Chamblee54

Democracy Now has a man telling a lie today. This is a whopper for the record books.
One of the things that President Obama has been consistent on is that we’re exceptionally precise and surgical in terms of addressing the terrorist threat. And by that, I mean, if there are terrorists who are within an area where there are women and children or others, you know, we do not take such action that might put those innocent men, women and children in danger. In fact, I can say that the types of operations that the U.S. has been involved in, and within the counterterrorism realm, that nearly, for the past year, there hasn’t been a single collateral death, because of the exceptional proficiency, precision of the capabilities we’ve been able to develop.
In this film, at 50:16, the image shifts to a shot from a camera on the side. We can only see the side of a man speaking. We cannot see if his lips are moving. In the embedded vdeo, the lips are clearly moving. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress.

PG read The Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle. It is a good story, which is all PG asks of a book. When he was commuting on Marta, a good story could make the time between Chamblee and Peachtree Center go by in a flash. Maybe that is the role of reading in life, something to pass the time on life’s journey.
The Tortilla Curtain ( Which is the same initials as Tom Coraghessan.) is a story of Los Angeles in the early nineties. The riots of 1992 have come and gone. The landscape is beautiful, but fragile. Some people flourish, and live a life of glittering excess. These people are scared to death by the Spanish speaking masses pouring over the border. The Tortilla Curtain is a story about what happens when worlds collide.
This is the first novel by Mr. Boyle that PG has read, after reading two collections of short stories. The man knows how to tell a story. While there are a lot of coincidences in this tale, your suspension of disbelief does not get in the way of a good time. (Unless you are a fuddy duddy English major, in which case what are you doing reading this blog?) The tale of two families rolls along, like a mudslide going down a canyon, to it’s sticky conclusion.
There is only one issue here. PG got his copy of The Tortilla Curtain at a yard sale. The printer made a mistake when assembling the book. At page 294, the wrong section was inserted. Page 231 to 294 are repeated, instead of the conclusion of the story. At the point of this mistake, PG was reading this story every chance he got. The momentum was intense. At this point, the only choice was to order the book from the library, and wait a few days to finish it.
By the time the complete book arrived at the library, the magic was gone. The plot twists seemed a bit more unlikely. By the time the story came to the  conclusion, PG was shaking his head in disbelief.
The story of the yardsale where PG got this book is almost as good. The house was a few doors down from where PG used to live, and was a 1948 Cape Cod house spared the plague of McMansionization. The cd’s were negotiable, and the book was a quarter. For two dollars, PG got the book, Alladin Sane by David Bowie, Zenyatta Mondatta by The Police, Chronicle by Creedence Clearwater Revival, and a cd by Emmy Lou Harris.
PG knows to check the cd case. The one by Emmy Lou Harris was empty. The yard salesman gave PG a dollar back. PG found a four cd box set by the Moody Blues, and bought it for one dollar. Pictures today are from The Library of Congress. The spell check suggestions for McMansionization : Acclimatization, Colonizations, Stigmatization.

The Living Walls conference hit Atlanta again. A collection of artists hit town and created images for the public. PG got a map of the specific locations, and went south to see the results. Uzi rode shotgun.
The first image was in downtown Decatur, across from the old courthouse. It was on the side of a business called Squash Blossom. A tree was in front of the mural,blocking the view.
A dance studio, on the other side of a courtyard, was the site for the second image. It was in a narrow alley, with a locked gate at one end. It was a nice enough image, but you could not back up and get a good overall view. Visibility was also an issue at Twain’s, where a vehicle was parked in front.
After viewing the three images on Howard Avenue, the fun started. PG memorized the address of a location on W. Trinity Place, and drove by that location without seeing anything. After seeing several mistakes in the google map, PG figured they had just missed it. He turned around in a parking lot, with the intention of going to town on College Avenue. While in the parking lot, he looked at his list again, and saw the correct address on W. Trinity.
PG started to pull into a parking lot, but quickly noted that it was full of police cars, and marked “authorized vehicles only”. Not being in the mood to discuss authorization with a uniformed officer, PG turned his vehicle around, and drove in front of the police station. He noted the street number, 420, on the front door of the police station. This called for a picture. ( This was image -042 in the folder.)
The Beacon Hill Recreation Center, an old school house, was at 430 W. Trinity, and was the correct location. PG drove in back, and looked for a place to park. He turned a corner, and found a fence at the back of the police station parking lot. A fence is more effective than a sign for blocking access. PG tried to turn around in a rather narrow space, and wound up with a curb in between his front and back tire. Several delicate front and back moves, and the vehicle was free to leave. It drove by a group of people doing exercises in a back yard. The murals were in a space on the building formerly occupied by a window. One of them was PG’s favorite image, to this point. It was not technically special, but had a happy vibe, and used the space efficiently.
College Avenue runs by the railroad/Marta tracks, past Agnes Scott towards the city. A business had a mural on the side, with the painter still working on it. The journey went down East Lake Drive, past the home of the late Hosea Williams, and into Kirkwood. A very, very subtle display was on the side of a business. PG drove around the block three times, and was going to give up, when Uzi saw something. It was a collection of pasted up images of a man in a fantasy costume.
The next stop was the beltline. A building near Cabbagetown had a vibrant mural on the side. In East Atlanta, a Bicycle Co-op had a face drawing, to go with the security equipment of his neighbor. A run up Moreland took the explorers to Arizona Avenue, where some traditional graffiti graced a wall.
Uzi was getting tired by this point. A decision was made to visit the rest of the murals later. After a tasty dinner at the S&S cafeteria, the weekend was over.

