Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Can You Say Disco?

Tonight on So You Think You Can Dance, there was a disco performance to the Sylvesters "Dance (Disco Heat)" which is a song that I put up in my top ten of disco songs.

But, you have to remember, I came of "dance" age in the disco era, so most of you don't even know this song. I tried to find it on You Tube, but didn't find any thing that was the real thing.

Second song best loved in that era was Dan Hartman's "Instant Replay."

Enjoy!



Don't forget, I am celebrating my 60th birthday party with a disco fest at the El Rey in Los Angeles! Stay tuned for more details.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

Speaking of lies and lying

... (see my post a few posts below), Glenn Greenwald has a greait piece up over at Salon that is well worth the read.

As CarolynC notes in Comments, the Straussian endorsement of "noble lies" is completely consistent with the two-tiered system of justice that dominates our political culture (the subject of today's first post), as only some people -- the elite -- are permitted to tell such lies, while ordinary citizens who do so must be punished. From Harper's Earl Shorris in July, 2004:

For Strauss, as for Plato, the virtue of the lie depends on who is doing the lying. If a poor woman lies on her application for welfare benefits, the lie cannot be countenanced. The woman has committed fraud and must be punished. The woman is not noble, therefore the lie cannot be noble. When the leader of the free world says that "free nations do not have weapons of mass destruction," this is but a noble lie, a fable told by the aristocratic president of a country with enough nuclear weapons to leave the earth a desert less welcoming than the surface of the moon.

Shatner's Reading Of Palin's Farewell Speech

This is absolutely the most hysterical take I've seen in years! William Shatner reading Sarah Palin's farewell speech, verbatim, as a poem, with beat music in the background. Levity, you are my friend in these dark times (grinning).




H/T to AMERICAblog for the video.

Monday, July 27, 2009

How Does It Feel Going To Hell In That Handbasket?

Partisan politics never played a part in my personal life since the 1970's when I was finally old enough to register to vote. I registered as a non-partisan, and have to this day, remained non-partisan.

I only began to think of politics as partisan after Bush was illegally installed in the White House as president. I was truly amazed that the Republican machine could actually get the United States Supreme Court to stop a recount of the votes in Florida, thereby denying Al Gore his rightful place as the President of the United States. The visuals on television of those Republicans forcing their way into the recount areas and being abusive and nasty and pulling the ballots out of peoples hands waiving the SCOTUS ruling in peoples’ faces as they giddily announced George W. Bush as the President scared the fucking shit out of me, and made me take a second look at partisan politics.

I know I wasn’t paying much attention when Bill Clinton was in the White House, and I sure didn’t give a crap about his sex life, having grown up with all the titillation of the Kennedy years and Marilyn Monroe! But, to some extent, I did notice that Republicans foamed at the mouth whenever you mentioned the name Bill Clinton, and it did strike me as odd. I still have an old political cartoon from some artist I clipped out of a paper and put in a frame, that has a bunch of Republicans beating the crap out of a dead horse, whose name was White Water, which still makes me laugh to this day.

But, by the time the 2000 Presidential election came around, I began noticing a “lock step” attitude emanating from the Republicans, en masse, as though they were under some spell, and it was creepy.

Now, 9/11 was the perfect opportunity for a president to unite the country with the rest of the world, and to be fair, I tried to give George Bush the benefit of the doubt for a while. But then, all of a sudden, and to me, out of the blue, came the Iraq/Saddam Hussein/WMD meme that every Republican (not to mention quite a few Democrats) were spouting, and I was like, WTF? Where did that come from? Having a working knowledge of some middle east traditions and history, I, personally, knew there was not a shred of truth in the Iraq, etc. connection, and that’s when I started to become alarmed. Truly alarmed. I would look around me and ask everyone “do you get this?” Then, it became abundantly clear there was a deep divide getting deeper – people on the left vs. people on the right. And although in my area (Los Angeles) people on the left outnumbered people on the right, in our government it seemed people on the right were running things ... and into the ground, I might add.

