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How City Hall is F*cking Record Store Day!

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 00:00:00 EDT

April 21, 2012 marks the fifth annual Record Store Day, a nation-wide project to promote struggling brick-and-mortar music shops. Across the country, independent stores offer exclusive, one-of-a-kind recordings as a way to bring customers through the door.

"It is the busiest day of the year," says Matt Moffatt, co-owner of Washington, D.C.'s Smash Records, a shop that sells new and used CDs and vinyl LPs, along with clothing, posters, t-shirts, vintage clothing, and more.

But now the powers that be in the nation's capital have decided that record stores must get second-hand dealer business licenses, which cost a lot of money and have onerous reporting requirements. Store owners such as Moffatt would have to report every new piece they put up for sale to the police, allow the cops to verify it's not stolen, and get information about all customers who buy used goods. Failure to comply would mean incurring massive fines of thousands of dollars a days.

"Basically," says Moffatt, "they want us to get a pawn shop license."

Local business groups such as the Adams Morgan Partnership are pushing back but the future of stores such as Smash Records is far from clear. "It just seems so heavy-handed, it could easily destroy businesses like mine," says Moffatt.

About 3.45 minutes. Produced by Meredith Bragg and hosted by Kennedy; co-written by Nick Gillespie.

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Matt Welch Talks DEA Raids on CA Pot Clubs, Obama, & Rolling Stones on Varney & Co.

Fri, 06 Apr 2012 00:00:00 EDT

On Fox Business' Varney & Co., Reason Editor in Chief Matt Welch discussed the outrageous DEA and IRS raid on Oaksterdam University in California. Welch also discusses the increase in gun sales amid a slow economic recovery and reveals his favorite Rolling Stones' song. Airdate: April 6, 2010.

3.40 minutes.

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Remy: Cough Drops-The Mandate (featuring Sandra Fluke)

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 00:00:00 EST

Remy crashes Sandra Fluke's Congressional testimony to demand a mandate for his cough drop addiction.

"Remy: Cough Drops-The Mandate" is one of a series of collaborations between Remy and Reason.tv. To watch Remy's other videos, go to youtube.com/goremy.

Approximately 1:50 minutes. Lyrics by Remy. Video shot and produced by Meredith Bragg.

More from Reason on Sandra Fluke and the cost of contraception:

Make the Pill Cheaper by Making it Over the Counter

Sandra Fluke's Protection Racket

It's Like Totally Different When a Liberal Blowhard Guy Calls a Conservative Woman a Twat!

Download the mp3 and HD versions at below, and subscribe to Reason.tv's YouTube channel.

Lyrics:
Yeah and listen up peeps, you better check the deal
We got another mandate we gone straight reveal
And if you don't listen up, we be walking out
Yeah you know cough drops what we talking about

Take a look at this graph, you gonna holler with fear
Cough drops costing me a hundred dollars a year
I'm talking Halls, Ludens, to keep me alive
It's like a dog-fighting ring, I need Vicks to survive

It's preventative medicine, suppressing my cough? Word.
I need a vote from each of you--oh, that's kind of awkward
Cough drops are so tasty--how is it allowed?
Yeah, this guy knows what I'm talking about.

Cherry, honey lemon, or the mentho-lytus
Directly to my house's where I suggest you ship this
They come in all kinds of colors and flavors galore
Even sheep sk--wait, I think this one's yours

I appreciate the testimony, very profound
We need to verify this policy is morally sound
And there's one reasonable way to see if it should be allowed
And it's to probe you internally, can somebody get me a towel?

My apologies for the gentleman across the aisle
He doesn't understand mandates, he hasn't been here a while
I see no reason we shouldn't pass your request
Just let me double check, yep, it passes our test

This is not about "men's health," this is not a prescription
Mandate Men's Health, 12 month subscription
Your party has no respect for individual rights
Now come on up here, I'd like to check your insides

Well I guess it's safe to say this has kind of devolved
Maybe it's not the best idea to have these people involved
So I think I'm gonna bounce, put this one on the shelf
Hit up the drug store--get some cough drops myself.

Remy: Missing You - The Incandescent Light Bulb Song

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:00:00 EST

Remy mourns the impending loss of his beloved incandescent light bulbs with a song set to familiar music.

Written and performed by Remy and produced by Meredith Bragg.

About 2.30 minutes. Go to Reason.tv for downloadable versions.

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Follow Reason on Twitter. Follow Remy on Twitter.

Visit the links below for more Reason's coverage of the impending light bulb ban:

Let There Be Light: The Dim Bulbs in Congress Have Condemned Me To Pee in the Dark

Blue Light Special: Psst... Wanna Buy A Light Bulb?