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and the March Hare and the Hatter were having tea at it: a Dormouse was sitting between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using it as a cushion, resting their elbows on it, and talking over its head. ‘Very uncomfortable for the Dormouse,’ thought Alice; ‘only, as it’s asleep, I suppose it doesn’t mind.’
The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it: ‘No room! No room!’ they cried out when they saw Alice coming. ‘There’s PLENTY of room!’ said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in a large arm-chair at one end of the table.
‘Have some wine,’ the March Hare said in an encouraging tone.
Alice looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. ‘I don’t see any wine,’ she remarked.
‘There isn’t any,’ said the March Hare.
‘Then it wasn’t very civil of you to offer it,’ said Alice angrily.
‘It wasn’t very civil of you to sit down without being invited,’ said the March Hare.
‘I didn’t know it was YOUR table,’ said Alice; ‘it’s laid for a great many more than three.’
‘Your hair wants cutting,’ said the Hatter. He had been looking at Alice for some time with great curiosity, and this was his first speech.
‘You should learn not to make personal remarks,’ Alice said with some severity; ‘it’s very rude.’
The Hatter opened his eyes very wide on hearing this; but all he SAID was,
‘Why is a raven like a writing-desk?’
‘Come, we shall have some fun now!’ thought Alice. ‘I’m glad they’ve begun asking riddles.—I believe I can guess that,’ she added aloud.
‘Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it?’ said the March Hare.
‘Exactly so,’ said Alice.
‘Then you should say what you mean,’ the March Hare went on.
‘I do,’ Alice hastily replied; ‘at least—at least I mean what I say—that’s the same thing, you know.’
‘Not the same thing a bit!’ said the Hatter. ‘You might just as well say that “I see what I eat” is the same thing as “I eat what I see”!’
‘You might just as well say,’ added the March Hare, ‘that “I like what I get” is the same thing as “I get what I like”!’
‘You might just as well say,’ added the Dormouse, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, ‘that “I breathe when I sleep” is the same thing as “I sleep when I breathe”!’
‘It IS the same thing with you,’ said the Hatter, and here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent for a minute, while Alice thought over all she could remember about ravens and writing-desks, which wasn’t much.
The Hatter was the first to break the silence. ‘What day of the month is it?’ he said, turning to Alice: he had taken his watch out of his pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to his ear.
Alice considered a little, and then said ‘The fourth.’
‘Two days wrong!’ sighed the Hatter. ‘I told you butter wouldn’t suit the works!’ he added looking angrily at the March Hare.
‘It was the BEST butter,’ the March Hare meekly replied.
‘Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well,’ the Hatter grumbled:
‘you shouldn’t have put it in with the bread-knife.’
The March Hare took the watch and looked at it gloomily: then he dipped it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again: but he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark, ‘It was the BEST butter, you know.’
Alice had been looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. ‘What a funny watch!’ she remarked. ‘It tells the day of the month, and doesn’t tell what o’clock it is!’
‘Why should it?’ muttered the Hatter. ‘Does YOUR watch tell you what year it is?’
‘Of course not,’ Alice replied very readily:
‘but that’s because it stays the same year for such a long time together.’
‘Which is just the case with MINE,’ said the Hatter.
Alice felt dreadfully puzzled. The Hatter’s remark seemed to have no sort of meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English. ‘I don’t quite understand you,’ she said, as politely as she could.
‘The Dormouse is asleep again,’ said the Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea upon its nose.
The Dormouse shook its head impatiently, and said, without opening its eyes, ‘Of course, of course; just what I was going to remark myself.’
‘Have you guessed the riddle yet?’ the Hatter said, turning to Alice again.
‘No, I give it up,’ Alice replied: ‘what’s the answer?’
‘I haven’t the slightest idea,’ said the Hatter.
‘Nor I,’ said the March Hare.
Alice sighed wearily. ‘I think you might do something better with the time,’ she said, ‘than waste it in asking riddles that have no answers.’
‘If you knew Time as well as I do,’ said the Hatter, ‘you wouldn’t talk about wasting IT. It’s HIM.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ said Alice.
‘Of course you don’t!’ the Hatter said, tossing his head contemptuously.
‘I dare say you never even spoke to Time!’
‘Perhaps not,’ Alice cautiously replied: ‘but I know I have to beat time when I learn music.’
‘Ah! that accounts for it,’ said the Hatter. ‘He won’t stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he’d do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o’clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons: you’d only have to whisper a hint to Time, and round goes the clock in a twinkling! Half-past one, time for dinner!’
(‘I only wish it was,’ the March Hare said to itself in a whisper.)
‘That would be grand, certainly,’ said Alice thoughtfully:
‘but then—I shouldn’t be hungry for it, you know.’
‘Not at first, perhaps,’ said the Hatter: ‘but you could keep it to half-past one as long as you liked.’
‘Is that the way YOU manage?’ Alice asked.
The Hatter shook his head mournfully. ‘Not I!’ he replied. ‘We quarrelled last March—just before HE went mad, you know—’ (pointing with his tea spoon at the March Hare,) ‘—it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing
“Twinkle, twinkle, little bat! How I wonder what you’re at!”
You know the song, perhaps?’
‘I’ve heard something like it,’ said Alice.
‘It goes on, you know,’ the Hatter continued, ‘in this way:—
“Up above the world you fly, Like a tea-tray in the sky.Twinkle, twinkle—”‘
Here the Dormouse shook itself, and began singing in its sleep ‘Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle—’ and went on so long that they had to pinch it to make it stop.
‘Well, I’d hardly finished the first verse,’ said the Hatter, ‘when the Queen jumped up and bawled out, “He’s murdering the time! Off with his head!”‘
‘How dreadfully savage!’ exclaimed Alice.
