Vote - Not For Rahm, but Vote! It is a Thing of Beautry!

This is a painting by Abstract Expressionist painter Joan Mitchell ( 1926-1992).  Joan Mitchell was the age of my parents and like them emerged from the crucible that is the 20th Century.  Her work above is called City Landscape.

I see it in much the same manner,  as when I look north from the roof of Leo High School and a pretty cool view it is -gliding the eyes over Hamilton and Ogden Parks and catching the slice of Englewood wedged between Wentworth and Vincennes Avenues ignoring, as Chicago does, the stockyard neighborhoods and sighting the twin pagodas of Chinatown to scope in the glass and steel of Rahm Oz.

Art can give one perspective beyond the gallery or coffee table. I don't have two nickels to rub together; therefore I use everything.  

Take time and vote tomorrow.  I expect a low turn-out and the news media has done its level best to unsure that fact.  They want every person to believe that elections, like David Axelrod and Hillary Clinton, are inevitable.

I caught Comb Over Dave after Mass yesterday on CBS and I remembered him as the scruffy hippie tag-along reporter of Richie Daley in exile.  Dave smelled a gold mine and struck it rich with Richie.  He used the very same drop poison breadcrumbs techniques* that made a Believer out of him and took credit from the real political architects who made not only Richie Daley, but also Barack Obama.

Richie drank the Progressive Soup offered to him by Esau Axelrod.  Daley needed Progressive cache and Axlerod gave Richie the Mikva Challengers and the gold that goes with them - PR maven Marilyn Katz, the Universities of Chicago and Northwestern, Peoples Law Office, Miner/Davis Real Estate and the editorial boards of both papers.

Rahm Emanuel was appointed to the Richie Daley Campaign for States Attorney by the Daley bundlers of Stepan Chemical.  He too served early and often.

Daley was no longer the leader of Wards Organizations** in exile, he was Mao on the long march, because of David Axelrod.

That said.  We have had enough of the chains forged in Hyde Park.  Let's have a Selma moment tomorrow and break them chains.  Vote so Rahm does not get one vote over 50%. It would be a 'thing of beautry,' as former Mayor Daley might say, when you really get down and scrutin everything. Of couse one should have someone from University of Chicago to parse the context for you.

The City Landscape deserves a good dusting off. 

* Axelrod is a nasty piece of work - always ahas been.  Here he was setting up Bernie Carey, for Richie.

** Daley signalled the world that he had turned his back on neighborhoods forever, when he abandoned life-long friend Alderman Patrick Huels.  The old ethnic Catholic neighborhood types would become fodder for investigative -nitwits like Andy Shaw, Carol Marin, Chuck Goudie and others -anyone who helped Daley rise and was from the Old Wards was now a Dave Axelrod Poison Breadcrumb.  Richie was and shall remain off limits to scrutiny.

Black Sails Season Two Raises The Rainbow Flag: Must The Pirate's Heart Want What the LBTQ Want Too?

 Yo, Ho and Ho again! Cable TV's Black Sails just hoisted the Jolliest of Rogers on a Rainbow Banner!

 The show is gorgeous to look at and action-packed, but over the first season and a half there didn’t seem to be a lot there specifically for gay (male) audiences. Sure, the show features many attractive actors, among them Tom Hopper, Toby Stephens, Zach McGowan and Toby Schmitz. (Added bonus, a couple of these guys seem to have no qualms about full frontal nudity.) The series also can boast a central lesbian character– a beautiful and clever prostitute named Max (Jessica Parker Kennedy) who has had two very passionate relationships with other central female characters. But gay men at least seemed pretty much absent from the canvas. That is, until last night’s episode.

  ABC - the Disney network is and has been fociferously gay. Sonic fast foods demands to sell the Rainbow Flag along with its hot dogs.  Fair enough.  Hollwood demands to be heard and its message for last twenty years or so, is loud and proud about homosexuals.  No big deal.

Genres?  The Pirate movie.  Gay subtext universal?  Gilbert & Sullivan defined gay according to the now archaic meaning. Douglas Fairbanks, Ty Power and Errol Flynn the same - cut a throat and lark-out a joyful 'Ha,Ha, Me Hearties!'

Real pirates.  The Gangster Disciples of Carribean were as homophobic as People and Folks demand of stone killers and players.

Hollywood?  Tin-ear. Peter Pan, not Peter Blood!

Pre-Stonewall Maritime Homosexual practices were punishable by death.  Homosexuals remained closeted, or went rouge like Claggert in Herman Melville's novella Billy Budd about the homsexual stalking of a handsome sailor, by the afroemnamed Master at Arms.

The Starz channel and other cable television outlets are thick with gay themed series, movies, documentaries, stand-up concerts and investigations.

America's part in WWII was cover nicely with two ten part series - Band of Brothers and The Pacific.  Vietnam, The Depression, Korea?  Not much to tell there.

Sex sells and blood sells.  Now mix them up and as quick as you can Say Will and Grace. . . you get Sex Cells and Bloods Cells and . . .Pirates! Ambiguous . . .nope, better yet, . . .A Pirate Captain who is Questioning!

Piracy is finally out of Davy Jones' Locker.  Black Sails, a pirate series packed with the usual cable TV KY Jelly lubrication of sapphic pillow talk and back-porch majority rule in matters of the heart, now has added the heart.  Capatin Flint is a Nancy boy. 

