4G3 H4S N0T SM00TH3D MY 3DG3S...

age has not smoothed my edges -

still as wild-eyed and anti

all this bullshit as ever

L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Six - 67 to 40

I am psychically affected today by the Japanese radiation of the earth, as meant to control world populations in certain zones, and feel a level of concern with this issue that goes beyond the news coverage. Sure, they were quick with the disaster porn images for a few days post-tsunami/quake/reactor crack, but now that we've got bombs going over Tripoli, they've turned their attention to Gadhafi and Eurasia, who has always been our enemy. Never mind Bahrain/Tunisia/Yemen/Egypt/everywhere else, Libya is a fucking problem, and to encourage democracy there would be a watershed moment that makes peace for the entire world. Never mind they have tons of proven oil reserves or that we are basically helping an Al Qaeda offshoot gain power there. Actually if we want to never mind things, let's also never mind that Al Qaeda was CIA trained in order to combat Russian forces in the massively ragged mountains there. We can never mind all types of shit. Let's never mind depleted uranium weaponry that has made the grounds of Iraq and Afghanistan and Kosovo and anywhere else we go on these peacekeeping missions infertile wastelands with high birth defect rates. Never mind some of the tainted ground has shown depleted uranium-4, which means that somewhere in America, they have already tested and developed fourth generation nuclear weapons, even though we are allegedly not proliferating them anymore. Man, fuck a Barack Obama. I miss the days of Bush when they would lay the foreplay groundwork through the media to fuck us up the ass with things like the Iraq invasion. Obama doesn't even give us foreplay. Monsanto is now organic, nuclear and coal plants are green power, and we just start bombing Libya right after we turned a blind eye to like nine other countries in the same fucking region.
So yeah, Japanese irradiation of the earth. I am using the criteria today of who is more Japanese, and if they are not, then who would have a better post-nuclear army of mutants under his/her direction...
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day three (1 to 1): I really couldn't think of a better person to have controlling an army of nuclear mutants than Ghostface Killah. He'd have the lingo down pat, could make up a nice fake religious text drawing on his 5% philosophies, and I'd feel fine with the re-proliferation of humanity with Ghost at the helm. I have been reading that fake Ghostface blog, which is funny as fuck, because it's all so true. And at the same time, I knew it would catch flack since real life rappers are getting hurt feelings over the fake commentaries. I was wondering when Ghostface himself would shut it down, or more likely his label or agents on his behalf, because I would figure he'd probably not give enough of a shit to care. Advantage: Ghostface Killah, declared victorious.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day two (1 to 0, Fulcher): Man, I'd be surprised if Henry Fulcher has ever been to California, much less Japan. Lazcano probably hasn't either, but there is no denying a practicing Mexican drug lord would be an excellent mutant army general. I mean, that's basically what he is already in this world, just instead of actual nuclear mutations to their genes, his minions just have severe environmental and social conditions that cause them to be completely desensitized to shooting children or beheading police captains and hanging bodies from bridges with signs that basically say, "Go Los Zetas!" but with one of those extra upside down exclamation points on the front that I can't type because my laptop is gringo as fuck. Advantage: Lazcano, tied 1-1.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day two (1 to 0, Tyson): Jackie Tyson has been to California - used to drive two west coast turnarounds a month back in the day, but probably not Japan. Jack Chick is one with a born again Jesus God, so he's been all around the world for the most part, and at the missionary training school he's affiliated with, for every country they have not been, they have a blank grey flag hanging in the cafeteria. I actually ate at a place like that one time, doing an installation for a company I worked for. Place was creepy as fuck. They ate with their hands to be like the countries they were going to be doing mission work, and the one trainer dude was explaining to us how they made secret relationships with people by helping and then introduced Jesus to them privately, so as to not make it a public affair. Very insidious, but they believed they had to save people who were not aware of Christ. I was just kinda creeped out, and ended up taking a couple old Hustler magazines with me hidden in my jacket, and would bust ass to finish my area really quickly and then go into every dorm room (which were empty because we were installing very sterile "art" into these new dorm rooms) and tucking a nasty picture page into the ceiling tile above every bed. It is my hope that at some point, somebody in that dorm was trying to hide contraband and found a nasty Hustler picture in there. I guess I was doing my own missionary work, although I prefer to be on the bottom. Advantage: Jack Chick, tied 1-1.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day two (1 to 0, Lewis): I've never seen catfish sushi so I would assume Jerry Rider has not gone to Japan, unless he want to grabble some koi. Jerry Lee Lewis is Mr. Rock-n-Roll and has been around the world a bunch of times and probably had children with 14-year-old Japanese chicks back in the '60s, and now those kids are like 40-something, and they might've been affected personally by this nuclear tragedy at Fukushina, and Jerry Lee Lewis may not even know, nor care. But that's his blood being damaged over there, even if it ain't in his own body. Blood is still blood. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, declared victorious.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day two (1 to 0, White): Not sure on this one. Neither seem naturally Japanese, and both have been involved in levels of odd fame that would make me think someone in Japan would bring them over at some point. So I'm gonna have to go the mutant army battle. Jim Brown's mutant army would obviously be a militant force, probably fed mutant power ideologies to make them not only feel stronger, but more confident in themselves, perhaps co-opting Soul on Ice or The Wretched of the Earth to apply to mutated genetics, and consider themselves not only equals in our post-Apocalyptic earth, but the very future of it. Meanwhile, I would assume Jesco White's mutant minions would basically be crazy hillbillies, but accelerated by their mutant craziness, so basically a bunch of dudes in a holler on super-crank. And really, the key difference here is the ideology behind the mutant armies. It is no coincidence that people who have a strong sense of faith tend to live longer lives, and I say that as someone without a very clearly defined belief system... well, I know what I believe but I don't have books to stack up to point out to make you understand it. The mutant with belief behind him is less likely to self-destruct or turn on his compadres. The super-crank hillbilly mutant is apt to fits of emotional betrayal, and turning on his own, then feeling terrible and wanting to come back. Jesco White's mutant army would eventually self-destruct, and would not be the unified fighting force that Jim Brown's would be. Advantage: Jim Brown, tied 1-1.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day two (1 to 0, Mangrum): One has probably raced cars in Japan, in super fast blasts of 300 mph straight stretches a quarter mile long. The other has sang his twangy rock-n-roll music probably in Japan, and had sex with women there, who only knew him as a rock star. Advantage: Jim "Dandy, declared victorious.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day two (1 to 0, Johnson): Neither is Jap, but John Waters is a first class wackjob that you know has seen and done great and amazing underground not-known-to-normal-humans things in Japan. That country seems pretty wacked out itself, and encourages bizarre obsessive compulsions that would get you a psychiatric prescription most places. Also, even if we threw out this figuring on my part, I would imagine a guy like Junior Johnson would not survive massive nuclear irradiation because while they were tweeting to everybody to not go outside, he wouldn't have a computer and would be patching fence on the back end of his property all day long, unaware of his thyroid blowing up like the World Trade. Advantage: John Waters, tied 1-1.
KIM JONG IL vs. KOOL HERC
Day one: Kim Jong Il ain't Japanese, but he lives right across the Japan Sea over on the Korean peninsula, being a little crazy assed dude - the world's only artsy-fartsy dictator type. Advantage: Kim Jong Il, leading 1 to 0.
KUNIZO MATSUMOTO vs. LARRY FLYNT
Day one: Matsumoto is the only for-real Japanese person in today's match-ups, and he is so incredibly and amazingly awesome that I refuse to even speak upon him until next time. Larry Flynt is Larry Flynt - a hillbilly legend who lived the American dream in truly hillbilly ways, but he has no Japanese blood to him, and probably respects that culture so very little. Advantage: Kunizo Matsumoto, leading 1 to 0.
LEONARD KNIGHT vs. LUCINDA WILLIAMS
Day one: Again, no Japanese blood. Williams has probably traveled to Japan more extensively, though by virtue of being a wacky Christian self-taught artist painting a giant mountain in the middle of a desert wasteland with messages to follow God, I would guess that Knight interacts with Japanese folks on a more one-on-one level more often. Plus, if it came down to mutant armies doing battle, I do not think Lucinda Williams would lead a very formidable mutant army. They'd all be depressed and mopey and drinking Budweisers all morning long. Meanwhile, Leonard Knight pretty much already lives in a wasteland. (Please watch Plagues & Pleasures on the Salton Sea, a documentary narrated by John Waters and featuring Leonard Knight, and really an amazing story about surviving amidst man's stupid stupid ways. I found it very inspiring.) Advantage: Leonard Knight, leading 1 to 0.

