The Beatles' 1968 song Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da has been voted the worst song ever in an online poll. The track was on the band's White Album - which is often regarded as one of the best albums ever made. It was rated as being worse than former footballer Paul Gascoigne's Fog On The Tyne in a Mars survey of 1,000 people.
In third place was Meat Loaf's 1993 hit I'll Do Anything For Love, while 5ive, Cliff Richard, Vanilla Ice and Steps were also in the top 10.
TOP 5 'WORST' SONGS
1. Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da - The Beatles
2. Fog on the Tyne - Gazza and Lindisfarne
3. I'll Do Anything For Love - Meat Loaf
4. Diamond Lights - Glenn Hoddle and Chris Waddle
5. We Will Rock You - 5ive featuring Queen
Posted by: Steve ||
11/10/2004 8:39:55 AM ||
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#1
What? Not MacArthur Park?
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
11/10/2004 8:54 Comments ||
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#2
Clearly they weren't sufficiently exposed to We Built This City.
#5
Where's "Disco Duck?" Where is "Afternoon Delight?" "Stayin' Alive?" The Cyndi Lauper discography? "Run Joey Run" by David Geddes? "Boogie Oogie Oogie?" "Eve of Destruction?" "In the Year 2525?" "Chuck E.'s in Love?" "99 Red Balloons?" John Mayer's "No Such Thing?" The Cure, "[insert song title here]?"
Posted by: Mike ||
11/10/2004 9:36 Comments ||
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#6
Anything by Yoko Ono
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/10/2004 9:52 Comments ||
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#7
Dropkick me, Jesus Witchita Lineman Rhinestone Lineman
Posted by: Mike ||
11/10/2004 9:55 Comments ||
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#9
"Someone left the cake out in the rain
And I'll never have that recipe again,
Oh, woe!"
That's not the worst song ever written?
Posted by: Fred ||
11/10/2004 10:02 Comments ||
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#10
Dave Barry's readers thought so a few years ago, Fred. And I'd agree, except for one thing. Have you heard any of the "contemporary *Christian* pop"? It's terrible. Forget a single song - just stick the whole genre in there.
Posted by: The Doctor ||
11/10/2004 10:05 Comments ||
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#11
fred is that the same tuner as the one that is go:
ima saw you (and him)
walker in the rain
you were holdin hands
and ima never be the same
#13
3. I'll Do Anything For Love - Meat Loaf
5. We Will Rock You - 5ive featuring Queen
These too songs may not be the best that the artists have to offer but they are a long, long, long shot from the worst songs ever recorded. I'm starting to think online polls are untrustworthy.
Worse than contemporary Christian pop must be rock songs by former "Christian pop" acts. I mean, do we really want to hear Amy Grant sing about the big yellow taxi taking away her old man?
Mike, do you mean John Gorka? He's not so bad.
Posted by: Eric Jablow ||
11/10/2004 12:27 Comments ||
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#19
John Denver and the Muppets Christmas album
Posted by: Weird Al ||
11/10/2004 12:37 Comments ||
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#20
How about "best" bad song? Arlo Guthrie's "Pickle Song."
Posted by: Weird Al ||
11/10/2004 12:42 Comments ||
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#30
Steve: In the Jungle, the mighty Jungle, the lion sleeps tonight..
But I like that song. Did you know that it's just some extra lyrics on top of a song called "Wimoweh"? I think I have the Yma Sumac version around here somewhere...
And you, Weird infidAl dog, shall die for insulting the honor of the glorious John Denver and the Muppets Christmas album! Christmas is coming, the goose is getting fat/please to put a penny in the old man's hat Ha ha! Choke on that!
#33
And Cthulhu fntagn right back at you. I would not have you think for a minute that I insult the Muppets. No, only that they lowered themselves to play with one of the most gaggy of entertainers of all time. Sort of like forcing Aerosmith to perform with Desi Arnez.
Posted by: Weird Al ||
11/10/2004 20:38 Comments ||
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#34
A third vote for "Having My Baby". And anything by Bobby Goldsboro as a runner up.
Hope they fire all their international correspondents.
Posted by: Ol_Dirty_American ||
11/10/2004 10:38:42 AM ||
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#1
I didn't think they still had beheadings in Great Britain. . . . Oh, I see, it's a metaphor. Darn!
Posted by: Mike ||
11/10/2004 11:39 Comments ||
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#2
Only half?
There they go - equivocating again.