Yep, the man who terrorized the warm waters of the Carribean is really a just a man in full denial of his lust and longing for an English Lord.  Captain Flint is now fully out of the closet and liberated.

Pirates. Buccaneers. High Sea free booters.  Captain Blood?  You know.

We get it homosexuals (Male/Female & Whatever) make up 2% of our human population.

Gays sell us our mortgages; they people our villages; they do more than dance in musical comedies. We understand that and we treat them like neighbors. I nod with sympathy whenever Stephen Fry cries about his gender specific heart breaks.  I get it. It is no tiresome.

Black Sails was a fairly entertaining pirate series. I'm off it. Black Sails?  Not worth watching Brokeback Cove.   What's next, The Enola Gay - Now It Can Be Sung! ?    

Did the gay agenda jump the shark with this one?  I think so.

George Pullman! - You Didn't Build Pullman! Pullman Porters Did!

President Obama, flanked by every middle class hating creep on the public tit, makes Pulman a National Park

Super. Pullman is a National Park.

Pullman?  Did George Pullman build that? Nope.

The James Buchanan of modern Presidents, President Barack H. Obama, came to Chicago to stump for Rahm Emanuel at Mendel High School . . . .at Gwedolyn Brooks College Preparatory Magnet Blue Riboon Public School that Ain't Fenger to announce that Pullman is a National Park.

Obama's Pullman is history going through its final rinse cycle. "“This site is at the heart of what would become America’s Labor Movement — and as a consequence, at the heart of what would become America’s middle class,*”

President History for Real Dummies went on to highlight the champions of labor who emerged to transform all workers into middle class Babbitts,  " “I want future generations to know that while the Pullman porters helped push forward our rights to vote, and to work, and to live as equals, their legacy goes beyond even that,” Obama said. “These men and women without rank, without wealth or title, became the bedrock of a new middle class. These men and women gave their children and grandchildren opportunities they never had.”

Nota Bene and hold this thought - The Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters (BSCP) was, in 1925, the first labor organization led by African Americans to receive a charter in the American Federation of Labor (AFL). It merged in 1978 with the Brotherhood of Railway and Airline Clerks (BRAC), now known as the Transportation Communications International Union. Prior to that African Americans who fled Jim Crow hatred in he South . . .scabbed. They took jobs Labor Union Members on strike once had and did so igniting race riots up to and through 1919.Chicago police protecting African American strikebreakers board a trolley to Chicago Stockyards on Strike in 1904.

Obama Labor history in America begins in 1925 and graces one and all with Civil Rights!

What happened in the Pullman Neighborhood before the Gwendolyn Brooks Presidential yak, is irre;evant . . . . adistraction.. . . .somethings that belongs in the deep dark recesses of historical Dawn Clark Netschy and curries only to Barbara Flynns.

• 1860 - War's aComin'!  George Pullman dreams of a luxury railroad car for rich war profiteers that has sleeping accomodations and upholstered walls
• 1861's with the American Civil War soaking the earth with white guilt, George Pullman goes to Colorado and gets 'capital' for his idea by running a store and an ore refinery.  No Goldman Sachs and no Illinois Legislature gave George Pullman and 'free money.'
• 1863 George got his pockets stuffed with money! Returns to Chicago.
• 1865 -A Pullman is included in Lincoln's funeral
• 1967- George Pullman aged 36 is a plutocrat with his Pullman Palace Car Company.
• 1877 George Pullman aged 47 is already as goofy as Bill Gates and becomes Social Reformer with an ideal city based upon a European model of German hygene and Swiss intolerance! He builds Pullman, Illinois to house his workers, pay them in company scrip, and bully rag their hours off
• 1886 Harmarket Riots break the Knights of Labor and allow radicals to dictate labor policy
• 1894 Pullman Strike George pulls in Illinois National Guard and U.S.7th Cavalry to break the stike as well as thousands of scabs -strike is broken, but so George.   No Pullman Porters participated with the strikers.
• 1897 George Pullman dies and in this sweet labor note  

There were strikes aplenty in Chicago from 1897 -1925.  There was a World War.  There was also Prohibition and George Pullman would have been very proud.

Pullman is now a National Park - Super.

*The people who most detest the American Middle Class and the hostory of Labor spout cooing love for both.  Obama is contemptuous of us. Rahm is out to end us and the Springfield nitwits will see that it is done.

ReBooting Ralphie Martire -Carol Marin et al Want Illinois Dead Broke, for the Children!

                                                       Ralph Martire-Some -King of Illinois!

The absolute king of Illinois is not Mike Madigan, let alone Bruce Rauner.  The absolute king of Illinois is a dandified meat-head with a slide rule -Ralph Martire.

"  Let’s start with the initial flawed premises. The Democrats never should have made the tax increase temporary from the start because they were not dealing with a temporary problem when they passed it.
Illinois’ revenue shortcomings weren’t primarily caused by the temporary — albeit significant — recent economic downturn, but instead are structural. Indeed, the state’s tax policy is so poorly designed that for decades revenue growth hasn’t kept pace with service cost growth — even when no services are added or expanded. Structural problems can’t be rectified with temporary solutions."

I have followed this goof's magical career from the moment Dawn Clark Netsch plucked him from obscurity and tossed Illinois into permanent and unresolvable debt. This is the creepy little public money trough slurp per who made "Fair Share" the buzz word for kill the middle class. He'd say horseshit like , 'We don't have a Revenue Problem in Illinois; we have a problem of will!'  Take money from earners and slather it all over dependant agencies and select demographics.

