Credit for today’s select goes entirely to Economist Jared Bernstein. Last Tuesday he posted this on his twitter feed.
If you’re feeling forlorn behind the ascendance of venal, racism-spewing idiots, and all the other hate and dysfunction that abounds, I’ve got an antidote, or at least an essential vacation. Seriously.
Jared Bernstein
Enjoy, Jack
Pogo, Mrs. Pogo, and the Clintons, Mariah Carey turn out for Barbra Streisand concert
[…]
The iconic singer performed a show-stopping concert Saturday night, receiving standing ovations from fans including Carey, who showed up to her seat as Streisand ended her first song of the night.
Former New York City Mayor David Dinkins, U.S. Rep. Jerry Nadler and Rev. Al Sharpton also attended the show, where Streisand was backed by an orchestra with more than a dozen talented musicians.
In characteristic fashion, Streisand brought politics into the concert, warning Republicans in the audience to cover their ears before launching into a remixed version of “Send in the Clowns” that took jabs at President Donald Trump. Streisand had covered the Stephen Sondheim song for “The Broadway Album” in 1985.
“Maybe he’s poor, till he reveals his returns who can be sure, who is this clown,” she sang as the audience erupted in applause. “Something’s amiss, I don’t approve, now that’s he’s running the free world where can we move, maybe a town, who is this clown?”
After the song, a photo of the White House — with circus tent on top of it — appeared on the screen, followed by Trump in clown makeup. An altered version of his Time magazine 2016 Person of the Year cover showed him with a red nose under the words “clown of the year.”
[continues]
more from variety:
While a picture of Trump as a clown was projected behind the stage, Streisand crooned:
He says he’s rich
Maybe he’s poor
‘Til he reveals his returns
Who can be sure
Who is this clown?
Something’s amiss
I don’t approve
Now that he’s running the free world
Where can we move?
Maybe a town!
Just who is this clown?
This is not a farce
It’s not just smoke
Is this his “Art of the Deal” or some awful joke?
You’ve got to admit
This fraudulent twit
Is so full of …
Next came another chilling number, “Children Will Listen” from “Into the Woods,” which took on new meaning in the current political environment, followed by “Walls,” her 2018 song inspired by the Trumps hateful rhetoric as it relates to borders and immigration. But Streisand wanted to end the night on a hopeful note. That led her to “Happy Days Are Here Again,” which she sang nodding to the Clintons, and a simple yet beautiful interpretation of the 1965 chestnut “What the World Needs is Now Love.” Truer words were never sung.
the guardian:
Dayton, Ohio shooting: nine dead in second US mass killing in 24 hours
Incident comes hours after at least 20 people died in another mass shooting in El Paso, Texas
Coulrophobia: The fear of Clowns
back to Yeol Eum Son for more music to cleanse the political palate
wiki:
Jump to search
손열음
Wonju, South Korea
Yeol Eum Son (born May 2, 1986, in Wonju, South Korea) is a South Korean classical pianist. She first drew international attention when she appeared as a soloist with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra under the baton of Lorin Maazel in 2004. Her awards include the Silver Medal at the International Tchaikovsky Competition 2011, in which she also received the Best Chamber Concerto Performances and the Best Performance of the Commissioned Work.
Childhood
Son took her first piano lesson at the age of three and a half. She made a recital debut on Kumho Prodigy Concert Series in July 1998. At the age of twelve, she started studying with pianist Kim Dae-jin. At age sixteen, she entered the Korea National University of Arts to continue her piano studies. At the age of 18, she recorded the complete Chopin Etudes (Op. 10 and Op. 25) for a CD on the Universal Music Label.
She’s a brilliant artist from a frightfully cold place (I wintered in Wonju once). It is an unfortunate Anglicization of her family name; more properly it would be Sohn.
Has SFB said anything about the two massacres? Any TP from the greedy old perverts? Sometime, maybe soon or maybe later, one of those white nationalists will get confused about a venue and kill off “evangicals” or even republicans. Will TP help clean that up?
Nice work Jack I hope we don’t need a permanent vacation
Yahoo News’s Michael Isikoff has a great new podcast, “Conspiracyland,” on the origins of the Seth Rich conspiracy theory. It’s an interesting look at how Russian intelligence operatives, Fox News, internet trolls, and a variety of rival right-wing hucksters collided to create one of the 2016 election’s most enduring hoaxes — and terrorize Rich’s family.
Republicans are domestic terrorists
Ms Cracker,
Thanks for the Isikoff article. Maybe I should call the rippers RICOblicans. Waddya think ?
Thanks for the credit x-r but not me.
Patd, Thanks very much with your search. Saved me time going and trying to find the rewrite of send in the clowns. I wasn’t aware that Mariah Carey was at the concert. There was no buzz about that.Well Barbara was Pillorying Trump, the right wing idiots that were sitting all around us were sitting on their hands.
More likely they were sitting on their guns.
Ms Cracker, I’m always happy to give you credit.
Blue Bronc, what is SFB?
x-r
ok then you are welcome
Landmines don’t kill people,
People kill people.
Support the right to keep and bury landmines.
Nukes don’t kill . . . .
In case anyone has forgotten, it is still illegal to own a Thompson sub-machine gun. Also illegal are sawed-off shotguns. I think they were made illegal After having become a big problem in society.
“Landmines don’t kill people. People kill people. Support the right to keep and bury landmines.”
Another genius line, XRepub. Bravo!
