White Nationalists March in Washington
Hundreds of masked members of the white nationalist group Patriot Front marched through Washington, D.C., on July 4, chanting "reclaim America" and carrying Confederate flags.
With replies by 🎓Cas Mudde, 🎓Simon Hix, 🎓Michael A. Clemens +75 more scholars.
Regular readers (both of you) will have noticed that this blog is, and always will be, ad free--because it's not about money, it's about people (well that and the fact that no money making enterprise cares about it either). But every now and again a business will do something surprising and worth noting...like this ad from Ancestry.com showing just how far we have come in our diverseness in the 241 years we've been fighting for the American dream:
Kid Rock should get down on his hands and knees every night and thank the Supreme Being for Lee Greenwood's song "God Bless the USA"; otherwise, he'd be the hands down winner of worst patriotic pop song ever fucking written with the utterly shitty "Born Free."
Man, I don't want to read too much into a half-assed local parade on the 4th of July, but Democrats need to do a much better job at the local level (auditor, assessor, state rep, circuit judge) of getting candidates out into the field. Of the twenty or so floats/cars/moving vehicles touting candidates this fall in our local parade today, maybe three or four were for Democratic candidates, the rest were solidly republican. I appreciate the fact that this area is a republican stronghold, but still we ought to give the good guys a little something to cheer about.
On the bright side, it was hard not to notice the Hillary Clinton car cruising by and nary a vehicle devoted to Donald Trump.
You really have to wonder about his chances when a town as republican as I live in won't even acknowledge the fucker.
Monday is Independence Day, and what says the Fourth of July more than a song about the boardwalk on the Jersey shore?
Plenty of things, actually--hamburgers, hot dogs, fireworks, parades, American flags, watermelon, picnics, apple pie...
Anyhoo, Friday Night Jukebox in keeping with this weekend's American theme is featuring All-American artist Bruce Springsteen for the second time in the last month or so and his song "4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)" from his second album, The Wild, the Innocent, and the E Street Shuffle. As we are wont to do sometimes here on Jukebox, we'll dispense with the Springsteen bio--if you don't know plenty about the man already, chances are you're not bothering to read this post anyway. And since it's a holiday weekend (for everyone but those of us who regally fucked up and chose retail as a career), no one wants to read a long ass piece, either.
While not as memorable as the album's other fan favorite, "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" "Sandy" does have its charms, mostly because, as Springsteen himself has said, the song is very autobiographical, and very much a paean to his home state. Our hero is basically a teenage loser trying to convince the boss' daughter that he's ready to move on from all the disappointments he's had in love and get the hell out of that place--and he wants her to come along. Sadly--and this is just my interpretation--the odds of that happening are about as good as my chances of waking up next to Salma Hayek tomorrow morning. Which is to say: none. Springsteen performs the song in an almost whisper from beginning to end, which can be interpreted as either weariness or fear. It features some nice accordion work from Danny Federici and the instrumentation captures well the spirit of the boardwalk. All in all, unless you're from New Jersey it's probably not in your Springsteen top ten, but's it's definitely in the top five of songs containing the words "4th of July." And if nothing else, it's a reminder that the sorrows of youth do not wound us forever.
Fun fact: The song mentions a fortuneteller named Madame Marie--turns out there really was such a woman on the boardwalk of Springsteen's youth. Oh the places you'll go with Friday Night Jukebox!
Punch line: "...she was always the girl you saw boppin' down the beach with the radio..."
The average American gets paid just enough so he doesn't quit his job, and works just hard enough so he doesn't get fired.
"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross." Source unknown
Uncle emaycee Wants You For the Coming Class War! Enlist today....
Capitalism: Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you can exploit his labor, become filthy rich, and keep the poor bastard living paycheck to paycheck for the rest of his life.