The invasion of Iraq did not give the Republicans, or the right wing nutjobs, what they wanted, but it did cost this country billions of dollars and thousands of American lives. We were lied to by the President, the Vice President, the Secretary of State, the Attorney General, and most of those in Congress, as to what the real cost of the war would be, and as history usually proves, there were no WMD, Iraq had no connection to the 9/11 bombers, and the war was never paid for by oil from Iraq. The same is happening now in Afghanistan, and the outcome will more than likely be worse then than of Iraq, specifically because of its proximity to Pakistan, which I might add, does have WMD!

That is why when the elections of 2006 and 2008 yielded a Democratic majority in Congress, not to mention the election of the first black president, I felt somewhat buoyed by that feat. The surge in Democrats being elected to congress was pushed along by the netroots’ funding of what was ostensibly considered progressive candidates. And Obama’s central theme was of change – something I deeply felt was needed. So, entering 2009, I was of the belief that election campaign promises would be part of the landscape.

Obama said he wanted America to move forward into the 21st century. He wanted to make sure that all Americans had the opportunity to be insured, like members of Congress and other public officials were insured. He said he wanted to close Gitmo. He said he wanted to repeal DADT. He said he did not support DOMA. He told crowds he supported civil unions and other GLBT issues. He vowed to end the secrecy of the White House and be transparent to all Americans. He promised to stop illegal spying on the American population, and end warrant less wiretapping. He claimed to represent the regular guy and would take the regular guy’s side vs. the corporation’s side.

Man, were we snowed by his pile of crap, not to mention the rest of the spineless Democrats that were elected in 2008. Democrats now control the White House, the House of Representatives and the Senate. And what, exactly, have they done for the little guy? Hmmm. Well, let’s see, they gave trillions of dollars to Wall Street and the banking industry, which industries have refused to account to the government or the American taxpayers about how they used such funds. We were told it was imperative or the world would collapse! And now, of course, we see huge bonuses are back and voila, the industry is making money again. Except, the American public is still losing their homes, losing their jobs, and no one, and I mean no one, can really get a loan these days. And of course, the banks keep finding ways to up the interest rates and unilaterally change their credit card rules so again, the average American gets fucked up the ass.

Then came the slow foot approach to closing GITMO. That started me worrying about whether or not this country was going to go to hell in a handbasket no matter who had control. And, to add insult to injury, the Obama administration is using all the same arguments that the Bush administration has used as to why it’s not possible to close GITMO! But the kicker was when the DOJ filed its brief in fucking support of DOMA, likening gays to pedophiles and implying being gay was akin to incest. Still, that didn’t ruffle any feathers up yonder at the Beltway connection. However, when the Obama administration started spouting crap about why it was not going to be able to do anything to repeal DADT, that’s when I knew the American public had been played. Of course, watching Obama pick his cabinet members (all from the banking industry, hmmmmmm) caught my attention, but I wasn’t alarmed until they coughed up taxpayer money to bail out their own buddies. The last straw for me was when the Obama administration played the same game as the Bush administration, claiming that visitors to the Oval Office are privileged and need not be divulged! It was like deja fuck me vu.

Now we have health care, an issue that Obama clearly ran on, and an issue that it is clear he is going to not give to the Americans that elected him. And I’m not even going to blame this on Republicans! America has long ago been handed over to large corporations vis-a-vis congress, as well as legislators in all of the 50 states. When I was growing up in the 1970's, breaking up monopolies was at the heart of freeing up competition in the market place, starting with the busting up of the telephone monopolies. Here we are, 30 years later, back where we started, with a handful of corporations owning everything in the world. And the few at the top are in control of what the rest of the world gets, from its news down to the products and services available to consumers. And the extent to which these corporations control Washington is amazing – even electing progressives to Congress has not halted their control, it has only unleashed an unimaginable amount of money flowing from corporations to lobbying groups to the palms of the legislators themselves. The money being spent by the health care industry to derail any form of real change in the way Americans are covered by insurance astounds me!

