Referring to voters who America has left behind economically as “bitter” isn’t an insult. In fact, it’s a compliment, acknowledging that they’re smart enough to understand what’s happening to them. The hopeful, now those are some idiots. So let’s separate the bitter – my people – from the idiots. If you think the Democrats are going to take away your Bible, you’re an idiot. If you think they’re going to take away your gun, you’re an armed idiot. And if you think they’re going to take away your gun and give it to a Mexican to kill your God, you’re Bill O’Reilly.
Bill Maher via Crooks and Liars
Author: NewMexiKen
Good ole days
Hell, NewMexiKen would probably even vote for her if they still looked like this.
The Audacity of Dreams
NewMexiKen has read both of Senator Obama’s books now — the autobiographical Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance
I strongly recommend both of them. The first as an outstanding memoir — good reading by any standard. The second as a statement of issues facing the nation.
How does this happen?
The temperature is well into the 70s now and so time to break out the summer uniform — shorts and polo shirts. The problem is it seems that my shorts have shrunk over the winter. How do clothes shrink while they are put away in drawers?
Iz
Israel Kamakawiwo’ole, “White Sandy Beach of Hawai’i”
April 19th already is a holiday
. . . in Massachusetts. (Well, I guess it’s the third Monday now, but whatever.)
Today we celebrate the birthday
. . . of TV’s Wyatt Earp. Hugh O’Brian is 83.
. . . of Elinor Donahue. Donahue has nearly 100 credits listed at IMDB, but foremost she was the oldest daughter on famed 1950s sitcom “Father Knows Best.” Betty “Princess” Anderson is 71.
. . . of Ashley Judd, 40.
. . . of Oscar-nominee (2001) Kate Hudson. More than almost famous at 29.
. . . of Oscar-nominee (2005) Catalina Sardino Moreno. She’s full of grace at 27.
. . . of Maria Sharapova, 21.
Ole Evinrude was born on this date in 1877. Guess what he invented.
Eliot Ness was born on this date in 1903.
Ever since Eliot Ness first published The Untouchables in 1957, the public has fallen in love with the adventures of this authentic American hero. His book was a runaway best seller because it was the exciting true story of a brave and honest lawman pitted against the country’s most successful gangster, Al Capone. The television series that followed in the 1950’s and the Kevin Costner movie in 1987 built fancifully on the same theme.
Vera Jayne Palmer was born on this date in 1933. We know her as Jayne Mansfield.
Grace Kelly became Her Serene Highness Princess Grace on this date in 1956.
By 1956, Grace Kelly was calling it quits after a movie-acting career of only five years—but what a career it was. Her 11 films included the 1952 classic High Noon, the 1956 musical High Society, and the Alfred Hitchcock-directed masterpieces Dial M for Murder, Rear Window, and To Catch a Thief. She had won an Oscar for her role in 1954’s The Country Girl—and all this before her twenty-seventh birthday.
The uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto started 65 years ago today. The Writer’s Almanac from American Public Media has background.
The shot heard ’round the world
April 19, 1775.
At Lexington Green, the British were met by 77 American Minute Men led by John Parker. At the North Bridge in Concord, the British were confronted again, this time by 300 to 400 armed colonists, and were forced to march back to Boston with the Americans firing on them all the way. By the end of the day, the colonists were singing “Yankee Doodle” and the American Revolution had begun.
Indeed, if actions spoke louder than words, today would be Independence Day.
Oklahoma City Memorial
It was 13 years ago that the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City was bombed, killing 168 people and injuring 500. NewMexiKen has been to the Memorial twice. I’ve created an album with 12 photos taken in 2006 at this striking, yet somber place. (You may click the image to advance to the next photo.)
[portfolio_slideshow id=10922 timeout=0 nav=bottom]
The greatest of the war correspondents
Earlier NewMexiKen noted Ernie Pyle’s death 63 years ago today. Here’s some more, this via CNN:
COMMAND POST, IE SHIMA April 18, (AP) — Ernie Pyle, war correspondent beloved by his co-workers, G.I.s and generals alike, was killed by a Japanese machine-gun bullet through his left temple this morning.