Light Bulbs vs. The Nanny State

For more Remy & Reason.tv vids go here.

For even more Remy, go to his YouTube page.

Lyrics to "Missing You: The Incandescent Light Bulb Song"

Seems like yesterday
we used to rock the show
I flip the switch
you rock the glow

So far from being
only luminescent
notoriously
incandescent

but looks ain't always
what they seem to be
Congress taking
you away from me

this new bulb
costs 10 times more
need a haz-mat crew
when it hits the floor

and the future can't
wait to see
what they look like
in my vanity

Ridiculous

Night they took
my friend
Try to block it out
but it plays again

they say the change is
what we need to make
got salmonella from
my Easy Bake

give anything to hear
half your breath...
I know you're still living
you life after death

Every time I see
Every time I read
Every time I breathe
exposed Mercury
I'll be missing you...

It's kinda hard
with you not around
new bulb warms up
in like a half an hour

watching us as
we pray for you
every day we
pray for you

until the day
we meet again
in the dark
is where I'm reading fried

give anything to hear
half your breath...
I know you're still living
your life after death

Somebody tell me why...
If that new light
bulb is so amazing
Then why don't people just go buy that light bulb?

[End]

Remy: Why They Fought

Thu, 24 Mar 2011 08:00:00 EDT

As American warplanes patrol the skies of Libya and American boots win the peace in Afghanistan, Iraq, Korea, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, Spain, Cuba, the Netherland Antilles, and more than 140 other countries, the international Interwebs recording sensation Remy unveils this timely song reminding all of us back on the home front about why they fight.

"Why They Fought" is the first of a series of collaborations between Remy and Reason.tv. To watch Remy's other videos, go here.

Download the mp3 here.

Music written and performed by Remy. Video produced by Austin and Meredith Bragg.

About 2 minutes.

Read Reason's foreign policy coverage here.

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"Why They Fought"

Since the birth of this great nation
Men and women have fought and died
To protect the very freedoms
In which we all have so much pride

And as they spilled their blood at Gettysburg
Saving freedom's what they sought
And if you asked a dying patriot
He'd tell you that they fought...

For random screenings at the airport
With the TSA all nagging
While we place our toiletries out in
Transparent plastic baggies

And if you asked them why they fought and died
They'd all give the same answer
So you could get pics taken of your junk
While slowly getting cancer

Ask any single one of them
it won't be no surprise
That's why they fought and died...

They braved the cold at Valley Forge
Facing sacrifice and pain, yeah
There was typhoid, measles, dysentery
Plus being in Pennsylvania

But they went off to fight the British
To save this independent nation
And with their final words they'd say
They died so our taxation

Could be on property and income
With withholding of our wages
With a silly complex tax code
Over 16,000 pages

And if you ask them why they gave their lives
They'd say their only wish is
So you could fill out seven forms
To prove that pencil was for business

Ask any single one of them
it won't be no surprise
That's why they fought and died...

Well they gave their lives
So we could save up for a mortgage, woo!
And they stormed that sandy beach
So we could pay our neighbors' too!

They fought and died in fields with pride
And gave us all we'd hope for
To save us all from tyranny--
And also from 4 Loko

Ask any single one of them
it won't be no surprise
That's why they fought and died...

Step Right Up

paul.feine@reason.tv (Paul Feine) — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 17:28:00 EST

Live, from the Rockpalast in Koln, Germany, it's Tom Waits' 1977 performance of "Step Right Up," a scattin ' ode to the huckster.

(This one's for you, Nick.)

Merry Christmas To All...

gillespie@reason.com (Nick Gillespie) — Mon, 24 Dec 2007 15:09:00 EST

No Christmas is complete without a nod to the (in)famous 1977 Bing Crosby holiday special featuring David Bowie. Their joint rendition of "Peace on Earth/Little Drummer Boy" is the stuff of legend and probably did more to close the generation gap than a thousand encounter sessions.

The phony patter ("...I'm sure glad you came by to work on the pianer today...") between Der Bingle and the Androgynous One--then at the height of his Twiggy Stardust look--is priceless and, if I'm remembering correctly from the Gillespie family room, left both my parents and my siblings thinking that the world had indeed gone splendidly mad. Remember folks, this was manna from heaven in the age of Carter, Son of Sam, global cooling, and the inability of the Americans to win the Little League World Series. And that's not even dealing with the omnipresent threat of a conversion to the metric system.

But the real paydirt from the Crosby special, IMO, Bowie's rendition of "Heroes," which makes everyday feel a little more like Christmas.