User-Supported News Commentary Hosted by Craig Crawford
Keep The Music Playing
We’ve lost some icons this year, but Tony Bennett (90) is still here.
Author: craigcrawford
Trail Mix Host. Lapsed journalist, author & retired pundit happily promoting nothing but the truth for Social Security checks.
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interesting little tidbit buried in wapo‘s the fix titled How to be declared ‘persona non grata’ and get yourself kicked out of the United States
The persona non grata declaration is not unique to the United States. Other countries can and have made similar declarations against U.S. citizens. In fact, President-elect Donald Trump was declared persona non grata by Panama City in 2011 after he told CNN that turning over the Panama Canal to the country was “foolish.” Something to keep an eye on, should he ever need to attend an event in the country as president.
seems he’s already thought to be png here (according the un-favorability polls) too bad we can’t apply it officially.
with all that hacking going on into government (including military and security agencies), corporations and private servers for a decade according to this latest analysis, it makes more sense now that the Clintons retained their own separate one. that email “poor judgement” on her part might not have been so stupid after all. perhaps they knew or suspected putie all along.
earlier guccifer crowed they got into her server, but months after that in july it was reported FBI: No evidence Clinton’s email was hacked by foreign powers, but it could have been
irritating that media is now grumping about Obama not making more of the Russian intrusion into the election back in sept/October than he did. where in the hell were they? the info was out there so why didn’t the media do their job instead of drooling over the drumpf?
boss, is that a silver lining glass half-full admonition or the opposite as in peggy lee’s shrugging who cares lyrics
Is that all there is, is that all there is If that’s all there is my friends, then let’s keep dancing Let’s break out the booze and have a ball If that’s all there is
Still binging on West Wing. Every episode reminds me that you either needed an education, be reasonably well read, or have access to some form of encyclopedia to understand the dialogue. It can be enjoyed just for events, story, and acting, but the writing is magnificent. Only Sorkin would humorously reference Euripides to a secretary about her “house of Atreus” family problems.
The modern audience has instant access to information on virtually every known subject and we get reality shows with writing at an elementary school level.
Retiring and sailing the seas is a strong feeling. There is something about sails up, port wind on the beam, going 6 knots, the wheel on autopilot heading to the horizon, sitting back sucking on a beer that makes an afternoon wonderful.
It is with great interest that I follow the purge of the operatives and the shutdown of the sites. Will the floater call up his saddle buddy and fill him in on details known only to certain people? Will he send a dozen roses to his BFF and apologize for disrupting FSB/SVR operations in the U.S.? Will treason be researched by the common man and woman, just in case they need to understand what that really entails?
Tony certainly has staying power. Glad he’s still around. I believe all his contemporaries – Frank, Bing, Dino, Sammy… are all gone.
Bluebronc, absolutely! (Too bad Mrs. P tends toward seasickness). I’m afraid any retirement boat will be a motor driven cruiser. Of course I could probably do a catamaran that she could abide.
Patd, I meant that part of the lyric as a headline in the hopeful, positive way.
RR, that Economist piece is a nice overview of where liberalism stands. If were editing I would have moved the prescriptions graph higher, instead of near the bottom:
Liberals must explore the avenues that technology and social needs will open up. Power could be devolved from the state to cities, which act as laboratories for fresh policies. Politics might escape sterile partisanship using new forms of local democracy. The labyrinth of taxation and regulation could be rebuilt rationally. Society could transform education and work so that “college” is something you return to over several careers in brand new industries. The possibilities are as yet unimagined, but a liberal system, in which individual creativity, preferences and enterprise have full expression, is more likely to seize them than any other.
The passage of time has certainly changed views of what is right for Israel and the Palestinians
First of all why is this just the responsibility of the Israel – the other contiguous countries particularly those who refused citizenship and other rights to Palestinians when they needed places to resettle where are they and what about all the terrible things they said about Palestinians.
I think Kerry is correct in stating that if there is a single state – a Jewish state it will not be a democracy….not in the sense of equal rights for all citizens. I think it will be never when Jews feel comfortable around people who have said they would like to kill them.
