— Satchel Paige|
By Blue Bronc, a Trail Mix Contributor
Who is “old”? What is “old”? What is “age”? Is chronological age important?
We know children who are “old for their age”. How about a person afflicted with “second childhood”? Some people just “never age”.
I am often told “you look so much younger” when told my chronological age. Some are off by up to thirty years. I am a few weeks from the age of sixty-eight. There are days I feel like I am forty. There are days I feel like I am eighty. Mentally I tell people I took too many hits to my head when I was in the military. Starting out I had a rather high I.Q., lost a lot of it when I was dying of Hepatitis B and Hepatitis C and being poisoned by liver failure. Then I recovered a lot of it back once the HepC was knocked down and my liver rebuilt.
My shrink often says she wishes her younger clients thought as “young” as I do. My young is often described as similar to Gen Z. To me I think more like a young Finn. My mother is ninety and travels all over the country, on her own.
Is Biden old? Is Pelosi old? Is SFB old? Did Reagan act old? Are the Dem leaders old? Are the greedy old perverts leadership old?
The problem is not “age”. The problem in politics is fighting the last election. Are the Dems not able to think “young”? Do the repubs think “young”?
I do think the Dems are not allowing enough input from the young in? Young to me means forty and younger. Yes. Leadership should be moved beyond one person, essentially for life. Movement, in politics as in shoulder joints, is necessary to prevent freezing in place.
Has Pelosi stayed too long. I tend to think so. Not due to age issues. I think because the Dems are not allowing younger leaders to bring in new ideas and people.
A lot of questions – on purpose.
More Posts by Blue Bronc
bbronc, at times i’m around 250 years old, in the midst of the age of enlightenment cavorting with franklin and Jefferson. at others, somewhere between seven and eleven yo (the age of reason in children, not the convenience store… hah! that age is anything but convenient)
off topic, but a fun read about faux news in this morning’s wapo:
At first glance, Fox News chief news anchor Shepard Smith and his employer share an odd relationship.
The broadcaster is an openly gay man at a network that regularly espouses Christian conservative values. He reports the news — quite well, by most accounts — instead of shouting hysterical rhetoric to the choir as per his colleague Sean Hannity. He has a long history of angering many viewers when he dismantles pet conspiracy theories, and he openly criticizes the network. During a single speech last year he called Fox both “the craziest conservative network on Earth” and “the freaky place where I’m working right now.”
Nonetheless, Fox News resigned Smith to a new multiyear contract, the network said on Thursday. It did not specify how many years. He also gave an interview to Time, in which he suggested one of his main reasons for staying was concern about how Fox might replace him.
“I wonder, if I stopped delivering the facts, what would go in its place in this place that is most watched, most listened, most viewed, most trusted?” he told Time. “I don’t know.”
[…]
he’s not blind to the image of Fox as deeply biased, a reputation he claims is earned not through its handling of the news but through its commentators, such as Hannity, Tucker Carlson, Laura Ingraham, and, until recently, Bill O’Reilly.
“People who maybe aren’t with us all the time who aren’t regular watchers, maybe there is some sort of confusion about what’s opinion and what’s news, but I think our audience understands the difference and comes to us when they need us,” Smith told Time magazine in its current edition.
“I get it, that some of our opinion programming is there strictly to be entertaining. I get that,” he told the magazine. “I don’t work there. I wouldn’t work there. I don’t want to sit around and yell at each other and talk about your philosophy and my philosophy. That sounds horrible to me.”
Smith has been beating this particular drum for years, both defending and complaining about the network.
“Everybody’s got a job to do,” he told HuffPo in October 2016, as he again defended the network’s news coverage.
“Hannity is trying to get conservatives elected. And he wants you to listen to him and believe what he believes,” Smith continued. “And I’m disseminating facts. It’s really apples and teaspoons. What we do is so different. He’s an entertaining guy who has an audience that he serves, and I deliver the news.”
Hannity’s job “is probably easier ― he knows what he thinks and just sticks with it,” Smith added. “This stuff changes all the time.”
That hasn’t stopped the network’s viewers from pushing against the anchor. As The Post’s Paul Farhi wrote, “Smith’s persistent fact-mongering has made him persona non grata among some parts of the Fox News faithful.”
