December 30th

The penultimate day of the year is the birthday

… of Russ Tamblyn. Riff, “a Jet to his dying day,” is 75.

… of Sandy Koufax. The most dominant pitcher in the game in the early 1960s, the man who threw four no-hitters including a perfect game is 74.

… of Paul (Noel actually) Stookey. Paul of Peter, Paul & Mary is 72.

… of James Burrows. The director of “Taxi,” “Cheers” and “Will and Grace” is 69.

… of Fred Ward. The actor (Gus Grissom in The Right Stuff and Earl Bassett in the greatest movie ever, Tremors) is 67.

… of Monkees Michael Nesmith (67) and Davy Jones (64).

… of Patti Smith. Punk rock’s poet laureate is 63.

… of Meredith Viera and of Matt Lauer. The Today show hosts are 56 and 52.

… of Tracey Ullman. She’s 50.

… of Eldrick Woods. Tiger is 34.

… of LeBron James. He’s 25 today.

Have a Coke and a smile today.

It’s the birthday of the man who introduced us to Coca-Cola, Asa Griggs Candler, born in Villa Rica, Georgia (1851). He grew up during the Civil War and wanted to be a doctor, but his family was so poor that he could only receive an elementary school education before becoming a pharmacist’s apprentice. But Candler proved to be business savvy, slowly building his own drugstore empire, and in 1886 he bought sole rights to John Pemberton’s original formula of Coca-Cola and formed the Coca-Cola Company in 1890. Candler understood the importance of advertising. He used calendars, billboards, and posters to keep the Coca-Cola trademark prominent in the public’s mind. After selling the patent in 1919, he went on to serve as Atlanta’s mayor and funded a teaching hospital for Emory University’s Medical School.

The Writer’s Almanac from American Public Media (2007)

The Genius Among Geniuses, Alfred Einstein, was born on December 30, 1880.

Bo Diddley was born on this date in 1928.

Music historian Robert Palmer has described Bo Diddley as “one of the most original and fertile rhythmic intelligences of our time.” He will forever be known as the creator of the “Bo Diddley beat,” one of the cornerstone rhythms of rock and roll. He employed it in his namesake song, “Bo Diddley,” as well as other primal rockers like “Mona.” This distinctive African-based rhythm pattern (which goes bomp bomp bomp bomp-bomp) was picked up from Diddley by other artists and has been a distinctive and recurring element in rock and roll through the decades.

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Move Your Money

How about a little populism?

The idea is simple: If enough people who have money in one of the big four banks move it into smaller, more local, more traditional community banks, then collectively we, the people, will have taken a big step toward re-rigging the financial system so it becomes again the productive, stable engine for growth it’s meant to be. It’s neither Left nor Right — it’s populism at its best. Consider it a withdrawal tax on the big banks for the negative service they provide by consistently ignoring the public interest. It’s time for Americans to move their money out of these reckless behemoths. And you don’t have to worry, there is zero risk: deposit insurance is just as good at small banks — and unlike the big banks they don’t provide the toxic dividend of derivatives trading in a heads-they-win, tails-we-lose fashion.

Arianna Huffington: Move Your Money: A New Year’s Resolution

More information from Move Your Money.

Trite Trophy

And the winner is … “Dial up a blitz.”

That nouveau football cliché beat out such stellar competition as “Take a shot down the field,” “It depends on the spot” and “Shy of the first down” to capture the 26th annual Trite Trophy, as awarded by Pittsburgh Post-Gazette columnist Gene Collier.

“Somewhere, somehow, defensive coordinators lost the ability to just call a blitz, order a blitz, signal a blitz, send in a blitz or even just blitz,” Collier wrote. “They suddenly were forced to ‘Dial up a blitz.’ It’s a beauty of a cliche, and it meets our ageless criteria: it’s meaningless, it’s everywhere, and I really, really hate it.

“It’s got multiple malignancies, such as the matter of when you do dial, whom do you call? Second, who dials anything any more? I mean as of, like, 1990, my grandmother and the Yanomamo Tribe of deepest Venezuela were the only people that still had that technology.”