The bulletin went via radio to a ship nearby, then to the United States and on to Europe. Radio picked it up. Reporters rushed to gather comment. In Germany General Omar Bradley heard the news and could not speak. In Italy General Mark Clark said, “He helped our soldiers to victory.” Bill Mauldin, the young soldier-cartoonist whose warworn G.I.’s matched the pictures Pyle had drawn with words, said, “The only difference between Ernie’s death and that of any other good guy is that the other guy is mourned by his company. Ernie is mourned by the Army.” At the White House, still in mourning only six days after the death of Franklin Roosevelt, President Harry Truman said, “The nation is quickly saddened again by the death of Ernie Pyle.”
Here’s one small, but wonderful, sample of Pyle’s work from a collection of eight published earlier this year by AP and found at The Seattle Times:
Italy, Jan. 10, 1944. Pyle’s most famous column concerned the death of infantry Capt. Henry Waskow, who was exceptionally popular with his men. His body was brought down a mountainside by mule, and laid next to four others:
“The men in the road seemed reluctant to leave … one soldier came and looked down, and he said out loud, ‘God damn it.’ That’s all he said and then he walked away …
“Then a soldier came and stood beside the officer and bent over, and he too spoke to his dead captain, not in a whisper but awfully tenderly, and he said: ‘I sure am sorry, sir.’
“Then the first man squatted down, and he reached down and took the dead hand in his own, he sat there for a full five minutes … looking intently into the dead face, and he never uttered a sound all the time he sat there.
“And finally he put the hand down, and then reached up and gently straightened the points of the captain’s shirt collar, and then he sort of rearranged the tattered edges of the uniform around the wound, and then he got up and walked away down the road in the moonlight, all alone.”
National Park Week April 19-27
National Park Week is an annual Presidentially proclaimed week for celebration and recognition of Your National Parks.
Your National Parks are living examples of the best this Nation has to offer – our magnificent natural landscapes and our varied yet interrelated heritage. Parks can provide recreational experiences, opportunities to learn and grow, and places of quiet refuge.
This year, take a moment, an hour, a day to visit the national parks near you.
Follow the link for a schedule of events.
That important 15%
Albert Einstein died on this date in 1955. He was 76.
Albert Einstein’s work laid the groundwork for many modern technologies including nuclear weapons and cosmic science.
After his death, Einstein’s brain was removed and preserved for scientific research by Canadian scientists.
It was found that the part of Einstein’s brain responsible for mathematical thought and the ability to think in terms of space and movement was 15% wider than average.
It also lacked a groove which normally runs through this region suggesting that the neurons were able to communicate.
In 1999 Albert Einstein was named “person of the century” by Time magazine.
I’ll bet you didn’t know
… that John McCain doesn’t wear a flag lapel pin either.
That’s him on April 15 about to deliver his economics speech in a photo copied from the official campaign site — John McCain 2008.
Think I’m wrong? Then find a recent photo showing him wearing the pin.
It’s not that I care. I think the pins are silly — like flare at Chotchkie’s. But if you doubt the political media has a double standard, how come McCain’s choice isn’t bandied about like Obama’s?
You may click the image for a larger version.
By the way, that is a seriously old looking dude.
Earthquake Risk
Map excerpted from USGS by The Lede – New York Times Blog. Click image for larger version.
Poor Kenneth
In answer to the comment:
I love Seattle and believe, perhaps foolishly, that the weather wouldn’t bother me all that much.
But I have no plans to make my April Fool’s Day prank actually happen.
If I ever change the name of this blog, it will become “Poor Kenneth’s Almanack.” Benjamin Franklin’s famous serial publication (25 years) is somewhere in my mind as I do this, even now.
April 18th
Today is the birthday
. . . of Pollyanna. Hayley Mills is 62.
. . . of two-time Oscar nominee James Woods. He’s 61.
. . . of Rick Moranis, 55.
. . . of Daphne Moon. Jane Leeves of “Frasier” is 47.
. . . of Conan O’Brien. He’s 45.
. . . of America Ferrera; she’s 24.
Lawyer and author Clarence Darrow was born on this date in 1857.
Darrow became famous for defending some of the most unpopular people of his time. In the 1925 Monkey Trial, he defended high school teacher John Scopes for teaching Darwin’s theory of evolution in a Tennessee school. In “The Crime of the Century,” in 1924, he successfully defended two confessed teenage murderers, Richard Loeb and Nathan Leopold, from receiving the death penalty.
. . .He once said: “I never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with a lot of pleasure.”
