September in the Rain With Sarah Vaughan

Everyone enjoys September in the Rain - at least when Sarah Vaughan sings about it. 

An Eternal Autumn in New York with Ella and Louis

An Eternal Autumn in New York with Ella and Louis - 1958

A Tribute to Eva Cassidy

When Eva Cassidy passed away in 1996 at the age of 33, she was a largely unknown local singer. I first heard her when Nightline broadcast this story in May, 2001 and was simply stunned and moved to tears.  I just watched it again with the same reaction. Whether you have also heard Eva in the ensuing years or have not yet had the very profound pleasure, do yourself a favor: listen. 

Over the Rainbow

What a Wonderful World

Chain of Fools

Cheek to Cheek

Time After Time

Popeye Meets a Most Remarkable Fellow

Max Fleischer Presents!

Popeye Meets Sinbad

Starring: 

Popeye as The Spinach Eating Sailor

Olive Oyl as The Irresistible Damsel

J. Wellington Wimpy as The Hamburger Fiend

and

Sinbad Bluto as The Most Remarkable Fellow

Todd Akin gets wowed by Claire McCaskill

Less than a month after insisting that "legitimate rape rarely causes pregnancy",  Senate wannabe Todd Akin remains on the attack, lamenting that his opponent, incumbent Claire McCaskill, refuses to act more "ladylike".

Following their recent debate, he opined, "I think we have a very clear path to victory, and apparently Claire McCaskill thinks we do, too, because she was very aggressive at the debate, which was quite different than it was when she ran against Jim Talent," Akin told the The Kansas City Star. "She had a confidence and was much more ladylike (in 2006), but in the debate on Friday she came out swinging, and I think that’s because she feels threatened."

Several days later, apparently still recovering from the threat he presented, he offered this, "The first two minutes, wow, it's like somebody let a wildcat out of the cage," Akin told a small group of supporters and activists in Rolla, a rural college town between St. Louis and Springfield. "She was just furious and attacking in every different direction, which was a little bit of a surprise to us." 

Apparently, what would most satisfy Todd would be if, while he attacked, Claire played the docile tabby, rolled over onto her back and enjoyed the ride.

Despite demonstrating, once again, that he has yet to evolve beyond the level of the Neanderthal, Akin has regained the support of the The National Republican Senatorial Committee which endorsed him yesterday. Ugh.

Well, after all, it is September and isn't there really somewhere else we all should be?

Well, after all, it is September and isn't there really somewhere else we all should be?

Rod Stewart and the Faces - 1971

Introducing the next great film auteur!

A new and startling talent has emerged and is taking the NYC indie film scene by storm. Yes, it's true. In her first full length feature film, Shari Berman, writer, director and auteur of the smash dramedy, My Life As Abraham Lincoln, is wowing the critics. 

Winner Award of Excellence; Indie Fest 2012

Winner Audience Choice Art of Brooklyn 2012

"(A) confident, briskly paced film". -James T. Sheridan, Cinespect.

A jarring dark comedy…with inventiveness that’s hard not to admire.” – New York Magazine

"Dense and beautifully shot" Dustin Freeley, Online Film Critics Society

Oh yeah, Shari is not only a great talent but she also happens to be my cousin. I know what your thinking; I'm only posting this because we are related. No way, man! I'm doing it 'cause the movies a lotta fun and so that the next time she's casting, she'll give me a part! 

C'mon, Shari! I'll carry a spear! I'll be a tree, a potted plant - you name it. All I need is that one big break! Lemme ride your coat tails, will ya, please? Oh! And most of all, congratulations!

PS Screening at Cinema Village, NYC, September 28-October 11, 2012 

The trailer

Interview with the brains behind the scenes

'Tis Autumn and Betty Boop joins the salute

Betty Boop (voiced by Stacey Kent) sings 'Tis Autumn

Cleo Laine graces Early Autumn

In this 1973 recording, British born jazz singer and actress, Cleo Laine, uses her incredible vocal equipment; a multi-octave range that glides effortlessly from a dark throaty whispering growl to high pitched trills and a nearly unparalleled scatting ability to frame Johnny Mercer’s Early Autumn with all the grace and elegance the romance of the lyric deserves.

Eva Cassidy describes the Autumn Leaves

The lovely and sadly doomed Eva Cassidy feels the Autumn Leaves.

Eva Cassidy was little known during her lifetime.  Her music was discovered by many beginning with this report on Nightline. Her beauty of her voice and the sadness of her early demise contribute to the her enduring legacy.

A September Song Sung by Sarah Vaughan

Sarah Vaughan accompanied by Wynton Marsalis and The Boston Pops perform Kurt Weill's September Song- 1984

Perez Prado and The Miracle of the Mambo

"Upon your approval or disapproval rests the entire future of this group".