Ralph Martire - you could not find this tax-happy mope anywhere near the press for the last two years, because Pat Quinn thought he could get re-elected.

Now, you can not avoid this toxic architect of fiscal ruin!



No less a jabbering nitwait than Carol Marin hosted Ralphie Martire on WTTW last evening in an attempt to make Rauner sound like Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker.

Rauner couldn't carry Walker's jock strap on his best day. Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner is Rahm Emanuel with all of his fingers.

We will never reboot Illinois until hogs like Ralph Martire get the permanent boot from public life.

Go to Work,or Play Sick Mountie of the Yukon All Day

Outpost of the Mounties                                        Outpost Hickey in 2014 before wind took down the basketball rigWhen the summer wind comes a-winging,

Then I’m feeling so alone.

There’s a melody softly singing,                       

Bringing me memories of home.
"Due to severe weather conditions, we will be closed tomorrow, Thursday, February 19, 2015."


Leo High School soundly decided to call off school due to the dangerous winds and Artic temperatures. we had an Alumni meeting at Father Perez Knights of Columbus Council 1444 last evening, while Lions of the Hard wood hosted our Brother School - Brother Rice in the 3rd Floor Gym.  I have yet to track down the score of that game - must have run late*.

We are in the frozen North! Midwest. South, East you name it.  Chicago was again blessed by God and avoided tons of the white stuff now crusting Indiana and Michigan.

I decided to come into the school and prep some stock donation with the requisite info and my signature - drop off Alumni donations and avoid being an Arctic cocoon.

My late wife Mary like corny old movies that had Singing Mounties, be they standard black and white epics, or Shirley Temple's blubbering interrrupted by song.  Whenever our Bourbonnais, Illinois apartment heat failed to keep up with the threshing winds and the thermostat dropped below 60 degrees, she'd say, "Time to play Sick Mountie!"

That meant that the two of us and later the three of us would cocoon within quilts, sleeping bags, Army blankets and even thick bath towels.

I though of that last night, when we got the call 8:53PM announcing "No Classes."

I covered the cat in an extra blanket and Sophie objected not a bit.

Car fired up fine, no snow.  Really cold, as predicted. 

It is Lent - be productive, somewhat!  Anytway, no oone to play Sick Mountie with but that damn scrawny cat.

* UPDATE Brother Rice 51, Leo 48: Mike Shepski scored 12 points in leading Brother Rice (11-16) to a spot in the consolation championship. Morgan Taylor added 11 points for the Crusaders and Jake Kosakowski had 10 in the contest at Loyola. Kewan Smith registered a game-high 21 points for Leo (9-15) and Darius Branch finished with 18.

Ward Bond Speaks to Chicago Woman About Voting for Rahm

Chicago - Streeterville: A Fortyish nurse sits in Starbucks and Mayor Rahm Emanuel enters; tells her to put down her book and vote for him, because he is a doer and a fighter.

From the herd of over cafeated WIFI operators and tumb-zombies rises huge man.  A Real man.  Ward Bond and he softly engages the woman, after Rahm's move to his next victim.

Ward Bond [whispering to keep babies from crying] "I heard every word you said. I've been trying to keep my nose out of your business, but I can't stand by any longer and watch you make a fool of yourself. "
Ms. Chicago, "Oh, Mr. Bond ..........."
...
Ward Bond : "Of course he comes to you when he wants to play. Where do you want him to go? Some other woman? You married him for what he is and then tried to make something else out of him. Well, you couldn't, and you never will. You began to feel sorry for yourself. How long would you love him if he *did* cry on your shoulder? "You don't need me... maybe I shouldn't have let you shut me out." What kind of silly talk is that? And what does *pride* got to do with love? Don't worry, he won't be happy, but what is more important... he won't be back! "
Ward Bond -: "Why are you crying? "
Ms. Chicago -" Because they're dead. Horribly dead. And it was I who killed them. "
Ward Bond -: "Killed who? "
Ms. Chicago: "All these men. Ours, and the enemy's. "
Ward Bond - "Huh! Are you crying about the English? "
Ms. Chicago -: "I have no hatred for the English. I spoke bold and loud so that you would follow me. I thought victory would be beautiful, but it is an ugly, bloody thing."
Ward Bond -: "Why, there never was a more beautiful victory than this!  Shucks."
Ms. Chicago -: "Don't swear, Ward Bond. But if you must, swear 'by my staff'. "
Ward Bond: "'By my staff!" What kind of an oath is that? Oh, all right. But you watch me, boy! girl, hard to tell sometimes.. .Oh, all right. But you watch me, boy! I'm the hardcase you're up against out here, not them childish savages! And if you don't hear my first holler, you better read my mind 'cause I don't aim to raise no two hollers on any subject at hand!ot them childish savages! And if you don't hear my first holler, you better read my mind 'cause I don't aim to raise no two hollers on any subject at hand!

Mayor Rahm Emanuel re-intrudes:

Mayor Rahm, "I've seen you around San Francisco a few times but from a long distance, of course."
Ward Bond -" Well, seein' me from a long distance is a smart idea, young fella."
Mayor Rahm," Uh,. . ."
Ward Bond - "You think you're the only guy that ever got a kick in the teeth? Well you're not. It's happening every day and it's gonna keep rig ht on happenin' till this thing's over. And you, you can sit here and feel sorry for yourself, or you can come on out with me and see how nice people are when they're alive."

