landmark just like he is trashing the White house by building the ballroom.   The ballroom is for Formal occasions unlike the basketball court the messiah built for his own edification but that part gets glossed over.  Looks like the same pattern of ballot harvesting, no chain of custody, unattended ballot drop boxes are in play again instead of in the United States, they are running the same play in california...Hey it worked before, let's roll the dice again.

     I shamelessly clipped this off farcebook, the photo's came from my "stash"  'cept for the last one.

People (Democrats) are harping and carping about President Trump’s efforts to clean up DC, both literally and figuratively.

And Democrats in the terminal stages of TDS are taking the lead in opposition to cleaning of statuary that were defaced by their constituents, parks filled with the detritus of industrially manufactured “protests” (curiously, tarnished by people who allegedly love the environment), and returning things that are supposed to be beautiful and functional to a state of being beautiful and being functional.

Democrats need DC and our public spaces to look like the aftermath of a nuclear blast to support their OMB (Orange Man Bad) narrative even though the unprecedented level of neglect reached its nadir during the Biden regime.

What President Trump is doing makes a lot of sense even if we weren’t less than a month from celebrating America’s 250th birthday.

And in many (if not most) cases, neglect costs more than keeping things in good condition.

As is often true with neglect, ugly and expensive go hand in hand.

By any account, as Trump 2.0 began, the Reflecting Pool on the National Mall, between the Washington monument and the Lincoln memorial, looked more like the retention pool of a sewage treatment facility than an architectural feature designed to reflect and magnify the beauty and solemnity of monuments to two of America’s most consequential presidents.

In truth, the retention pools of a sewage facility were cleaner than what was once a national treasure. Some accounts say that close to 20 dump truck loads of garbage were removed from the Pool. The National Park Service estimated that maintaining the pool required about 17 million gallons of replacement water per year, or around 327,000 gallons a week (and rising)—and that was after Obama took two years to “fix” it in 2010 to 2012.

You may still be wondering why the Reflecting Pool is important, so allow me to present some facts and ideas to help your understanding.

Many of you will remember that I have written several times about something called observable cues—the visible, audible, and measurable signals people use to interpret situations, behavior, and intent. They include facial expressions, body language, posture, eye contact, tone of voice, word choice, clothing, physical appearance, actions, and interactions with others.

Observable cues can also extend beyond people to environments and events, such as neglected property suggesting a lack of maintenance, a long line outside a restaurant indicating popularity, or a person’s hurried movements suggesting urgency. While these cues often provide useful information and help us make quick judgments, they are not infallible because they reveal only what can be directly observed and may not accurately reflect underlying motives, circumstances, or beliefs. Effective reasoning requires recognizing observable cues as evidence to be considered rather than conclusions to be accepted without further examination.

We can draw inferences from other observable cues to help us understand our current social and political landscapes.

Two major, immediate, and informationally rich cues are a person, Graham Platner, the presumptive Democrat candidate poised and a thing, actually an activity - the California voting and post-election vote counting process.

Platner is extremely valuable as a walking, talking example of the massive degree of hypocrisy that exists within the Democrat Party ranks and the sheer magnitude of cognitive dissonance it takes to ignore the logically crippling levels of contradiction that exist within their ideology. John Kerry revealed much about his party when he expressed his being “for it before he was against it” ethos those many years ago because he revealed a core principle of his party, one that allows them to turn on a dime when faced with any issue that might prevent them from achieving or retaining power.

In a sane world, the “for it today, against it tomorrow” contemporary Democrats would be relegated to wearing sandwich boards emblazoned with “The End Is Near” printed on them while wandering the streets.

And then there is the other observable cue, the Great State of California.

California is in many ways, the Reflecting Pool of America, and like the one in DC, has become filled with neglect, waste, and corruption. The difference is that nobody in California is interested in cleaning it up.