Sideline Chatter | Seattle Times Newspaper

Dude Studies

“The Big Lebowski” has spawned its own shaggy, fervid world: drinking games, Halloween costumes, bumper stickers (“This aggression will not stand, man”) and a drunken annual festival that took root in Louisville, Ky., and has spread to other cities. The movie is also the subject of an expanding shelf of books, including “The Dude Abides: The Gospel According to the Coen Brothers” and the forthcoming “The Tao of the Dude.”

‘The Big Lebowski’ and Its Dude Get the Academic Treatment

The Dude abides. I don’t know about you but I take comfort in that.

Visual aid of the day

The United States spends more on medical care per person than any country, yet life expectancy is shorter than in most other developed nations and many developing ones. Lack of health insurance is a factor in life span and contributes to an estimated 45,000 deaths a year. Why the high cost? The U.S. has a fee-for-service system—paying medical providers piecemeal for appointments, surgery, and the like. That can lead to unneeded treatment that doesn’t reliably improve a patient’s health. Says Gerard Anderson, a professor at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who studies health insurance worldwide, “More care does not necessarily mean better care.” 

National Geographic Magazine – NGM.com

That’s all very nice but click on the link and check out the graphic. BE SURE YOU ENLARGE THE GRAPHIC.

Been there, done that

From a meme that was on the internet a few years ago, name the locations where you spent the night during the year:

Albuquerque
Tucson
Denver
Virginia near Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Leadville, Colorado
Snowmass Village, Colorado
Joplin, Missouri
Brown County State Park, Indiana
Leland, Michigan
Newberry, Michigan
Eagle River, Michigan
Grand Rapids, Minnesota
Bismarck, North Dakota
Deadwood, South Dakota
Wheatland, Wyoming

Eleven states and the District of Columbia. During the year I was also in Texas, Oklahoma, Illinois, Wisconsin, Maryland, West Virginia and Georgia.

Wounded Knee

On this date in 1890 the 7th Cavalry killed about 350 Lakota men, women and children at Wounded Knee, South Dakota. It is considered the last action of the Indian Wars, but it wasn’t a battle. It was a massacre. The Indian men had been largely disarmed before the firing began.

This 10-minute video, excerpted from a longer production, is a well-produced telling of what happened.

American Horse: There was a woman with an infant in her arms who was killed as she almost touched the flag of truce, and the women and children of course were strewn all along the circular village until they were dispatched. Right near the flag of truce a mother was shot down with her infant; the child not knowing that its mother was dead was still nursing, and that especially was a very sad sight. The women as they were fleeing with their babes were killed together, shot right through, and the women who were very heavy with child were also killed. All the Indians fled in these three directions, and after most all of them had been killed a cry was made that all those who were not killed wounded should come forth and they would be safe. Little boys who were not wounded came out of their places of refuge, and as soon as they came in sight a number of soldiers surrounded them and butchered them there.

Lakota accounts of the massacre at Wounded Knee (1891)

One of the survivors was Black Elk, the famous medicine man, who was 27 years old at the time of the massacre. He wrote: “… I can see that something else died there in the bloody mud, and was buried in the blizzard. A people’s dream died there. It was a beautiful dream. And I, to whom so great a vision was given in my youth, — you see me now a pitiful old man who has done nothing, for the nation’s hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead.”

The Writer’s Almanac with Garrison Keillor

The Wounded Knee massacre of 1890 is different from the Wounded Knee incident of 1973.

December 29th

Mary Tyler Moore was born in Brooklyn, 72 years ago today.

On The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Moore played Mary Richards, a 30-something single woman “making it on her own” in 1970s Minneapolis. MTM first pitched her character to CBS as a young divorcee, but CBS executives believed her role as Laura Petrie was so firmly etched in the public mind that viewers would think she had divorced Dick Van Dyke (and that the American public would not find a divorced woman likable), so Richards was rewritten as a woman who had moved to the big city after ending a long affair. Richards landed a job working in the news department of fictional WJM-TV, where Moore’s all-American spunk played off against the gruff boss Lou Grant (Ed Asner), world-weary writer Murray Slaughter (Gavin MacLeod) and pompous anchorman Ted Baxter (Ted Knight). In early seasons, her all-male work environment was counterbalanced by a primarily female home life, where again her character contrasted with her ditzy landlady Phyllis Lindstrom (Cloris Leachman) and her New York-born neighbor and best friend, Rhoda Morgenstern (Valerie Harper).