Mayor Rahm Exits

Ward Bond calls after him, "  Keep you shirton, son. Your face looks honest to me even if it is homely. "

Mr. Bond returns his interrupted attentions to Ms. Chicago still sobbing

Ms. Chicago: “Father, . . .
Ward Bond, Ward, or Ward Bond if you will . . . .
Ms. Chicago could I... could I tell you in the Irish?”
Ward Bond: “Is ea, sea, sea, sea.”
Ms. Chicago: “Níor lig mé mo fhear céile isteach i mo leaba liom aréir. Chuir mé faoi ndearadh dó codladh i - Ó, i mála codlata! Mála codlata!”
Ward Bond -: “Mála c--? Céard é sin? ‘Bag?’”

Ms. Chicago - : “Sleeping bag, Father,. . .er Ward, er Mr. Ward Bond . . . with... with buttons! Ó, mo spré, ní throid sé ar a shon. An peaca é?”
Ward Bond: [angry] “Woman, Ireland may be a poor country, God help us. But here, a married man sleeps in a bed, and not a bag!. . . .   Well, then. Now. I'll begin at the beginnin'. A fine soft day in the spring, it was, when the train pulled into Castletown, three hours late as usual, and himself got off. He didn't have the look of an American tourist at all about him. Not a camera on him; what was worse, not even a fishin' rod. Brethren, leave us go amongst 'em! ”

 

 

Folks, Vote.  This little drama makes about as sense as another term for Rahm Emanuel.  Now, Mount . . . .Mount! . . . .MONTE!  Mount!

Ironic Lent - Forty Days of Lent, or Fifty Shades of Grey?

 Sacred Heart Church

I went to Confession of Saturday( St. Valentine's Day)  before the 4PM Mass at Sacred Heart Church.  It was a doozy - Father had to excuse himself twice during my recitation of sins of commission and omission.  When Father Bill's stomach had settled we continued.

That said, I am forgiven. Now, comes the hard part.

Stay clean.

It seemed that my sacrament was tailor made by the readings from Genesis, St. Paul and Mark's Gospel - banishment, lepers, and cleansing.  I have recently had surgery to remove a huge tumor on my snot-locker and remain bandaged - is this an out ward sign of my spiritual malaise? During the Gospel of Mark more than a few of my neighbors turned with accusing fingers and cried 'Leper, UnClean!'

Hey, it;s 'cuz of my See-Through Irish pelt!

However the earlier passage of Yaweh grilling Adam and Eve about what they'd been up to and their subsequent banishment was what it is all about.

The Genesis passage is the orginal Fifty Shades of Grey

But Yahweh God called to the man. 'Where are you?' he asked.
I heard the sound of you in the garden,' he replied. 'I was afraid because I was naked, so I hid.' 'Who told you that you were naked?' he asked. 'Have you been eating from the tree I forbade you to eat?'The man replied, 'It was the woman you put with me; she gave me some fruit from the tree, and I ate it.'*
Then Yahweh God said to the woman, 'Why did you do that?' The woman replied, 'The snake tempted me and I ate.'
Then Yahweh God said to the snake, 'Because you have done this, Accursed be you of all animals wild and tame! On your belly you will go and on dust you will feed as long as you live.

* N.B. - Guy blames the woman and woman blames the snake. Man, ain't that the way?


For this sin, God 86'd the Snake and booted Adam and Eve** from the Garden.

The snake is of course Old Nick, formerly known as Lucifer - The Prince of Darkness.-Satan.

Like God, we believe that Satan is myth. A fairy tale that breeders tell their bratty kids to keep them quiet.;

Nope.  He there.  I housed him for far too long. That is until Father Bill passed on the good word to me.

You see, a priest does not 'forgive' my sins - Christ ( Joshua Bar Jospeh) did that with His death on the cross and His Resurrection.  The priest is merely standing-in (skype-ing)  for Christ.  All of the forgiveness is already cashed in.

Satan does not want us to collect and to continue acting with him and ignoring God's love of us.

Father Bill gave a great homily on Lent and forgiveness. Tomorrow, Ash Wednesday, Catholics receive a cross of ashes on our forheads from a priest who tells us , "Memento, homo ... quia pulvis es, et in pulverem reverteris" (cf. Gn 3:19).trans. -"Remember, man, you are dust and to dust you will return."

I am dust held together by water, but I will be dust again.

In the early Church, Father Bill reminded us, there were three huge sins that required public confession before the whole community

• Murder
• Adultery
• Apostasy

All three would have been pretty obvious to the neighbors and for such sin a person would be shunned, until he has publicly asked forgiveness of his brothers and sisters and performed penance - wearing sack cloth and ashes.

Today, only murder gets some notice and if one has a great criminal defence lawyer - no sweat at all.

Apostasy is denying the faith.  Playing God.

Adultery is very confusing and difficult to describe these days without drawing boos from our studio audiences.  Fifty Shades of Grey types tell us that Adultery is liberating.

The first liberator was the snake in the Garden.

Me?   I know how weak I happen to be - I have forty days to work on it.

I kind of like being forgiven.

** Never fail appeal to a high court - Mother of God

Hail Holy Queen
Hail, Holy Queen, Mother of mercy,
our life, our sweetness and our hope.
To thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve:
to thee do we send up our sighs,
mourning and weeping in this valley of tears.
Turn then, most gracious Advocate,
thine eyes of mercy toward us,
and after this our exile,
show unto us the blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
O clement, O loving, O sweet Virgin Mary! Amen.