[…continues…]
love that “persistent fact-mongering”
https://youtu.be/6vUEKQQm-rY
As for me it differs. My knees feel 80+, otherwise the rest of my body feels like it’s in my 40s – except my waist and I’d make it to feel 60ish. Now my brain- I like to think it still acts like it’s in its 40s, but there are times it feels much younger- then I forget my keys.
Im 66, but I’m often told by friends and others they would never guess that. I tend to act younger than I look I guess. I hope. In the end I’m 66 and still love rock and roll. Someone else will have to do the math.
Grandma said she never felt older than 39 until the very last of her years. Fingers crossed that I can feel similarly youthful. I felt 17 until I was well into my 30s. On a good day I still feel 32. On a great day I feel 5.
Heard about a book on NPR this morning: The Long Hangover It’s all about (you know him, you love him) our favorite manipulator, Put-ey.
march 25th busy day for cbs with basketball madness of elite eight last game starting at 5:00 and at 7:00
Stormy Daniels interview tentatively set for March 25 on ’60 Minutes’
abcnews: Soviet-born Donald Trump adviser Felix Sater: ‘Send ’em to jail’ if Robert Mueller finds collusion
[…]
“I know how to play it, and we will get this done,” Sater wrote to Trump attorney and confidant Michael Cohen, his childhood friend, in emails published by The Washington Post and The New York Times. “Buddy, our boy can become president of the USA, and we can engineer it.”
The project was abandoned, but as federal investigators launched a wide-ranging probe of alleged Russsian interference in the 2016 election including possible connections to Trump’s campaign and personal businesses, Sater quickly found himself caught in the dragnet. Now, in an exclusive interview with George Stephanopoulos airing Friday morning on Good Morning America, Sater tells ABC News that there is much, much more to his life story.
And he’s right.
“I don’t think if a screenwriter was trying to write this movie that they could make this up,” Sater said.
Sater, 52, says that for the past two decades he has served as a high-level intelligence asset for the DIA, CIA and the FBI. As first reported this week by Buzzfeed News, Sater has helped bust mafia families, capture cybercriminals and pursue top terrorists — including Osama bin Laden — earning praise from some of the country’s top law enforcement officials.
He won’t say whether or not he’s been interviewed by the special counsel, but it’s almost certain that Mueller knows his body of work well. He served as FBI Director for much of Sater’s clandestine career.
As questions have swirled about his supposed loyalty to Russia, Sater is speaking out, recasting himself as an unheralded protector of the United States.
“I am a patriot,” Sater said. “Having the opportunity to serve my country and do anything in its defense was a no brainer. It was, ‘Where do I sign up?’”
[….]
He says he tipped off law enforcement to potential assassination attempts on Secretary of State Colin Powell and President George W. Bush; obtained information and photographs about North Korea’s burgeoning nuclear program; lured Russian cybercriminals hacking the U.S. financial system out of hidings so that they could be unmasked and captured.
And, he says, he was even tasked with hunting for Osama bin Laden and managed to turn Mullah Omar’s personal secretary into a key source that provided intelligence about al-Qaeda hideouts.
The information he had obtained was so valuable that when his past caught up with him and he finally faced his sentencing in connection with that multimillion-dollar fraud, the judge let him off with a mere $25,000 fine.
Former U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch told the Senate during her confirmation hearing that Sater “provided valuable and sensitive information to the government” and that information was “crucial to national security.”
[….]
And asked if — given his extensive sources in the both the Russian foreign intelligence services and the Russian criminal underworld — he knew of the effort underway to influence the U.S. election, he issued a forceful denial.
“I was not aware of what they were doing,” Sater said. “I read about it, just like everyone else, in the newspapers.”
Sater called Trump’s claim that he couldn’t pick him out of a lineup “disappointing,” but says Trump has nothing to fear from his testimony to investigators. He is unaware, he said, of any Russian money in any of the Trump projects he worked on and unaware of anyone in Trump’s orbit who may have colluded with foreign powers during the campaign.
If Mueller finds any, Sater recommended stiff penalties.
