And You Voted For this Dope???

"Sixty million people died. . . .So, you've got to pay attention. And vote." former President Barak H. Obama.

Germans voted Mr. Nobel President.  They voted for a dopey clown with powerful grassroots organization and a tightly controlled narrative dangled to a supine press.

The United States however did not lose a world war, nor did it undergo foreign occupation of its industrial heartland, nor look longingly for a return to the monarchy.

America only endured your Comedy Central Presidency.

That was more than  enough to make Donald J. Trump preferable to you and Hilary Clinton. 

Oh, and there is more.

Barak Obama spoke to the Economic Club of Chicago with Mrs. Star War Museum Melody Hobson-Lucas and compared Trump to Hitler, his Presidency to the Weimar Republic and praised America's bandwidth*:

American democracy is fragile, and unless care is taken it could follow the path of Nazi Germany in the 1930s.
Mixed in with many softer comments, that was the somewhat jaw-dropping bottom line of Barack Obama last night as, in a Q&A session before the Economic Club of Chicago, the Chicagoan who used to be president dropped a bit of red meat to a hometown crowd that likely is a lot closer to him than the man whose name never was mentioned: President Donald Trump.
Obama's comments came after a series of playful questions from moderator and Ariel Investments President Mellody Hobson—in the great Batman vs. Superman debate, for instance, we learned Obama sides with Batman—before she eventually asked him what he's learned as a world citizen of sorts.
One thing he's learned is that "things don't happen internationally if we don't put our shoulder to the wheel," Obama said, speaking of the U.S. "No other country has the experience and bandwidth and ideals. . . .If the U.S. doesn't do it, it's not going to happen."

OooooRah Yankee Bandwidth!!!!! That should lock up more Tech Geek bucks.

Now, go louse up Jackson Park the outer drive and other peoples' days

And you voted for this dope?


*  In computing, bandwidth is the bit-rate of available or consumed information capacity expressed typically in metric multiples of bits per second. Variously, bandwidth may be characterized as network bandwidth, data bandwidth, or digital bandwidth.

No Need to "Process" Idioms by Idiots

 “I’m still really processing it.” - Anne Curry NBC Hostess and Mensa Second Stringer upon the exposure of Matt Lauer's priapism and goatish hypocrisies. 

Idiomatic phrases allow us a pause in the old brain-pain. Some useful idioms add color to speech

• Kick the Bucket - Shed our mortal husk
• Take a Brody - Jump off  High Place ( bridge & etc.)
• Do the Dutch Act - Take one's life
• Two to Tango - Dance,or  ride an Argentine tandem
• Rock the Boat - Sit down Stubby!
  

Today, pretentious losers employ faux-brainy phrases dim the fog of culutral war and also tend to  whine,'Can't we dialogue?' when losing an argument.

No, Dummy we can not dialogue, unless you can present dialogue as a verb with all five characteristics!  Voila!

Dialogue: N.B: "It was evidently well-used as a verb in Shakespeare's day, fell out of favor, then returned in recent history as a business-speak word. I hate business-speak. There are alternatives, and, where there are good alternatives, I'm usually against verbification. Unless it's a colorful verbification. Discuss works nicely in most situations. What does dialog add other than a faint suggestion of probably non-existent workplace democracy and/or respect for the opinions of all?"Luftmarque - sage, that, Luft!

Person (first, second, third)

Number (singular, plural)

Tense (present, future, future perfect, perfect, imperfect, pluperfect)

Mood (indicative, subjunctive, imperative, infinitive, [participle])

Voice (active, passive) (Deponents are active)

These are the very same dopes who mispronounce common words like Armistice,Oeuvre,  Charcuterie and Denouement in correcting the proper pronunciation of said words, will preeningly puke out trendy phrases like  - 'Still processing' when trying not to laugh-snort a schnozzle full of coffee when talking about the late Matt Lauer- NBC's Mr. 30 Cock. 

Ubi Sunt, Matt Lauer?

Qui Shives a git!

Anne Curry, I guess,  and People, Hollywood Extra and other havens of craven sophisticates like Anne, Matt, Harvey, Spacey and CK Louis. 

The clowns are down for a few weeks. Let's enjoy their absences from our public stage.  Let us pay attention to children, to heroes and hard-working Americans.

Let's do that and make fun of pretentious imbeciles making oodles of cash.

Process that Miss Curry!