Sun Times Puffery: "Rahm Emanuel: 'I became my own worst enemy ... " Chicagoans Replay," Not as long as we're still breathing

Jerry Plunkett: If they don't let us at those Boches pretty soon, I'll have to carve me up a top-sergeant!

Terence 'Crepe-Hanger' Burke: Don't mind him sarge, he's his own worst enemy!

Sergeant 'Big Mike' Wynn: Not while *I'm* alive, he ain't! Fighting 69th (1940)

Rahm Emanuel: 'I became my own worst enemy ... '

Not even close' yet, the pre-election scenery painting goes on at the Chicago Sun Times.  Fran Spielman offers a dutiful homage to her overlord's and their favorite 9.5 fingered strongman -Mayor Rahm Emanuel.

In order to lend more national gravitas to her Rahm-souffle, Frannie cracked a few familar eggs - the Rajin Cajin Jimmy Carville and the alwats hilarious Pee-Wee Herman of Cable - Paul Begala, "Paul Begala says being mayor is “why God made” Rahm Emanuel, and he expects his friend to remain in the job “as long as the people of Chicago will have him.” 

The same was said of Mussolini, the Paper Hanger of Vienna and the Castro Brothers.  Gosherino, Paul!

Carville says, 'Two and Out and if it is third term Rahm Emanuel wants, why, he'll throw himself between Rahm and the filing petition scanner next time.

Tough.  I mean tough.

Not as tough as Rahm, to be sure - Fran Spielman's yellow brick road for the little prique to gambol his way back to Floor # Five is paved with Rahms own narrative,“I’m driven to make a difference. It’s part of my upbringing. It’s part of my psychology. I do it in a forceful way. It may ometimes rub people the wrong way. I’m not saying I haven’t contributed,”  and then  that gets calked with BS by Begala - " " He's a Do-er" 

Sure he's tough.

You wanna see tough?  Get aload of the second Rahm Emanuel term of office.

St, Valentine - Help Me Be Less of a Jerk

I take a backseat to no man, when it comes to being selfish, whiny and most of all a bearer of grudges.

I like to think that i bear no one grudges, but it ain't so.  I like to think that I am something of Stoic, nah. My liberal generosities?  Need work. Lots of work.

Where to begin?  Take a look at this paragraph from the biography of St. Valentine from Catholic On-line:

Saints are not supposed to rest in peace; they're expected to keep busy: to perform miracles, to intercede. Being in jail or dead is no excuse for non-performance of the supernatural. One legend says, while awaiting his execution, Valentinus restored the sight of his jailer's blind daughter. Another legend says, on the eve of his death, he penned a farewell note to the jailer's daughter, signing it, "From your Valentine."

He was a real flesh and blood human being during the reign of Emperor Claudius the Goth ( Claudius II - not the Julio-Claudian step daddy of Nero).  Valentine was a priest who continued to marry Christian couples though the Emperor had banned all Christian worship and ministrations of sacraments by priests.  Claudius was one of long-line of warrior emperors in the 3rd Century AD.  He spent most of his time with his legions fighting Germans and Goths.  Whether he ever met Valentine is a matter of some dispute.  However, Claudius Gothicus was an old-timey Roman pagan with no tolerance for Christians.

Valentine refused to go-along to get along. He was imprisoned and legend has it that he even tried to convert the Emperor while in the joint - bold, but fatal.  He was beaten, stoned and beheaded.

Valentine was not selfish,or  whiny, and bore no grudge.  He is the Patron Saint of lovers and his feast, like everything that's rooted in faith -All Hallows Eve, Christmas, Easter ad etc.- was co opted by secularists and largely forgotten as a flesh and blood hero.

I pray today that St. Valentine helps me be less of a selfish jerk.

Dialogue - Obama and Everyone Else from Dryden's" The Conquest of Granada"

John Dryden is rarely read by high school students.  Dryden was a 17th Century poet and he was the master of the 'closed couplet.' AKA the heroic couplet.

He wrote a play The Conquest of Granada using closed couplets.  I never taught this particular piece, but i really liked it.

The story is about the defeat of the Muslim Moors by the Spanish with the conquest of the city of Granada.

The main characters are mostly Moors and members of two factions violently opposed* to one another - think Sunni and Shia, or Democrat and Republican.  The Spanish Christians are united.

The hero of the play is the undefeated warrior Almanzor who is madly in love with his king's lady, Almahide/  She too loves Almanzor, but refuses to give in to 'what the heart wants' for the larger good of loyalty to one's word and lord.

There is a bit of dialog that reminds me of President Obama, the most closed minded and ineffective President since James Buchanan.

Boabdelin, the king of Granada, knows of the divided agendas (  Abencerrages v.Zegrys) and could care less; divided subjects give a king more power - keep 'em guessing: " The People their own tyrants are."

Almanzor, who has 57 Campaigns against the united Christians of Spain under his belt, knows that each of victories were Pyrric and further strengthened Christian resolve. Boabdelin, like 'I won both' Obama cares less.

Boab. I do not want your counsel to direct
Or aid to help me punish or protect.

Almanz. Thou want'st them both, or better thou would'st know,
Than to let factions in thy kingdom grow.
Divided interests, while thou think'st to sway,
Draw, like two brooks, thy middle stream away:
For though they band and jar, yet both combine
To make their greatness by the fall of thine.
Thus, like a buckler, thou art held in sight,
While they behind thee with each other fight.

