The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

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The Polls. Again. Sigh.

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 05/27/2016 - 8:16am |

Scanning RealClearPolitics, they've got the latest poll up from PPIC, showing Hillary up by only 2%, an improvement from 2 1/2 months ago when she led by 7%. Except nobody thought he was within 7% back in March, except for the most fiercely devoted. PPIC chose 552 likely voters - 2/3 to 1/3 of the typical poll.

You've Got Mail (Bomb)

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 05/27/2016 - 7:29am |

We've found out all sorts of important info from Hillary mails, such as some staffer misspelled Rafik "Rasik" and that Hillary was going to meet Kissinger for a dinner, the one that spawned all the renewed war criminal-association frenzy. And a hodgepodge about Libya and her various meetings & assessments. Sadly, we still don't have  Colin Powell's emails for comparison, to see how much he knowingly lied and bamboozled in his UN speech nor other hunt-for-yellowcake type deceptive events.

Femen: Optics & Ill Losin'

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 05/24/2016 - 8:49am |

For women, perceptions are truths. Forget first impressions - women are impressing all the time. It's not what actually exists - it's what appears to be true, even for a fleeting moment. And it's holistic - any piece in disarray destroys the totality. It's not "you look good, but..." It's "did you see that ..." That's why women use mirrors. One slip-up and it's game over.

Whine vs Dine: Global Poverty

By PeraclesPlease on Mon, 05/23/2016 - 3:21am |

I grew up in the shadow of the Peace Corps ethic, the rather noble and idealistic idea that we could help the rest of the world by running around and sharing our knowledge. My parents were less starstruck - they regularly remarked how much more good Albert Schweitzer might have done if he'd stayed home and made lots of money to send there instead. Well, we now know many of our "experts" were naïve kids less skilled than their hosts, and the horror stories of how money in the 3rd world can just disappear like water into sand.

Math is Tuff

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 05/18/2016 - 10:30am |

So if superdelegates shouldn't count, there are 4051 pledged delegates.

1/2 plus 1 = 2026 to win.

Hillary has roughly 1717 after last night - a few more to be awarded

She needs 309 for pledged victory.

There are 781 pledged delegates left.

With 40% of the remainder, she wins.

With 51% of California and New Jersey, she wins even with delegates elsewhere.

If she gets 45% of all others (81), she only needs 38% of CA & NJ to win (228)

Prince v. Supreme Court

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 05/17/2016 - 11:51am |

Prince died recently, apparently in a lot of pain due to decades of hard dance moves on-stage that left his joints in shambles (but still in better shape than mine could ever dream of).

Prince's demise came not from the joints, but from painkillers. But ironically for the fervently anti-drugs star is that his Jehovah's Witness religion prevented him from choosing the more common surgeries that would have likely lessened his pain. Why? The church's objection to "blood transfusions."

Should Jehovah's Witnesses object to their health plans paying for their employees' blood transfusions, it's hard to see this being more objectionable than not paying for contraception - it's a core tenet of their religious belief, and with 1.2 million "publishers" and 2.5 memorial attendees in the US, roughly half the US Jewish population, they're large enough to be taken seriously.

Never Quite Good Enough

By PeraclesPlease on Sun, 05/15/2016 - 10:49am |

In 2008, Hillary Clinton was the first serous female candidate and the first to ever win a presidential primary, eventually racking up 23 of them and arguably winning the popular vote, losing to the rising star of the party by only 97 pledged delegates, while only falling behind in superdelegates a month from the finish.

Throughout the primary campaign, Clinton was labeled as "inevitable", in lieu of her husband's presidency and her party connections, often as a pejorative accusing her of feeling entitled. Missing from this simplified equation was that many Democratic leaders had condemned her husband's actions, that he'd been impeached, that the 2000 election was largely about "Clinton fatigue" with many "liberal" media figures regularly slamming both Clintons' actions and reputation, and he didn't even have the coattails to pull his VP over the line.

Nebraska votes (again)

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 05/11/2016 - 9:10am |

As if to point out the bizarreness of caucuses, Nebraska offers both a primary and a caucus too.

Bernie won the caucus 2 months ago by a fairly large margin, though with superdelegates Hillary came out only 2 behind, with 2 more left to be selected.

                                                         Hillary        (delegates)        Bernie       (delegates)

Obama's Smart War?

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 05/03/2016 - 9:52am |

Recent announcements of attacks on ISIS paint a picture of a rogue group of militants finally on the run, getting their come-uppance as it were (being "brought to heel", since I'm not running for office?). Defeated in battle, having $800 million in cash destroyed, even having the US turn up the heat on their famed social media advocacy (helped by rock star hackers Anonymous).

After 7 years of maintaining and extending the Bush Doctrine to new countries, and tip-toeing around the Syrian conflict, has Obama finally found his groove, his not a "dumb war", but a smart war, one that has at least tangible benefits to what most people see as something worth fighting for?

Hillary Releases Transcript

By PeraclesPlease on Mon, 05/02/2016 - 6:54am |

Okay, not that one, but the Bejing one, but as bonus, you can find one of the Goldman Sachs videos below sans transcript. In the meantime, to answer Nancy Fraser (via Trkingmomoe):

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Superpowers
Defies gravity Can spit really far Almost touch my toes Can cut a fly's legs off with a beer cap from 20 paces Know how to say useless stuff and prattle on in a dozen languages Don't know when to shut up
Favorite Quotes
To be for or against the Plague, it's much the same thing. Fiddledee, how a body shure do get around - just 2 weeks ago I was in Mississippi and now I'm all the way to Tennessee... Eat or Be Eaten Better to be pissed off than pissed on.
Biography
Born in swaddling clothes (designer, of course) at the confluence of big waters, my first recorded words were "Dad, can I have the keys to the car?" Raised a Southern Pedestrian, my musical talents were recognized at an early age, leading to my being exiled to the shed out back with a stack of books that became my eddykayshun - advanced readin', writin' & ritmytick, creating a major quandary of "what will I do, oh what will I do?" (Gunslinger) As an old black man advised in song, "You Gotta Move", so move I did, traveling the byways sideways even a lot of driveways, picking up sticks and psychological tics, even movin' to Beverlee through a quaint misunderstanding of the seriousness of TV series, until finally I blew up so big the carry nation incarnation tarnation couldn't hold me no more, so I fixed my sights on yonder sitar, and like Queequeg and Paul Bowles and one of those abducted kids by the Pied Piper of Hamelin, I ventured forth to the larger world, pickin' and grinnin', doin' me some reckonin' and naughts from naughts, occasionally rightin', building me some buildings and wiring and just trying to understand the babble comin' out of people's mouths and heads, I finally ended up in what Rummy quaintly calls "New Europe", which ain't so new from what I sees, but that pit in my stomach from lack-of-moving-sickness finally disappeared, and instead I sit behind a whopping big desk stacked with missives from all the chiefs with big whampum around the world telling me "what's going on". Which seems like a load of boolshit to me, but I guess that's what keeps me busy and entertained now, separatin' the weeds from the chapstick. So my name is Perry Keys, or Peracles to you, and since my mammy always said, "say please and thank you", I added the please, but I'm holdin' back on that thankee until I feel you've earned it. But do welcome, and I hope we's a gonna have a real good time. It all starts with, "I wuz born a poor young white chile livin' in the South..." and we cycle through again, like Nietzsche and his infernal regurgence. So enjoy, and let's spin a spell...

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