L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Five - 70 to 40

It's a beautiful warm Friday afternoon, I've got the outside speaker - as water damaged and dry-rotted as ever but made of indestructible 1970s stereophonic craftsmanship - pumping it up from its perch on top of a blue milk crate, sitting at the picnic table, finger poking my madness into a laptop with a hot battery that feels like it'll burn my shit up one day. Alice Cooper is playing on the music box, "I'm a boy and I'm a man" blaring through the universe that is the compound back yard right about now. I'm feeling pretty swelled up with pride in my southside roots, my DNA a lot like that damned speaker I got five years ago from underneath the "To Good To Throw Away" carport at the Fluvanna County landfill. I get messed up and uglier the more I get left out unprotected in the elements, but somehow I keep doing what I'm supposed to do, and do it better than most new-fangled bullshit meant to replace me. Alpha-to-omega mindframe, in full effect. So the criteria I'm gonna use today is thinking back on those southside roots, crazy fuckers standing around the bed of a pick-up truck, passing joints, reaching into various coolers, wrapping a hot shot of Jim Beam with a pre- and post-swig of ginger ale, and telling stories, based on reality usually, but always extraordinary. That's how I got to talk the stories I talk at the world, from wanting to be all those dudes when I grew up. So the criteria today is who of the match-ups could handle leaning on the back of a '72 Silverado or '76 Ram or whatever, and survive the conversation.
GARY SNYDER vs. GAYLORD PERRY
Day two (1 to 0, Snyder): Gaylord Perry is a baseball player, which is most closely resembled in our modern southern society by the travelling salesman. They do okay in more structured environments, like bars or cookouts with pop-ups. They don't fare so well in the naked realms of pick-up truck philosophy sessions. And for as pretentious and cultural elite as Gary Snyder can come off as sometimes, he still slummed it up with lumberjacks for a long ass time, and has prided himself on being in touch with working class folks. You can't even try to pull that off without splitting some Olympias over top the back end of a Chevrolet. Advantage: Gary Snyder, he done won.
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. GLEN STEWART GODWIN
Day two (1 to 0, Ghostface): I hate to break it down this way, because it comes down to race, but Ghost is a black dude who probably would be wearing very clean clothes, that maybe had never been worn before. Godwin is a piece of white trash from California who somehow ended up being involved in running cocaine from central America as a fugitive from the law. Both would distrust the back of your average southside pick-up truck, but Godwin would make easier friends. Advantage: Glen Stewart Godwin, tied 1-1.
GRADY STILES III vs. GRANDMASTER CAZ
Day two (1 to 0, Caz): This is even tougher because Stiles is a carnival freak who refuses to be in a carnival, and Caz is a pioneer rapper who never got his proper cultural daps. Still though, being old school, Caz has hung with all types of folks by now, and you get them old dudes together with a joint, black and white, city and country, and they bond over the simple things like Otis Redding or how bad angel dust used to be or Mexican pussy or something. A carnival freak is always gonna be a carnival freak, no matter where you put them, unless it's Gibsonton, Florida. Advantage: Grandmaster Caz, he done won.
H.D. DENNIS vs. HARRY CREWS
Day two (1 to 0, Crews): Shit man, Harry Crews in his prime got most of his stories from leaning around the back end of pick-up trucks in scenarios exactly like I'm describing. Advantage: Harry Crews, he done won.
HENRY FULCHER vs. HERIBERTO LAZCANO
Day one: Not really a fair fight because a Mexican drug lord is not gonna trust a bunch of southside Virginia rednecks, nor want to be around them at all. Henry Fulcher is a southside Virginia AM radio bluegrass DJ, and old as fuck, so he probably wouldn't be comfortable around all those good ole boys either, but they'd at least be more tolerant of him, hiding their joints until he left, and toning down the conversation. Once he got back in his Buick and drove off though, they'd be blazing up for lost time. Advantage: Henry Fulcher, 1 to 0.
JACK CHICK vs. JACKIE TYSON
Day one: Jack Chick makes up Jesus comics for retarded Christians. Jackie Tyson is actually one of those southside Virginia dudes I remember seeing growing up. I need to get by and see that old dude once I can start driving again. Which reminds me I need to get a new battery and two new tires for my truck. Somebody used the truck to take our trash to the landfill, and the cargo light got left on, so the battery is dead. No matter how much I try to escape it, I'm still country as fuck. It's like a stain on my soul. Advantage: Jackie Tyson, 1 to 0.
JERRY "CATFISH" RIDER vs. JERRY LEE LEWIS
Day one: This is actually the best battle, between an old and crazy, somewhat racist rockabilly legend, and a dude who became somewhat famous for being one of the more fearless barehanded catfishers (aka noodler, or grabbler) that there ever was. In fact, this is the only match-up I'm writing about under the back-of-the-truck talk criteria that would move beyond the initial phase, because both of these dudes would probably survive the initial conversation. But after a few hours of talking about catching catfish with your bare hands, or throwing dynamite into ponds, or whatever, you run out of things to talk about. When you're an old crazy fucker who does not mind doing speed even slightly, you are bound to last longer around the truckbed, probably late into the night, until the conversation moves into the shed under lights. Advantage: Jerry Lee Lewis, 1 to 0.
JESCO WHITE vs. JIM BROWN
Day one: Again, Jim Brown is a somewhat proud black dude former football player. Jesco White is a tapdancing hillbilly from West Virginia. Jesco would easily survive better, but he also seems full of himself after his documented fame, and would probably get his ass kicked before the night was over. Advantage: Jesco White, 1 to 0.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. JOHN FORCE
Day one: Actually, this one would probably move past the first phase too, as you have David Lee Roth prototype lead singer of Black Oak Arkansas who parlayed being an Ozark wildman into a long musical career where he still has weekly gigs in Memphis, Tennessee. John Force is a wacky California-style redneck guy who races funny cars really well. Again, like the Catfish Rider/Jerry Lee Lewis thing, after you talk cars for a long ass time, which would probably take the early lead around the truck bed, what's left? And I doubt Force would get all fucked up, as he doesn't seem the type. Jim Dandy would probably make it until under the shed lights as well. Advantage: Jim "Dandy", 1 to 0.
JOHN WATERS vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Day one: Sorry, a homosexual filmmaker into kitschy art, as awesome as he is, is not gonna compare to a former bootlegger turned Nascar hero who got out of Nascar when it got too fucking stupid and corporate and sold pork products instead but now also sells small batches of handmade liquor. Not even close. Advantage: Junior Johnson, 1 to 0.

