NewMexiKen read yesterday about a movement in Vermont advocating that the state leave the United States. Other states have similar talk.
NewMexiKen thought the issue of secession had been settled in 1865. What do you think? The comments are available for you to elaborate.
MR. HALL: I know a business owner in northern New Hampshire who was on vacation in Spain last year for about three weeks. While he was there he had to buy refills for prescription drugs — brand-name drugs. And he discovered in buying those drugs that he could buy his refills there for $600 less than he could by them here in New Hampshire. So since then, he’s said he is going to take a trip over to Spain and get his vacation paid for to buy his drugs[.]
If only all those uninsured folks would just buy their prescriptions while on holiday in Spain.
“TB Guy Tops Bush in New Poll”
Update: Letterman had this line Monday night: “President Bush is off to Europe for the big G8 Summit — and his approval rating is very low. Right now, he’s less popular than that tuberculosis guy.”
“Bilingual countries don’t work, and we should not encourage it.”
Tom Tancredo, Republican candidate to be President of the United States.
Has anyone told the Canadians, the Swiss, the Chinese?
Jonathan Stein suggests the immigration bill’s points system will change the American dream.
Whatever happened to “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me: I lift my lamp beside the golden door”?
. . .We’ll have to change the inscription on the Statue of Liberty. I propose, “Give me your educated, your credentialed, your cubicle jockeys yearning to cash checks, the fluent doctors abandoning your teeming shores. Send these, the smart, the intelligent, to me: I lift my lamp beside the door of privilege.”
Via Autopia. Click for larger version.
Levi Stubbs is 71. Stubbs was and is the lead vocalist of The Four Tops.
“The Four Tops deserve to be recognized both for their achievements and their longevity. On the latter count, the group performed for over four decades together without a single change in personnel – a record of constancy that is mind-boggling in the notoriously changeable world of popular music. As for their accomplishments, the Four Tops cut some of Motown’s most memorable singles during the label’s creative zenith, including “Baby I Need Your Loving,” “I Can’t Help Myself,” “It’s the Same Old Song,” “Reach Out I’ll Be There,” “Standing in the Shadows of Love” and “Bernadette.” The Four Tops’ greatest records were recorded at Motown with the in-house songwriting and production team of Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Eddie Holland between 1964 and 1967.
It’s Stubbs who sings:
Now if you feel that you can’t go on
Because all of your hope is gone
And your life is filled with much confusion
Until happiness is just an illusion
And your world around is tumbling down
Darling reach out
C’mon girl
Reach on out for me
Reach out for me
Tennis Hall of Famer Bjorn Borg is 51.
Oscar nominee Paul Giamatti is 40. He was nominated for his supporting role in Cinderella Man.
Hall of Fame Yankee catcher Bill Dickey was born on June 6th, 100 years ago today. Not as well known as some other Yankees perhaps, Dickey nevertheless is one of the team whose number has been retired (with Yogi Berra’s — they both wore 8). FYI Martin 1, Ruth 3, Gehrig 4, DiMaggio 5, Mantle 7 and Maris 9 are among other numbers retired. Jeter wears 2.
Nathan Hale was born on June 6th in 1755. “I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country,” he said when hanged by the British in 1776 as an American spy. Hale had volunteered to report on British positions in New York. He was caught when Scooter Libby’s ancestor revealed Hale’s covert identity to Robert Novak.
“Governor, muchas gracias.”
John McCain to Mitt Romney as reported by The Daily Dish.
Romney says English should be the national language but runs campaign ads in Spanish. ¡Hipócrita!
Finished God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything
Beginning The Assault on Reason
“But what politics has become requires a level of tolerance for triviality and artifice and nonsense that I find I have in short supply.”
Al Gore quoted by Bob Herbert in The New York Times via The Daily Howler.
Me too.
Mother: Honey, save the cookies for later.
Little girl: You’re so mean! I’m gonna sell you on eBay!
–6 train, 59th St
Overheard by: effie
The editors of the American Heritage® dictionaries have compiled a list of 100 words they recommend every high school graduate should know.
“The words we suggest,” says senior editor Steven Kleinedler, “are not meant to be exhaustive but are a benchmark against which graduates and their parents can measure themselves. If you are able to use these words correctly, you are likely to have a superior command of the language.”
My friend Rob pointed out some nasty vines growing in my garden and immediately pronounced the cure: “Roundup.” He’s from Portland, is very ecologically minded, rides his bike to and from his job as an urban forester, etc. So to have him sanction a toxin brought a tear of gratitude to my eye. I did not mention that I’m going to apply it with an airplane.
“There are lots of threats to you in the world. There’s the threat of a heart attack for genetic reasons. You can’t sit there and worry about everything. Get a life.”
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg on the JFK plot.
Via Crooks and Liars, Jon Stewart Analyzes the CNN Democratic Debate.