‘And ever since that,’ the Hatter went on in a mournful tone, ‘he won’t do a thing I ask!
It’s always six o’clock now.’
A bright idea came into Alice’s head. ‘Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?’ she asked.
‘Yes, that’s it,’ said the Hatter with a sigh: ‘it’s always tea-time, and we’ve no time to wash the things between whiles.’
‘Then you keep moving round, I suppose?’ said Alice.
‘Exactly so,’ said the Hatter: ‘as the things get used up.’






‘But what happens when you come to the beginning again?’ Alice ventured to ask.
‘Suppose we change the subject,’ the March Hare interrupted, yawning. ‘I’m getting tired of this. I vote the young lady tells us a story.’
‘I’m afraid I don’t know one,’ said Alice, rather alarmed at the proposal.
‘Then the Dormouse shall!’ they both cried.
‘Wake up, Dormouse!’ And they pinched it on both sides at once.
The Dormouse slowly opened his eyes. ‘I wasn’t asleep,’ he said in a hoarse, feeble voice:
‘I heard every word you fellows were saying.’
‘Tell us a story!’ said the March Hare.
‘Yes, please do!’ pleaded Alice.
‘And be quick about it,’ added the Hatter, ‘or you’ll be asleep again before it’s done.’
‘Once upon a time there were three little sisters,’ the Dormouse began in a great hurry; ‘and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie; and they lived at the bottom of a well—’
‘What did they live on?’ said Alice, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking.
‘They lived on treacle,’ said the Dormouse, after thinking a minute or two.
‘They couldn’t have done that, you know,’ Alice gently remarked; ‘they’d have been ill.’
‘So they were,’ said the Dormouse; ‘VERY ill.’
Alice tried to fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went on: ‘But why did they live at the bottom of a well?’
‘Take some more tea,’ the March Hare said to Alice, very earnestly.
‘I’ve had nothing yet,’ Alice replied in an offended tone, ‘so I can’t take more.’
‘You mean you can’t take LESS,’ said the Hatter: ‘it’s very easy to take MORE than nothing.’
‘Nobody asked YOUR opinion,’ said Alice.
‘Who’s making personal remarks now?’ the Hatter asked triumphantly.
Alice did not quite know what to say to this: so she helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter, and then turned to the Dormouse, and repeated her question. ‘Why did they live at the bottom of a well?’
The Dormouse again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, ‘It was a treacle-well.’
‘There’s no such thing!’ Alice was beginning very angrily, but the Hatter and the March Hare went ‘Sh! sh!’ and the Dormouse sulkily remarked, ‘If you can’t be civil, you’d better finish the story for yourself.’
‘No, please go on!’ Alice said very humbly; ‘I won’t interrupt again. I dare say there may be ONE.’
‘One, indeed!’ said the Dormouse indignantly. However, he consented to go on. ‘And so these three little sisters—they were learning to draw, you know—’
‘What did they draw?’ said Alice, quite forgetting her promise.
‘Treacle,’ said the Dormouse, without considering at all this time.
‘I want a clean cup,’ interrupted the Hatter: ‘let’s all move one place on.’
He moved on as he spoke, and the Dormouse followed him: the March Hare moved into the Dormouse’s place, and Alice rather unwillingly took the place of the March Hare. The Hatter was the only one who got any advantage from the change: and Alice was a good deal worse off than before, as the March Hare had just upset the milk-jug into his plate.
Alice did not wish to offend the Dormouse again, so she began very cautiously: ‘But I don’t understand. Where did they draw the treacle from?’
‘You can draw water out of a water-well,’ said the Hatter; ‘so I should think you could draw treacle out of a treacle-well—eh, stupid?’
‘But they were IN the well,’ Alice said to the Dormouse, not choosing to notice this last remark.
‘Of course they were’, said the Dormouse; ‘—well in.’ This answer so confused poor Alice, that she let the Dormouse go on for some time without interrupting it.
‘They were learning to draw,’ the Dormouse went on, yawning and rubbing its eyes, for it was getting very sleepy; ‘and they drew all manner of things—everything that begins with an M—’
‘Why with an M?’ said Alice.
‘Why not?’ said the March Hare.
Alice was silent.
The Dormouse had closed its eyes by this time, and was going off into a doze; but, on being pinched by the Hatter, it woke up again with a little shriek, and went on: ‘—that begins with an M, such as mouse-traps, and the moon, and memory, and muchness—you know you say things are “much of a muchness”—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?’
‘Really, now you ask me,’ said Alice, very much confused, ‘I don’t think—’
‘Then you shouldn’t talk,’ said the Hatter.
This piece of rudeness was more than Alice could bear: she got up in great disgust, and walked off; the Dormouse fell asleep instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going, though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her: the last time she saw them, they were trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.
‘At any rate I’ll never go THERE again!’ said Alice as she picked her way through the wood. ‘It’s the stupidest tea-party I ever was at in all my life!’ Just as she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a door leading right into it. ‘That’s very curious!’ she thought. ‘But everything’s curious today. I think I may as well go in at once.’ And in she went.
Once more she found herself in the long hall, and close to the little glass table. ‘Now, I’ll manage better this time,’ she said to herself, and began by taking the little golden key, and unlocking the door that led into the garden. Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom (she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till she was about a foot high: then she walked down the little passage: and THEN—she found herself at last in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.
Today’s entertainment is Chapter VII of ALICE’S ADVENTURES IN WONDERLAND By Lewis Carroll .
The text is courtesy of Project Gutenberg. Living Walls by Zipcode happens today.

This is a repost from a year ago. In the past twelve months, we have gotten in one more war, that we know of. The economic turmoil in America is caused, in large part, because of these conflicts.