L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Three - 80 to 40

So I spent a good amount this yesterday morning reading about Mexican drug cartels, and how far they've splintered. This came about because they arrested a dude who was a higher-up in the Los Zeta cartel in southern Mexico. Actually, this came about because my google news reader is a retarded smorgasbord of topics. I have not like the google news reader since they revamped it, to make it dumber for dumb people. But I still have active topics on "Mexican drug cartels" and "outlaw bikers" and "CAA basketball" and "mental illness art" and really more shit than I should be let known. Sometimes I think of starting a separate blog that just aggregates all the dumb shit I change my google news reader around to. But at the same time, that's exactly the type of shit I hate about the internet - syphoning shit together and acting like, "Hey, look how awesome this shit I did is even though I didn't do none of it!"
Anyways, I was reading about the Mexican drug cartels, and it reminded me of how out of last fall's 80 candidates for the Learned Elders of Rojonekku, two of them have been removed from eligibility. One - biker artist David Mann - had been dead for years; I just didn't know it. The other - Nazario Moreno - was the leader of the La Familia drug cartel in Mexico. He had handwritten his own version of the Bible, and members were not allowed to do drugs themselves or sell locally, and the whole thing was allegedly a Robin Hood-like effort to take over the state of Michoacan from corrupt government officials. This of course makes the government police assassination of Moreno somewhat suspect, especially considering different parts of the government are in cahoots with different cartels, and the whole thing is more fucked that what The Wire tries to tell you Baltimore is like.
So Nazario Moreno is now dead, thus not eligible for the Learned Elders of Rojonekku. This put me in the mind of thinking about who I would most be sad if they died and I had not honored them in my weird ass little unabomber shack Hall of Fame. So that is the criteria in today's match-ups...
AFRIKA BAMBAATAA vs. ANGELA DAVIS
Day two (1-0, Davis): Afrika Bambaataa is a fucking hero and legend, space case hip hop gangsta from when the South Bronx was a third world battlefield of broken dreams. And somehow, he came out of that, crushed it without the use of social media, and blew the world the fuck up, hearing Planet Rock in his brain from the burned out urban rubble, and fucking the world with it. It is not outside of my mind that DJ Kool Herc, another important pioneer of a prostituted art that has meant a lot to me, just spent some serious time in the hospital. So without a doubt, I am thinking of Zulu Nation mortality. Advantage: Afrika Bambaataa, tied 1-1.
ATSUSHI ONITA vs. AUBREY DU GREY
Day two (1-0, Onita): Man, not even sure how Aubrey Du Grey got into this mix. I mean, he's got some interesting philosophies and all, but when you stack a longhaired, bearded, British egghead scientist dude with outlandish ideas against a Japanese wrestler who blows himself up and once fought in Afghanistan to help children not get blown up by landmines, with him being the inventor of the Landmine Death Match, it's just not even close. Plus, Onita is probably more likely to actually die because of all this. Advantage: Atsushi Onita, 2-0, done.
BILL MURRAY vs. BILLY CHILDISH
Day two (1-0, Childish): This is a tough one, because Billy Childish is a very minor pop culture figure. If Bill Murray died, I would probably watch Caddyshack again. If Billy Childish died, I would just listen to "You Make Me Die Now" and then maybe "Something Went Wrong" and his death would make more sense. But then also while watching Caddyshack, I'd be reminded of how awesome Rodney Dangerfield was, and how it's even more sad that he's dead. Like his bug eyes sticking out his skull, that shit was funny. And now his flesh is all decayed. It's sad. Advantage: Bill Murray, tied 1-1.
BILLY GIBBONS vs. BOBBY BEAUSOLEIL
Day two (1-0, Beausoleil): Oh man, this is not even close. When I think about Billy Gibbons potentially dying and no longer being part of this mortal coil, it makes me sad inside. He is quite simply an amazing man, who imagine still yells at people from across the street, laughs insanely, and then goes to some fucked up bowery row diner where you can still get venison sloppy joes and fight a dude with leather skin who looks like him and Philo Beddo might have crossed paths at some point over whether Freddy Fender from the jukebox is a Mexican or not. Advantage: Billy Gibbons, tied 1-1.
BUSHWICK BILL vs. CAROL NESMITH
Day two (1-0, Nesmith): Bushwick Bill is cool and all, being a one-eyed midget rapper. But Carol Nesmith raises gamecocks, which is an illegal sport in America, and probably it's not even legal for him to raise them, even though his business is strictly international nowadays. His is a lost and dying trade, crushed from the American underbelly by the liberal desires of gentrification of the world, where no shady and grimy things go on, and there's chai lattes within a 5-minute drive in every direction. Advantage: Carol Nesmith, 2-0, over.
CHAZ BOJORQUEZ vs. CORMAC MCCARTHY
Day two (1-0, Bojorquez): A strange match-up under these criteria, as both have been The Best Thing Ever in my mind at certain points of my life, but also heavily mixed into the background clutter of my waxing and waning interests at most other times. So I kind of went with who I would rather sit down with and be sad if they were dead afterwards, which would be Cormac McCarthy. I haven't read nearly as much of him as I probably should, but that's because usually when I'm reading fiction, I feel like I'm wasting my time that could be better spent writing nonsense fiction. I'm just not a fast enough reader to get through it, and this is because I just can't read every word. If I am reading a book and realize I zoned out for half a page, I go back one page and start re-reading. I have to feel every word go through my brain. As it has been explained to me, reading is a much faster endeavor for others, who blow through books, get the overall gist of it, and then blow through another book. I respect that, but just can't help myself from having to roll every individual word into my mind. And then when I read a sentence I really love, I have to write it down in a notebook, to feel the flow of the words. I am a fucking nerd about that shit. Or insane. It's a fine line to be honest. Advantage: Cormac McCarthy, tied 1-1.
DAMIEN ECHOLS vs. DAVID ALLAN COE
Day two (1-0, Echols): Damien Echols the railroaded metalhead kid who I guess I see something of myself in him, is just a young dude who has been in jail wrongly for his entire adult life. David Allan Coe is old and has a dreadlocked beard and plays a flying V confederate flag guitar. Not even close. Advantage: David Allan Coe, tied 1-1.
DEXTER MANLEY vs. DIEGO MARADONA
Day two (1-0, Manley): I thought that without a doubt this would go to Manley, what with me growing up a Redskins fan of the first order, and continue to suffer under the dictatorial regime of little-dicked Danny Snyder. But as I thought about it, Manley is a wacky figure, and still surrounding Redskins world, with his craziness, albeit not cracked out anymore (at least so goes the press releases). But Diego Maradona is a fucking international maniac. That dude was King of South America due to his soccer skills (which is the rest of the world's football), and made his fame off a probable hand ball. This athletic success was parlayed into cocaine, whores, dogs that bite his face, and who knows what else madness. Seriously, this whole Charlie Sheen thing has probably been done before by Diego Maradona three or four times over, it's just there wasn't a stupid around-the-clock media and social networking bullshit to run it up the hype machine into everybody's goddamned brains. Although saying that makes me wonder if I can follow Diego on twitter, because that would be cool. (By the way, twitter is fucking stupid. In case you were teetering on that, and then read that I do the twitters, please do not use that as a reason to start. I would encourage you to never look at it, ever. It is a useless wasteland of short blurts of people telling each other what they are selling/hyping/want you to look at/hoping you holler back because you are more famous than them. Avoid it.) Advantage: Diego Maradona, tied 1-1.
EL HIJO DEL SANTO vs. ESTEVAN ORIOL
Day two (1-0, Santo): I sent Estevan Oriol's website a question a few weeks ago, trying to send them money to buy a print. No response. Not even an auto-response like, "Yo, I am commissioned to take pictures of half naked chicana chicks for a Complex magazine spread coming out in April. My webmaster will get at you soon." Nothing. I bet if Santito had an official website, he'd respond. I bet he does, with mind mails that he sends to the kids, to help them not do drugs in war-torn Mexico. Advantage: El Hijo Del Santo, 2-0, terminado.
FIDEL CASTRO vs. G. GORDON LIDDY
Day two (1-0, Castro): Man, I still believe in the fundamental principles of communism, and feel what the Soviet Union was doing is as close to that as what America is now is in relation to an actual democracy. Both were perverted by a small, elite power base. And just like when the Soviet Union collapsed into a mafioso-happy military junta masquerading as a sort of democracy, America at some point will fall apart (potentially soon) and masquerade as some sort of mutant social state where the rich exploit the fuck out of the poor but give them shitty free educations and shitty free universal health care even though it only applies to the earth and specifically within one country. Thus, I will be for-realsy sad when Fidel Castro dies. The dude is the one guy who put that shit into motion, far better than most. Sure, Cuba has its own bullshit. But at one point it had the highest literacy rate and lowest infant mortality rate. He harbored Black Panther fugitives, and dumped a bunch of miscreant sociopath drug dealer types onto American soil back in the early '80s. And now he just likes to hang out and watch dolphins. Dude is an international treasure. Advantage: Fidel Castro, 2-0, goodbye G-man.