I Wish a Buck Were Still Silver: Moral Hazards, or Merle Haggard?

I generally watch the news between 5-6 P.M. but never seem to watch to the end, because NBC, CBS, FOX and CNN usually drift into the moral hazards bothering the rich, the powerful and politically protested.

I feel the need to shower after watching and reading the news.

Last night, it was very different.  I went to Catholic high high school wrestling, instead of watching preening dopes and oleaginous creeps parse tweets and tweak the turpitudes of turds in the political punch bowl.

I am no longer affected by the repellant Garrison Keillor, Matt Lauer, Harvey Weinstein, Kevin Spacey, Senator Al Franken, Judge Roy Moore, or the cavalcade of clowns occupying public office in Illinois.

I watched more than three hours of high school school wrestling and feel 100% morally clean, renewed, energetic and ready for the brand new day.

I watched Brother Rice High School, Loyola Academy and Leo High School grapple-ers hit the mats from 5: 30 P.M. to shortly before 9: P.M. in a  controlled violence ballet in which each combatant gave his all until a quicker man with better lock-up pinned two shoulder blades, or garnered more points with escapes and near-falls until the clock ran out.

Not a second of shame in over three hours and not a whine from anyone. The victorious raised hand was shaken by the loser and both young men applauded vigorously by the crowd. I went home and listened to Merle Haggard's "Are The Good Times Really Gone?"



I prepared my classes on Christian Morality and the Old Testament and wondered about  things -

Wish a buck was still silver.
It was, back when the country was strong.
Back before Elvis; before the Vietnam war came along.
Before The Beatles and "Yesterday",
When a man could still work, and still would.
Is the best of the free life behind us now?
Are the good times really over for good?
Are we rolling down hill like a snowball headed for hell?
With no kind of chance for the Flag or the Liberty bell.
Wish a Ford and a Chevy,
Could still last ten years, like they should.
Is the best of the free life behind us now?
Are the good times really over for good?

I don't think so Merle, just different - sloppier, sillier, sissy-er, maybe, but wrestlers compete and hug their moms after a pin or a pinning and sheepishly glance to see if Dad's eyes shine a bit moister than usual.

Black, White Mexican, Arab and Filipino kids who had spit in cups and nodded off in class due to trying to 'cut weight' came alive for three minutes in a husky three hours.

No one was rolling to hell last night, Merle.

Aphra Behn on Our Roll Call of Sex- Hopped Hypocrites: Matt, Charlie, Garrison, Harvey, Franken and the Judge et al

The Nymphs resentments, none but I
Can well imagin, and Condole ;
But none can guess Lisander's Soul,
But those who sway'd his Destiny :
His silent Griefs, swell up to Storms,
And not one God, his Fury spares,
He Curst his Birth, his Fate, his Stars,
But more the Shepherdesses Charms ;
Whose soft bewitching influence,
Had Damn'd him to the Hell of Impotence. Aphra Benn

Interestingly, the only name among this cavalcade of creeps to surprise me was Kevin Spacey.

The rest always struck me as smarmy, mealy-mouthed, power-addicted louts and sneaks.

Just sayin'.

 Oh, still waiting for the Jimmy Choo six inch pumps to fall on Bill Moyers. 

Crack Came to Us from Thackeray and to Me from Dr. Micael Clark of Loyola

Some poet has observed, that if any man would write down what has really happened to him in this mortal life, he would be sure to make a good book, though he never had met with a single adventure from his birth to his burial. How much more, then, must I, who HAVE had adventures, most singular, pathetic, and unparalleled, be able to compile an instructive and entertaining volume for the use of the public. . . .On the last day of the year 1837, even THAT game was up. It’s a thing that very seldom happened to a gentleman, to be kicked out of a spunging-house; but such was my case. Young Nabb (who succeeded his father) drove me ignominiously from his door, because I had charged a gentleman in the coffee-rooms seven-and-sixpence for a glass of ale and bread and cheese, the charge of the house being only six shillings. He had the meanness to deduct the eighteenpence from my wages, and because I blustered a bit, he took me by the shoulders and turned me out—me, a gentleman, and, what is more, a poor orphan!