They should have given the Jews Utah and we would all be happier
kgc, it’s harder much much harder to have an open dialogue in this country on Israel/Palestine problem and the billions of taxpayer dollars spent than it is on our racial problems and the little in comparison spent. here’s an excerpt from something written re celebs speaking out 2 years ago:
The gap between older American Jews like Foxman and even the 51-year-old Stewart is wider than many people realize, according to the New York-based Lisa Goldman, 47, the co-founder of +972, a digital magazine out of Tel Aviv.
“The Lena Dunham generation and fourth-generation Jewish Americans are less connected to the Holocaust than their parents, and they are turning away from Israel because of its policies over the last five years,” said Goldman. “I’m an Israeli citizen, but it’s unhealthy to be willfully uncritical about the place. Opinions have shifted. Young Jewish professionals in their 30s are less willing to turn a blind eye or justify Israel’s policies, and some of what you see being tweeted by celebrities is symbolic of that.”
Still, when Vanessa Redgrave took the stage at the Oscars in 1978 and nearly detonated her career by denouncing the Israeli government for its treatment of Palestine, it was hard to imagine that one day her heirs apparent would be the likes of Rihanna (who tweeted #FreePalestine on July 15, then quickly deleted her post after a barrage of criticism) and Selena Gomez (who posted “It’s About Humanity. Pray for Gaza” on Instagram July 18).
Sharpshooters were stationed on the roof of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in 1978 when Redgrave attended the Oscar ceremony because of death threats she’d received for her support of Palestinians. Today, American celebrities tweeting about Gaza get little more than sharp retorts.
Flatus I may have told you that my uncle spent the last 15 or so years of his AF career as an instructor at Maxwell AFB. Probably late 60s through early 80s.
Good link, RR. Craig would have put the “prescriptions” part near the top, right after rejecting the value of college education and apologizing for racist disinformation artists. Still, near the top.
The points of discussion are now just about the bad behavior of the Israelies and that is unfair. The other arab nations need to step up and do more for the Palestinians who they used to refer to in terrible terms.
I think there is a generational divide but it is bigger than this issue. I don’t know much about what is happening in other faiths but in the town where I grew up – Canton Ohio – there was a Jewish community that supported 4 congregations and a Jewish Community Center all wih their own buildings. Now there are barely two congregations and they all share the same building. People are not participating in the institutions.
patd… we got almost a foot of light fluffy snow…. it’s easy to deal with… and IMO, beautiful! Rick is not skiing this week…. it’s school vacation and the slopes are usually very crowded.
IMO, the Palestinians deserve better treatment from everyone… the Israelis and the Arab nations use them as pawns.
Will there be a time when all of God’s children treat each other with kindness? I hope so. All of the rules meant to keep others in line will never work. Peace, happiness and all good things come from the inside out. They can’t be negotiated, legislated, or in any way forced.
You see, due to the lack of barriers to the dissemination of thought in this electronic society, people who have become proficient enough in a language to express a thought believe that expression alone is enough to make it true. No support, no sourcing, no substantiation- just say it, and it’s true!
Fail to correct these self-righteous idiots at your own peril. I’m just being selfish.
Katherine, Pat
I suspect that many of us older people thought of the ‘settlements’ as being the kibbutzes of old. When reality hits us and we discover that they have the appearance of upscale small towns and villages, we are taken aback. Rightfully so, I think.
Do we have an obligation to rescue Puerto Rico from itself? It would cost a small fraction of our support for Israel.
I remember back to the very early 1970s. A few of us were showing an advanced munition to a couple of 20-something year-old Israeli colonels. Showing them the components, how they worked together, how to assemble it, and why, once they were armed, that you didn’t want to wear regular shoes around them.
From their demeanor, they didn’t believe a thing we were saying. From that point on, in any dealing with the Israeli military, they had to earn my trust.
I get the impression that the local Jewish community is holding its own. But, Columbia is part of the Religious South. Being Jewish, I sense, is okay. Being nothing, isn’t.
It’s going to be very difficult to conduct sincere acedemic arguments concerning the moral justification of Israeli domestic policy now that we’ve given neo-Nazis a seat at the table of our government.