L.E.o.R. - Spring '11 - Day Two - 80 to 40

I am really tired of the Charlie Sheen meme, so in today's analysis of who should or should not advance in the Learned Elders of Rojonekku process, I have decided the simple criteria is which of these has most likely not hung out, met, or interacted at any level with Charlie Sheen, face-to-face, hand-to-hand. While the idea of a guy just saying whatever shit comes to mind is intriguing (naturally... have you read this fucking site?), I just don't buy this dude. First off, you can't ever trust cokeheads, because they are always up to something. Always. Secondly, it's fucking Charlie Sheen. He had it handed to him from the beginning, so it's not like he's some noble salt of the earth truth sayer busting the coconuts of the masses with the realest of real talk.
So let's get through this nonsense today. And remember, the 80 to 40 round is best of 3.
AFRIKA BAMBAATAA vs. ANGELA DAVIS
Day one: Bambaataa is a legendary pioneer of hip hop, while Davis is a former Black Panther. Davis has remained fairly militant, though tempered down, and always political in nature. Bambaataa wore space outfits from the future, but old looking, and you would have to imagine a guy who ran with a gang in NYC in the late 1970s and decided that Kraftwerk was the greatest shit ever has probably done plenty drugs. And you would have to imagine if you make "Planet Rock" then you probably have snorted lines in the VIP room of various clubs. Though their realms of popularity seem disparate, pop culture is a strange fucking amoeba, and even if they did not split an eight-ball at some point, I would imagine it wouldn't take more than one person to connect Afrika Bambaataa with Charlie Sheen in a Kevin Bacon manner, but with shared cocaine use instead of being in movies together. Advantage: Angela Davis, 1 to 0.
ATSUSHI ONITA vs. AUBREY DU GREY
Day one: Onita is a Japanese hardcore wrestler famous for blowing himself up, who also ran for government office. Du Grey is a British science dude who thinks that humanity can cure itself of aging, and we can all live forever. And as much as it's hard to imagine either of these dudes ever actually sharing a party floor with Charlie Sheen. But at the same time, thinking you can cure people from aging ever again, and calling old age a disease, is not too far from thinking tiger blood makes you impervious to everything. Advantage: Atsushi Onita, 1 to 0.
BILL MURRAY vs. BILLY CHILDISH
Day one: As much as I love the crazy guy, there's probably not that fine a line distinguishing Bill Murray from Charlie Sheen. I would imagine they have crossed paths before. It may have been uncomfortable dealings, as it can be when two lifelong unrepentant substance abusers interact with each other, both used to their own way of recklessly endangering themselves in amusing ways. You'll get ruffled feathers in those instances, and chances are Billy Murray and Chuckie Sheen have done things together, or shared women, or talked about women they shared, or some Hollyweird drunkard bullshit like that. Billy Childish is a rock-n-roll pervert poet scumbag from Scotland. Charlie Sheen might seem similar to that in nature, but he'd never lower himself to Billy Childish's level. Advantage: Billy Childish, 1 to 0.
BILLY GIBBONS vs. BOBBY BEAUSOLEIL
Day one: Bobby Beausoleil has been in jail most of Charlie Sheen's life. ZZ Top was fairly big in the '80s when Charlie Sheen first became a young star as part of the Brat Pack. You gotta figure, even though the types that watched those movies (and the soundtracks themselves) were full of that whiny synthetic new wave type stuff, a young Charlie Sheen doing cocaine with River Phoenix and one of the Coreys is gonna pretty stoked to be backstage at a ZZ Top concert in 1986. And you would figure meeting Billy Gibbons would be part of the package. Advantage: Billy Childish, 1 to 0.
BUSHWICK BILL vs. CAROL NESMITH
Day one: Carol Nesmith is a gamecock breeder who has also spent long periods in jail for his philosophical beliefs. And if Charlie Sheen dabbled in cockfighting, it was probably somewhere more exotic like a high-dollar outfit in the Philippines or in Puerto Rico, not in fucking Alabama. Also, The Geto Boys got big briefly, and you gotta figure Charlie Sheen, much like ZZ Top in 1986, wanted to go backstage at The Geto Boys 1993. And he did. I imagine the conversation was uncomfortable, and Sheen probably made jokes to his entourage about the black midget rapper. But still, they met. Advantage: Carol Nesmith, 1 to 0.
CHAZ BOJORQUEZ vs. CORMAC MCCARTHY
Day one: Cormac McCarthy, like all great writers, was never heard of by most people until he had a famous movie made from one of his novels. In order to cross over into that Hollywood world, you have to schmooze. It is painful, but you do it, because it is the choice you have made. And though Chaz Bojorquez is a famous L.A. underground artist, and very well could have had gallery shows with Sheen in attendance, for some reason I am giving him the benefit of the doubt. I am pretending that his art remains pure, while Cormac McCarthy's does not. It is purely a personal judgment. Advantage: Chaz Bojorquez, 1 to 0.
DAMIEN ECHOLS vs. DAVID ALLAN COE
Day one: Damien Echols was a metalhead kid who went to jail for not murdering a bunch of kids, and is a cause celebre at times, and other times just some dumb southern kid in jail, probably trying not to get raped anymore than he already has been. And being I've turned Charlie Sheen into a big music lover at this point, I am going to pretend he's seen David Allan Coe as well. Advantage: Damien Echols, 1 to 0.
DEXTER MANLEY vs. DIEGO MARADONA
Day one: At first glance, this would seem like a tough call, as both Manley and Maradona are notorious sports drug addicts. But Manley dug into a nice crack addiction that caused him to pawn off his Super Bowl ring. That's an entirely different beast than cocaine, and most hardcore cocaine users consider themselves some sort of upper crust who would never fuck around with low class crackheads. Diego Maradona is probably a more famous Charlie Sheen than Charlie Sheen - insane, wildly delusional, and all of it brought on by slutty women, alcohol, and cocaine. I would imagine of everybody I went through in today's battles, the one I would expect to have literally done cocaine with Charlie Sheen the most would be Maradona. Shit, Diego Maradona actually almost makes me think better of Charlie Sheen, because perhaps he'll get to that Maradona level at some point. But all it takes is five minutes on the interweb to be like, "Man, fuck all this stupid Charlie Sheen shit that thinks it's funny but is not" again. Advantage: Dexter Manley, 1 to 0.
EL HIJO DEL SANTO vs. ESTEVAN ORIOL
Day one: I really want to give Estevan Oriol the same credit I gave Chaz Bojorquez, especially since I am actively trying to purchase a print of an Oriol photograph (to no avail thus far). But when the fuck is Charlie Sheen gonna be fucking around with Mexican lucha libre? Cypress Hill's former manager turned L.A. artist, and best friend of one of the more famous L.A. celebrity tattoo artists (Mr. Cartoon)? Yeah, I could see Charlie Sheen crossing paths with him. Advantage: El Hijo Del Santo, 1 to 0.
FIDEL CASTRO vs. G. GORDON LIDDY
Day one: Both are moral political leaders. But Charlie Sheen is a secret Hispanic who grew up rich. A fake Hispanic rich kid is gonna be trained to hate him some Castro. Hell, Communism goes against everything that allowed Charlie Sheen to become Charlie Sheen. I would imagine if not Charlie, then Martin Sheen and the G-man have hobnobbed at Bohemian Grove get-togethers or secret Illuminati conventions at seven-star resorts in western Pennsylvania, where you are given complimentary Land Rovers to drive around. Advantage: Fidel Castro, 1 to 0.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 20 to 10 - 2 of 2

We shall repeat the short and sweet question battle version, because it just makes sense...
AFRIKA BAMBAATAA vs. GHOSTFACE KILLAH
Who makes a point of dancing with fat chicks on stage at pretty much all his shows? Ghostface Killah.
Who extended the influence of creepy ass Kraftwerk on pop culture by 20 years? Bambaataa.
Who would I rather have teach a group of 10 to 13 year olds for an afternoon seminar on whatever the fuck they felt like teaching about? Ghostface Killah. He should take over Zulu Nation and change the name to Zag Zig Zag Nation.
Advantage: Ghostface Killah.
JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM vs. LEMMY KILMISTER
Is Jim Dandy awesome as fuck? Yes.
Is he Lemmy? No.
Advantage: Lemmy Kilmister.
FIDEL CASTRO vs. GARY SNYDER
Which one has shot guns a whole fucking bunch? Castro.
Poetry? Both, in all likelihood.
Had sex with the most brown-skinned women? I am going to assume Castro.
Favorite natural type thing? Dolphins for Castro, Sierra Madre Mountains for Snyder.
Advantage: Fidel Castro.
LEONARD KNIGHT vs. MIROSLAV TICHY
Possessed by inner godliness or inner bedevilment? God for Knight, devil for Tichy.
Favorite medium? House paint for Knight, homemade junk camera for Tichy.
Ultimate goal? Make you accept Jesus for Knight, fuck you leave me alone for Tichy.
Advantage: Miroslav Tichy.
DAVID ALLAN COE vs. SWAMP DOGG
Raw as fuck? Yes to Coe, kind of to Swamp Dogg.
Times I've seen them and had my mind blown? Like four mind-blowings by Coe, only one by Swamp Dogg.
If I filled up an 80 minute CD with my favorite songs by them, how much of those songs would be awesome as fuck without a doubt, even if I was hungover so badly when listening to it that a Dr. Pepper made with real sugar didn't make me feel better? 71 minutes on the David Allan Coe CD, 48 minutes on the Swamp Dogg CD.
Multiplied awesomeness from their best song ever? Times 72 for "Walkin' Bum" by David Allan Coe. Times 83 for "Sam Stone" by Swamp Dogg. Still not enough though.
Advantage: David Allan Coe.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 20 to 10 - 1 of 2

We will make this round a simple best of three questions format...
ATSUSHI ONITA vs. JIMMY VALIANT
Where do they live? Somewhere in Japan vs. Shawsville, Virginia.
Do they have a beard? Not that I know vs. yes, a long ass one.
Advantage: Jimmy Valiant, two to none.
CHAZ BOJORQUEZ vs. GABRIEL DUENEZ
Who is older and more obscure? Duenez.
Were I rich, who would I more likely commission to do something for me? Bojorquez.
Am I rich? No.
Advantage: Gabriel Duenez.
JACKIE TYSON vs. JOHN RIGGINS
Which has cut down a tree in my back yard? Jackie Tyson.
Which has taught me awesome things in real life and once almost shot me with a .357 because he is really paranoid and I thought I was a neighbor crackhead trying to rob him? Jackie Tyson.
Who was on a football team I watched on TV when I was a kid? TV heroes are gay.
Advantage: Jackie Tyson.
CHARLES MANSON vs. TED KACZYNSKI
Who is smaller? I don't know; they're both small as fuck.
Who has the better beard? Upon arrest, probably a push, but I'd bet Manson keeps better facial hair in jail. Still, no photos to prove this.
Who wrote a better manifesto? Again, a push, because The Unabomber Manifesto was a nice piece, but very intellectual. Manson was a word-of-mouth oral manifesto manifester. There is something to be said for that.
Who would I rather receive a letter from if I wrote both of them in jail? Oh, without a doubt, Manson.
Advantage: Manson.
LARRY FLYNT vs. OXANA MALAYA
Who subjugates women? Flynt. (This would not be considered an advantage, in case you were wondering. Women can be objectified, but they should be treated well so as to enjoy their rampant sexualization as much as you enjoy it.)
Who wants to live amongst wild dogs? Malaya. (This is an advantage.)
Who is more obscure, thus making me feel like more of an obtuse internet hipster fuckface, and after all, isn't that what this is ultimately all about? Definitely Malaya.
Advantage: Oxana Malaya.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 40 to 20 - 4 of 4

