Strange . . .

. . . but compelling . . .


(from http://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/158933012/the-strange-story-of-the-man-behind-strange-fruit)
One of Billie Holiday's most iconic songs is "Strange Fruit," a haunting protest against the inhumanity of racism. Many people know that the man who wrote the song was inspired by a photograph of a lynching. But they might not realize that he's also tied to another watershed moment in America's history.

The man behind "Strange Fruit" is New York City's Abel Meeropol, and he really has two stories. They both begin at Dewitt Clinton High School, a public high school in the Bronx that has an astonishing number of famous people in its alumni. James Baldwin went there. So did Countee Cullen, Richard Rodgers, Burt Lancaster, Stan Lee, Neil Simon, Richard Avedon and Ralph Lauren.

Meeropol graduated from Dewitt Clinton in 1921; he went on to teach English there for 17 years. He was also a poet and a social activist, says Gerard Pelisson, who wrote a book about the school.

In the late 1930s, Pellison says, Meeropol "was very disturbed at the continuation of racism in America, and seeing a photograph of a lynching sort of put him over the edge."

Meeropol once said the photograph "haunted" him "for days." So he wrote a poem about it, which was then printed in a teachers union publication. An amateur composer, Meeropol also set his words to music. He played it for a New York club owner — who ultimately gave it to Billie Holiday.

When Holiday decided to sing "Strange Fruit," the song reached millions of people. While the lyrics never mention lynching, the metaphor is painfully clear:

Southern trees bear a strange fruit,
Blood on the leaves and blood at the root,
Black body swinging in the Southern breeze,
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees.

Pastoral scene of the gallant South,
The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth,
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh,
And the sudden smell of burning flesh!

Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck,
For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck,
For the sun to rot, for a tree to drop,
Here is a strange and bitter crop.

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OHO's "Ocean City Ditty," the CD single is now available at http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/oho4
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Leveling . . .

Michael Bloomberg will use his personal fortune to fight, or at least counter, the efforts of the National Rifle Association. $50 million will be dedicated to his new group Everytown for Gun Safety, an umbrella for his two other gun control groups: Mayors Against Illegal Guns and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America.

The new organization will battle the NRA on its own turf and with its very own tactics. Shannon Watts, founder of Moms Demand Actions says Women, and more particularly mothers, will be the key demographic in the outreach to curb gun violence. "Moms are afraid that our children will be taken away. In the end, that's the emotion that's going to win."

Influencing those in charge of writing gun policy though, will be the ultimate goal beginning with creating a political action committee to elect gun safety candidates to office and a 501(c)(4), an IRS classification used to raise unlimited amounts of money to influence voters. It aims to motivate a million pro-gun safety voters to go to the polls in November. The group will also submit a gun safety questionnaire to candidates and keep a score card of how elected officials vote on gun-related issues, another NRA tactic.

By matching the NRA's financial heft, Bloomberg makes the challenge to the NRA a little less daunting. The NRA has spent more than $30 million lobbying elected officials since 1998. Its efforts have been very successful in Congress over the past decade, defeating attempts to ban assault weapons and expand background checks.
(Thanks to http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/15/us/bloomberg-gun-safety-initiative/index.html?hpt=hp_t2)

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Common. . .

. . . sense. . .


(Thanks to Medea Benjamin of truthout.com)

Some common sense to begin restoring America to its former position of respect and admiration:

1. No more drone strikes.  They don't stop, but help to make terrorists.

2. Save money and help the cause by closing the drone airbases.

3. Free Guantanamo prisoners which have already been cleared for release. Holding them is an affront to humanity and hypocrisy with regard to our values.

4. Apologize and compensate the families of innocent people hurt or killed by drones or other military action.

5. Withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan. 

6. Talk. The Taliban and more rational elements of Al Qaeda have indicated they are open to negotiations. History shows a large percentage of terrorists groups have been dissolved by joining the political process. 

7. End support of dictatorships and repressive leaders. Business selling weapons might be good for US weapons makers but not for the rest of us.

8. Support non-violent democracy movements. Chaos and instability only help terrorists.

9. Stop disregarding international law and national sovereignty in killing terrorism suspects. 

10. Use foreign aid to support education, healthcare and elimination of poverty.

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Thought. . .

 . . . so?   Or not? . . .

(from "Thomas Jefferson;  Author of America" by Christopher Hitchens)
". . . As his days began to wane, Jefferson more than once wrote to friends that he faced the approaching end without either hope or fear.  This was as much as to say, in the most unmistakable terms, that he was not a Christian.  As to whether he was an atheist, we must reserve judgment if only because of the prudence he was compelled to observe during his political life.  But as he had written to his nephew Peter Carr as early as 1787, one must not "be frightened from this inquiry by any fear of its consequences.  If it ends in a belief that there is no God, you will find incitements to virtue in the comfort and pleasantness you fell in its exercise, and the love of others which it will procure you.". . . "

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Reel. . .

. . . I mean REAL. . . the real deal!