Pogo, I went through Gunter AFS, also in Montgomery, in ’79. It was home of the USAF Senior NCO Academy. Goodness, we were a difficult bunch; opinionated, feisty, and serious about our chosen profession. Our instructors deserved lifetime achievement awards.
Bink- It doesn’t last unless it gets on the inside. If it’s just someone else’s rule, folks will revert to their authentic ways once nobody is looking, and sometimes in the open despite knowing there will be consequences for not doing so.
I’m not pretending to be virtuous. I just know lasting change happens on the inside.
Bink…. we can no longer conduct sincere academic arguments concerning the moral justification of any policies on anything. I suspect the rest of the world will have no problem pointing this out to us.
So…are we friends with Russia or not? Are we supposed to admire Putin or despise him? Trump’s followers sure seem to agree with him on Russia and Putin.
renee, aren’t you missing a “not” in that message to bink?
bink, all those 10 commandments and the code of Hammurabi aren’t relevant anymore in the mess in mesapotamia. the weeds in the garden of eden have taken over and looks like a Darwinian movement is in the process of weeding it out. too many rats in the cage and in particular too many male rats imho.
bid, the law of nature will eventually prevail. all those millions of molecules, the bacteria and fungi and viruses within us are the real lawmakers.
Corey – when I was learning things in the military we learned that the Russian/Soviet was a “friendly” and not an enemy. However, if we ever were near one to consider where we were and salute the officers and say “hello” to the enlisted. But, everywhere I was stationed was off limits to the Reds.
131.4 births per year. 55.3 million die each year. Net population growth 76.1 million brand new people.
7.4 billion people on the planet with a couple of more billion expected by 2050. If the human race didn’t have another child for 30 years, any baby girl born today would still be in the child bearing years and we still wouldn’t have made much of a dent in the numbers.
Courtesy of medicine and technology, we are happily breeding ourselves to death
Previous Milestones
Years back I had a conversation with a man who wanted to ban abortion. I told him I would never force a woman to have a child just as I would never tell a woman she couldn’t have a child. I get the whole overpopulation argument, which could be cured if our species was endowed with commonsense (insert hahahahaha …. hahahahaha here –> ____ ) but that ain’t happening. We will always be ruled below the belt. In a way this is good; more people = larger gene pool. I like diverse ancestries. Fewer folks ending up wearing drool bibs & having the IQ of a turnip (Exhibit A: see the Spanish Habsburgs. If you dare. You have been warned.)
Referring to people in terms of “breeding”, “rats” has historically bad meanings; ’nuff said.
The cartoonist Charles Addams was asked if he believed in God. “I believe in Mother Nature” was his answer. There is a wisdom in the natural world that is greater (thank goodness) than us. Things out of balance eventually even out. Heck, another asteroid the size of the Gulf of Mexico could be hurtling our way. ‘Tis what it ’tis.
And so it goes …. Life survives despite ourselves.
Mr Cracker and you are on the same wave length. He was born in 1928 and he was just talking about the bewildering number of people we now have to deal with. He grew up in Southern Cal.
How do we deal with the bewildering number of people? Sterilization or extermination? Which races/religions qualify? Fairer hues win over the duskier among us? Anyone here offering their children, grand or great grandkids up as excess population? If you ‘bred’ you are guilty, correct? Or will it be a political test? If you voted Clinton, you live; voted for the other guy …. rats.
interesting little tidbit buried in wapo‘s the fix titled How to be declared ‘persona non grata’ and get yourself kicked out of the United States
The persona non grata declaration is not unique to the United States. Other countries can and have made similar declarations against U.S. citizens. In fact, President-elect Donald Trump was declared persona non grata by Panama City in 2011 after he told CNN that turning over the Panama Canal to the country was “foolish.” Something to keep an eye on, should he ever need to attend an event in the country as president.
seems he’s already thought to be png here (according the un-favorability polls) too bad we can’t apply it officially.
another article from yesterday’s wapo that I hope is not overlooked:
David Fahrenthold tells the behind-the-scenes story of his year covering Trump
A reminder that in spite of all efforts to do otherwise, Keith Richards still lives. Something weirdly comforting about that fact.
Marine Le Pen gaining support in France.