The last of the second round. Please share your opinions of things with me because it occupies my life as I wait for the second number to get carved into my tombstone while sitting at work waiting for it all to crumble in on me...
DAVID MANN vs. LEMMY KILMISTER
No matter how much Sons of Anarchy I watch, nothing will make me think David Mann posters are cooler than Lemmy Kilmister songs. Especially if you've ever heard that semi-acoustic version of "Ironhorse/Born to Lose". I have it somewhere but I'm not going to find it and upload it. Just come by the house. We will plug in the camper and the backyard speaker and I'll play it real fucking loud while we get up a game of bones or huvna at the picnic table. I found a couple of boxes of our spring lemon homebrew and have been drinking brown and tans with that and Guinness lately. It's a lovely combo, the perfect double dropkick of your daily blues.
Advantage: Lemmy Kilmister.
DAVID ALLAN COE vs. WILLIE NELSON
In case you haven't noticed, I pair these match-up of similar people, so as to avoid something stupid like all five of the final people being wrestlers or all five being musicians, or whatever catches my personal interior pop culture retard flow at an awkward angle just perfectly while I'm doing this. This really isn't a fair battle for the second round because both of these guys are not only immense figures in the wacky real world, but immense figures in my real life. I grew up with my dad usually drinking and stoning til all hours of the morning. Many late Friday and Saturday nights were spent with him demon driving a car home from Cumberland county all the way to the south end of Prince Edward after a long night of small stakes poker playing, with me laying down sideways in the back seat so as to not see the outside world swerving past, and to hope I made it home alive. And God bless the old man, he never killed me once. We never even wrecked. And if it was a good night at the kitchen poker table at Tip's house, and we were coming home late enough, he'd buy me some cinnamon-n-raisin biscuits from Hardee's on the drunken sneak through Farmville. When I was about ten or eleven, I used to get to sit with the grown folks and play poker too, with my parents giving me like five or six dollars in change to gamble. Really, it showed how much they trusted me, because no other kids ever got to do that in all the time (we're talking years) these weekends went on. And if there weren't enough grown folks chairs for all the grown folks players, I would sit in Tip's son's high chair with the top off of it (rest in peace Tony Tipton... shit rest in peace all of them, Tony, Tip, my dad, Stuart just died from cancer, memories full of wild back roads ghosts), so we'd joke, "Raven's been playing poker since he was sittin' in a high chair."
Anyways, the ol' man would wake up early in the morning, probably about the time his drunk wore off, and start playing music loud as fuck and cooking up big fat breakfasts and cleaning the house and just generally, it seems to me in retrospect, cleansing himself with a good life. Of course, come dark, if it was the weekend, he was right back at it. But a lot of Willie Nelson and David Allan Coe got played. And though I think that "Redheaded Stranger" may be one of the greatest songs ever (and definitely the best country album ever made), David Allan Coe is just such a lifelong kook. Finding his underground stuff, or all the full albums that the For the Record was compiled from, or even his early post-prison insane rock-n-roll blues country drunken nightmare shit that it's hard to believe people actually made back in the late '60s/early '70s. Willie Nelson is amazing, but there's a lot of square ass people who love them some Willie Nelson. You go to a David Allan Coe show, yeah there'll be some bullshit fratboys, but there's gonna be some real shit there. Bikers staring at cowboys who are laughing at the hippies, so to speak.
Advantage: David Allan Coe.
CHARLES MANSON vs. LEONARD PELTIER
Not even close.
Advantage: Charles Manson.
MIROSLAV TICHY vs. VOLLIS SIMPSON
Oh man, this is another pair that I kinda wish could both be the final five, except I'm matching them now because they are both crazy self-taught artist types. I seriously cannot say how much I love Vollis Simpson and the idea of this wacky Carolina farmer dude starting to weld metal things together to blow in the wind, with them growing ever larger and gaining notoriety worldwide for what he does. But Miroslav Tichy did a similar thing but more anonymously, taking pictures with a homemade camera. And Tichy resents the fame he has achieved, because he is just an old man who wants to be left the fuck alone by society. I can understand that all too well, and probably more so than I should at my age.
Advantage: Miroslav Tichy.
GARY SNYDER vs. HARRY CREWS
Two of my favorite writers that are living and breathing and have rarely let me down. Hard to pick either or because they both have great books that are bibles in my mind, and I've read through things they've both done that did not interest me even slightly. But I guess if this dude writing in the Huffington Post about me said I was the "literary and philoshopical heir to Harry Crews," as sad as it sounds to say, he must not be as great as Gary Snyder if some raggedy blog-having piece of shit like me is his heir apparent.
Advantage: Gary Snyder.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 40 to 20 - 2 of 4

Let us resume this nonsense with very little explanation, so as to work my way closer to finishing up the fall class of Learned Elders of Rojonekku.
CHAZ BOJORQUEZ vs. ROBERT CRUMB
I looked at a bunch of gang graffiti online the other day, yet did not masturbate to muscle worship videos.
Advantage: Chaz Bojorquez.
OXANA MALAYA vs. PHYLLIS LIGHT
My wife is taking another class under Phyllis Light at some point this fall, and she's an awesome old herbal lady, but there is something that warms my heart about a 20-something chick who loves to tend animals on a mental hospital farm because she is considered mentally retarded or undeveloped or handicapped or whatever because she was raised by wild dogs. I am very much on a kick lately about how science and religion are both religions of course, and they differ on so much. Yet for some reason science has wholeheartedly taken the Dominion over the Earth thing and still attempts to point out constantly how superior humans are, when really how do you judge superior? Superior by our standards of what makes something better? Wouldn't that be biased? I love Oxana Malaya and wish they'd let her just hang with the dogs and stop trying to force her into some super role of reformed beast child.
Advantage: Oxana Malaya.
ATSUSHI ONITA vs. MIKE TYSON
Tyson is a wonderful story, especially if you work in all the strange superstitions and processes of boxing culture. But Onita blew himself up in fake fighting matches, got elected to Japanese Congress, and helped the children of Afghanistan somehow. My daughter just joined Facebook and her first status update was "I am sad about Afghanistan."
Advantage: Atsushi Onita.
TED KACZYNSKI vs. VINCENTE PIERRE
Pierre is a local hero of militant anti-governmentality gone to jail, while Kaczynski is a living legend of such affairs. There are only two people I'd like to initiate a prison/not-in-prison letter-writing relationship with - Kaczynski and Charles Manson. Of course, we all use laptops nowadays so I'm not sure I even know how to write with my hand. My signature has become swirly squigs with a couple of humps. I don't even get the number of humps right anymore.
Advantage: Ted Kaczynski.
DIEGO MARADONA vs. FIDEL CASTRO
Diego Maradona is a soccer player who went to coach soccer. Fidel Castro is a baseball player who went on to overthrow a corrupt government. Now he is old and hangs out watching dolphins. Che Guevara's daughter is a marine veterinarian. I read it on the internet last week, so it has to be true.
Advantage: Fidel Castro.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 80 to 40 - 5 of 5