The really sad part of the past 10 years is the way truth is handled in this country. It is no longer unacceptable to lie. Lying is a way of life for news media, politicians, corporations, and Republicans (although quite a few Democrats have the lying thing down as well). Bald face lies, too. I have a feeling that Americans are tired of the lies, and I do think the voting over the past few years reflected a desire from the American people to be represented, and not lied to. But lied to, they have been. No one in our government, from the local up to the national levels, gives a rats ass about the people that elect them. Once they are on the gravy train, it’s all about them, and nothing about their constituents. And the media is really scary. I remember when the news was actually, you know, news. Now it’s sound bites, and talking points and endless gossip, wrapped up in a tidy ribbon and spoon fed to the public as “the news.” Journalism used to be a profession one aspired to because truth was relevant and exposing toxic lies was what a journalist did. Now, it has been dumbed down into a “he said, she said, oh well” spewfest, in which outright lying is up against the truth, and no one in media will expose the difference.

I am losing my patience as an American. Unfortunately, since I am getting older, I will have less and less of an impact on my country and what will eventually be a very big demise. The question is whether I will be alive when it happens, and what will Americans do when it does.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Katie Holmes Doing Judy Garland? Where's The Wicked Witch, Damn It?

Hmmm. As a consumate fan of So You Think You Can Dance, I was anticipating the Katie Holmes rumoured appearance. Too bad she tried to do Judy Garland, both vocally and dance wise.

I do appreciate that she donates her name and perhaps money to the dizzy feet (dot com) organization, but come on ... Katie vs. Judy? Not even close.

This is Judy's version.




Here is Katie's version. It has been reported she didn't sing it live, but lipsynched.

Monday, July 20, 2009

And You Thought Michael Invented The Moon Walk!

(If music is automatically playing, just scroll down to the podcast and hit pause).





As many of us that were alive when this infamous walk took place, I remember where I was, and who I was with.

I was in between junior and senior high, and with my aunt and uncle and cousins in Burbank, CA, watching it on television (of course, in black and white), like everyone else.

And, for the record, I am not part of those conspiracy theorists that think this was all staged on a back lot in Hollywood!

Thursday, July 09, 2009

Pelosi, 1, CIA, 0

And to think that just a few months ago the Republicans were calling her the liar!

Isn't this party (meaning Republican) over yet? Why are they still here?

The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Leon E. Panetta, has told the House Intelligence Committee in closed-door testimony that the C.I.A. concealed “significant actions” from Congress from 2001 until late last month, seven Democratic committee members said.


"Concealed 'significan actions.'" From 2001 until late last month.

Are we done with all of this yet?

Senator Grassley - Go Fuck Yourself



Senator Grassley's crass comments to a town hall meeting question about insurance - go work for John Deere or the federal government!

What an asshole. And this is a Senator, no less, telling his constituents to go fuck themselves, basically, about health insurance. He gets a great plan, but god forbid real Americans be afforded an equally great plan. And if you listen to the video, the bastard is actually pissed off for having to answer the perfectly valid question. And note, too, that he claims to not know what his deductible is, or what his co-pay is! Either the man is that out of touch with reality, or he's a fucking asshole liar.

I tell you, there will be mob mentality from Americans if this government caves in to the Republicans' idea of what constitutes appropriate health care reform, which is blocking any right to a public option (or in other words, giving their constituents the same health coverage they have been afforded while working FOR the people.)

H/T to AMERICAblog.

Tuesday, July 07, 2009

Congratulations, Senator Franken

(heads up - there is a music podcast unrelated to this post, so if you want the music to STOP, just scroll down to player and pause it!)



Amazing! Just amazing. And the spontaneous and long standing ovation and applause was great to hear (and see). Finally, the Democrats have a 60 seat majority in the Senate. And a pretty good comic, as well ! Not to mention that Franken is pretty astute when it comes to politics, and he is a true progressive.


Congratulations, Senator Franken! (Has a weird ring to it, doesn't it?)

Friday, July 03, 2009

Liberal Alternative To This Weekends' Teabagging!

(Note: to turn off unrelated music, scroll down to podcast and pause player)




Sounds like a good idea to me. To find a local food bank, click here.

H/T to Crooks and Liars