Trump sycophant and serial liar Kellyanne Conway went on some really gullible news shows this morning to press the latest bullshit from the Trump administration: that this weekend's murders of eleven people in a Pittsburgh synagogue was caused by the anti-religiousness of late night comedians.
Au contraite, mon frere--I'm pretty sure that if the man accused of killing eleven people because of their faith had been influenced by comedians he would have bopped them over the head with a rubber chicken or thrown a pie in their faces.
And our nation would be a much safer, though a bit sillier, place because of it.
There is a subset of Democratic supporters who are convinced that sharing their hand wringing and the rending of their garments over recent polls that show the midterm elections tightening will drive more people to the polls in fear...but I'm not as convinced as they are. As often as not, it ends up being a self-fulfilling prophecy, and the negativity ends up dragging us down.
Fuck the media--they're not interested in interpreting polls, they're interested in selling newspapers and getting people to watch their news shows. And right now they're cherry picking poll results so they can do just that--they want me to be reading their newspapers over the next two weeks and being up at 11:30 pm watching Rachel Maddow on November 6th worrying over whether or not we'll win back control of the House.
Let me remind you that the last two midterm elections that resulted in waves--2006 and 2010--the media was telling us that the election was tightening in the days before the the actual votes got counted...and both of them ended up being much bigger waves than the polls were showing.
Am I confident we will win? God, no. But I'll wager that the odds we win a solid majority in the House (and I wouldn't rule out the Senate--no one thought we'd take it in 2006 and a few upsets led the way to just that) are much better than that the republicans will retain a slight majority.
There's enough of us who believe our 242 year experiment is worth continuing, and not nearly enough of us who want to turn it over to fascism.
It's easy with the daily onslaught of bad news that's the hallmark of the Trump administration to not see the good that will result as more Americans wake up to the fact that the republican party is not taking the country in a direction a vast majority of Americans favor. One such piece of good news is that Americans are finally waking up to the reality that the Supreme Court is a wholly owned subsidiary of the wealthy--a recent poll showed that more than 75% of Americans no longer had trust in the Supreme Court, and thanks to its barrage of decisions against the best interest of average Americans and in favor of corporate America, its prestige will continue to sink even lower.
Think about that--while many Americans have had their doubts about both houses of Congress and politicians, the Supreme Court has usually remained above the fray. The ramifications of a solid majority of Americans no longer having faith in the institution are endless--somewhere down the line, as is done in many states, can it be possible that the Justices will be elected with term limits? Never underestimate the anger of the powerless.
It is also becoming clearer to many Democrats that the way to advance our agenda is through the state courts, most of which, through being duly elected, can and will be held accountable for their decisions.
Yes, it may take years and we will lose a number of battles along the way, but the prize is to win the war and with changing demographics and the utter madness of today's republican party, that prize is looking much more likely.
Not that we needed it, but today's events--bombs sent to President and Mrs. Obama, Bill and Hillary Clinton, CNN, and Eric Holder--plus yesterdays attempts on George Soros should embolden all of us on the left to do all we can to end the GOP's stranglehold on our government. Make no mistake: this week's acts show the true colors of today's republican party. They've been fomenting this shit for decades now and it was only a matter of time before one of their own became unhinged.
If the FBI is able to find the culprit behind this act of domestic terrorism, despite all of the GOP's bullshit lies today, he or she will be a right wing nut job. Period.
We have less than two weeks until the vote of our lives. So vote like your life depends on it--because it very well may.
If you're familiar with Boz Scaggs, you'll know he has a distinctive vocal style--so much so, that when I was still a young man I spent months trying to imitate it (with some, but not much, success). A couple of weeks back when I realized a Scaggs' tune was coming soon here on FNJ, I thought, "Wouldn't it be fun to see if I can imitate Scaggs' vocals again?"...and promptly coughed up my larynx....