The Trump Inauguration is this musical generation’s Sun City.
Shout out to Little Steven here. He never wavers. ✔
with all that hacking going on into government (including military and security agencies), corporations and private servers for a decade according to this latest analysis, it makes more sense now that the Clintons retained their own separate one. that email “poor judgement” on her part might not have been so stupid after all. perhaps they knew or suspected putie all along.
earlier guccifer crowed they got into her server, but months after that in july it was reported FBI: No evidence Clinton’s email was hacked by foreign powers, but it could have been
irritating that media is now grumping about Obama not making more of the Russian intrusion into the election back in sept/October than he did. where in the hell were they? the info was out there so why didn’t the media do their job instead of drooling over the drumpf?
keep the music playing?
boss, is that a silver lining glass half-full admonition or the opposite as in peggy lee’s shrugging who cares lyrics
Is that all there is, is that all there is
If that’s all there is my friends, then let’s keep dancing
Let’s break out the booze and have a ball
If that’s all there is
in the meantime
Still binging on West Wing. Every episode reminds me that you either needed an education, be reasonably well read, or have access to some form of encyclopedia to understand the dialogue. It can be enjoyed just for events, story, and acting, but the writing is magnificent. Only Sorkin would humorously reference Euripides to a secretary about her “house of Atreus” family problems.
The modern audience has instant access to information on virtually every known subject and we get reality shows with writing at an elementary school level.
Retiring and sailing the seas is a strong feeling. There is something about sails up, port wind on the beam, going 6 knots, the wheel on autopilot heading to the horizon, sitting back sucking on a beer that makes an afternoon wonderful.
It is with great interest that I follow the purge of the operatives and the shutdown of the sites. Will the floater call up his saddle buddy and fill him in on details known only to certain people? Will he send a dozen roses to his BFF and apologize for disrupting FSB/SVR operations in the U.S.? Will treason be researched by the common man and woman, just in case they need to understand what that really entails?
My, and many 60s soldiers’ favorite Tony Bennett, is this one:
https://youtu.be/qX_KRilBnNA
Here’s what I read in the Economist this morning. IMO, it’s worth the read.
The future of liberalism…
Tony certainly has staying power. Glad he’s still around. I believe all his contemporaries – Frank, Bing, Dino, Sammy… are all gone.
Bluebronc, absolutely! (Too bad Mrs. P tends toward seasickness). I’m afraid any retirement boat will be a motor driven cruiser. Of course I could probably do a catamaran that she could abide.
My favorite Tony Bennett for a whole lot of reasons happy & sad
https://youtu.be/VmwApZaMNe0
renee, hope you aren’t too snowed in for it to be more trouble than fun but bet rick is in skiers hog heaven
Patd, I meant that part of the lyric as a headline in the hopeful, positive way.
RR, that Economist piece is a nice overview of where liberalism stands. If were editing I would have moved the prescriptions graph higher, instead of near the bottom:
The passage of time has certainly changed views of what is right for Israel and the Palestinians
First of all why is this just the responsibility of the Israel – the other contiguous countries particularly those who refused citizenship and other rights to Palestinians when they needed places to resettle where are they and what about all the terrible things they said about Palestinians.
I think Kerry is correct in stating that if there is a single state – a Jewish state it will not be a democracy….not in the sense of equal rights for all citizens. I think it will be never when Jews feel comfortable around people who have said they would like to kill them.
They should have given the Jews Utah and we would all be happier
kgc, it’s harder much much harder to have an open dialogue in this country on Israel/Palestine problem and the billions of taxpayer dollars spent than it is on our racial problems and the little in comparison spent. here’s an excerpt from something written re celebs speaking out 2 years ago:
The gap between older American Jews like Foxman and even the 51-year-old Stewart is wider than many people realize, according to the New York-based Lisa Goldman, 47, the co-founder of +972, a digital magazine out of Tel Aviv.
“The Lena Dunham generation and fourth-generation Jewish Americans are less connected to the Holocaust than their parents, and they are turning away from Israel because of its policies over the last five years,” said Goldman. “I’m an Israeli citizen, but it’s unhealthy to be willfully uncritical about the place. Opinions have shifted. Young Jewish professionals in their 30s are less willing to turn a blind eye or justify Israel’s policies, and some of what you see being tweeted by celebrities is symbolic of that.”