How I did rage and swear at him when I got out into the street! There stood he, the hideous Jew monster, at the double door, writhing under the effect of my language. I had my revenge! Heads were thrust out of every bar of his windows, laughing at him. A crowd gathered round me, as I stood pounding him with my satire, and they evidently enjoyed his discomfiture. I think the mob would have pelted the ruffian to death (one or two of their missiles hit ME, I can tell you), when a policeman came up, and in reply to a gentleman, who was asking what was the disturbance, said, “Bless you, sir, it’s Lord Cornwallis.” “Move on, BOOTS,” said the fellow to me; for the fact is, my misfortunes and early life are pretty well known—and so the crowd dispersed.

“What could have made that policeman call you Lord Cornwallis and Boots?” said the gentleman, who seemed mightily amused, and had followed me. “Sir,” says I, “I am an unfortunate officer of the North Bungay Fencibles, and I’ll tell you willingly for a pint of beer.” He told me to follow him to his chambers in the Temple, which I did (a five-pair back), and there, sure enough, I had the beer; and told him this very story you’ve been reading. You see he is what is called a literary man—and sold my adventures for me to the booksellers; he’s a strange chap; and says they’re MORAL. The Fatal Boots by Wm. Makepeace Thackeray (emphasis my own)

 In both Britain and America, 'crack' could mean good or excellent – and to boast or even make a joke (wisecrack).

While ‘crack unit’ or ‘crack regiment’ is a little archaic nowadays, we still talk of something as not being all it’s ‘cracked up’ to be.

In the martial sense, the word ‘crack’ dates to around the 1830s. William Makepeace Thackeray’s short story The Fatal Boots (1839) contains possibly the first printed use of the term ‘crack shot’. The onomatopoeic connections between shooting and cracking noises are obvious. It might be – and this is just my theory – that it became popular in the 1830s to 1840s due to the newfangled percussion caps on firearms, which would have made more of a cracking noise than flintlock weapons. History Question by Ellie Cawthorne

In Loyola University graduate school, I had the great good fortune to learn from Dr. Micael Clark, PhD.  She was and remains one of the most exacting and serious scholars of 19th Century Literature and a wonderful mentor.

Dr. Clark had been a student of America's most distinguished Thackeray scholars, Gordon Ray of University of Illinois.  Professor Roy was chosen by the descendants of William Makepeace Thackeray to edit the great artist's letters and correspondence.  I own the set, I am proud to say.

One of Thackeray's great shorter works is the Fatal Boots, a sketch in fiction of young man's vain and snobbish lust for a pair of German boots.  Imagine a young gent addicted to Brooks Brothers clothing when he has a K-Mart budget.

Addicts have no budgets by the way.

Thackeray's themes of vanity and snobbery are lessons well learned and in our goatish and slob-centered cultured much needed.  Thackeray is recognized as the pioneering voice against snobbery ( meanly admiring mean things - are you the type of person who boasts " WE only read the New York Times, watch only PBS and eat only whole grains and organically grown foods"?    A snob is someone who takes great stock in persons, places, ideas and possessions to which most people can say, " Well so-effing what?"

e.g.

• I drink only craft beer
• I drive a Volvo
• No one gets between and my Calvins
• I dine only at Ken's on Western
• I have every Beatle 45
• I date only Roller Derby queens

Bob Stubbs ruins his entire life and career over the purchase and possession of pair of Hessian Boots. Bob steals the boots, on credit, giving the foreigner his name - Lord Cornwallis.  When the bookmaker tries to get paid.  Bob and his snob of a schoolmaster threaten the alien and Milord the hell out of him.  They refuse to pay the price of the fatal boots and the German craftsman prophesies

"Vell, my lort,” says he, “you have paid SOMETHING for dese boots, but not all. By Jubider, YOU SHALL NEVER HEAR DE END OF DEM.”   And Bob's life is carried into the gutter by this theft of a branding item.  

In this story Thackeray used the phrase 'crack shot' and it immediately became fashionable to crack on about everything that seemed cracker jack.

Things fall into place when think about what our elders and betters teach us.

Thank you Dr. Clark!  I had a cracking good education. 

Thanksgiving - "these Things I Remember , , ,"

 Where Thanksgiving began for me - 1755 West 75th Place, Chicago 60620

Psalm 42:4

These things I remember and I pour out my soul within me For I used to go along with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God, With the voice of joy and thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival.

Thanksgiving is very special and it always has been.