Boz Scaggs learned to play the guitar at the age of 12, and shortly thereafter began a friendship with Steve Miller that would result in the two of them playing music together for a number of years. Scaggs went to college at the University of Wisconsin (where he continued to play with Miller) before bouncing around London and Sweden on his own for a couple of years before releasing his first album in 1965 (dud). He would then relocate to my city by the Bay, where he became the lead vocalist for the Steve Miller Band's first two LP's. Scaggs went solo again in 1968 and released his second album which contains the seminal (and long, at over twelve minutes) song, "Loan Me a Dime." Scaggs continued to release albums steadily and then in 1976 released Silk Degrees, which would go on to sell over 5 million copies and make Scaggs an international star. Scaggs success would continue through the early eighties before the inevitable tapering off that afflicts so many artists set in. In all, Scaggs has released 19 studio LPs (the latest just this year), had two top ten LPs, a top ten single (the incredible "Lowdown"), won a Grammy Award, and co-owns a club in San Francisco as well as owning a vineyard. His son, Austin, is a music critic for Rolling Stone. Not a bad little career at all.
Fun Fact: A classmate of Scaggs at a prep school in Texas began calling him "Bosley" which over time was shortened to "Boz" and thus created his distinctive moniker.
Fun Fact #2: I was quite the Scaggs fan back in the day and wanted to name my oldest son "Boz" in tribute to Mr. Scaggs. Fortunately, my first wife was the brains in the outfit and nixed that idea forthwith...
"Lido Shuffle" was released in 1977 on the aforementioned Silk Degrees LP. It would eventually reach #11 (with a bullet!) on the Billboard Hot 100 (it would hit #2 in Australia and #5 in Canada--so many cool kids in Australia and Canada, eh...). On a completely unrelated note, I scored a copy of Silk Degrees for a buck a few months back and spent two solid months listening to it on my drives to and from work--had forgotten what a fine piece of work it was.
I think what stands out for me about "Lido Shuffle" is how different it is from most of what Scaggs has released through the years. He's known for smooth pop songs (with elements of jazz and R & B) and lush ballads, but this one is as close to a balls out rocker as he's done. And he manages to do it with little or no guitar (the credits list three guitarists but I'll be damned if I can hear them). It's driven by a rock solid bass line and some pulsating drumming. There's a nice organ solo about midway through that features emaycee fave hand claps...and did I mention it's a song about a small time hood looking for one last big score before he calls it a career? Throughout, Scaggs vocals (as ever) provide the juice to make it electric. All in all, it's a rock tune from the 70's that, like so many others from that decade, stands the test of time.
Lyric Sheet: "He'll be making like a bee line/Headin' for the borderline/Goin' for broke/Sayin' one more hit ought to do it/This joint ain't nothin' to it..."
Donald Trump's best buddy, Vladimir Putin, gave his annual foreign policy speech this past Thursday, and in it he gloated that America's world dominance was declining due to too many mistakes.
Like electing Donald Trump?
On a related note, Putin also bragged about Russia's hypersonic missile system (which CNBC claims we have no defense against) being only months away from actuality...and a mere two days later, Trump vowed in a speech in Nevada to pull out of the INF treaty (it limits the range of missiles, much like Russia's noted above) opening up the arms race again just as Putin's missile system comes to fruition.
Putin must be a hell of a fiddle player--because he's playing Trump like a maestro.
In a last ditch effort to save their pathetic asses, republicans are running on the platform that only they stand between ordinary Americans and a Paid Angry Mob of Liberals (read blacks, Latinos, Muslims, and women)...which would be merely pitiful if it weren't for a recent study that showed almost two-thirds of the terrorist attacks in America are committed by right wing extremists.
Over the last generation, the biggest threat to Americans has been the republican party--from their fealty to the NRA to their union busting to their racism to their misogyny to their war on the poor to their fellating of the rich to their collusion with Russia, there is no group that has done more damage to Americans than the republican party and the pawns who have cast their votes for them.
Frankly, considering everything they have done to us, they should be relieved we're merely screaming in the streets instead of going absolutely medieval on their asses.
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.
