dagblog - Comments for "Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become"

hahahahahWe lived in a

Richard Day — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 17:27:02 +0000

In reply to Thanks for that (the link was

hahahahah

We lived in a working class suburb and next door to us--on both sides--was a group of Fundamentalist Christians. Really nice folks.

We have them over for dinner and my four year-old daughter greeted them at the front door.

Oh do come in. Daddy is in the kitchen fixing a big ass salad!

Thanks for that (the link was

Barth — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 13:59:37 +0000

In reply to Yeah, I wrote a blog about

Thanks for that (the link was not good, but I found it and was surprised to have not read it before). I am going to miss Sam, who has been commuting home with me for a few months reading his stuff through my Ipod to enetertain a tired commuter.

I hold no grudge for Keillor. He is a treeasure. We don't agree on the value of the Twain autobiography. (The whole Twain thing is beautifully posted here: http://www.marktwainproject.org/xtf/view?docId=works/MTDP10362.xml;style...

So, speaking of Harriet Beecher Stowe, as you were in December, but which I just read ---(one of Clemens' great devices in the autobiography is to to just require you to occupy his time, so I am doing the same)---he had this great story toward the end of the thing about Rev Charles Stowe (who I assume to be her brother in law) and his son, who the margin notes identify as the writer Lyman Beecher Stowe. He wrote, I think, in The Nation and was a good lefty rabble rouser.

This story predates LBS' literary career, and I will let Sam tell it:

Which reminds me of Reverend Charley Stowe’s little boy—a little boy of seven years. I met Reverend Charley crossing his mother’s grounds one morning and he told me this little tale. He had been out to Chicago to attend a Convention of Congregational clergymen, and had taken his little boy with him. During the trip he reminded the little chap, every now and then, that he must be on his very best behavior there in Chicago. He said “We shall be the guests of a clergyman, there will be other guests—clergymen and their wives—and you must be careful to let those people see by your walk and conversation that you are of a godly household. Be very careful about this.” The admonition bore fruit. At the first breakfast which they ate in the Chicago clergyman’s house he heard his little son say in the meekest and most reverent way to the lady opposite him,
“Please, won’t you, for Christ’s sake, pass the butter?”

Yeah; sigh. Dunno if you'll

we are stardust — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 22:37:38 +0000

In reply to I'm getting so I can't even

Yeah; sigh. Dunno if you'll like this, but it gave me a real shot in the arm this morning, though I admit I struggled keeping the images alive. Peterr writes about Marian Anderson and Eleanor Roosevelt, and what negotiating really can look like, and it means sometimes not negotiating at all, but just making sure the right thing gets done.

http://firedoglake.com/2011/04/09/lessons-in-negotiations-from-marian-anderson-and-eleanor-roosevelt/

I'm getting so I can't even

quinn esq — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 22:07:40 +0000

In reply to Don't be so pessimistic.Just

I'm getting so I can't even listen to regular Democrats talk.

It's as though their emotions - chiefly despair - have swallowed their brain. The most basic facts of the situation, the bare bones of political power on the ground - that we have the Presidency, they have no obvious leader, we have a majority in the Senate - seem not to even appear on their strategic dashboard. It's as though the Republicans have somehow won power, all power, and we're lost, flailing, going under, making the occasional noble moaning sound as we slip away.

There's no confidence. No forward agenda. No taking it to the opposition.

And it is this, above all for this awful loss of hope, loss of confidence, this caving, this most negative and marginal agenda, that I blame the White House.

And to the regular Democratic apologists for this sort of swill, with their pseudo rationalizations and their grand poses as realists - while their fellow citizens are thrown from job and home and good health and any hope for safety - that I wish them a cold day in hell.

I don't know if you caught

stillidealistic — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 22:02:20 +0000

In reply to Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become

I don't know if you caught the interview with Barbara Boxer who brought it to my attention that RICHARD NIXON signed into law the very women's health program that the repubs are trying to do away with now. I swear, even Ronald Reagan himself couldn't get elected as a repub now. That shows just how nuts they've gone.

I'm ashamed at the lack of compassion many of those on the right have, and I am also ashamed that the dems don't seem to have the intestinal fortitude to stand up to them. Maybe it's just a lack of numbers, I don't know, but I'm sick to death of the new reality that when you lose, you win, and when you win, you win...but only if you're a repub.

Good piece. I plan on being around more, and am looking forward to more of your thoughts.

Yeah, I wrote a blog about

Richard Day — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 21:41:18 +0000

In reply to Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become

Yeah, I wrote a blog about this autobiography and Keilor's reactions several months ago:

http://dagblog.com/arts/hypnotic-rhythms-7940

This Helen Keller letter just raises my heartbeat a bit! wow

I am an apologist for our President; I just have seen too many presidents in different shades of right and left and I have witnessed many contexts as they perform in office.

W Bush was so very, very bad.

The Reagan Administration contained the worst of the worst as far as leaders that we were forced to see again with w.

Jerry Ford was just horrible..he vetoed more in his two years than most presidents veto in two full terms under the direction of dicky cheney--the man who would become the biggest embezzler and greatest war criminal of all time.

I read the news sources everyday...but I have not read the full file!

I am extremely elated that the repubs are not in the WH, that a teapartier is not in the WH and that McCain aint in the WH.

I will tell you one thing, I am interested in how this all plays out!

Don't be so pessimistic.Just

Obey — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 21:36:17 +0000

In reply to Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become

Don't be so pessimistic.

Just look at what a party without the presidency, a party without a majority in the Senate, a party without any strong individual leader can do! Massive tax cuts and the greatest spending cuts in history! Total control of the framing of the national debate, and a decent shot at destroying the Great Society. And that's in their first three months...

The Democrats are powerless because they choose to be powerless. If one day they decide to change their mind, the sky's the limit.

Neither am I, but a guy needs

Barth — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 21:07:14 +0000

In reply to The other night I saw a PSA

Neither am I, but a guy needs a dream and a hope. I really feel bad that our gereation has pissed away what our grandparents' generation (at least for me since my parents were barely starting grade school when FDR was elected) gave us. And, yes, that is why the last 100 pages of the Twain autobiography, including the Keller letter that abruptly ended it, really shook me, because in his tone as he dictated these things--- blog posts way before blogs really---I saw a guy struggling with same horsebleep one hundred years ago. He tells a story of a US military outfit in the Phillpines essentially murdering unarmed civilans and the press back here trumpeting all of this as some sort of great military victory for a few days until it styarted to become clear that it was not. And I can just hear FOX News in the background.

The other night I saw a PSA

Elusive Trope — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 19:47:02 +0000

In reply to Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become

The other night I saw a PSA aimed at people responsible for hiring folks to consider those with physcial disabilities. The stigmas and the misconceptions still remain to this day, although great strides have been made.

The outcome of the current budget negotiations (should it be put into quotes) is something that does leave a bitter taste in one's mouth, one gets to join the the taste from last November still lingering there. The socio-political views of the people in this country seem to be taking longer than one might hope to enlighten. Some great strides have been made, but some steps back, too. One would hope that a nice crew of FDR populists can ride easily into the House and Senate seats. But I'm not holding my breath.

Great post, Barth. That

Michael Maiello — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 19:35:43 +0000

In reply to Mean Girls (and Boys) and the Mean Women and Men they Have Become

Great post, Barth. That letter from Keller is something else. Even when good things do happen it's as if we've lost our sense of grandeur about them.