Boab. Away, and execute him instantly! 

At least an IRS audit, Mr. President.

* "The story is told that one of the Abencerrages, having fallen in love with a lady of the royal family, was caught in the act of climbing up to her window. The king, enraged, shut up the whole family in one of the halls of the Alhambra, and ordered the Zegris to kill them all. The apartment where this is said to have taken place is one of the most beautiful courts of the Alhambra, and is still called the Hall of the Abencerrages."

Cappy Dick Hick says, "Hey Kids, Diagram This Sentence and Qualify for Valuable Prizes!"

I used to love Cappy Dick, the old cartoon section activity and swell yarn feature found in the Funnies Section of most newspapers. Cappy Dick was supposed to be some gnarled wharf rat, ex-Sea Dog, who hung around kids, , , ,in a good way.   Kids were asked to do puzzles, draw funny pictures, connect dots, and read stories about kids trapped in caves.

Great stuff.  I never completed one assignment.  I had enough to do not doing the homework assigned to me by Religious Sisters of Mercy.

While reading across the web, I was stunned not to find the usual Hollywood headline grab of the week - you know Michael "Michigan Fats" Moore telling the world that American Snipers are cowards, or Whoopie Goldberg's latest GI misfire on the View. However, I did find this statement by Amy Pascal, the cashiered SONY exec who had her e-mails hacked by NK Reds.

"I kept calling [IT] and being like, 'They don't have our emails, tell me they don’t have our emails,' " Pascal said at the Women in the World conference.

Man, I communicate with greater clarity after twelve ice cold cans of Drewry's and nose full of Testor's Airplane glue.

I immediately thought of Old Cappy Dick -BTW: I am referred to by boon chums as Hick, but mostly Hickey. Babies, even my Mom and children,  call me Hickey.

Hick works - How about I take on the role of Cappy Dick Hick(ey).

Quote I - "Hey, Kids diagram this sentence!!!!!!!!!!  You may qualify for valuable prizes!"

• World Book Encyclopedia, Vol 14
• Balls of string
• Balls of Yarn
• Book of Yarns

Here we go, Mateys!!!

"I kept calling [IT] and being like, 'They don't have our emails, tell me they don’t have our emails,' " -Amy Pascal of the Glass Ceiling

Twenty Two Shades of Moss - The Liberating Soul of the American Zombie

I  will knock down the Gates of the Netherworld,
I will smash the door posts, and leave the doors flat down,
and will let the dead go up to eat the living!
And the dead will outnumber the living! Epic of Gilgamesh

October 31, 2016
 (voice over)
Louis got down out of the tree only long enough to take quick look around.  They were out there and he could feel their dead eyes on him somehow. "How they do that they're dead, " he said to no one in particular; rather still animated by a human soul.




How?

Let me tell you, how.  Hi, I 'm Craig Masters Y Johnson - Soledad.  You may remember me from CBS This Morning, where I was the go-guy on matters concerning our sexual mores and Latino web-surfing.  Louis was up a tree because he was afraid, afraid of change, not in touch with his emerging self and still a distributionist who reads Belloc and Chesterfiield. Louis like so many Americans is unliberated and remains a kinemortophobe.

Since 2006, people have evolved.  From the first Zombie Walk in Pittsburgh - Stonewall of the UnDead - Americans have come around with the help of Federal Judges, appointed for life and smarter than God, the only metaphysical phenomenon unacceptable to good persons.

Thirty eight of fifty States have included the perambulating departed,  or Mossies because of our evolved coloration, if you simply must be slang-ready,  as eligible for health care benefits, home loans, foster care eligibility and service as first responders. Thirty-eight states and their Mossie federal judges have finally made things right for the hundreds among us who are different - less talkative and addicted to live human brains.

Let's get the twelve remaining Tea Party states to toss their bags get more alive with people who ain't! Call your Federal Courts of Appeals - no sense doing this by legislation. Act now. Moss is the new Green. 

Worldwide Kristallnacht, or Obama's 'Just Some Random Jews'

I don't have a Nobel Prize.  Yet. Could happen.  A former Illinois State Senator, currently residing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in D,C. has one.  He's the very same gent who asked me 'Where's the Gate?," when asked to climb into the boxing ring at an amateur boxing show in the old Saber Room on 95th Street in Hickory Hills, Il.  In 2000, this celebrity trophy presenter did not remember that one climbs through the ropes of the square ring - pretty confusing in itself, for some, that term.  Barack Obama is now Mr. President.

Back then in 2000, Illinois State Senator Barack Obama was looking for any opportunity to get his face and name out there - that's politics.  My task that night was to steer our celebrity trophy presenters to ring just before the bout -" Senator,  the referee will raise both kids' arms because it is an exhibition.  I'll have both trophies near by on the canvas - hand one to each and then give your spiel."

Illinois State Representative Kevin McCarthy(ret.), a Leo Class of 1968 went before Mr. Obama. Prior to McCarthy, two Chicago alderman and Chief Tim McCarthy who dove in the path of bullets meant for Ronald Reagan awarded trophies to the kids.

Nobel Peace Prize Laureate to be and future leader of what we then called The Free World, asked me, "How do I get in there? Where's the gate?"

I smiled that sort of busy " YOU GODDA BE$HIDDING ME smile and then realized that Senator Obama was confused.

