Living in Austin, our little landlocked Island Republic in the sea of Texas, we're hard pressed to find musicians who turn down money. In fact, it's usually just the opposite when you trip over them sleeping on the sidewalk. In some alternate universe right now, the guitar players are making six figure incomes and the weapons designers are panhandling on the street while writing their equations on the back of their cardboard signs. Pamela Anderson is President and doing a damn fine job of it. The Israeli and Iranian soccer teams just played in the championships for the World Cup, then went out for drinks afterwards, and Bob Dylan is sitting around wishing he could write songs as good as David Baerwald. That's the place I want to live.

Maybe I'll send $25 to the ACLU - given the current situation, they seem to need the money more than any of us.

-Stephen