“Send ‘em to jail,” he said. “Anybody who colluded with anybody– with any other country against America — is guilty of crimes against our country.”
But as for himself, Sater isn’t worried.
“Eventually, it will become known that I’m guilty of trying to build the world’s tallest building,” Sater said, “and that’s about it.”
When someone asks my age, I usually respond, “Inside or Outside”. The outside is going to go on getting older until it doesn’t. I try to hold the inside to the mid 30s. Still eager to learn new things and engage the world even when strongly tempted on some days to retire to “old lady with cats”.
Politically, I’m fine with Nancy being in charge initially if the Dems take the House purely for organizational reasons. I would hope that she would move rapidly to the “find and replace” activities necessary to train and move others into leadership positions in readiness for the Presidential campaign.
Oh and one of my favorite mottos, especially when I see a set of swings in a park, is:
Give yourself one whenever possible. Five year old days at the playground or zoo are wonderful.
stormy’s attorney this morning on morning joe says she was threatened physically and that 6 more women have come forward with stories about the twit.
People are either mature or immature for their years. In saying that I’m speaking of the state of their minds; do they use their words to help, hurt, heal, hug or hate. There’s not a day that goes by in this forum that we don’t see each of those emphases espoused by individuals having reached the age where wisdom would hopefully blossom forth.
So SFB Jr’s wife filed for divorce.
Best to get out earlier rather than later I’d guess.
Are five kids earlier or later?
I’m like most people… some days I feel younger and some days I feel older than my 63 yrs. Like Pogo, I still love rock’n’roll. Can’t stand the newfangled “country”… which I guess means I don’t think like a Millennial.
I’ve stated here many times I want to see new blood and fresh ideas coming from the Democratic Party. However I agree with sj that older Dem politicians should be treated with graciousness and respect.
As for Pelosi needing to leave because she’s been made a target by Fox News… yeah… so. The Dems could replace her with a resurrected Jesus Christ and it wouldn’t make a difference to them. Besides… no one who watches that channel on a regular basis would ever vote for a Democrat. IMO, Dems need to give moderate people a reason to vote for them. That formula worked well in Alabama and Pennsylvania.
My family was thrilled when Paige joined the Tribe in ’48. He contributed mightily to our winning the World Series that year.
“I use my single windup, my double windup, my triple windup, my hesitation windup, my no windup. I also use my step-n-pitch-it, my submariner, my sidearmer and my bat dodger. Man’s got to do what he’s got to do.”
–Satchel Paige
I’m 71 but act and think much younger. Mr. Cracker is soon to be 90 and also acts and think much younger. We think we are in our early 30’s except as Pogo says except for our knees and our waist lines.
“Depending on how he gripped the ball and how hard he threw it, Satchel Paige had pitches that included the bat-dodger, the two-hump blooper, the four-day creeper, the dipsy-do, the Little Tom, the Long Tom, the bee ball, the wobbly ball, the hurry-up ball and the nothin’ ball.” ― Buck O’Neil, I Was Right On Time
Will be fifty-seven in June but frequently am told that I look/act anywhere between twenty-seven and forty. To the Millenials I work with–the ones most likely to think me younger than I am–I’m pretty sure that unlike many other elders among us, I cut up with them and don’t preach about my faith or politics. I try to live my faith. Works better that way.
One of the issues with the Dems is the lack of upward mobility. Unless someone says “I resign my chair” no one else will move up. The R’s have time limits on chairs, which is good for getting a lot of members experienced. The Dems need to do something. I do not advocate to tossing aside our leaders, but as the party elders they carry the knowledge and contacts to be used by Dems.
Here we are …we look pretty good for a combined age of 160
One young man at work tells me he’s a Republican (at all of age twenty) because he believes in our “traditional values”. I don’t think he entirely realizes that not all our traditional values are good ones, nor yet that our so-called conservative leaders truly do not hold those values.. Being liberal both in religion and politics, I feel somewhat like a sixties radical when I talk to this youngster.
nice essay Bronc. I usually can’t remember how old I am, so guess I’m pretty old.
Buck O’Neil was a great story teller and brought the negro leagues to life.