I am blessed to be teaching again after two decades of helping to raise funds at Leo High School.  One of the classes that I teach at Brother Rice is Old Testament.  I got into teaching through the religion department at Bishop McNamara in Kankakee in 1975.  The education circle of my life has closed, but loops off in a new directions as life has a habit of doing. Old Testament passages are not set-pieces but living reminders of God guiding the way to better living.

The Book of Joshua which my guys are reading over the five day break from classes is not just a chronicle of battles and Jewish ninja operations in the land of Canaan, but path to the pattern fulfilled by Joshua bar Joseph, during reign of Tiberius Caesar in Roman occupied Judea (formerly known as Canaan).  This Joshua ( Jesus in Arameric) explained the Covenant - thou shall not kill also means to love your enemies.  And the walls come tumbling down.

I used to come home from Kankakee for Thanksgiving on Greyhound and Amtrack, until I could afford a car.  I'd carry my banjo and guitar with my changes of clothes, because I would be playing Irish tunes with my cousins at Reilly's Daughter in Oak Lawn on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and maybe Saturday ( unless Boz got sick of us and hired Berwyn Moose).

I'd take the the CTA from 95th & the Dan Ryan to Oak Lawn, where my folks had moved from Little Flower.  Little Flower was where all of my Thanksgiving begins.

We lived in a Georgian at 1755 W. 75th Place with a tiny kitchen, but a pretty substantial dining room.  Relatives came and we ate like we were going to the chair.

• Turkey with Sage and Sausage Stuffing
• Baked Sweet Potatoes with marshmallows
• Turnips
• Green Bean  casserole 
• Swedish Potato Sausage from the Swedish Deli at 76th & Bishop
• Mashed Spuds
• Cranberry Sauces (canned for kids and real for human beings)
• Milk from Hamilton Dairy at 75th & Paulina
• Sparkling Burgundy from Sol's Liquors at 79th & Marshfield
• Pecan Pie, Pumpkin Pie and Apple Pie

Before all of that Mom would take us to morning Mass at Little Flower along with our neighbors, while Dad finished his shift at Illinois Medical Hospital.

We would be reminded of everything we should be thankful for - 

• Our Country - we beat it out of Ireland
• Our Faith -we have been Catholic for thousands of years
• Our Freedoms - we had no one telling us who we were
• Our Health - kids rarely died of anything anymore
• Our Wealth - about that!

Yeah, we were loaded!  Dad worked three jobs with the State, the Beverly Theatre and David Berg packing house in Pilsen.

We really were loaded. We had everything!

Dad and his brothers fought for our freedom to practice our religion in this great country where we could go to the dentist, Dr. Anthony and eat real food from National Tea, Kroger, or the Jewels and make a future for ourselves. 

In the 1970's I'd make almost as much money playing Irish tunes with my cousins, Whitey O'Day and the inimitable Terry McEldowney than I would in two weeks of teaching religion and English at Bishop Mac.  I'd feast at the house in Oak Lawn, grab my instruments and head up to Reilly's Daughter and in the late 1970's I would be accompanied by the beautiful red head who would marry me and mother three beautiful children.

The loops of the circles in life would take me and mine from Kankakee to LaPorte and Griffith, Indiana and back to the south side of Chicago.  My children are wonderful adults now and their mother is home with Christ, my Dad and hundreds of Gunkels, Donahues, Hickeys, Brennans, Winters, Murphys, Garveys, & etc.

For that and this Thanksgiving Day, I shout "With the voice of joy and thanksgiving, a multitude keeping festival."

Life is Not a Seamless Garment -Book of Maccabees e.g.

 

 First Maccabees 1:10-15; 41-4310 From these there grew a wicked offshoot, Antiochus Epiphanes son of King Antiochus; once a hostage in Rome, he became king in the 107th year of the kingdom of the Greeks.11 It was then that there emerged from Israel a set of renegades who led many people astray. 'Come,' they said, 'let us ally ourselves with the gentiles surrounding us, for since we separated ourselves from them many misfortunes have overtaken us.'12 This proposal proved acceptable,13 and a number of the people eagerly approached the king, who authorised them to practise the gentiles' observances.14 So they built a gymnasium in Jerusalem, such as the gentiles have,15 disguised their circumcision, and abandoned the holy covenant, submitting to gentile rule as willing slaves of impiety.  . . .41 The king then issued a proclamation to his whole kingdom that all were to become a single people, each nation renouncing its particular customs.42 All the gentiles conformed to the king's decree,43 and many Israelites chose to accept his religion, sacrificing to idols and profaning the Sabbath.