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut ||
11/10/2004 11:53 Comments ||
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#3
Too bad, they're leaving the news mandarins untouched and sacking the sports and entertainment folks that actually provide value for the the money. Not the way to endear yourself to an increasingly dubious tax base.
#5
The new dates will fuel speculation of unprecedented job cuts that bosses want to announce as far from Christmas as they can. A source said: "They know if they wait another week or two it's going into the Christmas period."
Bah and Humbug! The heartless money grubbing capitalistic pig management protecting their own gold plated existance while exploiting the poor downtrodden working bloke and at the very time Tiny Tim is expecting at least some mealy porridge at Christmas! Oh, this is the BBC...Oh, then nevermind. Four legs good, two legs better!
Posted by: Don ||
11/10/2004 12:16 Comments ||
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#6
BBC, that hopeless, lounge-lizard agit prop politburo, anti-American, Arabist, taxpayer sinkhole, continues to indicate what is left of Al Brittania. Is there anything of relevance coming from that bigger island near Ireland (another case).
Posted by: Erik ||
11/10/2004 13:00 Comments ||
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#7
bet they axe the "wrong" half
Posted by: Frank G ||
11/10/2004 14:27 Comments ||
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#8
Betcha a guinea that they don't sack any upper level management.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/10/2004 15:14 Comments ||
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#9
Oh come on, they'll just raise the television tax and keep them all on right?
OUR PRICE
£1,750.00
DESCRIPTION
Executioner's Axe. Circa 1650, 'Headman's axe'. Typical large crescent-shaped heavy blade with original wooden handle with the end cap carved into the shape of a human bone. Macabre in the extreme, this type of chilling original artefact could only have been made out of necessity. Identical to the one used in the last beheading in Britain, now on display in the Tower of London. This hideous axe must have been used in the execution of many famous people. Traces of wood worm in the handle, otherwise in Extremely Fine condition.
#11
this type of chilling original artefact could only have been made out of necessity
Eh. The carved end cap suggests an artistic flair to its construction.
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/10/2004 16:29 Comments ||
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#12
This is a disaster waiting to happen. Does anyone here really believe that these newly-unemployed lefty journos won't be immeidatley snapped up by ABCCBSNBCNYTLATETC?
From East Asia Intel, subscription req'd
A delegation of Chinese officials that visited Panama last week offered to help widen the Panama Canal, according to the Independent Central American press agency. We'll widen your ditch. We have the best concrete in the world. Look how we did at 3 gorges dam!
Nine members of the communist People's Congress discussed the issue with Panamanian officials. They also raise the possibility of investing in the Howard Special Economic Zone on the Pacific side of the isthmus. We would like to build a missile silo factory in your zone.
"There is no doubt in our minds that the initiative to modernize the canal will enjoy the support of its principal users, which, like China, have witnessed the innovative efforts we Panamanians have made to place ourselves in a strategic position in the development of a more unstable world international maritime trade," said Elias Castillo, chairman of the Panamanian Congress' foreign relations committee. Panama also wants to promote high-technology development in the special economic zone, which was once the U.S. Howard Air Force Base. China has purchased long-term leases on ports at both sides of the Panama Canal, raising national security concerns that Beijing could disrupt shipping through the strategic waterway in times of crisis. Never crossed Jimmuh's mind, heh.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/10/2004 5:14:07 PM ||
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That way they can fill even more DOLLAR STORES with their exported drek...
#2
Hmmm... how much wider does it need for carriers to be able to pass through?
Posted by: Robert Crawford ||
11/10/2004 18:03 Comments ||
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#3
I believe most carriers already can pass through the canal. The new one, the Ron Reagon doesn't fit though, it had to go around.
If most US carriers fit the dinky ones built by other countries certainly should. I don't know about supertankers though.
Perhaps the Chinese could build a second canal next to the first one so they don't screw up the shipping during the construction. All of the hard work fo draining the swamps and stuff is already done now.
#4
There are some very good and practical engineering reasons that the Panama Canal was never widened. First and foremost that it is just plain not the best place to put a canal in the first place. If you want a far better location, Nicaragua offers a better Central American route via Lake Nicaragua. The second reason is that a canal is an integrated unit--if you widen or deepen it, you must replace the locks, and probably the pumps and just about every other part. It would be far more sensible and less expensive just to make a brand new canal than widen and deepen the existing one. Even the walls of the existing canal would have to go in an upgrade.
