Live and Direct Kim Slawson

Today's episode of Live and Direct Listens features a musical interpretation of a Finnish epic poem. It's 33.6MB and 1:02:03 long. Ruth MacKenzie's album "Kalevala: Dream of the Salmon Maiden" is a mixture of Finnish and English folk song punctuated by a high pitched call named "kulning", which is actually a Finnish animal call. MacKenzie has said that in Kalevala she realized that beauty and ugliness are not too different and also that there is very little separating the earth, the animals and the human voice. The original written work that the album is based upon is called the Kalevala, it was published in 1849 and is a collection of oral tradition which may come from as far back as pre-recorded history and include fragments as recent as the Iron Age. Part creation myth, part folk song and poetry, it has a national Finnish holiday dedicated to it (February 28th) and has influenced numerous artists, of whom Ruth MacKenzie is one. There's an overview of the Kalevala here on wikipedia, along with the source text (in english) here on wikisource. You can buy it from Ruth on her site and also find it on iTunes. I hope you enjoy today's show. It's a little bit different from things you normally hear on the radio, and I wanted to share it with you in the hope that it would touch something within you and awaken part of you. Thanks for listening, and please tell me what you think.

This week's Live and Direct, episode number 10, is about the IRS (Internal Revenue Service) and the illegal and unconstitutional federal income tax. This podcast version is 1:00:47 long and the file size is 21.9MB. The podcast includes an extra 7 minute clip at the end about so-called tax criminals who were harassed and brutalized by the IRS, including a family whose small business and personal life was scrutinized mercilessly by the IRS, though they had done no wrong and had in fact paid their taxes, and a historic celebrity boxer during WWII named Joe Lewis whose winnings, though donated entirely to others, were taxed by the IRS, putting him so deeply into debt that his once-hated opponent paid for his funeral. Some talking points from the clips I played follow. Remember: The 16th Amendment was never legally ratified by the states. The federal income tax is a direct, unapportioned tax, which is illegal as per the Constitution. As Catherine Fitts (former Assistant Secretary of Housing) explained, the government's use of tax money is not reported, nor will they disclose the breakdown of their expenditures upon request, as they are legally required to do. The federal income tax money you pay only goes to the U.S. debt, as Reagan's investigative commission found. "Income" is undefined in the tax code, though it is defined in the Constitution (the definition of which the tax code contradicts). Income is not wages or labor, it is gains from corporate activity (as defined in the Constitution). Your labor is your private property, as per the Supreme Court. The 16th Amendment (which was never legally ratified, remember) gave no new powers of taxation. So, if former IRS agents and government officials are no longer paying taxes, why are we? If tens of millions of people do not pay taxes (so says Sherry Jackson, former IRS agent) because they do not wish to continue propping up this illegal and unconstitutional perversion of governmental authority, why should we? Also, I missed this the first time: If you are audited, put in a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request asking to be shown applicable statutes and laws under which your income is taxed and the records substantiating the audit. Check out filmmaker Aaron Russo's site freedomtofascism.com. As I previously mentioned, there are news updates, blog entries, and video interviews there. You can watch the film online if you have a broadband connection. You may also rent or buy the movie on DVD. You should also check out David Champion's site nontaxpayer.org. An article on the America Patriot Friends Network site has some interesting things to say about taxation. Googling "How to STOP the IRS" cd will turn up some interesting research that a fellow named Eugene Kernan has compiled on exactly what to send the government to get them off of your trail as far as taxes. He wants $400 for the CD of materials, research, and instructions. While I understand he has gone to some effort to make this information available, $400 is expensive for a CD. I'll try to see if I can turn it up for less than that; I'll keep you posted. Furthermore, as you can see by searching the Internet, there have been many individual victories over the IRS as well as Supreme Court decisions recognizing the illegality of the federal income tax. The problem is that the lower courts do not recognize this. The more people that help make their others, the media, and their elected officials aware of this sham, the closer we will come to turning the tide of coercion foisted upon the American people. Some people say two things are inevitable: death, and taxes. Myself, I'm not so sure about the latter. Thanks for listening. Please weigh in with your thoughts on this or any of my topics.

This week I replayed my third show (Weather), and as an added bonus at the end I played a medley of Somewhere Over the Rainbow and What a Wonderful World by a young Canadian singer named Aselin Debison. It would be redundant to put up the episode again, so instead I'll just direct you to the original podcast episode of Weather (45:18, and 41.5MB) and to Aselin's song Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World (5:20, 7.3MB) from her 2002 debut Sweet is the Melody, recorded when she was 12 years old. Some people have mistaken her for Norah Jones in this song, but I actually prefer her version over Jones'. The episode I intended for this week was, in part, delayed by weather (specifically, high winds ripping part of my roof off), making this an appropriate episode to rebroadcast. Stay tuned next week for fresh new content.