"You climb through the ropes, like in Rocky and all those boxing movies, Senator."

"Oh."

He was fine after that, but he was later elected President and awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

I mentioned this incident when people asked me why I could not back Obama for President; they said, " Who are you? Some @#$%ing genius?  Anyone could get they wrong."  True, maybe this guy can be President.


Well,  here we are in 2015!.

A little girl was murdered by ISIS(L) only hours ago.  A Jordanian pilot was put to the torch last week.  Japanese gents were beheaded.

The guy who looked for the gate at the Saber Room blamed Crusades.

More importantly 70 years after Leo High Graduates like Lou Knox killed SS men in Italy, Bernie Ingersoll recovered from Battle of Bulge wound and three score and more of their schoolmate gave their lives, Jews are refugees once again.

There is a worldwide Kristallnacht ( The Night of the Broken Glass) signalling another wholesale slaughter of Jews.  This Kristallnacht is not sparked by the cries of Seig Heil nor limited to German states but by an prayer ( Takbir) shouted allahu akbar! This atrocity is worldwide and religious.

President Obama is the same young ambitious guy who does what he is told. President Obam is told to do everything by Valerie Jarrett; simple as that.

Jews are fleeing Paris, London, Berlin and even Dublin 

Here is Barack Obama's reply to the Retro Exodus, PRESIDENT OBAMA: "My first job is to protect the American people. It is entirely legitimate for the American people to be deeply concerned when you've got a bunch of violent, vicious zealots who behead people or randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris. "

That's the Obama I know - whithout Valerie Jarrett he'd go on and on " Jews are folks - random folks.
Islamist savages are just bunch of knuckleheads . . .probably Tea Partiers and Ferguson haters . .  religious zealots like Catholics through history . . .who burn and lynch black folks, lie Dr. Ben Carson and Col. Allan West . . .as American as a Clinton Eastwood western . . .random Jews can go whereever they want . . .not to Gaza . . .or here . . . random Jews aren't Dreamers . . ." until 2017, when he boards Air Force One to Hawaii.

Obama still looks for the gate.

Custer Park Men Released into the Custody of Brian Wesbury - Economist

Two men from Custer Park, Illinois were arrested on suspicion of being recruited by Islamic State of Iraq and Syria ( and the Levant) ISIS(L).

Dwanne Burhop (45) and Dale 'Critter'  Poissons-Croc (44)  of Custer Park, Il claim that they only volunteered to enlist in the army of Islamic States of Iraq and Syria ( and the Levant) because the guy speaking on the toll free number mentioned Free Ice. Burhop took the call at Custer's Keg, when the owner asked him to watch the bar, while he grabbed a smoke outside,

Homeland Security has determined that the jug-line fishermen were not an existential threat; however, Dale 'Critter' Poisson-Croc is still under investigation for hate-crime speech and thought by yet-Attorney General Eric Holder, who is personally reviewing 'This Cracker's Hateful Soul." Poisson-Croc termed the membership of the Wilmington Rod and Gun Club "Faggots" and he did not mean bundles of kindling, nor underclassmen in an English boarding school.

Both men were release into the custody of economist Brian Wesbury.* Wesbury fully intends to make sure that Burhop and Poisson-Croc avoid future use telephones, as the Kankakee River Naturalists had been taken into custody for answering the phone at Custer's Keg and mistaking the ISIS(L) for an ice-philanthropist. Burhop told Reuters, or Rooters, or whatever, " We been keeping our cans of Red, White and Blue cool in the river and we eat everthing that comes our way on the spot.  These last few weeks the beers freeze.  It makes sense to get free ice. The damn Federal lawyers don't see it that way - needed us some ice.Man said, " Free Ices" so we're in."

He repeated that claim upon release. " Man said Free Ice-es. O........Kay?? What'ld any one do?  We said we're in!"

Wesbury is a graduate of Northwestern University and therefore can be counted to be 'nuanced.'

He is also a superb Jug-line fisherman and avid drinker of sub-Premium domestic beers.  He will shack with the two until Homeland Security is satisfied. Homeland Security is always 'satisfied' with the best intentions of inebriated motorist on the Dan Ryan slowing down to 15MPH at the sight of a State Police roller.

Wesbury had this to say,  "Pundits have a bottomless reservoir of pessimism and also a magnified ability to extrapolate the most recent trends. So, when Q1-2014 real GDP fell at an annual rate of 2.1%, fear turned rampant."

Poissant-Croc was non-plussed. Burhop has yet to go on record regarding Mr. Wesbury's stewardship,

Extrapolate.  Cool.  Now without jumping to no conclusions. . .this story will develop some.





*  Brian S. Wesbury (born September 8, 1958) is an American economist focusing on macroeconomics and economic forecasting. He is the economics editor and a monthly contributor for The American Spectator, a conservative political magazine, in addition to appearing on television stations such as CNBC, Fox Business, Fox News,and Bloomberg TV frequently. He is a member of the Academic Advisory Council of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, and for five years served as an adjunct professor of economics at Wheaton College in Wheaton, Illinois.

U of C's John J. Mearschiemer Critic of Israel, Pal of Iran and Now Ukraine Crisis Molotov

Anyone who hates Israel, demands that Iran should get The Bomb and understands why Obama lie, naturally will want to sell the Ukrainian people back into slavery under Vlad Putin.