There was a feature the other day on the innertube called War is a racket . It was about a man with the unlikely name of Smedley Butler . Pictures for today’s adventure are from The Library of Congress. The video features an actor named Graham Frye in the role of General Butler. The video is courtesy of Smedley D. Butler Brigade Chapter 9 Veterans For Peace.
Major General Smedley Darlington Butler was a star of the U.S. Marine Corps. He lied about his age to enlist during the Spanish American War. Mr. Butler served in Philippines, China , Mexico, the Caribbean, Central America and World War I. With the exception of World War I, most of these conflicts are forgotten today.
Smedley Butler received the Medal of Honor twice. “His first Medal of Honor was presented following action at Vera Cruz, Mexico, 21-22 April 1914, where he commanded the Marines who landed and occupied the city. Maj Butler “was eminent and conspicuous in command of his Battalion. He exhibited courage and skill in leading his men through the action of the 22nd and in the final occupation of the city…The following year, he was awarded the second Medal of Honor for bravery and forceful leadership as Commanding Officer of detachments of Marines and seamen of the USS Connecticut in repulsing Caco resistance on Fort Riviere, Haiti, 17 November 1915.”
After his retirement in 1931, Mr. Butler had a change of heart, and decided that killing for Uncle Sam was not such a great idea. He wrote a book, “War is a Racket”, and became a popular speaker. Here is a “money quote”… “I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class thug for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902–1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.”
Smedley Butler died June 21, 1940. Eighteen months later, America was at War again. How he would have reacted to that conflict is a mystery.

World Class Stupid is a great corner of the internet. It has chamblee54 on an automated blogroll called “my blog list”, which displays the latest post here to the digital universe. Thank you. The neighbors on MBL include WTF Japan Seriously and  Alex Balk. The videos embedded today come from WTF Japan Seriously. (Youtube is embarrassed by this video.) Mr. Balk records bits of digital merriment. A recent post involved a tweet from @Hooters. “Happy Women’s Day! Celebrate @Hooters, where every day is women’s day!” A response was “Get a load of the powerful sisterhoods on her”. Today’s WCS post involves the period abusing Joe.my.G-d. The current lineup at JMG involves a cnn poll on the Republican Presidential hopefuls. Of the top five in the polls, three are currently not in the race. The poll was taken by ORC international. Company spokesman Mork did not make a comment. In any event, the post today at WCS was a work of art. It is borrowed below for your reading pleasure. Pictures today are by chamblee54. I love love love Joe.My.God, but sometimes I wonder about the usefulness of political posts. I mean, after we’ve established that somebody is a brain-dead idiot, do we really need daily updates? Say your neighbor tells you that in the middle of the night a little yellow space alien walloped his butt with uncooked spaghetti. The next time you see him, are you going to ask for news? Will you email asking for any continuing developments? No. You’re going to write the dude off.  As the spokesperson for certified hate group Liberty Counsel, Matt Barber has been walloped with spaghetti more times than anyone can count. Yet today Joe quotes him attacking Ann Coulter for her ties to the right-wing gay group GOProud: “There is nothing conservative about the radical homosexual activist agenda which seeks to impose, under penalty of law, sexual anarchy.” Got that? We’re going to impose — under penalty of law — sexual anarchy. It’s crazy. Certifiably crazy. But, you know, I like it. I’m glad I read about it. It cheers me up to think idiots actually believe gay people have that kind of clout. That kind of vision. In fact, I want to hang on to this mental picture of our agenda. No longer will the police patrol our streets: no, they’ll be stationed in our bedrooms. “Let me see,” Officer Rachel Tension will bark as she ticks off items on her check list. “Rubber sheets, Slim Jims, vanilla pudding. Looks like you’re good to go!” “I’m sorry,” Sgt. Wilma Fingerdo will say to Mr. and Mrs. Demarest across the street as he gently maneuvers her into the missionary position, “but if you don’t have a black dude or a chicken, I’m going to have to write you up.”

The top yahoo search item was “most hated person in America”. PG, once the most hated person at RedoBlue, saw something to write about. Why is the corporate media fanning the flames of opprobrium?  The answer might say more about America, than about the winner of the contest.
The impeccable NY Daily News reports :”Casey Anthony is officially America’s Public Enemy No. 1. The 25-year-old brunette acquitted of killing her daughter tops a list of the nation’s most hated people, beating out loathsome lowlifes like reality-show creep Spencer Pratt, Nadya “Octomom” Suleman – and even O.J. Simpson, a new poll shows. The survey was released Wednesday by California-based E Poll Market Research. Of the 1,100 responders, 53% said they were aware of Anthony, and 94% said they disliked her, the poll showed. Additionally, 60% of poll-takers called Anthony “cold,” while 57% said she was “creepy.” The rankings come from the firm’s E-Score Celebrity rankings, which rates more than 6,000 celebrities and public figures based on their public awareness, appeal and other attributes.”
The story is a publicity coup for E Poll Market Research. The Celebrity rankings are sold to companies who subscribe to the service. The idea is to find the ideal famous person to endorse your products. One wonders what would be a good product for Casey Anthony to endorse. Duct tape comes to mind.
Psychology Today has an article about Anthony mania. It is boring. The article has a header ad for a book, Kabbalah on SEX: Make Love, Make Light.
When you google the phrase “the most hated…”, the suggestion is for “The most hated family in America”. There seems to be a consensus for some Jesus worshipers in Kansas. They probably take pride in the designation. The fact that many Jesus worshipers share their overall values is conveniently forgotten. While one medium is more flashy, the message is the same.