Click, download, listen! Live and Direct number 9 (Live and Direct Listens ep #3) has arrived. It's 48.9MB, and 56:10 long. In it, I featured an album composed in real time on the Internet by a group of musicians collaborating with some software called NetPD. NetPD in turn relies on PD, which is a graphical programming language particularly suited to music synthesis and composition, but also extensible to video and other forms of data, hence the name "Pure Data". The album is "dub" in style, featuring samples and loops that wind here and there at the whim of the collective controlling them. I played most of it, sans the last bit, which I had to cut for time constraints whilst on-air. If you wish to listen to it, you can find the whole thing here as an mp3. It's 72.1MB and 1:18:44 long, and the bit that I cut starts at 1:08:03 and goes till the end. If you're interested in playing around with PD, you should check out the main site listed above as well as other sites on the PD webring. PD comes in Mac, Windows, and Linux flavors, so chances are it's compatible with your hardware. There's also a book, which gives some of the philosophy and context of PD's development as well; you can download the whole thing in pdf format here. Wrap your mind around the idea, install PD, download some other people's patches (PD programs are called patches), and then give it a whirl. It's free, you're bored, go create something! As always, feel free to let me know what you think. In the future (given a large enough listenership) I'd love to do an experiment in live radio where you, the listener get to influence the music going live on the air. Whether this is via a web browser which interfaces with PD behind the scenes, or some such similar arrangement, I think it'd be fun.

= Live and Direct episode #8 has arrived. It features background and critical analysis concerning the Federal Reserve System, why it is illegal and unconstitutional, and why it must be abolished. This episode runs for 55:33, and is 50.9MB. For your convenience, the times listed below in parentheses indicate the start and end of each segment. The song I played is Money For Nothing, by Dire Straits (it's between 01:12 and 09:12). I then played the intro to Aaron Russo's documentary "America: Freedom to Fascism" (09:48 to 13:30). "Freedom to Fascism" is a timely, shocking expose of the duplicitous and corrupt nature of not only the Federal Reserve, but also the IRS and the federal income tax. You may watch a low-quality version of it here on Google Video, see it in select theatres, rent it, or buy it directly from Aaron's site. Aaron also maintains a blog on the site with timely news, interviews, and commentary. Next up is a 2002 speech before Congress by Ron Paul, current Presidential hopeful and monetary-reform advocate (14:05 to 19:22). You may watch it on YouTube or read it at the House's web site as well. I followed Ron Paul's speech with another excerpt from "Freedom to Fascism" detailing the creation of the Federal Reserve, its unconstitutionality, and the ways in which it harms the American people and government (20:24 to 33:44). Lastly I read from Dr. Cleon W. Skousen's publication "The Urgent Need for a Comprehensive Monetary Reform". I have included it here on my site (in an easy to read and print PDF format) as the original at the National Center for Constitutional Studies seems to be defunct. You may check out the table of contents, the first section "Development of the United States Monetary System", the second section "How the Federal Reserve System Operates and Why it Has Failed", or the third and final section "Providing the United States with a Sound Money System". I retrieved the above linked pages with the help of the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, mentioned in my show as a handy online research tool. I continue to delve into the conspiracies by a powerful few elite bent on controlling and dominating the rest of the people, aided by money-hungry politicians, complicit industries, and helped along here and there by a few sad historical accidents. Please stay tuned to Live and Direct for more provocative and imperative issues. Listen to WRFR locally in Midcoast Maine at 93.3 and 99.3FM, online, or subscribe to my podcast and listen at your convenience using your computer, iPod, or other MP3 player. As always, please email me with what's on your mind. It's a pleasure to produce this show, and I'd love your feedback.

A scant week later, it's time for Live and Direct, episode #7. This week I've assembled a hypothetical soundtrack to the 80's comedy Real Genius, starring Val Kilmer. I say "hypothetical" because there was never an official soundtrack, however many fans have compiled their own lists of songs heard in the movie. This week's show is 44.5MB and runs for 50:36. The playlist for the show is below, along with the point in time at which each song starts (minutes:seconds). The only song played in the movie that is not included is Tonio K's "The Tuff Do What", as it is unreleased and apparently unavailable in the wild. (however, if you have it, please, please send me a copy?) You Took Advantage of Me - Carmen McRae, 01:31 I'm Falling - The Comsat Angels, 03:32 Number One - Chaz Jankel, 08:01 All She Wants to Do Is Dance - Don Henley, 11:50 One Night Love Affair - Bryan Adams, 17:01 The Walls Came Down - The Call, 21:26 Pleasure Seekers - The System, 25:47 Standing in the Line - The Textones, 30:25 Summertime Girls - Yesterday & Today, 34:51 You're the Only Love - Paul Hyde and the Payola$, 38:25 Everybody Wants to Rule the World - Tears for Fears, 44:16 a Real Genius sequel? What you say? That's right, at the end of last year multiple news sites, wikipedia, and blogs were reporting that Val Kilmer has announced a desire to reprise his role as Chris Knight in a sequel to the original Real Genius. A fan has started a site dedicated to this hypothetical sequel. We'll see how that pans out. I suppose it could work, though I'm leery of sequels by default. If you haven't seen the movie, you should. In the immortal words of Chris Knight, it's a moral imperative! Enjoy this "what if" soundtrack, and as always, please let me know what you think.