#5
Our carriers haven't fit into the locks for a long time. They are 110 X 1000 feet. A Nimitz class (90-100K tons) carrier is a bit over (130ft X 1000) draught. Even a Kitty Hawk class (60K tons) won't fit in the canals. I think even the WW2 Essex class carriers had to have their anti-aircraft gun sponsons removed to fit in the canal.
Posted by: ed ||
11/10/2004 18:42 Comments ||
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#6
I would agree about the economics of it, but there was a show on TLC recently about the canal. Amazing the options they were looking at. At the end, there was discussion of widening it b/c of future size of ships (especially supertankers). During the show, they videoed (from onboard) a Russian tanker going through and there was like 3 feet (1.5' on each side) of wiggle room through the tightest spot. It was amazing watching them squeeze it through w/o scraping the sides. Also, a few concerns were outlined about widening it, mainly the soil conditions in the area (lots of landslides) as well as the sheer amount of water it would take (in the lake nearby) to fill a wider canal (and supposedly the area has been in drought and there's some worry about where the water would come from).
Posted by: BA ||
11/10/2004 18:46 Comments ||
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#7
The current Gaillard (Culebra) cut widening program:
http://www.pancanal.com/eng/eie/cut.html
This has several very good illustrations as to the technical difficulty at one of the choke points on the current canal.
#10
The reason the canal was not built through Nicaragua is because of the seismic activity in that country. There is practically zero seismic activity in Panama. In general Panamanians are not convinced of the benefits of the expansion of the Canal due to the large amounts of land that would need to be flooded to accomodate the larger water requirements. If this is done it would have to be through referendum. BTW, important US companies also has investments in the Howard Zone, and at both sides of the Canal. Panamanians are the farthest thing from communist you can ever have.
Haitian authorities detained at least 21 prison guards in connection with an alleged plot to kill prisoners affiliated with ousted President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a top official in Haiti's most prominent rights group said Tuesday. Police spokesman Gessy Coicou said 21 prison guards were detained for corruption and other allegations, but declined to comment on the alleged plot or say whether charges would be filed. Pierre Esperance, the local director of the National Coalition for Haitian Rights, said police had said the detained guards worked in the National Penitentiary in Port-au-Prince.
Some inmates from Aristide's Lavalas Family party have been transferred to undisclosed locations for protection, he said. The director of the national penitentiary system, Claude Eugene Theodat, said some prisoners had been transferred to jails in three other towns as a security measure but declined further details. Top officials in Aristide's administration, such as former Prime Minister Yvon Neptune and former Interior Minister Jocelerme Privert, have been in the National Penitentiary for several months. Esperance said police would not say if they were targets, but that neither had been transferred out of the penitentiary.
Posted by: Fred ||
11/10/2004 10:36:51 PM ||
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Chief Cabinet Secretary Hiroyuki Hosoda said the submarine was spotted by a reconnaissance plane near the Sakishima island chain off Okinawa. He said the submarine had now left Japan's waters, but that it was being followed by a reconnaissance plane and a destroyer in the hope it would surface and show its flag. Japanese officials refused to speculate on the submarine's nationality. But Japan's Kyodo news agency quoted defence officials as saying it was a Chinese nuclear-powered sub.
More likely a diesel-electric boat, nuke subs don't run on the surface.
#1
'More likely a diesel-electric boat, nuke subs don't run on the surface.'
unless they actually wanted to be seen , a nuke sub off the coast of Japan would have the Japs flustered badly and show serious flaws in their defences against a pre-emptive strike
Also , i hear down the grapevine the chinese have made a new Yuan-class attack submarine , maybe they just testing it out and flexing some muscle , tensions are running pretty high down there atm .
#2
Defense officials confirmed that two Chinese military vessels â a submarine rescue vessel and a towing vessel â were spotted between Friday and Monday in waters 200 miles southeast of Japan's Tanegashima island. Officials, however, refused to comment on a possible link between the two incidents.
Guess the Chinese are planning ahead, shows a lot of confidence in their sub.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/10/2004 13:00 Comments ||
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Stratfor reported the following today in an article:
The submarine was spotted in the early morning by a Japanese P3C patrol, and Defense Force officials held their first meeting on the intrusion at 6:50 a.m. local time. By 8:10 a.m., a crisis management task force had been set up at the prime minister's office, and a little more than half an hour later, at 8:45 a.m., Ono ordered the dispatch of defense force assets to the area. By that time, however, the submarine already had left Japanese waters, and Tokyo tracked its movement with additional air assets. It was not until 3 p.m. that a meeting of the directors general of several Japanese agencies finally convened, long after the submarine was gone.
