The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age
    Richard Day's picture

    THE REPUB HOT TUB TIME MACHINE

    OR...MEET THE FOCKERS!

     

    Trent Lott drove to the mansion of Ted Cruz for the 'event'.

    Many things were on his mind.

    Why am I doing this?, thought the old Senate Majority Leader.

    But Cruz represented the New Hope!

    Michael Maiello's picture

    It's Too Soon To Taper

    Reuters had me back today in advance of the sixth Federal Reserve meeting of 2013, the meeting that is meant to signal the beginning of the end of quantitative easing and the eventual return to normal Fed operations.

    It's too soon.

    Putin---don't play me!

    Putin's now universally known initiative on chemical weapons control in Syria has, in my opinion, opened the door to essential American character traits which may preordain our getting more involved in Syria's war.

    We don't like to be lied to. We particularly don't like to be played for chumps. When we do decide to address a problem, we are impatient. We are capable of revenge, but as one pundit has put it, "...we have the watches, the Middle Easterners have the time."  We don't have the patience for cold revenge, we like ours hot. And if Putin is playing us for chumps, he has all but written a scenario for American intervention.

    And the winner is...

    Who cares ?

    The debate over the Russian proposal for Syria reminds me of a season in the early 80s. With a week to go the Yankees were as usual in the lead. But during that week they "mailed in" their performances and they didn't finally clinch until the last weekend.

    Reporter.

    Some people are saying you backed into the pennant

    Thurman Munson

    They'll be saying that from second place. 

    TimDanahey's picture

    A Nation of Sheep Will Beget a Government of Wolves

    When one discovers a friend has lied or an associate has stolen, a trust has been violated and the pre-existing bond is broken - often irrevocably.

    Such is the case with our current government versus U.S. citizens allied with people aroud the world.  Each day, new revelations detail how our government has spied on its own citizens, foreign leaders, and allies.  Glenn Greenwald, the Guardian reporter who covers the Edward Snowden story, is rumored to be preparing a story how the U.S. government assigned the CIA to spy to benefit U.S. multi-national corporations on matters not affecting U.S. security,  In essence, spying for fun and profit.  This was made legal during the Clinton administration but it was never made ethical or honorable - nor was it made widely public.

    Richard Day's picture

    THE WEDDING

    The Spanish Wedding

    My new daughter-in-law finally made an honest man of my son!

    My beautiful granddaughter is no longer a bastard. (or is it bastardess?) Hahahahahah

    I told my brother that in Victorian England with all the prudence? that 80% of the 'public' (read unwashed) never married and the Law of Bastardy applied only to the inbred aristocracy. haaah

    Rumsfeld's Chobani bank shot.

    I thought Donald Rumsfeld had been dumped from the shelves long ago for there is no bloated stuffed shirt more worthy of  being removed from our eyesight and consciousness than Rumsfeld--- architect of our unfortunate military intervention in Iraq.   

    Orion's picture

    Mr. Rodman Goes To Pyongyang

    In the chaos surrounding the possible Syria strike, mass shootings, George Zimmerman and all sorts of other things, you might have missed out on a really strange story - Dennis Rodman's apparent new job as ambassador to North Korea.

    All together now

    killing people is wrong. Since I get lost trying to follow complicated debates I  need some “golden thread”to hang on to. That’s it.

    Sure there’s the usual suspects: Are we being lied to by the Administration? What does the Constitution permit?  Should we take sides with al-Qaeda? Does the “norm” with respect to chemical warfare trump all other considerations ?

    Tomorrow I’ll have eloquent comments on all the above. Unless I decide to go to the beach. Today I’m just trying to decide what’s right.

    Killing people isn’t.

    285 to 272

    was the vote in the House of Commons against the UK supporting military action against Syria in response to the use of chemical war fare measures allegedly by the regime.

    Cameron immediately responded essentially that while he disagreed with this implied instruction of the  House  he was required to be guided by it.

    The response from Obama's spokesmen is that we do what we think is right.

    Orion's picture

    That Degrading Black Culture

    It seems like the proverbial shit has been hitting the fan a lot with American society  these days. I grew up in it at its best so I can tell you - at its height, living in America was generally so comfortable that it was easy to ignore things, to bury things and to put lingering problems to the side.

    With the economic downturn, the election of Barack Obama and other factors, the American lifestyle itself seems to have changed. The way people behave and talk seems different - the tone is much more extreme than it ever was before.