 “We should be no less appalled by the indifference toward the thousands of people who die daily for lack of decent medical care; who are denied rights by a broken immigration system and by racism; who suffer in hunger, joblessness and want; who pay the price of violence in gun-saturated neighbourhoods; or who are executed by the state in the name of justice.” - Blase Cardinal Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago

Cardinal Cupich is very much like most Progressive Cook County Democrats ( Claypool, Preckwinkle, Quigley & etc), because he nails appointed positions, but just can't seem to get enough votes.  Recently Chicago's Archbishop, elevated by Pope Francis I and destined to be long associated with his pontificate, suffered a loss in an election of the National Conference of Bishops, to Archbishop Joseph Naumann:

Archbishop Joseph Naumann, by contrast, has argued that “issues that involve intrinsic evils – direct attacks on human life, abortion, euthanasia, embryonic stem cell research, or direct attacks on the institution of the family (for example, a redefinition of marriage to equate with same-sex unions or cohabitation) – must assume a moral priority. While all issues are important, all are not equally important from a moral analysis.”
Some observers, such as Christopher white(sic) of Crux, had framed the Cupich-Naumann vote in advance as a “referendum on both the conference’s approach to pro-life policies and Pope Francis”.
However, the editor of the Catholic News Agency, JD Flynn, tweeted after the vote: “CNA has talked with bishops who emphasis this is not a referendum on Francis. Bishops voting for both candidates told me it was only about trying to discern the best fit.” Catholic Herald

Today, at St. John  Fisher, Ray the Lector read the wonderful passage from the Book of Maccabees posted above and it got me to thinking about this vote and the state of goofy culture.

Going along to get along has won far too many elections for people who have no business crafting laws, let alone setting the table for human actions - especially with regard to moral and social justice issues. Seamless garments - one size fits all - have their  purposes, I suppose, but they do not  the necessarily present like a tightly tailored suit of ethical cloth.

Like this one from Deuteronomy

Learn Then that, I , I alone am God,
and there is no god besides me.
It is I who bring both death and life

Got it.

That will not play well on Chicago Tonight and WTTW, in general, but it just might get more cars in the parking lots of St. Cajetan, St. John Fisher and other parishes on a Sunday.

St. Odilo's 9:30 AM Mass was parked yesterday.  Just saying. 

Al Franken and Roy Moore - Bi-Partisan Creeps and Bullies

I know less about Roy Moore than I do about the minimum value of 5cosA + 12sinA + 12.

Al Franken I know was on Saturday Night Live during the era that the show tanked and became the dweeb U.S. Senator from Minnesota.

Now, I know that both men have been corralled in the same pig-pen with Kevin Spacey, Mark Halperin, Harvey Weinstein, David Corn et al. 

They share the common germ - unchecked power.

They are politicians, journalists, Hollywood moguls, judges, lawyers, actors, CEOs, gays, straights, bisexuals, questioning, Democrat and Republican.

They are all the creepy little boys we knew as kids who were 'protected' by nuns, parents, class, religion and friends. They were 'protected' from ever needing to check their impulses at the door, window, couch, or playground.

They did whatever and to whomever they chose to do when, where, why and what they wanted.

The creep on the playground at St. Tommy More parish who ran up to you and your pals and spit hockers on your shirts only to dash to the robes of Dominican nun on supervision and whine, "They hate me because I am going to be a priest, Sister!" might now be leading social justice protests all over the news.

The creep who grabbed the girls in the cloak room only to be given a 'second chance' from Sister Duplicious, because his Dad was a 15th Ward wheel, might now be facing a Hollywood Extra camera and microphone. 

We do what our consciences and our morals allow us to do.  If our consciences and morals are warply shaped by people who love a compromise, we might tend to abuse power.

We never read that Stan the cop, Eddie the roofer, Theresa the nurse, or Willie the County Mountie are being charged with criminal sexual assault, pleasuring themselves in public, exposing their short comings in an elevator, or forcing their impulses on a child.

These are not powerful people.

Predators work to gain trust, acceptance and power over people.  They are people with no 'off-switch' in operation.  They do as the feel, please and will, because they can.

The rest of us answer to God, the parents, teachers, coaches, our children and above all our spouses.

The freak show will continue until we return to some higher authority. Gee, God might be a good start.