The following quote is from this story about Satchel Paige
In Florida, by law, all local elected political offices are nonpartisan. That includes all the county officials and the mayors, commissioners, city councils, ad infinitum. I liked the system and was elected under it as a city commissioner. Prior to that I had served on the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council and was a member and chair of the city code enforcement board. From the positions I adopted I was clearly a Democrat even though I never stated that fact.
The thing I was getting at with all the Nam stuff was look what our current situation is: Mueller the competent soldier vs trump the ultimate draft dodger…..even though none of this involves Nam in any way, there it is, right in the thick of things.
I’m old (three score and ten) but I still work as if I were fifty or so.
i just now no longer ascend ladders
If you wish to be an old man long, you must begin to be an old man early
—Cicero
My greatest hoo-doo now is that damned slippery tub with shower…..that’s a dangerous piece of work there and I’m always careful to do the Moose Jaw Shuffle for entering and exiting…..
The Moose Jaw Shuffle, by the way, is how one walks on solid ice when wearing leather sole cowboy boots.
sturg – It’s “The Adhesive Duck Deficiency” scenario from BBT. Get yourself some sticky ducks or dots for your feet to grip.
When Sadam was taken from his hidey-hole, it was mentioned that he, like Quadaffi, liked to keep up as youthful an appearance as possible (hair dye and such) because aging might show weakness and it also might remind folks how long the old, bastards had been in power.
Yesterday (when we were all a big younger), someone posted an article about a guy taken from Dulles for questioning. Something about Trumpsky having sex with a minor. Do you suppose that’s what the russkies have on him?
The old lion in a pride will do his best not to let on that he has a backache……..
RIP Louise Slaughter
crackers – You & the Mr must be doing something right.
BID
I think we both won out in the genetic pool –nothing we’ve done has been helpful
Kurt Vonnegut was always threatening to sue Pall Mall cigarettes because they promised on every pack to kill him but they never did…..it became his favorite joke…..
Wiki:
In a 2006 Rolling Stone interview, Vonnegut sardonically stated that he would sue the Brown & Williamson tobacco company, the maker of the Pall Mall-branded cigarettes he had been smoking since he was twelve or fourteen years old, for false advertising. “And do you know why?” he said. “Because I’m 83 years old. The lying bastards! On the package Brown & Williamson promised to kill me.”
So the Republicans have rules regarding how long their leaders can be in leadership positions? And the dems don’t ? So looking at the two parties and how they have governed, I think I prefer the way the Dems to it.
abc news:
Veteran U.S. Rep. Louise Slaughter, a Kentucky blacksmith’s daughter who went on to chair one Congress’s most important committees, died Friday at a Washington hospital where she was being treated after falling in her home, her top aide said. She was 88.
The New York Democrat died at George Washington University Hospital a week after a fall in which Slaughter had sustained a concussion, said Liam Fitzsimmons, her chief of staff.
Slaughter had been the first woman to chair the House Rules Committee and was her party’s top member on the panel when she died.
Slaughter was serving her 16th term in the House, and her 31 years in the chamber made her its third longest-serving woman, according to the official House website. She chaired the rules committee from 2007 through 2010.
A special election will be held to elect someone to serve out the rest of Slaughter’s term, which expires Dec. 31. Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo will set the date for the special election in the 25th Congressional District, which includes the city of Rochester.
Slaughter had a degree in microbiology and was originally from Harlan County, Kentucky, and her soft, twangy accent always seemed out of place for someone representing a western New York district. But she was repeatedly re-elected —including a narrow victory in 2014 — and was the longest-serving member of Congress from New York when she died.
“Louise never forgot her roots as the daughter of a Kentucky blacksmith,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement. “She brought the grace and grit of her Southern background to her leadership in the Congress, building bridges and breaking down barriers all with her beautiful accent. Louise could be fiercely debating on the floor in the morning, and singing in harmony with her colleagues across the aisle in the evening.”
House Speaker Paul Ryan called Slaughter “a giant in the people’s House” and said she was “unrelenting” in working for her ideals and constituents.
“Louise did not need a gavel to make a dent in history,” the Republican speaker said.