    And of course - what's the thing to hit the fan when America begins to unravel. Race. And with race of course comes pop culture - as Fox News reminded us today: 

    trkingmomoe's picture

    St. Petersburg Florida Mayor's race looks good for Democrats

    The first round of non partisan voting took place on Tuesday for the primary race for Mayor of St.

    Richard Day's picture

    IRONY

    So he asked me if I believed that Jonas really survived in the belly of a whale for three days.

    I responded that I did not know but maybe I will ask him when I get to heaven.

    And what if he is not in heaven when you arrive.

    Well then you can ask him.

    jollyroger's picture

    Money doesn't talk

    Yes, I am a hypocrite, already on record chortling as big bucks Bloomberg shoved one up the NRA's ass. Call me pisher.

    Today in a rare ( perhaps unique) demonstration of courage, New York's City Council overrode the mayor's veto and imposed long needed oversight on a police department intoxicated with ( if statistics are to be believed..) crime suppression success.

     

    Richard Day's picture

    HONESTY IN THE REPUBLICAN PARTY


    The curse of being Irish is that
    women just love me for my stories!
    (Eyewitness_(1981_film@32min)

    Honesty is the best policy?

    Really?

    Forget the best policy aspect of this Franklinian (is that a word?) proverb; does it work or do we need more stories from Irishmen?

    Honesty has been creeping into our media lately and the honesty has been coming from the repubs; of all people?

    Rep. Scott DesJarlais (R-Tenn.) told an 11-year-old girl who spoke out at a town hall meeting last week that her undocumented father should be deported, saying "we need to follow" current immigration laws.

    Orion's picture

    Calling Out White America Part Two: Popping The Bigot Balloon

    Something interested happened yesterday. Just as a trio of young black kids in Oklahoma randomly murdered an Australian track runner and illiciting an international incident, this happened elsewhere in the country:

    Orion's picture

    Macklemore Calls Out White America - Is It Listening?

    I am so proud to be from Seattle and to be involved in hip-hop. This is amazing: 

    Gawker quotes Macklemore’s Rolling Stone interview, in which he says in part: “If you’re going to be a white dude and do this sh*t, I think you have to take some level of accountability. You have to acknowledge where the art came from, where it is today, how you’re benefiting from it. At the very least, just bringing up those points and acknowledging that, yes, I understand my privilege, I understand how it works for me in society, and how it works for me in 2013 with the success that The Heist has had.”

    TimDanahey's picture

    Advice for the Enemy

    It may seem un-American to offer advice to the enemy but, if ever there was a win-win situation, this is it.

    If Al Qaeda would like to win, all they have to do is copy our Vietnam experience, declare victory, and go home.  The American people can finish your job.  It will be peaceful, bloodless, and all of our objectives will be fulfilled.

    Orion's picture

    For The Church And Wrestling, It's Nonchalantly Gay

    One of the really amazing things about Pope Francis rebuking homophobia was how nonchalant he was about it. There was no huge press conference or media campaign with long explanations about why being gay was now okay - in fact, the Pope seemed to secede his authority on the issue altogether - "Who am I to judge?"

    We have a possibly equally strange rebuke of homophobia in the form of professional wrestler Darren Young. After being asked by a reporter if "a gay wrestler could be successful in the WWE," Young simply laughed and said "Absolutely. Look at me. I'm a WWE superstar and to be honest with you, I'll tell you right now, I'm gay. And I'm happy. I'm very happy." Here's the video from The Young Turks:

    Natasha Gural's picture

    When Social Media Becomes Too Much To Bear (Death Goes Viral)

    I’ve thought a lot about this trend of people planning and sharing on Twitter, Facebook, blogs, anywhere online they they’ll gain the most attention, the most morbid and intimate details of death, knowing they will go viral.

    Elusive Trope's picture

    Preface Draft Part 2

    https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcSXUikvkHLTUuVlVxm2h_El78RIHtXsV0hpd5E1Zuai6o1Svp3EtwIt has been two and half months since my previous blog and I suppose one might say that a lot has happened, as  in it has been a bit of an emotional roller coaster.  I am still technically unemployed, and by “technically” I mean I am working on starting a small business (a downtown diner of all things) with another person (who is putting up all the money).  At the same time, there is the ebb and flow of personal relations with the all the dysfunction and chaos that comes from that.

    There is much more than that, but the details aren’t important.  The details keep changing, as does my perception of them.  I have been dinking with this particular blog over the course of the past two and half months, and each time it becomes something a little different than the previous draft.  Most of the time, it was struggle, because I kept wondering just what the point was I was trying to make.

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