The creeps are protected.

Al Franken!  Shake hands with Judge Roy!  Never mind the filth; Old Roy's got what you got. 

Chris Kennedy Looking Good For My Vote - Press Going Full Press Michigan Avenue Fats

Chris Kennedy is an exceptionally nice man.  Like many liberals of the old cloth (Don Rose, the late great Phil Krone & etc.) Chris Kennedy belies the conservative mind-set of intolerant automatons in lock -step with Marxism, Planned Parenthood and Globalism.   Rather Mr. Kennedy is an active do-gooder who walks the talk.

In my two decades and change of work for Leo High School, I have encountered Chris Kennedy and his kids quietly delivering goods and services to people in and around 79th Street, right in Pflegerland between Ashland and Halsted.  Unlike the blonde Jesus who rules St. Sabina like a political ward healer, who never clears his throat, nor breaks wind without CBS,ABC,NBC, WGN, Tribune, Chicago Sun Times and Windy City Times acolytes holding back dozen or so nodding activists around Pastor Pfleger, the son of RFK does good without fanfare, applause and hack reporters.

That said, Chris Kennedy tows the Durbin Dogma too much for my liking.

I understand that.  Chris Kennedy, an Irish Catholic, is not like me, or most of the people (white black, Mexican, ethnic) I encounter.  He comes from the Lace-Curtain traditions that eschew rock-ribbed core values as obnoxiously quaint.  He is a PBS Catholic, stamped and approved by Bill Moyers.  His politics is not unlike many of the people in the more comfortable Zip Codes - Chris Kennedy is much more of 60643 than he is a 60620, or 60655.

My temperament has been formed by my faith, family and friends.  Please note, that I might be the only member of my vast to have not cast a vote for Barack Obama and hurled one into the mix for Donald Trump.  I vote Catholic, organized labor and working class values.  Lately, I have voted for Republicans but I largely loathe the GOP as party of the Quisling tasseled loafer crowd ( Bruuce Rauner, Mark Kirk, Judy Barr Topinka, Chuck Percy, John McCain and John Boehner)  and for  Socialists (Bernie and Chewy Garcia).

Can you  say"Property Taxes?"  Chris Kennedy called our Cook County/Madiganistan system "extortion."The Democrats only have them to bleed and nothing else and Chris Kennedy has criticized County and State abuses. The is sucking dry!

The only GOP voice in Illinois that registers with me is Rep. Jeannie Ives.

Jeannie Ives has more balls than a bowling alley, if may hazard an indelicate metaphor in her praise.

Because the media is feasting on Chris Kennedy's liver, because he has offended the Cook County Democratic Titans and shall be cast eternally into the chthonic depths of Tartarus, or Peotone, maybe, that I am moved to shout for all and sundry within my limited sphere to vote for him against JB Pritzker, The Michigan Avenue Fats of the Pritzker pedigree,

Today the Chicago Tribune lifted a story from Ohio that was all the news back in July, in order to gin up some Chris Kennedy hate.  Maybe SEIU can get the huge Rat put up in front of the Merchandise Mart.

It may take the Sun Times a day or two to catch up, because Sneed is working to help Kimm Fox.

If the media is piling on Chris Kennedy, I am all for him

I'd vote for Chris Kennedy.

I probably will take a GOP ballot to make sure that Jeannie Ives takes down Bruce Rauner.

Merry Gamiss-mas!!!! Kids, I Got Everything Already.

This is what happens when nice people insist on giving presents.   This too.


Everything I read on-line these days seems to have a pop up ad for Gamiss (with the A presented as an upside down V).  These ads are eye-popping examples of new fashion for new Americans. I imagine these folks would love a Techno-version of Christmas in Killarney.



These New Americans must be 'evolved' Americans who eschew meat, sugar, fat and any sense of other people on this planet.

Star Wars Meets Zena the Warrior Princess, Gents!

Kool Yule!

I got nothin'!

                                           Tyger Rags?

I am not a guy who does not like presents ( birthday, Father's Day, Christmas, or Talk like a Pirate Day).  I am not grouch.  I love giving presents to loved ones, but presents embarrass me.

I have everything, already. Gamiss can keep its goods well-warehoused and out of sight.  De Gustibus Non Est Disputandem - I likes what I likes and buy them myself.

Gamiss is not doing it for me. I have everything already and more.

