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

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Thems the Breaks?

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 03/01/2016 - 6:54am |

Checking the list of college spring breaks which take place largely in March, it's a huge problem for Bernie. I total 5.8 million, and guessing a 20% overlap, that's 1.2million potential youth votes knocked out of most contests (since absentee vote isn't often allowed in primaries, caucuses and for first time voters.)

Leaving Las Vegas...

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 02/24/2016 - 11:13am |

Donald meets Hillary in a quiet rendezvous. "Ok, you got 5 minutes to close the deal", says Hill. "What gives?" 

"Let's stop pretending otherwise and wasting time when there's so much at stake," replies Le Donald, "you know we belong together". "Fat chance, broomhead - and don't go quoting me on that, basta with your Trump tweets or I'll put my Texts4Hillary boys on you.' "Those pantywaists? Why do you spend all this time with gays and metrosexuals?" "Cause they're my base, Don - unlike you I can't just count on the lunatic fringe to sustain me."

Left Las Vegas

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 02/24/2016 - 3:38am |

Ok, moving back to regular Reader section.

Sisterhood

By PeraclesPlease on Sat, 02/20/2016 - 6:26am |

Now that voting one's gender has been taken off the table, it's time to bring it back - or at least if women want.

It's a typical crap piece of pseudo-emancipation; women are told they don't need to be their anatomy - when all around us we see women lauded most for being their anatomy.

Bernie, older & wiser

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 02/19/2016 - 11:23am |

I'm pleased that Bernie's finally clueing in on how the game's played. He's discovered that Hillary's wrapping herself around Obama because that endears her to black voters, who make up a large core of the Democratic vote. He's also discovering that it's not so easy for him to do the same because she started courting the Big O 8 years ago, something an Independent might be loathe to do. And taking onboard one of Obama's fiercest black critics, Cornel West? Not likely to help, since he's about as popular with the black community these days as George Zimmerman. Bernie did hire a BLM member as spokesperson. But it's simply not the same thing.

Millennial Revolt

By PeraclesPlease on Thu, 02/18/2016 - 8:11am |

17 miles from Georgetown at George Mason U, perhaps we begin to see the real issue on which this election rests.

 

 

Perhaps old folks are out of touch...

Au Pair of Dux

By PeraclesPlease on Fri, 02/12/2016 - 2:46am |

Voters in both parties are reflexively unhappy with the establishment, but Hillary's problems with voters are all about her.

The best woman for the job is the one who's not running.

The male candidate is a better feminist than the world-known established female advocate of women's causes.

The best candidate to shake up Congress and get new programs through it is the one who's been in Congress for 30 years as a relative outsider with little to show for it.

Testament

By PeraclesPlease on Thu, 02/11/2016 - 2:26am |

In answer to Hal: "So what is it about the prospect of another Clinton in the White House that causes you to write so much so zealously in her service?"

Pretty simple, Hal - when Clinton came in there was a high crime rate, entrenched poverty and welfare state, just coming off the unsocial/Iran-Contra Reagan-Bush years with a president who thought grocery checkout scanners were the height of tech. When he left, we had high employment, a ballooning internet industry, lots of jobs, black home ownership and jobs way up (including high up visible in his administration, plus Vernon Jordan as one of his most trusted advisors), a balanced budget, and a number of interesting possibilities for the future including trying hard to fix Israel-Palestine. Plus he balanced doing a bit of military action in hot spots - and for the first time got us helping a Muslim people who didn't have oil - rather than getting us heavily involved in foreign wars for crass imperialistic reasons, or doing nothing. We had a strong dollar but were *still* increasing exports, rather than the bullshit weak dollar/cheap goods approach.

Half a Loaf 2.0

By PeraclesPlease on Wed, 02/10/2016 - 3:07am |

[to Flavius & Barefooted]

The poor or disenfranchised simply don't know where the levers are to do the most harm.

I know corrupt small businessmen and corrupt mega-multimillionaires. The difference is largely access. But I also know very ethical mega-multimillionaires. Money may provide a bigger venue to display corruption, but I glanced at the troopers in Paula Jones-gate yesterday, and besides lying in her case, they were already pulling other insurance scams. They simply had bad ethics.

Half a Loaf Rising

By PeraclesPlease on Tue, 02/09/2016 - 12:09pm |

Charles Blow on Hillary's "I have Half a Dream" effect on millennials (hat-tip Digby):

Young folks are facing a warming planet, exploding student debt, stunted mobility, stagnant wages and the increasing corporatization of the country due in part to the increasing consolidation of wealth and the impact of that wealth on American institutions. - Blow

As has been pointed out before, this is largely fighting the last 2 elections' problems. Obama expanded a program for student loan relief last year to 5 million people. Stagnant wages up to now has been less important than still-high-unemployment, but now that unemployment is at 5%, the still unhealthy ~2.3-2.5% wage growth has more of a chance of growing. (this article suspects workers have been pushing less hard for wages due to harsher conditions for unemployment benefits). While the planet is warming, renewables are taking off, electric cars are finally hitting the market, and energy costs are dropping due partially to increased solar & wind, but largely due to the rise of contentious fracking. (meaning also that for the first time in my lifetime, we're not really dependent on Mideast oil anymore, while Russia's hold on Europe has also waned). And hey, we're no longer talking about "studying" global warming - we're finally beginning to do something about it.

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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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