Although the bureaucracy failed to keep pace with the developing situation, the deployment of JMSDF assets was in itself a shift for Tokyo. In dispatching the navy, Ono invoked Article 82 of the Self-Defense Law, which allows, with approval of the prime minister, the deployment of defense force vessels to deal with a maritime security issue the coast guard is deemed incapable of effectively handling. The last time (and also the first time) the order was issued was in March 1999, during the pursuit of two suspected North Korean spy ships operating near the Noto Peninsula and Sado Island. That case also marked the first time the Japanese coast guard had fired warning shots at a suspicious vessel since 1954.
Posted by: Alaska Paul ||
11/10/2004 18:12 Comments ||
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Death Knell for Dingo
RESIDENTS and Aboriginal elders have leapt to the defence of a dingo marked for death. A dog's gotta eat tender meat. No fair scaring it off!
The dingo had entered a Fraser Island resort room in which a baby was sleeping. As it headed towards 14-week-old Scarlett Corke, her five-year-old sister, Georgia, screamed and jumped in front of the animal. Kid's got guts!
Georgia's father David ran from another room to chase it away. Big human foiled my dinner. - The Dingo. I must find a PETA member to protest!
National Parks and Wildlife Service executive director Allan Feely said his order to shoot the dingo would not change, despite locals' concerns. Of course those who want to save the dingo are slow to offer their children as food. That is for the "city slickers".
"Our number one concern is public safety and we won't take risks at Fraser or for that matter anywhere else," Mr Feely said. "I authorised the culling of the dingo and it stands. I believe it's our only choice." He said it could take a week to track, identify and put down the dog. Feely ordered the culling on Friday after the dingo entered the room at the Kingfisher Bay Resort. A dog threating a baby has got to die. This is common sense.
Resort spokeswoman Kaye Bishop said the company had strict procedures regarding dingoes and was meticulous at securing food scraps. Some people still can't read, and it puts everyone at risk.
Resident and island community advisory panel member Mike West said it should not be shot as it had not exhibited aggressive behaviour. Licking its chops over a little baby doesn't count, eh Mikey?
"If that was an aggressive dog, it was easily big enough to have gone for the five-year-old let alone the baby," Mr West said. Voted Green party in your election last month, eh? Sounds like it. Listen dimwit. The dog was probably scared of the 5-yr-olds yelling. Dimnwit. How about we volunteer YOU as bait to lure the dingo. Then we will really see how aggressive it is!
A total of 65 dingoes have been shot since 2001 when Clinton Gage, 9, died after being bitten by a dingo. But Mikey probably says that the dingos have a quota, too!
If I recall correctly, the NYT already had plans for this move prior to 9/11/01, but was able to get a bunch of cash from the federal/state/city slush development fund that was set up to keep businesses from fleeing the south end of Manhattan, plus major tax concessions.
Hundreds of French citizens have fled their former colony Ivory Coast after days of anti-French riots and looting in a country once seen as a model for Africa of post-independence prosperity. Nearly 600 French nationals took off from the main city Abidjan in two aircraft during the afternoon and two more planes were due to leave the world's top cocoa grower on Wednesday. About 150 American, Australian, Canadian and Spanish nationals gathered at Abidjan's sleek, modern airport. A Spanish air force plane was parked waiting to fly away its citizens, along with the Americans, the airport manager said. "I don't have a job any more or a house ... They took the bath, the furniture and electrical wires, everything," said Bruno Regis, a teacher from a French school that was razed. "The way it ended here, I wouldn't come back here even if they offered me a new job," he said at the airport, as he waited for a flight with his wife and three small children.
"Then this guy comes at me with a fork, see? So I sez, 'I'm gettin' outta here!' I mean, they can have the wiring!"
More than 2,200 French and other foreign nationals have been sheltering in French and U.N. bases in Abidjan, chased from their homes by fork-wielding supporters of President Laurent Gbagbo. French military sources said about 1,200 wanted to leave the country. People queuing in the airport departures hall clutched the few belongings they had salvaged. Some rested on military camp beds, women tended to babies and children played with luggage trolleys. There was an air of sadness but also of relief.
"Guess who's not being dinner!"