Sheknowsentertainment adds little to the story. They have one comment: “Rick Patel • August 11, 2011 • 2:23 AM There is no way shapely, seductive super-hottie Casey Anthony is “most hated”. That dubious distinction belongs to nasty Nancy Grace.”
Jezebel reports that “Jesse James Is The Most Hated Man In America”. For those, like PG, who have memory/apathy issues, it is noted that Mr. James is not the bank robber, but someone who was married to Sandra Bullock. He done her wrong. “And sure, Bullock will recover, at least professionally. But James is a woman’s worst nightmare: the lying, the cheating, the hairline.”
Many of the people who should win this award are not known to the public. The functionary in the bowels of government that allowed banks to only keep a tiny percentage of cash in reserve, while they made riskier and riskier loans. The wonk who decided to let the 911 plot go on unimpeded. The person who outsources an American jobs to India. The government which allowed housing to be built, not knowing where the water was going to come from. The list goes on and on.
Maybe Buffalo Beast has the answer. They published a story, “The BEAST 50 Most Loathsome People in America, 2005”. Number one was Pat Robertson, followed by Dick Chaney and George W. Bush. ( BHO was a little known Senator at the time.) Number four was YOU. “Charges: Silently enabling and contributing to the irreversible destruction of your planet. Absolving yourself of your responsibility to do anything about it that your immediate neighbors don’t. Assuming that it’s normal behavior to spend several hours each day totally inert and staring into a cathode ray tube. Substituting antidepressants for physical motion. Caring more about the personal relationships of people you will never meet than your own. Shrugging your shoulders at the knowledge that your government is populated by criminal liars intent on fooling you into impoverished, helpless submission. Cheering this process on.”
Pictures today are from The Library of Congress.

PG wondered what happened to Lurch, the harpsichord playing butler on The Addams Family. A bit of web searching turned up a festive facility called Findadeath. It turns out Ted Cassidy passed away in 1979, Maybe that scene in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid hurt more than we thought.
Findadeath, or FAD, turned out to be a delightful dungeon of digital death. The directory page has an alphabetic list, from Don Adams to Robert Young. Both men had active lives, full of danger and disappointment. Mr. Adams was a Marine at Guadalcanal. Mr. Young was an alcoholic with alzheimers, and was not invited to James Brolin’s wedding to Barbra Streisand. (Mr. Brolin was his co star on Marcus Welby M.D.) Both men lived to an old age, and died of “natural causes”.
Some TV shows have a group page. Ted Cassidy is with The Addams Family. Carolyn Jones survived marriage to Aaron Spelling, to play Morticia. Colon cancer claimed her. One time child actor Jackie Coogan played Uncle Fester, and had heart issues. ( Charles Addams says that the Uncle Fester character was modeled on himself.) Ted Cassidy was Thing, in addition to Lurch. After his death from heart failure, his children buried the urn, with his ashes, in the back yard, and then moved. No one knows what became of the urn.
Another dysfunctional TV family was the Clampets. Nancy Kulp ( whose middle name was Jane) played Jane Hathaway, and was out of the closet years before Ellen. According to FAD, this was not acting. Jerry Springer put a Clampet reunion together once, and the merriment was intense. “He (Max Baer, Jethro) spoke of Nancy Kulp’s dykedom, and the fact that Donna Douglas slathers on makeup with a trowel. He did tell one story about how he and Reenie (Irene Ryan, Granny) were doing a scene together once, and for some reason unbeknownst to him, she kicked him with one of those army boots she wore. He asked her (not so politely) why? She pointed upwards, “You were in my key light.”
In one episode of The Hillbillies, Bea Benederet played Jethro’s mother. Ms. Benederat was given a role on Petticoat Junction . Bea Benederet was the original voice of Betty Rubble. She was also the first choice to play Ethel Mertz, but had already committed to play the neighbor of George and Gracie.
It is tough to imagine a room big enough for Milton Berle and Groucho Marx. Apparently, it did happen once. “Groucho Marx had many stories about Berle. “You’re not funny,” he once told Berle. Berle’s reply, “Everything I know, I stole from you, Grouch.” Groucho, unplacated, shot back, “Then you didn’t listen.”
Looking down the list, (sponsored by stardoll , the world’s largest online fashion and dress up games community for girls! ), PG noted the name of Margaret Mitchell. FAD thinks the Museum on Peachtree Street is the real residence of Peggy Marsh. PG sent the following email to FAD.
I am a native of Atlanta GA, and have written about Maragaret Mitchell . I hate to be nit picky, but there are a couple of mistakes in your story.
The Margaret Mitchell House has little in common with “the dump” except the location. The really tacky apartment where Mr. and Mrs. Marsh lived was on Cresent Avenue, behind where the present house is. (I have never been to the museum.) The apartment building burned to the ground, with little left. The house that is there now was built from scratch, and bears little external resemblance to the apartments.
After she left Cresent Avenue, Mrs. Marsh ( She was married to John Marsh, an executive for Georgia Power Company. Her friends called her Peggy.) moved to an apartment at 4 17th Street. They lived there until they moved to Piedmont Avenue and South Prado. It was across from the Piedmont Driving Club, which made it convenient for Mrs. Marsh to get a drink.
“Genius and Heroin” reports that Peggy enjoyed a long cocktail hour at the Women’s club, where her husband joined her. They went across Peachtree (it is a straightaway, which is rare in Atlanta) into eternity. The book that I based my blog post on said she had been feeling unwell, and spent the afternoon in her apartment. Her and the husband parked on the other side of Peachtree, and tried to cross the street to the theater. Who knows what really happened?
The Theater survived until a few years ago, when it was torn down to make way for a high rise. It had a yellow glow in the lobby, and permanently smelled of popcorn.