JACK CHICK vs. LEONARD KNIGHT
Last of the first round, fast and furious. Chick drew Jesus comic strips that are ironically hilarious, yet the local baptist church still hands them to my kids every summer stapled to popsickles in a serious fashion at the Scottsville 4th of July Parade. I gather up as many as I can that get tossed on the ground. Knight lives in the desert of California, painting a mountain and trucks and anything in his way with donated housepaint in the name of the Lord. Stoner people you know have coffee cans full of Jack Chick pamphlets. You have to get in your car and drive to see Leonard Knight's roadside proselytizing.
Advantage: Leonard Knight.
GARY SNYDER vs. GIL SCOT-HERON
Look, Gil Scot-Heron is awesome as fuck, and if you've never heard of him you should get ahold of his music, especially the 1970s era stuff, as soon as possible. But Gary Snyder introduced me to about the only poetry that I think is not stupid and gay, through his translations of the collected works of Han Shan. And even though he's a long dead T'ang Dynasty poet, no one has had as much an influence on my adult life as Han Shan. If I could emulate one man who walked this earth surface, it'd be Han Shan.
Advantage: Gary Snyder.
GHOSTFACE KILLAH vs. MF DOOM
MF Doom is cool and all, quirky to be quirky, but Ghostface is the best rap show I've ever seen in my life, and he had the flu that night. And he's the best rapper alive. Period. He can switch phases and styles and remain himself and remain relevant. Period.
Advantage: Ghostface Killah.
DAVID LEE ROTH vs. JIM "DANDY" MANGRUM
You know all the tight pants womanizing lead singer over the top craziness that made David Lee Roth the man during Van Halen's for real years? It was all a carbon copy of what Jim Dandy did ten years earlier as lead singer of Black Oak Arkansas. And Jim Dandy still has long hair.
Advantage: Jim "Dandy" Mangrum.
NEK CHAND vs. VOLLIS SIMPSON
Nek Chand is an Indian dude ("Thank you, please be coming again" Indian, not "How, paleface, your litter make me cry" Indian) who built a giant rock city for no reason. It is awesome, but in India. Vollis Simpson builds giant metallic whirligigs (homemade things that move in the wind) in a field on his farm in North Carolina, which is not far at all. In fact, I should take the kids down there this Labor Day weekend, and look at his whirligigs, and dream up building 60 foot tall contraptions on my own compound because fuck the world especially my uptight neighbors.
Advantage: Vollis Simpson.
BILLY GIBBONS vs. ROKY ERICKSON
Roky Erickson is "man, this dude is crazy, fuckin' LSD, hunh?" awesome. Billy Gibbons is motherfuckin' Billy Gibbons. Were I to have bazillions from winning the fake lotteries three Fridays in a row, I'd build a college to replace my Rojonekku Training Compound, and Billy Gibbons is one of the first dudes I'd hire as a professor. We just wouldn't talk about all that electronic bullshit from the 1980s.
Advantage: Billy Gibbons.
SHARON JONES vs. SWAMP DOGG
Sharon Jones is amazing, and it'd be like my Lucinda Williams write-up with her too. But Swamp Dogg is Swamp Dogg, the most amazing R&B singer extraordinaire from Virginia that ever did exist, and with a voice that no one's ever been close to having one like. He is a state treasure, even though he's not claimed Va. for the last half of his life. God bless that motherfucker. And if you are a John Prine fan, and love that "Sam Stone" song, go find the same song by Swamp Dogg and pretty much ruin John Prine for yourself forever.
Advantage: Swamp Dogg.
DAVID ALLAN COE vs. MERLE HAGGARD
Merle Haggard is here because I needed 80 guys and I like him and all because he made a lot of songs about riding trains and used to live in a boxcar as a house when he was a kid, which has always been a dream of mine, and he lived on a houseboat in Utah for a while as an adult, which has also been a dream of mine. What is it about white trash types wanting to live in things other than houses? What the fuck is wrong with me?
But David Allan Coe is David Allan Coe. Jail. Outlaws biker gangs. Practicing polygamist. Underground records. Early Jerry Lee Lewis on acid meth albums. Old guy to this day playing flying vee guitar with rebel flag paint job and he sports a dreadlocked beard and writes song about how gay people are awesome. There are a lot of motherfuckers on this earth but there is only one David Allan Coe. In fact, I just found out he's playing a club in Richmond the weekend before my birthday next year, so start paypalling me money now, because we gonna tear some hotel up (or somebody's back yard if someone lets me crash).
Man, I could write a goddamn 2000 word essay just on wacky shit that has happened to me at David Allan Coe shows, much less about the guy himself. Having my hippie girlfriend decide to break up with me. Being the hippie getting laughed at by cowboys who were being stared at by bikers. Almost fighting an entire frat but dazzling them with my retarded drunken mantis style that then had one of them come bring me a beer and my wife be like, "what the fuck was that about?" although she's gotten kinda used to retarded shit like that going on around me now. I'm like Pigpen from Charlie Brown, except my dust cloud is an aura of retarded.
Advantage: David Allan Coe.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 80 to 40 - 4 of 5

CAROL NESMITH vs. JUNIOR JOHNSON
Carol Nesmith did time in prison for cockfighting and now runs his operation mostly for just breeding, although most cockfighting information is really hard to find, being it is illegal. There were some dudes near me who word was ran cockfights, but after the Michael Vick thing, the state of Virginia came down hard on everybody, and they sold off their operation to some guy in California. Now they run mud bogs.
Nesmith is one of the main dudes in America for the sweater breed of gamecock, which goes back to some dude in North Carolina back in the 1920s, and there is a large paying market for these birds in the Philippines and Mexico, and I'm sure here too, wink wink nudge nudge. Being an owner of chickens, and knowing these remarkable yet dimwitted creatures well, I can understand the fascination with cockfighting, and breeding a good game bird. These are the lost arts our modern world is overlooking while everyone gets giddy because some dumb bitch did a blog about every recipe in a Julia Roberts cookbook. (Yes, I know that's not correct, but it will be one day; trust me.)
Junior Johnson, similarly, was a bootlegger who ran shine throughout the south, infamously. Legend had it he was never caught, and when Nascar turned into a thing (nothing like the thing it is now though), he was one of its earliest superstars, parlaying mad stock car success into owning his own racing teams, and ultimately into a pork product empire still seen on grocery store shelves, like any good Carolina boy would do. In fact, his life was basically a long-winded money-laundering scheme.
However, he has gone legit, through redneck sports, while Nesmith remains not necessarily outside the law, but flirting with the edges of legality for sure. This world becomes more of a slave ship every time another outlaw dies, because cell phones are HAARP beams.
Advantage: Carol Nesmith.
BOBBY BEAUSOLEIL vs. CHARLES MANSON
Bobby Beausoleil was a dude who sold some drugs to Charles Manson's family, in a bad deal, and went to retrieve the money with Manson, and killed a guy in the process. Beforehand, basically he had just fucked some of Manson's chicks, and hardly hung with the crew, but the Manson family hysteria has caused Bobby Beausoleil to be stuck in jail the rest of his life. He has used this solitary confinement to paint, make music, and write some really interesting things about the spiritual aspects of high-minded masturbation. Really, he's an amazing motherfucker.
Charles Manson is Charles Manson. He is the best con man the world has ever known, able to reflect exactly what you want to see in him. I sometimes hope he never dies, or at least lives to be like 139, so that they have to release him from jail, because he has outlived American society.
Advantage: Charles Manson.
JIM BROWN vs. JOHN RIGGINS
Football running backs who are #2 and #3 in the all-time career rushing yards list as I recognize it in my heart (behind only Barry Sanders). Brown only played for 7 years, kicked ass, did movies, and attempted to uplift broke ass black kids. John Riggins was insane, wore his hair like Travis Bickle, passed out drunk at a Presidential dinner, and is still crazy as fuck. I am a Redskins fan though.
Advantage: John Riggins
LUCINDA WILLIAMS vs. STEVE EARLE
While I think both of these people can be overrated, as most things that fall under alt.country tend to be, being the type of people who rant and rave about alt.country lack that much of the country part of the genre title to get a good feel for real life shit. Steve Earle, as a musician, is not nearly as awesome as I'd like him to be. I could probably whittle his catalog down to a couple of CDs full of my favorite shit. But his life story is an amazing one, and he knows the real deal about Nashville. And when it comes to music, good lord, the man fucking knows it. His satellite radio show he used to do (may still do, I just never remember to listen) is one of the most amazing things you could ever hear. And you throw in all the political shit he's done, and his involvement in The Wire, and what you have is a rock solid bearded man from Kentucky.
Lucinda Williams is the type of older crazy drunkard woman I'd like to share a shitty hotel with for a couple weeks, until we almost kill each other, and I ride a Greyhound home, and never talk again for ten years, until we find each other on Facebook and time has made our memories of each other more romanticized, and we share in pretend nonsense about how great things could have been. But they wouldn't have been.
With all that being said, ultimately I have to think about the influence of the eventual Learned Elder on my teenage trainees. A crazy old vagina that likes to drink and play guitar can rip apart entire groups of friends, while a crazy old beard that had to quit drinking but still plays guitar can bring them together better than ever.
Advantage: Steve Earle.
BILLY CHILDISH vs. LEMMY KILMISTER
Billy Childish is a national treasure for whatever nation he's from (Scotland? Is that it's own nation anymore?), but Lemmy is motherfucking Lemmy. I mean, he's Lemmy.
Advantage: Lemmy Kilmister.
JACKIE TYSON vs. JESCO WHITE
Jackie Tyson is a dude who was friends with my folks and grew up with my dad and lives not too far away from me and keeps me connected to my upbringing yet grasping for something more. He is a solid motherfucker who I will not speak too much upon at this point because he may find it on the internet and freak out and never talk to me again.
Jesco White is a crazy country character like thousands of others, yet he had a documentary made about him. There are Jesco Whites all over this fucking country, including Jackie Tyson, who are allowed to flourish in their natural habitat without being dragged into the public consciousness like a goddamned zoo animal.
Advantage: Jackie Tyson.
CORMAC MCCARTHY vs. HARRY CREWS
Two of my favorite four living writers (along with Gary Snyder and Chris Offutt), and a pair of guys I hope to be a quarter as successful as before they chunk me in the ground and poke a slab of soapstone in at me. Oddly enough, most of my life, I did not read any Cormac McCarthy, even when a few people had specifically told me, "Hey Raven, I think you'd really love Cormac McCarthy; you should read him." And I never did, because usually when people tell me about things they think I'd like, it just ends up making me think they don't really know me. But yeah, when we were pregnant with our second kid, the boy's name we had in reserve in case it was a boy was Cormac, because it means "son of raven". But we had a girl. However, an interest in Cormac McCarthy completely separate from people telling me how much I'd like the new Little Brother CD or Kevin Smith movie or a book by him actually had me get some shit from library. And honestly, I have not finished half of the books I've read by him, but his style is so goddamned thick and dirty, yet very beautiful, it makes me realize very easily how far I have to go as a writer and how, even at 37 years and writing a few thousand words a night, I'm a goddamn baby on this stroll.
Harry Crews is the best ever, in my book. I could give a fuck about his novels, and haven't gotten into them when I try to, but his collection of essays (Florida Frenzy and Blood and Grits) are the fucking shit I would try to emulate. Good writing about regular crazy-assed people. It is what I grew up around, what has been sterilized by Wal-Marts and satellite TV and Toby Keith songs. He is a man I'd like to sit across the table from, or in a classroom with, or somewhere, and just listen and learn. Not that I think he'd tell me anything I couldn't figure out on my own, or I'd try to impress his old ass and get in good or be his holmes as a little sycophantic young 'un, but just to soak up the vibe. He's been on the same road, with the same crazy ghosts swirling around in his head, just when he went on it, it was unpaved gravel, and by the time I got to it, it was asphalt, but still unlined, and still way off the interstate. And while I think Cormac McCarthy's collected works would have more to offer than Harry Crews's collected works, the influence of man vs. man edge has to go to Crews.
Advantage: Harry Crews.
HENRY FULCHER vs. RALPH STANLEY
Henry Fulcher is an AM radio DJ in my hometown of Farmville, Virginia, and in some sort of country music or bluegrass hall of fame because he's a famous old school DJ back when playing music on the radio meant something more than getting your 19 Facebook friends to listen to you online. And what an entertainer. I have heard him play songs for the first time ever, then stop it by scratching the needle across the record saying, "We won't be playing that no one no more, folks." He'll talk about an old dude who died and then play a wonderful gospel instrumental that'll make you cry like you just heard Red Sovine's "Teddy Bear" for the first time ever. And work in plugs like a mad man, talking about getting your pork chops cut thick at the butcher's counter at some grocery store that still does stuff like that somewhere in southside Virginia where that type of thing is still appreciated. You know, them old folks are dying off. And I can tell you from a whole lot of personal research in my lifetime that the fried chicken you get from a Food Lion or Wal-Mart ain't shit compared to what you could get at the deli counter at them country stores or old mom-and-pop grocery stores. The best fried chicken you can get in the whole middle part of Virginia is in Palmyra, at the E.W. Thomas grocery store. And they have pickled beet eggs, for real ones, not those pink pieces of rubber shit they try to sell at other places as pickled eggs.
Ralph Stanley is of course a founding father of bluegrass music, which is basically speed metal for hillbillies. He also is a Dr. of some sort, and many bearded men in work trucks want him to be President. And though I'd want Ralph Stanley music to be played at my funeral (like it was at my dad's), Henry Fulcher is a fucking classic, in a dying breed way of doing things, and that's what Learned Elders are all about. There's all kinds of newgrass dumbasses playing Pink Floyd on banjo that can half-assedly carry on the legacy of Ralph Stanley. Who the fuck on the internet is gonna tell you where to get pork chops?
Advantage: Henry Fulcher.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 80 to 40 - 3 of 5