[….continues…]
perhaps the twit meant that “RED line” that Mueller crossed with his subpoena of twit records refers to russia
… or maybe the true financial condition of twit org.
tough news about Rep Slaughter..that’s what happened to Katherine Graham fell and died. People need to do balance exercises as they get older
And become adept at mastering the Moose Jaw Shuffle.
its a matter of life and death…….Vonnegut fell too, on the ice in front of his home I think.
You sure that wasn’t Dr, Atkins sturg?
I got sore, falling on the icy driveway & front walk, so we sold the big old barn and moved to a co-op with heated underground parking. That added at least 3 2/3 years to my life – and counting.
Sweetie is a smartie
Mr C fell the other day – he was rotating our solar panels and stepped into a hole in the garden and went down hard on a paver…he had a few days of lying around. But he’s good now. He uses trekking poles to go up and down the hill to the parking area but they couldn’t save him from a hole.
the guardian:
The Russian chemist who revealed the existence of the novichok family of chemical agents to the world has dismissed the notion that a non-state actor could be behind the poisoning of former spy Sergei Skripal and his daughter in Salisbury, England, earlier this month.
Vil Mirzayanov, 83, said the chemical was too dangerous for anyone but a “high-level senior scientist” to handle and that even he – who worked for 30 years inside the secret military installation where novichok was developed and gained extensive personal experience in handling the agent – would not know how to weaponize it.
He said he did not see how a criminal organization or other non-state group could pull off such an attack.
“It’s very, very tough stuff,” Mirzayanov told the Guardian at his home in New Jersey, where he has lived in exile since 1996. “I don’t believe it.
“You need a very high-qualified professional scientist,” he continued. “Because it is dangerous stuff. Extremely dangerous. You can kill yourself. First of all you have to have a very good shield, a very particular container. And after that to weaponize it – weaponize it is impossible without high technical equipment. It’s impossible to imagine.”
[….]
Mirzayanov said the perpetrator of the attack must have been the Russian state.
“No one country has these capabilities like Russia, because Russia invented, tested and weaponized Novichok,” he said.
The theory that the agent was stolen for use in a crime was weak for similar reasons, Mirzayanov said.
“If you steal it, and after that, what to do with that?” he said. “You cannot weaponize, no exceptions, you cannot weaponize that.”
Mirzayanov further said that there was probably no current stockpile of novichok to steal, because it has a limited shelf life and the preferred form would be a binary version in which two relatively benign, non-banned substances were mixed to produce novichok.
“The final product, in storage, after one year is already losing 2%, 3%. The next year more, and the next year more. In 10-15 years, it’s no longer effective.”
[….continues…]
abcnews:
Al Franken’s replacement in the Senate said she wishes ‘ethics process’ for him had run its course
The Minnesota senator who replaced Al Franken when he resigned after facing allegations of sexual misconduct said she believes he should have had the benefit of an ethics investigation before he stepped down.
[…]
Smith said on “The View” that she is friends with Franken and his wife.
“Al was a champion for Minnesota, and he was a champion for progressive issues around the country,” Smith said.
[….]
Smith is running for re-election to a full term as senator this year, and she said she believes voters in her state will decide the raced based on which candidate they want rather than on whether they support or oppose President Donald Trump.
She also commented on the victory this week of Democrat Conor Lamb in a special election for Congress in a district that went heavily for President Trump in 2016. Smith said Lamb won by “talking about base economic issues” and “what matters to people in their economic lives” such as child care and college debt.
“Smith said Lamb won by “talking about base economic issues” and “what matters to people in their economic lives” such as child care and college debt.”
What a concept – talking about issues that actually affect voters rather than stoopid shit acts of the circus led by an orange clown.
Except for dissing Nancy P, Lamb is pretty much in line with the speaker’s agenda– those pesky SF values
Apparently if you are paying attention you find out that the Dems have a platform
The only people who harp on Nancy P are Republicans and Fox News..and/or trolls
I love Lisa Smith.
Fortunately, trump & the corrupt ripper Congress make people receptive to sane talk.
When you pass seventy it’s all about not falling…….and never trusting a fart…….