PG has been to Peachtree and Tenth Street before.
People of a certain age will remember this area as the strip. The tenth street district was a neighborhood shopping area, up until the mid sixties. At some point, the old businesses started to move out and the hippies moved in. For a while, it was a festive party. Soon enough reality returned, and the area went into a crime filled decline.
The 999 complex is the neighborhood story in a nutshell. Before 1985, it was a block of small businesses. There was a hardware store, with the peace symbol set in tiles in the sidewalk. On Juniper Street stood the Langdon Court Apartments. They were named for PG’s great uncle Langdon Quin. Ru Paul used to stay there. He would sit out on a balcony, and wave to the traffic going by.
Across the street was a chinese restaurant, the House of Eng. A staircase on the side led to the Suzy Wong Lounge. Behind the building was an apartment building. It was one of the residences of Margaret Mitchell, while she wrote “Gone With The Wind”. She called it “the dump”, which was fairly accurate.
PG went to the House of Eng for lunch, one day in 1985. He noticed that he was the only customer in the house, at 12:30 pm on a weekday. After finishing his lunch, PG knew why.
At some point, it was decided to build a high rise there. Heery was one of the equity partners, along with a law firm and an ad agency. The building was designed by Heery (duh).The ad agency folded before the building opened, followed within a couple of years by the law firm. Heery was sold to a British company. PG does not know who owns the building now.
Pictures are from ” The Special Collections and Archives,Georgia State University Library”.

the police try to protect the banks – everything else is secondary … Oh look, BBC News is informing the rioters of tomorrows weather. … According to commercial on #skynews, all we need is someone to set out a table with some mozzarella on it… In 1992, a jury in California returned an upopular verdict. Two days later, the trouble hit downtown Atlanta. PG was working in the Healey Building that afternoon, and heard the helicopters overhead. There was a lot of soul searching, and people saying things needed to change. Today it is London. … Times headline:”Siege mentality grips a city that dare not show its colours”. It’s about #Tripoli, but could as well be about #londonriots … I’d call those who seem keen to own the #londonriots for their own agenda the real opportunists. Let’s get everyone safe and argue later… When you clock @Official_Tino with a kfc bargain bucket you know it’s nothing to do with #londonriots it’s just dinner time … What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun? … Or does it explode? [Langston Hughes … INFO: Due to public order disturbances, trains are currently not stopping at Ealing Broadway. … Stop the dole. They’d soon run out of special brew to steal. … The headline at cnn.com is “Dow plunges 630 points”. The headline at the fishwrapper is “Grieving mom blasts judge’s sentence”. Foxnews reports “Bad Turns to Worse on Wall Street”… In other news, I like most people, have wildly uninformed opinions and am merely trying to rationalize all this. I am sad … despite what the news reports, #londonriots around me are not angry protests, but more like a party … These people are not rioters or protestors, they are knobheads using any old excuse to behave like uneducated animals … This is a new type of riot – social media, mainly looting, not racial – police, press & politicians struggling to comprehend … A dozen or so teens with faces covered just walked past my window casually discussing where to go & what they want to steal … Get to the cause of discontented youth and sort out the bloody stupid parents who let their kids go feral in the first place! … The ##londonriots IRC is an amusing mix of nice geeks and trolls, as far as I can see … Seriously Boris! Send out the water cannons. Hit the fires and the scumbags at the same time. Don’t make me come down there! … Mobs of yobs: a scarf across your face now allows you to have a lack of respect for your own community and human life?! … Coverage of the #londonriots non-existent in the US. @Guardian and @LBC973 are the places to go for real-time reports … This country is too soft. Get the army in there, give the police more power and hammer these scumbags with severe punishment … Heartbreaking. @Meera_Selva’s interview with a man outside his family business, burnt down after 144 years … To ask why they are rioting isn’t to condone the violence. Why is that so confusing to some? #londonriots …RT @mambutcher What’s left to express anger at economic inequality? Not the labour party. Not the unions. This is what happens. #londonriots … Shame that this is the city holding the #Olympics in less than a year. #londonriots … Shame that this is the city holding the #Olympics in less than a year … My bra is REALLY tight today. Sorry, Grrr riots. Back on track now … how low can you get, some idiots approached a injured guy lying on the ground and mugged him. how big of them. Just obnoxious … Why use horses? The poor things are only gonna get hurt! … I’ll give the police the same advice I give to lovers- use whatever force is necessary … WTF @channel4news reporting that Syrian news is branding #londonriots as an uprising against police brutality in the UK! … Feral rat boasting about his loot http://t.co/7VTCmmm Retweet & ridicule the loser. #londonriots cc @metpoliceuk @CO11MetPolice…mate if i get one more message containing a photo of you violating your cats arse with a fire poker whilest you give a thumps up to the camera I will have to report you… Rioting in Clitheroe due to shortage of Moet… Waterstone’s employee on the news: “We’ll stay open, if they steal some books they might learn something” … Can anyone help an elderly man who is stuck in our now locked pub wanting to get home no taxis in sight. Anyone?

The Last Meals Project is a 28 page website. It shows a picture of an executed person, along with a picture of the last meal. TLMP does not support the death penalty. HT to Andrew Sullivan. Pictures are from The Library of Congress. Part two of this feature is a repost of a Chamblee54 post about last meals.
The first executee featured is Ted Bundy (steak, eggs, hash browns, coffee). Page four is Karla Faye Tucker (garden salad with ranch dressing, a peach, a banana), the first Texas person. More people are offed by the State of Texas than any other state, as well as the European continent. Another celebrity is Timothy McVeigh (two pints of mint chocolate chip ice cream). Mr. McVeigh is listed for Indiana, when he was processed by the U.S. Government.