The riots have blocked cocoa exports, vital for a country which grows more than 40 percent of the world's cocoa beans, and inflamed simmering ethnic tensions in a major cocoa town. The United Nations said on Tuesday it may remove some non-essential staff from Ivory Coast, where there are nearly 800 people employed by U.N. and sister agencies. The plans would not affect more than 6,000 U.N. peacekeepers in the country. In Abidjan, several small clusters of youths draped in national flags ran to join anti-French protesters outside the state television building, singing the national anthem. Others manned checkpoints blocking roads with rocks and pieces of wood. "We are still here today. The white people want to kill us but it won't stop us coming out to demonstrate," said a young woman catching her breath while running with a group of 20 or 30 to the crowd of several thousand outside the television centre. Some youths brandished sticks as if they were machine guns. At least 10 demonstrators were killed and hundreds injured on Tuesday when bursts of gunfire ripped into a crowd outside Abidjan's showpiece Hotel Ivoire, which was under the control of French soldiers at the time. It remained unclear who had fired.
Posted by: Dan Darling ||
11/10/2004 1:03:40 PM ||
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"French fleeing...(!!!)"
__We all gotta be good at something, methinks...
France is to begin evacuating its nationals from Ivory Coast after days of anti-French demonstrations. The disturbances come in response to France's destruction of the Ivorian air force, in retaliation for the deaths of nine French peacekeepers on Saturday. They have also accompanied the renewal of the country's civil war, which the UN says has prompted 5,000 people to flee to Liberia. South African President Thabo Mbeki is making efforts to start peace talks. "It is on a voluntary basis. We are not going to evacuate all our French citizens because they are too many," French Embassy spokesman Francois Guenon told Associated Press. An aircraft was due to leave the French military base near the commercial capital, Abidjan with 270 people on board on Wednesday morning, French military spokesman Colonel Henry Auusavy told AFP news agency. Mr Guenon said they expected to evacuate up to 8,000 French nationals.
Run away!
Posted by: Steve ||
11/10/2004 8:25:28 AM ||
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Oops! By the title I thought you meant the Prench were sh*tting themselves. My bad.
#2
About bloody time. The French troops demonstrated long since that, given their numbers and rules of engagement, they would never be able to protect their nationals. The colonists who stayed this long were living in a fool's paradise.
#3
Ah yes, another glorious defeat for the brave Phrench. Oh, BTW France, enjoy the "...all our French citizens because they are too many." and have it talk about actual Frenchmen. With your declining population and a hostile Islamic population on the rise, you are gonna be in deep doo doo in a decade.
#4
Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- The French cabinet approved a decree authorizing the requisitioning of airliners because of anti- French violence in the Ivory Coast, as French aircraft evacuated French nationals and UN staff prepared to leave.
Today's weekly cabinet meeting examined measures presented by Transport Minister Gilles de Robien as ``the situation in Ivory Coast necessitates the protection of French nationals and other foreigners in the country and to permit the repatriation of those that want it,'' the government said in a statement.
If they are requisitioning planes, they must be planning for a major bug-out.
Posted by: Steve ||
11/10/2004 12:52 Comments ||
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When you get your butt handed to you by the Ivory Coast Air Force it's definitely time to regroup.
Posted by: Matt ||
11/10/2004 13:01 Comments ||
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Not just French. Anybody "white" is a target, and there can't be enough guards to protect you from mobs. (High tech only goes so far . . .)
It doesn't sound exactly like a "defeat:" the French creamed the Ivorian Air Farce and seem to have control of the ground wherever they go. They just can't be everywhere, and have to plan accordingly.
I'll be rooting for the French here: the rebels don't sound like a friendly group at all, and as for the Gbagbo supporters: from VOANews
But many French nationals who have been living in Ivory Coast for decades said they were leaving for good. The French population which numbered about 40,000 during the 1990s has dwindled to less than 15,000 because of instability in Ivory Coast, the world's leading cocoa producer.
Their departure prompted celebrations outside the headquarters of state television. Some supporters of President Laurent Gbagbo chanted they had been liberated, including Sylvain Kone.
"I am happy that they are leaving our country. I am very happy," he said. "They do not permit us to express our freedom. They take us as their slaves and we are not happy, not happy because we want to be free and they do not want it."
Nutcases. Xenophobic flavor. Gbagbo has a lot to answer for: this used to be a fairly stable country.
Hold on. Update from personal correspondance:
"Things are calm here but things got pretty bad on the other side of town at the Hotel Ivoire. It has been badly damaged they say and 11 more people were killed. The French soldiers had to leave it to keep down the violence. The French are trying to calm things down and we heard that they were even saying that they would replace the Ivorian war planes that they had destroyed."
Wow. Dunno if the rumor about the replacement offer is true, but it sounds pretty desperate.
Posted by: James ||
11/10/2004 15:10 Comments ||
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