As much as I will admit I personally have no conclusive evidence that an already mentally compromised Joe Biden didn’t get 81 million votes in 2020, I can also admit I have no direct evidence that the Democrat controlled machine is manipulating the LA vote counts to eliminate Spencer Pratt (who is NOT MAGA or even a Republican) from contention in the runoff—but I also don’t have direct evidence that they aren’t.

Cuban trained Comrade Karen “Let it Burn” Bass was always expected to take the lead, and we know the California system was designed not for legitimate competition but to decide how much of a communist Democrat to elect. As a result, outside challenger Pratt has lost his second place standing, falling due to some statistically impossible ballot drops that have pulled the supposed third place Democrat into second place.

My observation is that the Pratt Fall is eerily similar to the late hour “anomalies” that propelled Biden into the Oval.

Voters for change have apparently been Californicated once again.

Combine that with the constant “anomalies” that the longer election counts go on, the more the Democrat candidates benefit from it, and if anomalies keep happening with the same outcome, one might legitimately question if they are really anomalies at all.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., the American jurist, legal philosopher, and U.S. Supreme Court justice, once wrote “Even a dog distinguishes between being stumbled over and being kicked.”

I guess the real question is whether we are as smart as Holmes' dog and if we have any bite left.

Monday Music "Tusk" by Fleetwood Mack

I have stated many times on my blog, I am a huge fan of Fleetwood Mac as a group and with the individual ventures...I consider them one of the greatest groups of all time.   But I am a bit biased, not all would agree with me.  I have the LP in my record collection...I paid a pretty penny for it back in 1979, I had a good lawn cutting business, I had a bunch of houses I would cut the yard for $5.00 no matter the size...and I had a lot of regular customers....it kept me in comic books and the occasional album.  It taught me the value of work and money...I had to measure the sweat equity for the goodies I wanted...so for a kid...I was careful.  I liked the album...and it helped that there was a "nekked" pic inside the jacket.   , b the pic was rumored to be that of Stevie Nicks and it was pretty nice pic.(I looked at it again, and no, the "nekked" pic was more *busty* than Stevie Nicks)  I don't know...but when you are 13/14 years old...you remember such things...   I enjoyed playing the album, it was a dual LP and I liked the Songs especially "Sara" and "Tusk"

                        Here is the actual album I bought back in 1979

"Tusk" is a song by Fleetwood Mac from the 1979 double LP of the same name. The song peaked at #8 on the U.S. charts for three weeks, reached #6 in the UK (where it was certified Silver for sales of over 250,000 copies) and #3 in Australia and Canada. It was one of the first songs to be released using a digital mixdown from an original analog source.

Looking for a title track for the as yet unnamed album, Mick Fleetwood suggested that they take the rehearsal riff that Lindsey Buckingham used for sound-checks. Producers Richard Dashut and Ken Caillat hence created a drum-driven production.
The single was recorded live together with the supporting video at Dodger Stadium (without an audience) in Los Angeles, California in collaboration with the University of Southern California Trojan Marching Band. The performance was also filmed for the song's music video. John McVie was in Tahiti during the Dodger Stadium recording, but he is represented in the video by a cardboard cutout carried around by Mick Fleetwood and later positioned in the stands with the other band members.
The band's part both set a record for the highest number of musicians performing on a single and earned the marching musicians a platinum disc. Lindsey Buckingham, Stevie Nicks and Mick Fleetwood presented it to the Trojan band on October 4, 1980 during a game at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, this time in front of a huge crowd. The song was also performed live during Fleetwood Mac's concert in 1997 in conjunction with the USC Band.
The single was released with two different picture sleeves in many territories: The first featured the black and white picture of producer/engineer Ken Caillat's dog Scooter snapping at a trouser leg, the same as that used for the album cover, whilst the second featured a plain cover with the same font as the album cover but without the dog picture. A very limited promotional 12-inch version, featuring mono and stereo versions, was also released to US radio stations.