Perez Prado, his Orchestra playing Mambo No. 8 

1950

The female dancer is Maria Antonieta Pons, a famed Cuban ballerina. The man is "Resortes" (Adalberto Matrinez) a renowned Mexican comic actor and dancer, often credited with inventing "The Moonwalk" later popularized by Michael Jackson. 

It turned out to be a fine and dandy future.

Que Rico El Mambo

Mambo #8

The Name of the band was Talking Heads

The Name of the band was Talking Heads and they were one of the best and brightest of their day.

Life During Wartime

Girlfriend is Better

Take Me to the River

The Showdown! The Rifleman takes on Matt Dillon

When my dear friend AB revealed to the world that Chuck Conners and James Arness were the first objects of her grade school affections and that all these years later, she still couldn't choose one over the other, it was time to size 'em up for her. This one's for you, AB 

Does God Get a Vote?

Does God get a vote?

The latest wave of “all in the name of God” is cresting and poised to drown all infidels.

The groundswell started at the Democratic convention when the word “God” was removed briefly from the party platform as well as the designation of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. You know, the party platform – those meaningless statements of purpose composed of so called “planks”  that no one pays much attention to unless there are political points to be scored.

President Obama insisted that "God" be put back into the platform along with reference to Jerusalem "to maintain consistency with the personal views expressed by the president and in the Democratic Party platform in 2008." 

This is the final language of the “God” plank: "We need a government that stands up for the hopes, values and interests of working people, and gives everyone willing to work hard the chance to make the most of their God-given potential."

The Jerusalem designation reads: "Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel. The parties have agreed that Jerusalem is a matter for final status negotiations.  It should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths." (Further discussion of this topic is deferred for another time as, after so many acts of barbarism there is as much reason to believe that portion of the planet is truly God forsaken as there is to be believe it remains the Land of Milk and Honey.) 

Meanwhile, on the other side of The Great Divide, Republicans, whose own platform referenced God twelve (12!) times launched its' Greatest Crusade.

Mitt Romney insisted that God created the United States not to be one among many nations, but rather, to to lead the world and that taking the word "God" out of the platform proved that the Democratic party is "veering further and further away into an extreme wing that Americans don't recognize."

A Romney spokesman, Andrea Saul, in a statement, called on "President Obama to state in unequivocal terms whether or not he believes Jerusalem is Israel's capital," which Saul claimed Obama had not done, thereby impinging upon any policy initiative of negotiating a two state solution.

 Romney's vice presidential running mate, Paul Ryan, insisted that the omission of God in the DNC platform was "peculiar" and "is not in keeping with our founding documents, our founding vision."

But the word "God" does not appear in the Constitution.  It appears only once in the Declaration of Independence, which states "the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitles people.  The Declaration also mentions the "Creator" as having bestowed inalienable rights upon us all. That’s all.

So now, both party platforms include the word "God". Isn’t that dandy?  Never mind that according to an ABC/Washington Post poll in March, 63 percent of respondents said political leaders should not rely on their religious beliefs when making policy decisions. When you run for President, God has to be on your side and that means you have to offer Him or Her or Whom or Whatever, the requisite testimonials.

Witness: last December, Romney said, " I know there are some people who would like to make this nation a secular nation, who want to take God out of everything that exists in this country.’  After acknowledging that he was not looking for teachers to have prayer every day in the classroom" he stated that he supported having prayers at "special ceremonies" such as at graduations or football games because “it's appropriate for us to recognize that in the public square." The public square?

Why not the private church, synagogue, mosque or home?

And just when did football games become special occasions requiring prayer?  When Johnny U’s 1958 Colts beat the NY Giants?  When Joe’s ’67 Jets won the Super Bowl? Is Football now our national religion?  (You bet it is).

Most recently, we have descended to the spectacle of Romney denouncing the administrations apparently top secret plan to remove “In God We Trust” from the dime. If you missed the announcement of any plan to do this, so did everyone else in the country, save Romney, who hasn’t actually seen a dime in years.

When did professions of faith in God become a litmus test for one’s political viability anyway?  Was it when Ronald Reagan, the least church going President of modern times, began ending every single speech with the phrase “God Bless the United States of America” that, in itself, a ploy to mollify the Bible Belt conservatives who didn't trust him in the first place. In other words, preying for votes. Since then, it’s been an insidious creeping process, accelerated by the Christian right until now the only way to get elected to high office in this, our land that was made for you and me, is to invoke God as often as possible - to the point of meaninglessness, irrelevance and often, hypocrisy.  Or as the great Mencken would have it, “Deep within the heart of every evangelist lies the wreck of a car salesman.”