Page five is a list of supplies for “lethal injection”. It shows sodium thiopental, which is no longer used in executions. The total cost of supplies for a chemical execution is said to be $86.08.
Aileen Carol Wuornos (1 cup of coffee). James David Autry (hamburger, french fries, Dr. Pepper). Odell Barnes Jr. (justice, equality, world peace). Gary Leon Brown (ice cream sandwich). Reginald Lenard Reeves (four pieces of fried chicken, two cokes). Stacy Lamont Lawton (one jar of dill pickles). Victor Feguer (a single unpitted olive).
Page 25 makes the point that $100 million a year is spent in the USA seeking the death penalty. It is a jobs program for the legal industry. Page 20 is devoted to Jonathan Wayne Nobles of Texas, For his last meal, he requested the Eucharist Sacrament.

There is a story of a man who was afraid of mushrooms, but ordered them for his last meal. The details of a condemned man’s last meal are part of the death penalty lifestyle. The State of Texas used to document the last meals on a website, but that has been discontinued.
A yahoo page about last meals has a quote from the former warden of the prison at Jackson, Georgia. The facility at Jackson is the site for executions. The name of the former warden is Fred Head.
Slate.com had a story about last meals recently. Some details about what can and cannot be ordered were shown, and some of the shortcuts some states…notably Virginia…take. A famous execution in Arkansas was remembered. This execution was authorized by Governor Bill Clinton. “In 1992, Arkansas convict Ricky Ray Rector, who had brain damage from shooting himself in the head after killing a police officer, ate a final meal of steak, fried chicken, and cherry Kool-Aid, but famously said he wanted to save his pecan pie for later.”
In nearby Oklahoma, Jimmy Dale Bland was processed June 26, 2007. Mr. Bland had terminal lung cancer, and would die within six months anyway. His last meal was “hot and spicy chicken breast, two slices of sausage pizza with extra cheese, a slice of German chocolate cake, a pint of French vanilla ice cream and a Dr. Pepper.” Also in Oklahoma was the final lifestyle choice of Thomas Grasso, on March 20, 1995. The final words of Mr. Grasso were “Please tell the media, I did not get my Spaghetti-O’s, I got spaghetti. I want the press to know.”
Ricky Lee Sanderson, in North Carolina turned down a final meal on Jan. 30, 1998. “I didn’t take [the last meal] because I have very strong convictions about abortion and the 33 million babies that have been aborted in this country. Those babies never got a first meal and that’s why I didn’t take the last in their memory.”
In 1983, Robert Dale Conklin had a dispute with a friend. Mr. Conklin killed his good buddy, cut the remains into little pieces, and left them in a dumpster. The fact that the deceased was an attorney did not justify this action, and the State of Georgia executed Mr. Conklin in 2005. PG is confident that this execution has a strong deterrent value.
At the time of his indiscretion, Mr. Conklin was a manager at a McDonalds, and he knew his food. For his final meal, Mr. Conklin got ” a filet mignon wrapped with bacon; de-veined shrimp sautéed in garlic butter with lemon; baked potato with butter, sour cream, chives and real bacon bits; corn on the cob; asparagus with hollandaise sauce; French bread with butter; goat cheese; cantaloupe; apple pie; vanilla bean ice cream and iced tea. Prison officials said he ate the entire meal, cleaning two plates.”

An aged count once lived in Switzerland, who had an only son, but he was stupid, and could learn nothing. Then said the father: ‘Hark you, my son, try as I will I can get nothing into your head. You must go from hence, I will give you into the care of a celebrated master, who shall see what he can do with you.’ The youth was sent into a strange town, and remained a whole year with the master. At the end of this time, he came home again, and his father asked: ‘Now, my son, what have you learnt?’ ‘Father, I have learnt what the dogs say when they bark.’ ‘Lord have mercy on us!’ cried the father; ‘is that all you have learnt? I will send you into another town, to another master.’ The youth was taken thither, and stayed a year with this master likewise. When he came back the father again asked: ‘My son, what have you learnt?’ He answered: ‘Father, I have learnt what the birds say.’ Then the father fell into a rage and said: ‘Oh, you lost man, you have spent the precious time and learnt nothing; are you not ashamed to appear before my eyes? I will send you to a third master, but if you learn nothing this time also, I will no longer be your father.’ The youth remained a whole year with the third master also, and when he came home again, and his father inquired: ‘My son, what have you learnt?’ he answered: ‘Dear father, I have this year learnt what the frogs croak.’ Then the father fell into the most furious anger, sprang up, called his people thither, and said: ‘This man is no longer my son, I drive him forth, and command you to take him out into the forest, and kill him.’ They took him forth, but when they should have killed him, they could not do it for pity, and let him go, and they cut the eyes and tongue out of a deer that they might carry them to the old man as a token.
The youth wandered on, and after some time came to a fortress where he begged for a night’s lodging. ‘Yes,’ said the lord of the castle, ‘if you will pass the night down there in the old tower, go thither; but I warn you, it is at the peril of your life, for it is full of wild dogs, which bark and howl without stopping, and at certain hours a man has to be given to them, whom they at once devour.’ The whole district was in sorrow and dismay because of them, and yet no one could do anything to stop this. The youth, however, was without fear, and said: ‘Just let me go down to the barking dogs, and give me something that I can throw to them; they will do nothing to harm me.’ As he himself would have it so, they gave him some food for the wild animals, and led him down to the tower. When he went inside, the dogs did not bark at him, but wagged their tails quite amicably around him, ate what he set before them, and did not hurt one hair of his head. Next morning, to the astonishment of everyone, he came out again safe and unharmed, and said to the lord of the castle: ‘The dogs have revealed to me, in their own language, why they dwell there, and bring evil on the land. They are bewitched, and are obliged to watch over a great treasure which is below in the tower, and they can have no rest until it is taken away, and I have likewise learnt, from their discourse, how that is to be done.’ Then all who heard this rejoiced, and the lord of the castle said he would adopt him as a son if he accomplished it successfully. He went down again, and as he knew what he had to do, he did it thoroughly, and brought a chest full of gold out with him. The howling of the wild dogs was henceforth heard no more; they had disappeared, and the country was freed from the trouble.