Still, when Vanessa Redgrave took the stage at the Oscars in 1978 and nearly detonated her career by denouncing the Israeli government for its treatment of Palestine, it was hard to imagine that one day her heirs apparent would be the likes of Rihanna (who tweeted #FreePalestine on July 15, then quickly deleted her post after a barrage of criticism) and Selena Gomez (who posted “It’s About Humanity. Pray for Gaza” on Instagram July 18).
Sharpshooters were stationed on the roof of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in 1978 when Redgrave attended the Oscar ceremony because of death threats she’d received for her support of Palestinians. Today, American celebrities tweeting about Gaza get little more than sharp retorts.
Flatus I may have told you that my uncle spent the last 15 or so years of his AF career as an instructor at Maxwell AFB. Probably late 60s through early 80s.
Good link, RR. Craig would have put the “prescriptions” part near the top, right after rejecting the value of college education and apologizing for racist disinformation artists. Still, near the top.
The points of discussion are now just about the bad behavior of the Israelies and that is unfair. The other arab nations need to step up and do more for the Palestinians who they used to refer to in terrible terms.
I think there is a generational divide but it is bigger than this issue. I don’t know much about what is happening in other faiths but in the town where I grew up – Canton Ohio – there was a Jewish community that supported 4 congregations and a Jewish Community Center all wih their own buildings. Now there are barely two congregations and they all share the same building. People are not participating in the institutions.
Gee. I spent a week at Maxwell AFB, May 1974. In the hospital to get a knee repaired enough to put me back on duty.
patd… we got almost a foot of light fluffy snow…. it’s easy to deal with… and IMO, beautiful! Rick is not skiing this week…. it’s school vacation and the slopes are usually very crowded.
IMO, the Palestinians deserve better treatment from everyone… the Israelis and the Arab nations use them as pawns.
Will there be a time when all of God’s children treat each other with kindness? I hope so. All of the rules meant to keep others in line will never work. Peace, happiness and all good things come from the inside out. They can’t be negotiated, legislated, or in any way forced.
“They can’t be negotiated, legislated, or in any way forced.”
6000 years of the history of human civilization belie your ridiculous assertion, but keep pretending you’re virtuous, it’s entertaining.
You see, due to the lack of barriers to the dissemination of thought in this electronic society, people who have become proficient enough in a language to express a thought believe that expression alone is enough to make it true. No support, no sourcing, no substantiation- just say it, and it’s true!
Fail to correct these self-righteous idiots at your own peril. I’m just being selfish.
Katherine, Pat
I suspect that many of us older people thought of the ‘settlements’ as being the kibbutzes of old. When reality hits us and we discover that they have the appearance of upscale small towns and villages, we are taken aback. Rightfully so, I think.
Do we have an obligation to rescue Puerto Rico from itself? It would cost a small fraction of our support for Israel.
I remember back to the very early 1970s. A few of us were showing an advanced munition to a couple of 20-something year-old Israeli colonels. Showing them the components, how they worked together, how to assemble it, and why, once they were armed, that you didn’t want to wear regular shoes around them.
From their demeanor, they didn’t believe a thing we were saying. From that point on, in any dealing with the Israeli military, they had to earn my trust.
I get the impression that the local Jewish community is holding its own. But, Columbia is part of the Religious South. Being Jewish, I sense, is okay. Being nothing, isn’t.
It’s going to be very difficult to conduct sincere acedemic arguments concerning the moral justification of Israeli domestic policy now that we’ve given neo-Nazis a seat at the table of our government.
Pogo, I went through Gunter AFS, also in Montgomery, in ’79. It was home of the USAF Senior NCO Academy. Goodness, we were a difficult bunch; opinionated, feisty, and serious about our chosen profession. Our instructors deserved lifetime achievement awards.
Bink- It doesn’t last unless it gets on the inside. If it’s just someone else’s rule, folks will revert to their authentic ways once nobody is looking, and sometimes in the open despite knowing there will be consequences for not doing so.