Incidentally, or perhaps most crucially, whose God are they invoking? The God of Muhammad or Abraham, Isaac or Jacob? Zeus?  Buddah?  Or is the Christian God the only viable candidate? Can we put it to a vote and have done with it already?

In the end, does God even care? I would have greater faith if I knew the Omnipotent One(s) were tending to more urgent business than who wins our Presidential election, whether our economy recovers or who wins the next war - like saving the rain forests, rescuing vinyl LP’s and making the mosquitoes in my back yard disappear forever.  HL August 2012

Mitt the Patrician; suspicions confirmed.

Over the course of a campaign, one way or another, candidates are revealed. In this campaign, Romney has disclosed as little of his planned policy as possible, revealed relatively nothing of his personality, professional background or finances. But he has consistently demonstrated an entire lack of understanding and  compassion for those he calls "victims" who live in this country he presumes to govern.  I don't know about you, but I don't want a President who holds me in such contempt.

This is the audio clip of  "Thurston Howell Romney"  as The NYT's David Brooks dubbed him, expounding to wealthy donors about how he truly feels about those who support President Obama for reelection. 

"There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what," Romney says in one clip. "(T)here are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent on government, who believe that, that they are victims, who believe that government has the responsibility to care for them. Who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, you name it.' '"[M]y job is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives." 

At a late night press conference, a certain sign that his campaign knows he stepped in it again, Romney explained that his views were not "elegantly stated" and "off the cuff" but he didn't back down from his comments. 

What we are left to ponder is how little he seems to know - and possibly care - about those presumed 47%. Are we all free loaders and lay abouts? What of those who are elderly, disabled, Vets and who have fallen through the safety net of the social compact through no fault of their own? 

It may not be as searing an indictment as The Dick Who Hated Us All but it is troubling to know that this is a guy who, behind closed doors dismisses nearly half the electorate in so cavalier a manner. 

It's a Beautiful Day for a trip back in time

There was something a little spooky and and mysterious about their music. Not quite scary but weird enough to make their name seem a trifle ironic. In the end, they didn't have more than a handful of songs anyone ever listened to or cared about so I guess it doesn't matter anymore except to those who care about whether or not It's a Beautiful Day. 

White Bird Live - White Bird July 17, 1970 Tanglewood

White Bird Studio version

Girl With No Eyes

Popeye launches his never ending campaign for a certain imported Sicilian doll

In this very first episode, Popeye, the Sailor Man, launches his decades long crusade to rescue the object of his affection, the famed Sicilian pin up doll, Olive Oyl, from the advances of the ham fisted Bluto.  Featuring a guest appearance by Betty Boop, a mystery pipe and of course, his favorite vegetable. 

.

Romney's Team Chicken Hawk vows to take us with him

Yesterday, Mitt Romney, campaigning in Virginia, said that President Obama wants to limit the U.S. military's capacity so it can only engage in one conflict at a time. Criticizing the automatic defense spending cuts looming at the end of the year, passed as part of the bipartisan debt-limit deal, Romney said he will "restore our military commitment and keep America the strongest military in the world."

"This president's done something I find hard to understand. Ever since FDR, we've had capacity to be engaged in two conflicts at once," Romney said. "He's saying, 'No, we're going to cut that back to one conflict.'"

Let's step away from the time machine, Mitt. I want to ask you a couple of questions and I'll give you the answers.

1. How did things work out for We, the People, the last time we fought two wars at once?  Not real well for the men and women, boys and girs who got shot up on the ground, right?

2. How did it work out for you, your five sons and your 18 granchildren, Mitt? My guess is that, if you noticed at all, you all did just swell.

Now that Mitt is convinced that he has to be a play pretend tough guy, you can bet his last bottom dollar which side he's on. He's with manufacturing! Munitions manufacturing, that is. Munitions manufacturers who will experience a mild but discomfiting credit squeeze of those budget cuts (a minuscule $680 billion) kick in, and who could really use a good war to stir the bottom line. 

You want to invoke FDR? Really And take us back to those thrilling days of yesteryear (Gee, it seems like it was just the last administration) when we waged large scale hot and cold wars as policemen to the world? Must be the secret part of your jobs bill. Anybody seen Rosie the Riveter?

September 14, 2012

Tell us Mitt: Who will you send to die and why?

As we await the foreign policy debate between The President and Cowboy Mitt, in which Mittens is sure to attack over the administrations perceived "weakness" in its' response to the embassy attacks, let's get the chronology straight. 

Pete Seeger and Johnny Cash; Two Worried Men Who Won't Be Worried Long

Pete Seeger on the Johnny Cash Show 1970

Lay Down Our Swords and Shields

On this Memorial Day, let us set aside a few precious moments to reflect and hope for the day when people the world over lay down their swords and shields and study war no more.