The Encyclopedia of Television

Angelina Jolie’s dad is 71. That would be four-time Oscar nominee, one-time winner, Jon Voight. Voight won his Oscar for Coming Home, as did co-star Jane Fonda. The film had eight nominations, three wins.

Marianne Faithfull is 63. Faithfull is a descendant of Count Leopold von Sacher-Masoch, the 19th century author and source of the term “masochism.” Her signature song, As Tears Go By, was written by Mick Jagger and Keith Richards.

Mayday Malone is 62. That’s Sam, Ted Danson.

Paula Poundstone is 50 today.

Two-time Oscar nominee Jude Law is 37.

On this date 52 years ago Tobin Rote threw for four touchdowns and ran for another as the Detroit Lions defeated the Cleveland Browns, 59-14, in the NFL championship game. (That was it. There was no Super Bowl then.) It was the Lions’ third title in six years, all over the Browns. Since then the Lions have missed 43 out of 52 post seasons (counting this year) and are 1-9 in games when they did make it. For nearly all of that time the Lions have been owned by William Clay Ford, grandson of Henry and son of Edsel. The Lions aren’t exactly built Ford tough.

The 17th president, Andrew Johnson, was born on this date in 1808. From the obituary in The New York Times in 1875:

The history this man leaves is a rare one. His career was remarkable, even in this country; it would have been quite impossible in any other. It presents the spectacle of a man who never went to school cession of posts of civil responsibility to the highest office in the land, and evincing his continued hold upon the popular heart by a subsequent election to the Senate in the teeth of a bitter personal and political opposition.

And today is the birthday of Donna, great and loyal friend, doting mother and grandmother and aunt, highly regarded federal executive and American Indian leader. She keeps mentioning making posole. She aces that and she’ll be perfect. Happy Birthday, Donna!

Christmas 2009

Friday, the 25th, was Christmas Day, the Christian commemoration of the birth of Jesus Christ, celebrated in many places around the world with prayers, singing, gift-giving and charity. Modern Christmas traditions originate from many backgrounds, combining several historic holidays and celebrations into one, the most well-known traditional story being Santa Claus, a jolly old elf who brings gifts to good children all over the world. Collected here are a handful of photographs of people observing the Christmas season this year. (34 photos total)

The Big Picture – Boston.com

The truth about airplane security measures

Why do we fail to detect or defeat the guilty, and why do we do so well at collective punishment of the innocent? The answer to the first question is: Because we can’t—or won’t. The answer to the second question is: Because we can. The fault here is not just with our endlessly incompetent security services, who give the benefit of the doubt to people who should have been arrested long ago or at least had their visas and travel rights revoked. It is also with a public opinion that sheepishly bleats to be made to “feel safe.” The demand to satisfy that sad illusion can be met with relative ease if you pay enough people to stand around and stare significantly at the citizens’ toothpaste. My impression as a frequent traveler is that intelligent Americans fail to protest at this inanity in case it is they who attract attention and end up on a no-fly list instead. Perfect.

Christopher Hitchens – Slate Magazine
It’s a good essay. You should read it all.

After all, who was looking through the bags at Fort Hood?

Best closer to the truth than we might imagine line of the day

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report) – In the wake of the Christmas Day airline terror attempt, the Department of Homeland Security today said it was instituting a bold new series of security measures, including issuing an official “proof of terrorism” I.D. card.

“All potential terrorists must have the terrorist I.D. card in order to be barred from boarding,” said Homeland Security secretary Janet Napolitano.  “If you want to get on the no-fly list you’ll need a completed application and the $25 fee.”

Borowitz Report

There’s more. Click.

Best line of the day

“If sex is used to market a nonsexual product, that product is generic.”

Mark Barrett, Ditchwalk

He explains:

Any time you see sex added to a product that is not inherently sexual, you are being told by the company that makes the product that their product is not special or unique in any way. Axe body spray is no better than any other body spray. Carl’s Jr.’s dead cow is no better than anybody else’s dead cow.

This inherent revelation of mediocrity holds for all products in all markets. This includes movies, music, computer games and books.

Idle thought

Urban Meyer is just another “it’s about me” jerk.

All this indecision couldn’t wait a week until the team’s season was over?