JIMMY VALIANT vs. OX BAKER
I am going to blaze through this group of eight match-ups, because I feel like blazing. This is a pair of wrestlers who were awesome when I was a kid. Jimmy Valiant was the greatest wrestler ever because he looked and talked and acted like one of the dudes that would be getting drunk and stoned with my dad, playing poker on Friday and Saturday nights. Ox Baker was the biggest, scariest dude ever.
As it stands, Jimmy Valiant is still a crazy dude, has a wrestling school in southwest Virginia, and drives weird bengali striped stationwagons, plus still rocks long hair, plus has ridiculous tattoos like pink roses in his ear and "COME TO PAPA" on his belly. Shit man, there's too many pluses to even list. For most of my life, if you could pick a famous person to be your fake dad, Jimmy Valiant would be my choice.
Advantage: Jimmy Valiant.
JOHN WATERS vs. ROBERT CRUMB
A pair of artistic freaky-dekes. I do not like John Waters' movies too much, because they are either shocking just to be shocking, or slightly pretentious. But I have never really seen anything John Waters has cosigned that hasn't been at least worth my while. Robert Crumb is a perverted old comic strip maker, born from the '60s, but pretty up-to-date with modern fetishes throughout his time putting ink to paper. If I was picking a guy to lead a tour of retarded shit scattered throughout a strange city on a bus tour, it'd be Waters. But if I was going to pick a guy to kick it in the minds of my teenage Rojonekku trainees for the rest of their lives, I'd want Robert Crumb's thumbprint in there.
Advantage: Robert Crumb.
AFRIKA BAMBAATAA vs. KOOL DJ HERC
Two of the three founding fathers Fly Trinity of hip hop (along with Grandmaster Flash), yet two very different dudes. Kool DJ Herc was a guy that liked it loud, carrying a big ass Jamaican-inspired sound system in his late model convertible to blast cats with back in the early days. He was a party rocker. Meanwhile, Afrika Bambaataa was on some other shit, somehow morphing from gang leader back when NYC still had old school The Warriors-style gangs into a space commander making strange danceable cybertronic musics from the future. And really for me, it all boils down to the fact that Herc, though a pioneer, lacks the post-pioneer days resume of retarded shit that Bambaataa has, starting the Zulu Nation (of which you can fill out an application form online, though their website is like a geocities website or some shit), and leading the charge to turn the housing projects he lived in and used to rock jams in the basement of into a historic marker and a sort of temple to hip hop, although most likely it will be torn down and turned into a condominium like the rest of New York City.
Advantage: Afrika Bambaataa.
BILL MURRAY vs. ROBERT DUVAL
A pair of actors, neither of which I imagine will make it even close to the Final 5. Bill Murray has always been one funny motherfucker, and still regularly does wacky shit like get DUIs while driving a golf cart. Robert Duval is a great actor, but more of a serious business actor. Plus, I'm watching Lonesome Dove the last couple nights, and the special effects on that thing are so goddamned stupid looking, it's actually leaving a bad taste in my mouth for all the actors involved, regardless of how good they are. Also, so far as I know, Duval never did a movie with Rodney Dangerfield.
Advantage: Bill Murray.
DAVID MANN vs. SONNY BARGER
This is a battle between American outlaw biker influences. David Mann is the artist who drew all the crazy white trash centerfolds that were in Easyriders magazine throughout the '70s and '80s. Sonny Barger was President of the Hell's Angels. Having had an uncle who rode in the Pagans back in the day, plus all the crazy fuckers my old man knew, who would actually have Easyriders laying around for me to just thumb through when no one was looking, biker shit is a small thread in the bizarre fabric of my life. I actually remember seeing David Mann centerfolds stapled to walls back in the day. And the drawings are so goofy, like it raining on a biker dude and his old lady taking off for the road to catch a ride with a trucker, or a giant close-up of a pair of freaked out eyeballs in a sideview mirror with four burly motorcycle dudes riding up behind him. Quality art.
Meanwhile Sonny Barger took outlaw biker and made it sort of corporate, although still criminal. And as much as I enjoy the whole sub-culture of proud dirtbags on motorcycles, I am more for the shitty yet wonderful art that would come from such a sub-culture than the intellectual property ownership or whatever stupid shit has happened ever since the Hells Angels trademarked and copyrighted all their shit. That does not mean I want you guys to fuck me up though, because I know there's crazy biker shit going on in Virginia right now. My uncle was called Littlejohn. I also spent a week in the hospital with a dude named Smurf who knows you guys too. We both got our faces caved in at the same time fifteen years ago or so, mine by a concrete stairwell after a gallon of wine, his by a 2x4 after a riverside bonfire party fight.
Advantage: David Mann.
ATSUSHI ONITA vs. EL HIJO DEL SANTO
More wrestling bullshit, but of an international variety. Atsushi Onita is a Japanese hardcore legend who got blowed up, wrapped in barbed wire, and generally mangled for years, and long before anybody else did it to quite the extent he did it. Also he became a successful politician in Japan, and wrestled in Afghanistan after 9/11, for the children. He truly is an amazing human being.
El Hijo Del Santo is the offspring of the most famous Mexican wrestler ever, and has carried that tradition on almost exactly, except just not quite so much. I don't think 100,000 people will line the streets of Mexico City when he dies like they did his father. Yet lucha libre is one of the most bizarre and wonderful sub-cultures on this blessed Earth. Still though, El Hijo Del Santo never got elected to Mexican Congress.
Advantage: Atsushi Onita.
COLONEL BO GRITZ vs. TED KACZYNSKI
Ahh, yes, a pair of anti-American influences, from the right and left wings. Colonel Bo Gritz was involved in trying to go back to Vietnam and recover POWs, and it is said the character of Hannibal on the A-Team was based on him (although he sold the rights to his life story to William Shatner back in the '80s). He was the go-to man when it was negotiation time with Randy Weaver or the Montana Freemen, and I think he ran for President a couple of times. He was connected to Ross Perot somehow. And the best thing is he was never even an actual colonel.
Ted Kaczynski is the infamous Unabomber, a super smart Ivy League genius who wanted to disappear into the wilds of Montana to live a simple and unseen life. But motherfuckers had to go and start building shit into the wilderness, and just generally wreak their "let's make order out of all the chaos with our dominion over the earth" bullshit on everything. We destroy everything. So he started mailing bombs to select motherfuckers.
Now I do not endorse killing motherfuckers, not at all, but I do endorse abandoning society completely and getting pissed at them if they won't let you alone and growing your beard long and hair shaggy and writing long-winded explanations about everything that's happened to have ready once the authorities finally close in on you.
Advantage: Ted Kaczynski.
BILLY JOE SHAVER vs. WILLIE NELSON
In the process of filling out the field of 80, just like with March Madness, there's going to be some mismatches in the beginning. Billy Joe Shaver is a crazy fucker, and an outlaw country original, and shot his wife like so many country people dream about doing. But he is not Willie Nelson.
Advantage: Willie Nelson.