After some time he took it in his head that he would travel to Rome. On the way he passed by a marsh, in which a number of frogs were sitting croaking. He listened to them, and when he became aware of what they were saying, he grew very thoughtful and sad. At last he arrived in Rome, where the Pope had just died, and there was great doubt among the cardinals as to whom they should appoint as his successor. They at length agreed that the person should be chosen as pope who should be distinguished by some divine and miraculous token. And just as that was decided on, the young count entered into the church, and suddenly two snow-white doves flew on his shoulders and remained sitting there. The ecclesiastics recognized therein the token from above, and asked him on the spot if he would be pope. He was undecided, and knew not if he were worthy of this, but the doves counselled him to do it, and at length he said yes. Then was he anointed and consecrated, and thus was fulfilled what he had heard from the frogs on his way, which had so affected him, that he was to be his Holiness the Pope. Then he had to sing a mass, and did not know one word of it, but the two doves sat continually on his shoulders, and said it all in his ear. This story courtesy of Project Gutenberg.

At the 24 minute mark of an online discusssion , the subjects becomes people who are defending BHO online. It seems like in spite of…or maybe because of…the tsunami of Obama bashing in public discourse, that some people are willing to cut the man some slack. PG has seen this with other presidents … the opponents go on and on and on, saying horrible things about the man, until some people hear so much that they begin to sympathize with the POTUS. After all, the man was popular enough to win the election ( or get close enough in the electoral votes to enable the Supreme Court to install him).
PG made a comment, which attracted a reply. A lively discussion of media racism ensued.
1- Maybe Ms. Ms. Soltis can bring her band along and do a singing diavlog. Mr. Scher can dance when it is appropriate. 2- The talk of “liberals” coming to the defense of BHO should not be surprising. The anti-BHO forces have gone for rhetorical overkill since the 2008 campaign. People are getting tired of this, and feeling sympathy for the embattled POTUS. 3- Another factor is the perception that the anti BHO forces are a bunch of right wing body parts. These are frequently very unpleasant people. There is a perception of racism, which leads to point number four. 4- BHO is the first dark skinned POTUS. Many people feel an ethnic kinship with him.
Sulla the Dictator … It seems that it is impossible to critique the President for anything without it being called racism. The commenteriat, longtime allies of the current ruling regime, have become unhinged.
PG has been watching politics for nine presidencies now, going back to Lyndon Johnson. LBJ escalated the war in Vietnam. A hundred men died every week, and the war became very unpopular. The word in the streets was “hey hey LBJ, how many men did you kill today?.” In 1968, he decided not to run for another term in office. The next POTUS was Richard Nixon, and he was the beneficiary of what we will call derangement backlash.
Tricky Dick played hardball. He had enemies, and when they had a chance to get back at him, they did. America wallowed in Watergate for the first twenty months of Mr. Nixon’s second term. After a while, you began to hear people say ” I admire his guts for fighting to stay in office”. As oval office tapes later revealed, the man was guilty as sin, but that didn’t stop him from fighting like a caught thief. Finally, he resigned, and Gerald Ford took over. There were jokes about Mr. Ford, and gossip about his family, but no derangement.
Jimmy Carter was the object of intense criticism, a good bit of it justified. He was followed by Ronald Reagan, who was the master of show business. There was grumbling about him, but the bottom line was that he was a likeable man. George H.W. Bush won a fast, low cost war. There were complaints, and a third party candidate that helped Bill Clinton move into the oval office. The era of presidential derangement was about to begin.
From the minute Bill Clinton moved into the White House, the press trashed him relentlessly. Talk radio was becoming a force, and the likes of Rush Limbaugh competed to see who could outdo who in saying rude things about Mr. and Mrs. Clinton. (The lack of chivalry when talking about Hilary Clinton was astonishing.) This didn’t stop the man from being reelected in a landslide, only to be impeached because of blowjob related issues. After a while, no matter how vocal the denunciations of the President were, there were supporters who just tuned out the haters.
George W. Bush had a quiet beginning to his Presidency, until 911 jumpstarted the war machine. People were appalled by the war in Babylon, and started saying very rude things about Mr. Bush. The phrase “Bush derangement syndrome” entered the conversation. Soon enough, those who supported him and his war began to fight back against all the hysterical criticism.
With BHO, the denunciation of the President has hit a new low. Hardly a day goes by without a new urban legend. While his record in office is certainly open to criticism, one has to wonder if maybe he could have done better with a little cooperation from his enemies.
An added factor with BHO is his dark skin. Millions of americans feel a bond with him because of this. When they hear criticism of the President, they only love him more. While some of the screams of racism are exaggerated, the concern is a legitimate one. Crude jokes about BHO may entertain the Tea Party crowd, but they anger many supporters. The support of BHO grows stronger.
With all Presidents, the matter of simple patriotism should be raised. The man is the elected President of the United States. (Even George W. Bush won the popular vote for reelection.) While legitimate criticism is expected, at some point the over the top POTUS bashing leans dangerously close to treason. People should consider that if the President fails, America fails along with him.
Picture today are from The Library of Congress.