I’m not pretending to be virtuous. I just know lasting change happens on the inside.
You just keep on projecting, though.
Bink…. we can no longer conduct sincere academic arguments concerning the moral justification of any policies on anything. I suspect the rest of the world will have no problem pointing this out to us.
Since we have limited Puerto Rico’s ability to correct its problems I’d say we have a responsibility to fix it.
So…are we friends with Russia or not? Are we supposed to admire Putin or despise him? Trump’s followers sure seem to agree with him on Russia and Putin.
renee, aren’t you missing a “not” in that message to bink?
bink, all those 10 commandments and the code of Hammurabi aren’t relevant anymore in the mess in mesapotamia. the weeds in the garden of eden have taken over and looks like a Darwinian movement is in the process of weeding it out. too many rats in the cage and in particular too many male rats imho.
bid, the law of nature will eventually prevail. all those millions of molecules, the bacteria and fungi and viruses within us are the real lawmakers.
corey, they might not think so highly of vlad when the grids go down, the internets garble and nothing works.
People who have Exxon stock love Vlad
everyone else not so much.
Corey – when I was learning things in the military we learned that the Russian/Soviet was a “friendly” and not an enemy. However, if we ever were near one to consider where we were and salute the officers and say “hello” to the enlisted. But, everywhere I was stationed was off limits to the Reds.
131.4 births per year. 55.3 million die each year. Net population growth 76.1 million brand new people.
7.4 billion people on the planet with a couple of more billion expected by 2050. If the human race didn’t have another child for 30 years, any baby girl born today would still be in the child bearing years and we still wouldn’t have made much of a dent in the numbers.
Courtesy of medicine and technology, we are happily breeding ourselves to death
Previous Milestones
5 Billion: 1987
4 Billion: 1974
3 Billion: 1960
2 Billion: 1927
1 Billion: 1804
Yes there are too many rats in the cage.
Todd Fisher Tweet
Years back I had a conversation with a man who wanted to ban abortion. I told him I would never force a woman to have a child just as I would never tell a woman she couldn’t have a child. I get the whole overpopulation argument, which could be cured if our species was endowed with commonsense (insert hahahahaha …. hahahahaha here –> ____ ) but that ain’t happening. We will always be ruled below the belt. In a way this is good; more people = larger gene pool. I like diverse ancestries. Fewer folks ending up wearing drool bibs & having the IQ of a turnip (Exhibit A: see the Spanish Habsburgs. If you dare. You have been warned.)
Referring to people in terms of “breeding”, “rats” has historically bad meanings; ’nuff said.
The cartoonist Charles Addams was asked if he believed in God. “I believe in Mother Nature” was his answer. There is a wisdom in the natural world that is greater (thank goodness) than us. Things out of balance eventually even out. Heck, another asteroid the size of the Gulf of Mexico could be hurtling our way. ‘Tis what it ’tis.
And so it goes …. Life survives despite ourselves.
Jamie
Mr Cracker and you are on the same wave length. He was born in 1928 and he was just talking about the bewildering number of people we now have to deal with. He grew up in Southern Cal.
For those Michigan and Seminole fans, looks like short of a miracle the ‘noles will prevail over big blue.
Just watched my first “Sherlock” with Benjamin Cumberbatch. I had no idea what I was missing. Great stuff.
…then, again… Michigan isn’t folding yet.
OMG, big blue just went ahead w/ 1:57 left, made the 2 point conversion to go up by 3 after being down by 12 with 8 1/2 left.
And the Seminoles come back with a 65 yard kickoff return…
Great football game.
…and score with :36 left. Extra point blocked and run back by MI to make it a 1 point game advantage Florida State.
“Cumberbatch”
You should see him do Shakespeare. (You can in 2 hrs)
And the Seminoles intercept on 4th down to win. Congrats to Florida State.
How do we deal with the bewildering number of people? Sterilization or extermination? Which races/religions qualify? Fairer hues win over the duskier among us? Anyone here offering their children, grand or great grandkids up as excess population? If you ‘bred’ you are guilty, correct? Or will it be a political test? If you voted Clinton, you live; voted for the other guy …. rats.