L.E.o.R. - Fall ’10 - 80 to 40 - 2 of 5

BIZ MARKIE vs. TOO SHORT
A pair of elder rap legends, who came from a different angle. The Biz (whom allegedly cannot be beat) was a big, goofy fucker and Too Short came from the wrong end of the country and was doing lower class anthropological dissertations on the culture of pimps and prostitutes. I met Biz Markie once, at the Marriott in Richmond, while Jay-Z was surrounded by a hundred Mennonite kids getting his autograph (no shit, one of the most surreal moments of my life) and Biz was over by the bathrooms so I said, "What's up," and he looked like he was pregnant with a watermelon in his belly.
Too Short, although not the cultural icon that Biz is, is definitely something I still listen to regularly. When he gets onto his "I'm gonna make a comment about some shit other than pussy" kicks, there really ain't nothing like a Too Short song. And I guess if I was forced to get high and play Mario Kart Wii with one of them, I'd pick Biz, but in every other way, life is Too Short.
Advantage: Too Short.
ANGELA DAVIS vs. LEONARD PELTIER
And now a pair of "I'm going to college and really like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky a lot" legendary types. And being I don't want to waste my life writing long in-depth analysis of all these match-ups that ultimately don't mean anything, even within the retarded parameters of what I'm doing here in this little microcosmic corner of the interwebs, I will simply say frybread is fucking awesome.
Advantage: Leonard Peltier.
DIEGO MARADONA vs. GAYLORD PERRY
Cokehead world soccer star who did not lead his native Argentina to World Cup glory again as a coach like he did as a player, matching up against a wiley old baseball white dude who pretty much made his name off cheating, pitching baseballs with all sorts of imported illegal substances. And while the intriguing nature of being a spitball pitcher in Major League Baseball is one of the few wonderful snippets of baseball lore, and for me far different than dudes taking steroids, because there's so much more trickery and deceit involved in having vaseline hidden inside your zipper and somehow rubbing it on the baseball while nobody sees you while you are standing in the most obvious and watched place in the entire fucking stadium, it's hard not to appreciate Diego Maradona's eccentricity, which is what you call a stone cold crazy fucker when he's richer than everybody else around him.
Advantage: Diego Maradona.
PHYLLIS LIGHT vs. STEPHEN HARROD BUHNER
These are a pair of herbalist types that come through my brain via my wife's influence, who has studied under both of these people. I am sure if she were picking, it'd be Phyllis Light in a heartbeat. She is an older Alabama woman who practices the old mountain folklore ways of herbalism, and unlike a lot of modern new agey herbalist types, is not afraid to mix in some real world shit like, "Drink a Coke, just a regular old every day Coke." Her son is apparently an MMA fighter of some sort, and she has some crazy herbal farm in rural Alabama that we have apparently been invited to visit if we'd like. I'd like. I feel I haven't had a thick infusion of deep South craziness in my life for far too long, too mired down in this watered down pretend Virginia south where everybody loves bagels and lox and the New York Yankees.
Stephen Harrod Buhner has written a book called Sacred and Herbal Healing Beers, which is a must-have if you are into the homebrewing shit, because he can guide you into the realm of mildly psychotropic beers. Also, I met this dude one time, painting a lady's house, and we hit it off, and he told me how happy the house was to have a guy like me painting it. I was like, "No doubt," because all houses liked me. It's just their stupid owners that made it hard to survive self-employment, not to mention the overall decline of the American economy. Plus, Buhner cold kicks it with two partners, which I guess new agey types call "polyamorism" to make it sound more impossible to deny than just admitting you got two ol' ladies in the same house. On one hand, I can dig that, and it makes sense physiologically in a lot of ways, not to mention when it comes to the companionship make-up of men's and women's minds. But I also am pretty good with my one ol' lady, which, even as good as we have it, is hard to navigate at times. Having two ol' ladies, that I'm mentally saying I'm lifelong committed to, and them saying the same, and to each other, I don't know, I can see it getting oddball as hell emotionally and filling that hunk of soul right above my intestines with a clenched fist.
Advantage: Phyllis Light.
LOUIS FARRAKHAN vs. MIKE TYSON
When I still lived in Richmond, I used to love buying Final Calls, although a few of those dudes wouldn't even sell them to me, what with me being a white devil and all. The dietary column alone was worth the couple dollar donation. There are some really great philosophical aspects to the Nation of Islam, bus pigeons, which give him some meditative moments, and just generally tries to continue navigating his way through life, like we all do, with as little a clue as anybody, but a much thicker publicly known history. There are shady industries like boxing all over - pro wrestling, porn, the music industry - that create these pop cultural monsters, squeeze every dollar they can out of them, let them burn through their small cut of it, and then dump them on the side of the road as a celebrity has-been. I just can't help but feel like Tyson's story ain't over, and some pretty crazy (in both good and bad ways) shit is still gonna develop out of this man, especially now that he's older and realizes he can't knock out the world.
Advantage: Mike Tyson.
LARRY FLYNT vs. RON JEREMY
Larry Flynt made magazines, where you actually got to see an open vagina, plus a dick beside it. And he gave us the Chester the Molester cartoon, not to mention Beaver Hunt, which pretty much helped inspire a large corner of the interweb's naked parts.
Ron Jeremy is a porn dude who did it far longer than anybody else, and with a tongue-in-cheek style. Even as porn moved far away from having people actually act anymore, he still made a living at it. But that's about it.
Flynt fought, no matter how ridiculously his arguments were, the government. I've always had a soft spot in my heart for people who fight the government over their God-given right to express their retarded perversions publicly. Plus, he's a Kentucky hillbilly who became a millionaire. Ron Jeremy's probably from like Reno or Arizona or something.
Advantage: Larry Flynt.
CHAZ BOJORQUEZ vs. SEEN
A pair of graffiti legends, both of which I'd love to have a piece by hanging up in my living room. Seen is a NYC legend of the first order, and you can actually contact him through his website to deal straight with the guy about buying some art. He's straight graffiti style though. Chaz Bojorquez, being an L.A. legend, has this weird style of script that's very obviously cholo-influenced, yet artsy as fuck. And I don't want this to seem like an east coast vs. west coast thing, but the wild styles that NY graffiti developed into is cool to look at, but it doesn't speak to me like seeing actual letters that are just barely legible do. Bojorquez's stuff is crazy as fuck, like any wild style, but still there's something that keeps it a written word with a message, even if it buried behind stylistic bedazzlement. The thing that sets him apart, for me, is how just with black and white, he can make something strong. Most graffiti relies on an abundance of color, and I've always been attracted to simple black-and-white. That's why I never have and never will get any colored tattoos on my body. Basic is solid. And then you take that solid basicness and wild style the fuck out of it.
Advantage: Chaz Bojorquez.
GRADY STILES III vs. OXANA MALAYA
Kind of an odd pairing, in that Grady Stiles III is a seventh generation lobster boy, and the heir apparent to a living as a freak show superstar, except his dad was an abusive alcoholic, and got his self killed by a hitman hired by his then wife, and Grady the III's mom. Thus, the long run of playing the Lobster family in the carnivals ended, as Grady III didn't want to follow in those footsteps. So he's a stay-at-home lobster boy (technically, it's called ectrodactyly), and even though his fingers and toes are fused together into something resembling claws, he has that head full of a carnie ass family and living on the freak show circuit as a kid to get him through life. Last I heard, like many children of severely abusive alcoholics, he doesn't drink at all either, which means he will probably mire away in obscurity in Gibtown, Florida, where the freaks are dying off, and they are building condos in their place.
Oxana Malaya is the Ukrainian dog child. More so than carnival freaks, I have always been fascinated with feral children, because we have these grand notions of what it means to be human, even if we don't subscribe to Christian dogma, most scientifically-minded people still believe in man's dominion over the earth. So I find it interesting when a child who has not yet formed into a solid thing is left to the wild. Malaya's parents were also terrible alcoholics, and sort of just kicked her out when she was 3. So she started roaming the streets, and ended up tagging along with wild dogs, who took care of her and taught her basically everything she knew when she was discovered in 1991 at age 8. Ever since that point, she's been in a government joint for the mentally disabled, being she behaved and acted like a dog for the most part, and she's slowly learned many human things, most notably language and what is considered somewhat normal behavior. But she is not connected to humanity at all, and has expressed this, saying she is most comfortable when she is hanging out with dogs. She is now 26 and takes care of the cows at the clinic's she's been in since being found.
Honestly, I think looking up to something like that is a good thing, because it challenges the whole dominion over the earth thing anyways. To be a simple dog person who takes care of cows, what the fuck is wrong with that? Personally, I think we need more feral children, not less, and I am proud of the fact that I've abandoned two of my five children in the woods.
Advantage: Oxana Malaya.