(from http://www.raybly.com/)
"Ray Bly
U.S. Congress, District 2
My run for 2010 Congress
Why I am disillusioned about America is because of the money involved in getting elected to office. It takes millions of dollars to become a U.S.

Congressman and millions more to become a Senator and hundreds of millions to become President. The average campaign for a candidate for office costs them $1 to as much as $10 a vote and I've heard it's gone as high as $30 a vote. The only way you can get this money is from special interests and the corporate world and of course, if you get elected with corporate and special interest money, you have to vote on behalf of these groups. This is why our government for close to a century is now wholly owned and controlled by our special interests and our corporate world. No candidate wants to stand up against them because they will not get elected, or get the money they need to run."

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Broken

. . . record. . .

 

Mittster says, 
"The president's campaign falls far short of the magnitude of these times. And the presidency of the last four years has fallen far short of the promises of his last campaign," Romney said. "Four years ago, America voted for a post-partisan president, but they have seen the most partisan of political of presidents, and a Washington in gridlock because of it."

Now let's look at this carefully.  Here is a man who was a one-term governor and head of a 'global management consulting firm'  who conveniently espouses positions that appeal to any particular audience to whom he is speaking at any particular time, and running as the Republican party candidate, claiming that the sitting president is the "most partisan of political of presidents"(sic) and has caused gridlock because of it. 

Clearly this man does not live in a factual world.

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Is this the real life. . .

. . . is this just fantasy?. . .

 (from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-maher/todd-akin-republicans_b_1826617.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false)
". . . Or as it's known on Capitol Hill, supply-side economics. Remember that magic beans theory? That you actually bring in more revenue by bringing in less? Ronald Reagan believed it. But at least back in the '80s it was new. The thing is, we tried it, and it doesn't work. Yet, Paul Ryan, who every shit-for-brains pundit in America keeps telling us is a "serious" guy, still believes in the supply-side theory. All the Republicans do. They all believe in something that both science and history have shown to be pure fantasy. The symbol for their party shouldn't be an elephant -- it should be a unicorn. . . "

". . . The grown-up answer is: identify problems scientifically, prioritize and solve. The Republican answer is: there isn't a problem. And anyone who tells you different is a liar who hates America. . . "

". . . Next week in Tampa the Republicans must admit that the difference between a GOP convention and Comic-Con is that the people at Comic-Con have a much firmer grasp of reality.. . "

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I prefer. . .

 . . . to give benefit of the doubt whenever possible. . .

. . . but I don't believe any benefit remains for one who continues to say such things as. . .

(from http://santorumexposed.com/wp/?page_id=22)
    “I don’t believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute. The idea that the church can have no influence or no involvement in the operation of the state is absolutely antithetical to the objectives and vision of our country” on the absolute separation of church and state, 2/26/2012

    “…everything I’ve read shows that we would not have gotten this information as to who this man was if it had not been gotten information from people who were subject to enhanced interrogation. And so this idea that we didn’t ask that question while Khalid Sheikh Mohammed was being waterboarded, he [John McCain] doesn’t understand how enhanced interrogation works. I mean, you break somebody, and after they’re broken, they become cooperative. And that’s when we got this information. And one thing led to another, and led to another, and that’s how we ended up with bin Laden.”  on John McCain, who was tortured as a prisoner of war, doesn’t understand “enhanced interrogation”, 5/17/11

    “A lesbian woman came up to me and said, ‘why are you denying me my right?’ I said, ‘well, because it’s not a right.’ It’s a privilege that society recognizes because society sees intrinsic value to that relationship over any other relationship.”  on gay adoption, 5/3/11

    “The reason Social Security is in big trouble is we don’t have enough workers to support the retirees. A third of all the young people in America are not in America today because of abortion, because one in three pregnancies end in abortion."  on how abortion is responsible for Social Security’s problems, 3/29/11

    “I find it almost remarkable for a black man to say ‘now we are going to decide who are people and who are not people’.”  on President Obama’s race and pro-choice beliefs, 1/19/2011

    “But is there such thing as a sincere liberal Christian, which says that we basically take this document and re-write it ourselves? Is that really Christian? That’s a bigger question for me. And the answer is, no, it’s not. I don’t think there is such a thing. To take what is plainly written and say that I don’t agree with that, therefore, I don’t have to pay attention to it, means you’re not what you say you are. You’re a liberal something, but you’re not a Christian. That’s sort of how I look at it.

    “When you go so far afield of that and take what is a salvation story and turn it into a liberation theology story, which is done in the Catholic world as well as in the evangelical world, you have abandoned Christendom, in my opinion. And you don’t have a right to claim it.”  on “Is Obama a sincere, liberal Christian?”, 10/200

    “Is anyone saying same-sex couples can’t love each other? I love my children. I love my friends, my brother. Heck, I even love my mother-in-law. Should we call these relationships marriage, too?”
on love that same-sex couples share, 5/22/2008

. . . but having depleted all the magnanimity and tolerance that I can possibly muster, I must now paraphrase one of the most opinionated yet talented artists of our time,  "Rickie's such an asshole."

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