SI.com lists the highest earning athletes in the world. Tiger Woods is number one, earning an estimated $$111,941,827.
Guess who is number two? And not only that, but he earned almost half as much as Tiger from salary and winnings alone, not endorsements.
“If President Bush and Vice President Cheney can blurt out vulgar language, then the government cannot punish broadcast television stations for broadcasting the same words in similarly fleeting contexts.”
Report in The New York Times on federal appeals court ruling against FCC.
Gawker has a great take on the decision. [Not for the faint-hearted.]
Bill Moyers is 73 today.
Author Ken Follet is 58.
Suze Orman is 56.
Supporting Oscar nominee Mark Wahlberg is 36.
Richard Scarry was born on June 5, 1919. Scarry has written more than 300 books for children and, according to The Writer’s Almanac, “said that what made him happiest as an author was getting letters from people telling him that their copies of his books were all worn out and held together with Scotch tape.” Scarry died in 1994.
Doroteo Arango was born on June 5, 1878. We know him as Pancho Villa.
Adam Smith was baptized on June 5, 1723. His An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations was published in 1776.
Another immortal economist, John Maynard Keynes was born on June 5, 1883.
A red light camera in Knoxville, Tennessee claimed a white Toyota pickup truck photographed running a red light was actually a silver BMW convertible. . . .
A closer look at the photo showed the optical character recognition software used by the Australian red light camera operator Redflex had mistaken the number “2” on the pickup truck’s license plate for the “3” that appears on the BMW’s plate. Knoxville police insist that each violation is carefully scrutinized by two human beings . . . Neither noticed that the description of a “BMW convertible” on the citation in no way matched the Toyota Tacoma shown in the photo.
“But instead of some public servant reading this and calling me on the phone with a ‘Whoops! We screwed up! Sorry!’ I will have to go downtown and perform my obeisances in an orgy of forelock tugging, curtsying, and groveling, and beg my betters to please let me go about my business unmolested,” Tamara wrote.
William Boyd, better known as Hopalong Cassidy, was born on this date in 1895. After success as a leading man in silent film, Boyd’s career was going nowhere in 1935 when he was cast to play the cowboy, Hopalong Cassidy. He made 54 films in the role for producer Harry Sherman, then 12 more on his own. In 1948, in one of the great prescient moves ever made in Hollywood, Boyd bought the rights to all the films, selling his ranch to raise the money. Television needed Saturday morning fare and Boyd had it.
One medium fed on the other, and by 1950 [William] Boyd was at the center of a national phenomenon. For two years he was as big a media hero as the nation had seen. In personal appearances he was mobbed: 85,000 people came through a Brooklyn department store during his appearance there. His endorsement for any product meant instant sales in the millions. It meant overnight shortages, frantic shopping sprees, and millions of dollars for Boyd. There were Hopalong Cassidy bicycles, rollerskates (complete with spurs), Hoppy pajamas, Hopalong beds. The demand for Hoppy shirts and pants was so great that a shortage of black dye resulted. His investment in Hopalong Cassidy paid off to an estimated $70 million.
Why a man of 52 years appealed to so many children remains a mystery. Possibly some of it had to do with the novelty of television: just as Amos ‘n’ Andy had capitalized on the newness of radio a generation earlier, a TV sensation was bound to occur. And the hero had a no-nonsense demeanor: he was steely-eyed and quick on the draw, and he meted out justice without the endless warbling and sugar-coated romance that came with the others. As for Boyd, he became Cassidy in a real sense. His personal habits changed; he gave up drinking and carousing and lived with his fifth wife until his death in 1972.
John Dunning, On the Air
Hopalong Cassidy was NewMexiKen’s first hero. None has been as good since.
. . . was shot by Sirhan Bishara Sirhan early on this date in 1968. The 42-year-old brother of assassinated president John Kennedy died the next day. Read the story from The New York Times.
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Sirhan’s snubnosed .22-caliber Iver Johnson Cadet model revolver, which wounded five individuals in addition to killing Senator Kennedy. |
“Leslie thinks it’s a bad idea, but worst-case scenario, I’ve got great home videos.”
Judd Apatow on including his and actress Leslie Mann’s daughters in the cast of the film Knocked Up.
From a profile in The New York Times Magazine.
Acclaimed biographer Jean Edward Smith (John Marshall, Ulysses Grant) has published a new biography of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, FDR
Early reviews are glowing. Smith’s Grant book garnered him a Pulitzer nomination in 2002.
(Actually, I figured this was an important book when I saw it stacked on the table at Costco the other day.)
Over at the Duke City Fix a guest blogger reports (with photos) on the birth Friday of a baby giraffe at the Rio Grande Zoo.
Once upon a time, a female giraffe at the Zoo took an interest in Kiley, one of The Sweeties. Perhaps it’s the same mama giraffe. Here’s the story.