I had to think long & hard to think up the most despicable thing in his own style. “There’s a lot of talk about it. I don’t know, but I’ve been told by many people. Ivanka’s baby daddy is really grand pa. We want to see the DNA results!” There are pictures and videos of his hands all over her, her sitting on his lap and interviews, with Howard Stern, that are just enough to support that. *gag* But that’s how he rolls!
Found it. *creepy*
Click to EditDelete
You go Tiptoe!
That’s just one of a number creepy Ivanka and Donald photos. yuck!
Our President has American blood on his hands.
“Guns don’t kill people, Republicans kill people”
KGC, that’s how the ‘fake’ news gets started …by THEM! Just a grain of truth…
tiptoe, SFB is an endearment coined by pogo (I think) which means sh*t for brains
Thanks for the explanation patd.
the hill: Democrats call for Senate to return to vote on gun reform after two deadly mass shootings
[…]
Democrats are asking McConnell to call Senate, which is currently on a month-long recess, back to vote on a background check bill passed by the Democratic-controlled House in February.
“El Paso, Dayton, one awful event after another. @SenateMajLdr McConnell must call the Senate back for an emergency session to put the House-passed universal background checks legislation on the Senate floor for debate and a vote immediately,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer tweeted Sunday morning.
“Mitch McConnell should bring the Senate back into session immediately to pass HR 8, the gun safety bill that has already passed the House. That’s a first step to addressing our serious gun violence epidemic,” Sanders tweeted.
When asked by CBS’s “Face the Nation” host if he supports returning to D.C. for a vote, Sen. Tim Scott (D-S.C.) said he’d “be happy to go back.”
“I’d leave tonight. I’ll go tomorrow, it doesn’t matter to me. This is such an important issue,” Scott said.
Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown also said McConnell should call for Senate to come back into session to pass the universal background check bill.
Rep. Harley Rouda (D-Calif.) tweeted it is “time for a special session of congress to make this mass shooting the last.”
“I’m heartbroken and disgusted. Thoughts and prayers from NRA apologists in Congress are insulting to victims. Their silence is deafening— It makes them permissive, even complicit in this epidemic,” he tweeted.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez did not explicitly call for a special session, but she tweeted that McConnell should “explain to the people why” he hasn’t called for a vote on the bill the House passed in February.
The House passed the bill with overwhelming Democratic support, and some support from Republicans.
[unless sen. scott has also defected from GOP, methinks the hill needs a proofreader]
Really the only way people won’t kill people with guns is if there are no guns…or people. Hope they come up with something that has teeth and makes a difference.
massmurder mcconnell won’t return to session, cuz not enough Dems have been nra-ed yet.
The very first bill that the republican Congress passed and trump signed in Feb 2017, allowed known maniacs to procure guns and ammo. These shootings were not accidental or roll-of-the-dice incidents. They were enabled, incited, expected, and intended by the republican party.
LOCK THEM ALL UP !
I read that one asshole’s manifesto and he employs the Trump-inspired phrase “send them back”, in it. He also invokes Trump directly while making his justification for trying to ethnically-cleanse America.
internet+Trump+white male= crazy
(Internet+Trump+white male)guns= you’re dead
Republicans politicians in America serve the same function that radical Islamist imams do in the Middle East- inspiring vulnerable, mentally-ill young men to engage in terrorism on their behalf to intimidate political opponents.
Hubris.
the chickens are coming home to roost.
karma.
wings of wax.
tide’s coming in.
feet of clay.
Every late evening you can sit on the pier and spy the more intelligent gop’s in a rat parade down the mooring lines.
tiptoe…. SFB can also stand for Stupid Fat Bastard… or as patd said… Shit For Brains. Whichever one suits you. And I think it was BlueBronc who coined it.
Remember the greedy old perverts of SFB cult want to have the anti-fascists labeled as terrorists and the white naziis not. It looks like the white SFB cult has killed hundreds of people without any backlash.
RR I like “Stupid Fat Bastard”.
Blue Bronc,
“Asked about El Paso shooter, Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick issues warning to Antifa Instead”
I dunno. It seems that even the ‘establishment’ has ingested the party line. But Tejas is mostly the party line.
The Houston Chronicle continues, “The Anti-Defamation League has identified Antifa as a loose collection of groups, networks and individuals who believe in active, aggressive opposition to far right-wing movements.” No wonder ‘they’ don’t like Antifa.
Not sure whether I coined it or stole it. Either way I like it. Both names work. He’s both without a doubt.
Antifa. What bullshit. Racist white nationalists who believe what SFB says kill people because they know he wants them to. Let’s be clear and call out the bullshit.
Pogo, are you sure? Thinking of Germany and no one, hardly anyone, actively opposed. Maybe the underground. Doesn’t someone have to call out the SFB’s white nationalist bull? There’s the lingering question, what would you/we do if something like that happened now? It is happening now.
There were some of those stupid burned, Tiki torches in a dumpster nearby. It was genuinely creepy.
While Antifa may be a problem for a Texas politician to bring them up right now……….
I believe there is a bible quotation for that:
Jack
A reporter caught Beto in an unguarded moment.
So, i got this friend, and he used to say racist shit around me. You know- the usual. Without alienating him, i’d tell him that i wasn’t cool with it, and that every individual deserves respect until they demonstrated otherwise, while expressing that i understood the sentiment (sometimes that would be a lie).
Anyway, and it took a while, he kind of stopped saying that stuff around me, and if he did, he would catch himself and apologize, to which i’d reply, “hey, don’t apologize to me…”.
Point being, even if it doesn’t seem like there’s much you can do in this current cultural climate, there might be a little tiny bit you can do.