It's So Nice to Have Friends of Distinction

I don't know whatever happened to these folks, but they are always welcome in my ear.

Grazing in the Grass

Love Or Let Me Be Lonely

Going in Circles

Mongo Santamaria's Afro-Blue

Mongo Santamaria performing his classic composition, Afro-Blue

The Shangri-Las; A Love Story

Before the Shangri-las ran away from home and MAMA!, they spent the night walking in the sand of Rockaway Beach and trading great big kisses with that dirty finger nailed prize, the Leader of the Pack, which is where they spawned The Ramones. True story.

Remember?

Give Him a Great Big Kiss

Gabrielle Giffords; Number One with a Bullet

Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings do Woody Guthrie and US all proud

Sharon Jones was a true soul survivor who spent decades in obscurity despite possessing one of the great vocal instruments of her time before finally breaking thorough with her band, The Dap Kings in the late '90's. Ms.Jones success was short lived as she passed away in November, 2016. 

She left us with a worthy legacy of recordings including her version of This Land Is Our Land which does Woody Guthrie and us all, proud.

Two wonders of nature: Raquel Welch is 77. And I'm still 16!

I have never seen one of her motion pictures, but I always liked Raquel Welch because she never took off all of her clothes (would that have been necessary?), never stooped to slowing the aging process through artificial means, (She did? Really?) clearly had an abundance of talent in many areas and most of all, never seemed to take herself too seriously . What's not to like? 

Happy 77th Birthday, Rocky!

Raquel Welch and Cher 1975 

In gratitude to and appreciation of President and Mrs. Obama

Update: Nearly four years ago, I watched Michelle Obama deliver a speech to the Democratic National Convention. I was so impressed and so filled with high spirits that I posted the speech here and included a cheeky joke about wanting to steal the President's "gal". Today, I wish to withdraw that joke. 

Last night, I watched and again was mesmerized as Mrs. Obama delivered her final convention address as our First Lady. 

I am at a loss of words for anything beyond the trite and trivial to describe what she and the President have given us. 

They have truly risen above the unrelenting, unreasoning and savage criticism directed at them because of their race, religion, values, looks and even, in the President's case, the man's very name, and have represented us with unfailing grace, style, dignity and courage. 


Never once have they responded in kind to the cruel jibes directed at them. Never once have they brought the Presidency or his administration into disrepute. Never once has there been a hint of scandal. Never once have they been anything other than exemplary role models as parents and citizens. 

In retrospect, the only thing that I have ever written about either of them that I regret is an innocuous joke that I now wish to withdraw. I no longer wish to "steal" Mrs. Obama from President Barack Obama. He is the only one who truly deserves her. 

What a fine and lovely family; what a magnificent couple. 

Thank you both.

July 26, 2016 


......................................................................................................................................

Last week I watched and listened to the launching of Anne Romney, the Ice Queen,  as she declaimed from on high, "I love you women!" Tonight, I watched and listened to the First Lady, Michelle Obama. speak as one of us, with warmth, compassion and a heart full of soul. Each to his own, but for me, I wanna K.O. Barry O. and steal his gal! September 4, 2012.

Michelle Obama addresses the Democratic National Convention, 2012. 

Michelle Obama addresses the Democratic National Convention - 2008 

The Democrats put a human face on what's at stake

The Democrats finally put a human face on this dreary death march of a campaign. 

Thank you, in particular to our Governor, Deval Patrick, who reminded us of the stakes, calling on the fire in the belly and challenging us not to be bullied;Major Tammy Duckworth for her sacrifice, compassion and commitment and Stacy Lihn for putting a human face on health care.

Congressman Joe Walsh (R-Ill) is a back bench, bomb tossing tea bagging nut job who has claimed that radical Islam is taking over the country. He is running for reelection against Tammy Duckworth, an Iraqi combat veteran. Congressman Joe claims that Ms. Duckworth is not a "true hero". Note to Joe: Ms. Duckworth gave two legs and an arm in service to our country in Iraq. Stand down, Joe. 

Stacy Lihn, her daughter and the human face of health care 

What's My Line? takes a surreal turn with Salvador Dali

"There is only one difference between a madman and me.  The madman thinks he is sane.  I know I am mad." - Salvador Dali

Are we better off than we were 4 years ago? Ask George W.

"I think I got a "B" in Econ 101" - October, 2007

The deer stares into the teleprompter high beams  - September 24, 2008

Mitt The Willow just keeps swaying in the breeze

Mitt Romney will advocate for and defend universal health care, abortion and gay rights and affirmative action. How do I know? Because he said so and I trust him; that's why.