Fred Imus joke: Gramps was tellng his grandson a tall tale about hunting lions in Africa……”Carrying my trusty rifle I was tracking the lion…….I stepped out into a clearing and wow, the lion jumped right out in front of me….’Roar!’ and I just crapped my pants!.”
The little guy says, “But grampa, you had the rifle, you didn’t need to crap your pants….”
And grampa says, ” No….not when the lion jumped out……just now when I went ‘Roar!’ “
It’s heartening that a Minnesotrian loves Ms Smith.
Heated parking…….they don’t have that stuff in South Carolina………
You park, and you brave the elements to get to your door……..and sometimes it’s downright chilly!
Since I have filled my shop with the detritus and fall-off of 30 years of cabinet fabrication and whatnot, I wind up doing a lot of my own wood bending outside.
a winter like this last one was a godsend………one big ice storm and then 70 degrees false spring……into March and 70 degrees and holding………this must be globalius warmius………
If you Minnesotrians can just hang on a bit longer it’ll be like 70 degrees all winter………you’ll love it.
Thinking I’ll write a country song about a guy who moves from Saskatchewan to Florida called “No More Moose Jaw Shuffle”…….damn…..where’s Colorado Bob when you need him…….
The upper two/thirds of the song are an explication of the shuffle……the move to Florida in last stanza for the resolve. Built-in hook.
That rivals my other one about “The American Craftsman” and then turn around and sell it to Craftsman tools, hopefully before they go out of business..
its all in the timing with Show-Biz………
Two more great hooks
“Caught Between the Bottle and the Deep Blue Sea”
and
“Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Hurtin’ ”
both guaranteed Nashville killers, but it takes ambition to write a whole song……
sturge, put all those titles together and you’ve got yourself a song…. hard work already done, just tap out a beat and sing talk your way to stardom.
another dolly parton in our midst
sans a coupla thingies, bouffant hair do and such…
No, you can’t have an American craftsman being a slave to the grape…….wouldn’t play……..
The American craftsman got to be a Ram Truck, craftsman tools, git ‘er done kinda guy……
Maybe a little like that guy running against Ryan……..hmmm,campaign theme song…….
I see it being done by “Alabama” as their swan song…….( one of the fellers getting too old to tour)
jeeze john kelley how could anyone have thought he would be a moderating influence –what a jerk
Why would you ever think a Marine four star general would be a ‘moderating’ influence?
He was supposed to be a moderating influence on SFB
Clearly he is nothing but a Trump troll – to cling to the story he told Tillerson (including the detail that Tillerson was on the toilet.) I don’t care if he was king of the world it turns out he is nothing but a lackey. People give to much unearned credibility to former military especially high ranking officers. Based on what I’ve heard – most of them are horse’s asses and Kelley certainly is in that category
A few years back I was working with a neighbor, his wife ask me how old I thought he was. I thought, working with him he was my age so I cut him some slack and made him 5 years younger. lol I missed it by 10 years, So How old do I think I am? About 15 tears younger than I am. As to climbing the ladder I can still go up and down it as good as ever. It is just horsing that big sumbitch up that wears me out.
Jack
KGC
The only hope was he could give some structure so solid advise could reach the president.
But in the end Trump is president, he takes advise where he will and nothing Kelly can do will change that.
Jack
Preparing for tomorrow
https://youtu.be/000zytM9y6Y
Happy St. Paddy’s day, Andrew McCabe. This day is for you! It is all I can afford as I, too, had my retirement stolen by some bad men. The little mongoose went hunting last night and tried to bite the head of the snake for his corrupt boss.
Go Stormy, the current sunshine at the moment and along with Mr. Mueller, our best hope. Plus, the trump divorces on the horizon. I’m keeping the altar burning.
Nice post, BB.
I noticed the comments on the death of Slaughter…more older humans die from falling than any other cause, both of hubby’s parents died from falls. ailes met his downfall death that way, too. There have been many advances in medical recognition of muscle and nerve decline in old age. We are big mammals and it take our bodies some time to wear-out to death. Exercise with weights, a balance routine, etc. help as do tens units, shoes with balance alerts, etc. Canes, walkers, crawling…I have seen it all at events with a graying population. Take care of your feet and get a pedicure as it helps remove dead skin that hinders nerves in the feet.