John J. Mearschiemer is a University of Chicago apologist for all things Valerie Jarrett.  Get this crapola from another rarefied air breathing professor -

Sending weapons to Ukraine will not rescue its army and will instead lead to an escalation in the fighting. Such a step is especially dangerous because Russia has thousands of nuclear weapons and is seeking to defend a vital strategic interest.

There is no question that Ukraine’s military is badly outgunned by the separatists, who have Russian troops and weapons on their side. Because the balance of power decisively favors Moscow, Washington would have to send large amounts of equipment for Ukraine’s army to have a fighting chance.
But the conflict will not end there. Russia would counter-escalate, taking away any temporary benefit Kiev might get from American arms. The authors of the think tank study concede this, noting that “even with enormous support from the West, the Ukrainian Army will not be able to defeat a determined attack by the Russian military.” In short, the United States cannot win an arms race with Russia over Ukraine and thereby ensure Russia’s defeat on the battlefield.

I can almost see that other fatuous ninny David Brooks with brow a-knit nodding his doughy noggin with amiable accent on the PBS News Hour -'Yes, yes,'

Obama has already sold out 

• the American Middle Class 
• African Americans Citizens
• Black Youth in America
• Mexican American Citizens
• Organized Labor (sans public sector unions and SEIU)
• the Syrians
• the Libyans
• the Egyptians
• the Crimea
• Fort Hood
• Boston
• Coptic Christians in particular
• Christian universal
• Israel
• Jews universal
• NATO
• Nebraska
• Chicago Obama Library bidders
• Hillary Clinton

Vlad Putin a tin-horn bully who scares the poop out of Choom Gang Barry, was given a license to steal by President Obama and his White House.   Obama eco/petro fuel policies all but saved Putin from certain economic implosion.  

Valerie Jarrett, it seems, has called out her reliable academic shill John J. Mearsheimer to set the scenery for another dagger plunged in the back of the brave Ukrainian people. Obama and Putin dance to the same jig fiddled by George Soros - you must crack a few skulls to make brain salad.

Obama is a screw up.  He is a very calculated screw-up.  He listens only to a very few people. John J. Mearsheimer is one of them. 

Rahm Emanuel has "Earned" My Vote? BS, MBS & PhD!

There was a an old response to an outrageous assertion from a person who had college degrees after his name, that I no longer hear in Chicago.  It went  " Listen to him. He's an important guy. Look at the letters after his name BS, Master of BS, Piled High and Deep!"

We no longer live in Chicago.  We reside in Chicagoland.

Editorial Boards in Chicago are umbilical chords pumping life and vitality into the misery that is Illinois still-born government.  Editorial Boards in Chicago shined no light on Candidate Obama long association with Chicago Slum Warlords: Allsion Davis and Valerie Jarrett who trotted out bundler Tony Rezko - The Man in The Iron Mask. Nor did they point out the daffy irregularities of  Blago, Burris, Quinn & Company, Ralph Martire: The Architect of Pension Three Card Monte, Daley's Sell off of Assets.

Reporters did that. No paper has better reporter than Chicago Sun Times: Tim Novak, Dan Mihiapolous, Chris Fusco, the silenced Dave McKinney and Natasha Korecki. They are the Casandras of our  City.  Chicago went the way of the stockyards and became Chicagoland, which is gussied up with verbal arugula from Sundance Films and Sundance Bob Redford doing a solid for Ari Emanuel  We are asked to pretend that Rahm Emanuel is 'one of us.' Chicagoland is Hollywood-lite.

That is Okay with both Chicagoland Papers.

These twin Chicagoland editorial boards work to get Rahm a permanent place on the 5th Floor.

That is their right and privilege.  The pin-stripe crowd that comes into Chicagoland from Lake County and points tonier and exits at sunset command the skype-ready board rooms that look down on Chicagoland and giggle with pride and snide, knowing full well that Rahm Emanuel will direct more cash to their vaults.  They nod with conviction and solemn agreement when the Twin Chicagoland Medill Brat Pack inks its endorsement.

The twin pulp endorsements are as glued to the truth as a Brian Williams combat yarn and tell us that our lot is Resignation.  "Resignation is the lot of the helot with thirty year mortgage and $ 487 water every six months.  Resign yourselves to the inevitable, pay your bills and shut the duck up, or Rahms sake."

I am told by the editorial board of the Sun Times, the paper with fanged talent I listed above, that Rahm Emanuel 'Earned My Vote.'

Bullshit!

Was that too intemperate and un-WTTW?

How about Horseshit - you know the stuff Ed Burke so solemnly banned from the Gold Coast.

I earn my pay.  I earn the love of my children and respect and courtesy of my neighbors.

The very same editorial ink that tells me, in no uncertain terms, that I owe my vote to Dancing Priam, tells me also that, " The city’s four main pension systems are underfunded by a stunning $20 billion. Workers and retirees will have to pay in more and get back less. There is no other way. Homeowners, best we can tell, will have to pay higher taxes. Absolutely nobody will be happy."

Gee, you think?

I will bet that my Ward, the 19th, will go along with Rahm, because for too many of my neighbors personal obligations will demand it.  They will be a doing a solid for the guy who desperately believes that Rahm wil save his job on the Garbage trucks, or down at the Hall, or help his kid get a pipes trades job, in some way.

I know. I have been there and voted that.

Vote for whomever you believe to the best person, be it Rahm, Bob, Chuy, Willie, Doc or Jimmy the Two-Headed Boy.

You owe no one your vote.   You don't need a PhD to tell you that, but he will.