The first game was played at Yankee Stadium on this date in 1923.
War correspondent, and Albuquerquean, Ernie Pyle was killed by Japanese gunfire on the Pacific island of Ie Shima, off Okinawa, on this date in 1945.
Albert Einstein died at age 76 on this date in 1955.
And it was on this date in 1775 that Paul Revere and others rode to warn their countryman that British troops were mobilizing.
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
Continue reading Paul Revere’s Ride by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
It’s beginning to look like a recession
Question for the Class
Do you think if Barack Obama had left his seriously ill wife after having had multiple affairs, had been a member of the “Keating Five,” had had a relationship with a much younger lobbyist that his staff felt the need to try and block, had intervened on behalf of the client of said young lobbyist with a federal agency, had denounced then embraced Jerry Falwell, had denounced then embraced the Bush tax cuts, had confused Shiite with Sunni, had confused Al Qaeda in Iraq with the Mahdi Army, had actively sought the endorsement and appeared on stage with a man who denounced the Catholic Church as a whore, and stated that he knew next to nothing about economics — do you think it’s possible that Obama would have been treated differently by the media than John McCain has been? Possible?
And — this is fun to contemplate — if Michelle Obama had been an adulteress, drug addict thief with a penchant for plagiarism — do you think that she would be subject to slightly different treatment from the media than Cindypills McCain has been? Anyone?
Via Crooks and Liars.
Bisphenol A Update
Popular plastic water bottles, sippy cups and baby bottles made with a chemical called bisphenol A may be on their way out.
Two big signs in this morning’s papers: Wal-Mart says it’s going to stop selling BPA baby bottles early next year, and the company that makes Nalgene water bottles says it will stop using the chemical as well.
Fine and Mellow
Despite the rube doing the introduction, one of the great performances ever.
Lost Town Blues
Good insight as always from Timothy Egan. He writes here about the real plight of small town America.
“People who live in small towns that have been passed over don’t need to be told that they’re bitter, or heroic. They’re stuck, is what they are.”
They don’t get it even when they get it
David Bohrman, who oversees all of the political coverage at CNN, took particular issue with the lapel-flag question, which was posed to Mr. Obama by a voter appearing on tape. Mr. Bohrman said he would have instead had the moderators ask each candidate about their stance on a possible amendment to the Constitution banning flag-burning. “That’s a legitimate flag question,” Mr. Bohrman said. “I think the voters are expecting more from us.”
Reported in The New York Times.
The bone-bending, ergonomic hell of economy class
Ask the pilot, Patrick Smith talks about airliner seats:
When carriers offer improvements, the focus, all too often, is on legroom. The various souped-up economy cabins out there — marketed as Economy Plus, Premium Economy, etc. — emphasize legroom as their biggest selling point. I can’t speak for everybody — I’m under 6 feet tall — but among the least of my concerns is the lack of space for my legs. A bigger issue is the inability to lift my legs.
What he talks about is actually kind of interesting for anyone who flies, including something I’ve never thought about before — why no cup holders?
Late night best lines
• Actually, one really embarrassing moment — you see this on the news? When the Pope blessed the crowd with holy water, well, some of it splashed on Dick Cheney, burned his skin.
• Some news from Iran. The chief of police in Tehran, who is in charge of fighting vice and bad morals, was found naked with six hookers. His name, Ahmed Spitzer.
— Jay Leno
• Well, big news, ladies and gentlemen –- the Pope is in the United States, flew into Washington, D.C. Hillary Clinton declined to meet the Pope at the airport. You know, she was worried about sniper fire.
— David Letterman
The Cougar Ace
A fascinating article from “Wired” about righting a capsizing ship off Alaska with $100 million worth of new Mazdas on board. Worthy of the click if only to peruse the photos.
High Tech Cowboys of the Deep Seas: The Race to Save the Cougar Ace
I gotta find another way to spend my time (rather than blogging)
Here’s the top four search strings in the past few hours here at NewMexiKen:
katrina campins 306
virgen de guadalupe 13
warning sign 11
“katrina campins” 9
Katrina Campins was among the first group on the Apprentice. It’s no doubt her photo they want now. I’m guessing this is the one.
I feel used. I’ve never posted that photo or linked to it before. The one I have that gets the traffic headed this way is, I suppose, this one from four years ago.