• I do not live in Isis, or Daesh controlled Syria
• I got a woman . . .crazy for me; she's funny that way
• My Kids are all splendid adults
• My Granddaughter Lily is a beautiful, happy and smart baby
• My roof don't leak . . .yet.
• I have most of my teeth
• I can still bend over and pick up pennies on the sidewalk and paper and pencils in the halls of Brother Rice
• I eat like a Sultan
• My Malibu starts and goes
• I take Communion with my neighbors most mornings
• God allows me to continue to draw breath
• Encore Westerns is on cable
• Lovely people crack me up
• Soda Stream keeps me hydrated
• I know Mike Joyce
• I still teach

Gamiss not this Christmas!  Give your love!  Tell me, "You're really not that bad."  Get yourself something nice - on me!  

Remember Christ was born in manger and not on Black Friday.

Brazil '66 Legend Lani Hall and Herb 'The Lonely Bull' Alpert Help Make a Pretty World of Centered People

Our world is populated with wonderful people, who love, give, create and share with God's own grace.

The Hollywood creeps, the City Hall sneaks, the White House oafs and psychopathic haters who dominate our media would have us believe the world is toast and needs a fork stuck in it.

Not so.

I am an empiricist, a south side Catholic one to be sure , but a skeptical observer of the passing scene -Tell a tourist, Bub,  I live here. I run encounter great people.

Last night, I was treated to a 65th birthday fete, by Miss Sullivan, a woman of extraordinary beauty, grace and deportment, that began with brisk walk through Little Italy to Rosebud on Taylor Street.  The lady enjoyed Veal Piccata and I the sinful Eggplant Parmesan, followed by a shared scoop of Lemon Sorbet.  We walked off this meal and went to my car for the present - Seats at Chicago Winery for Lani Hall and Herb Alpert!

This is what I'm talking about!



We sat with strangers who turned out to share paths in our lives- one woman is the sister of the owner of Katerina's on Irving Park Road, where Terry Sullivan sang with her trios and the other woman and her husband owned property near La Lumiere School, where I taught for years.  We both know and love a woman Jane Lindborg, who cooked for the school and authored the delightful quasi-memoir Tappy in 2002.

Strangers no more three couples two native Lakeview couples, my emigrant Buckeye beauty and this cynical south sider swapped yarns, memories and associations as if were familiars at a Leo Alumni dinner.  We don't know if we were Hilary voters, or Deplorables; we were enjoying each others company.

Lani Hall and Herb Alpert had packed Chicago Winery with people who love their music and what it did for us as people.

The couple is madly in love -- 43 years and change.  Herb Alpert, the Steve Stunning record label tycoon and savvy musician of the 1960's met Lani Hall, a Chicago girl from Lawrence and Kimball and a Von Steuben High grad through Sergio Mendez.  Mendez discovered Lani Hall at a north side pub and added her to the roster of Brazil '66 which had signed with Alpert's A & M records.

The love between is as real the examples I see at Mass at Scared Heart in Morgan Park and all around my immediate neighborhood and beyond.

My empirical senses were reignited after weeks of navel-gazingly horrible news on air and in print.

This is a Pretty World !

<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/iovvUsZU7MU" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Mas Que Nada!



That's Portuguese for  "Yeah, right!" - in a good way.

Cardinal Blase Cupich - Exorcise Guns, Not Evil.

Guns kill people in the same way that pencils flunk exams.

The news media's most beloved Catholic leader, is Chicago Archbishop Cardinal Cupich.  Blase Cardinal Cupich is no Francis Cardinal George in that the media love Cupich's every utterance, teaching moment and close association with Cook County's political class, their operatives and their doctrines. The news media treated Cardinal George to an endless bed of nails.

Yesterday, Cardinal Cupich decried gun violence - not evil, but guns: assault rifles in particular.  Cardinal Cupich planted his crosier next to the banner of the Democratic Party in solidarity.

It’s not the first time that Cupich, a keen hunter and supporter of hunters’ rights, has called for tougher gun laws. But he was as pointed as he has been in his criticism of Republican politicians who toe the National Rifle Association’s line on gun control (President Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan have offered their prayers after Sunday’s atrocity, but none has supported an assault weapons ban).
“When the hunting sport has human prey, we have to take action,” Cupich said.

I would venture to guess that more human prey have been 'taken down' in human history by the long bow, spears and swords than all of the quadruped beings shot by hunters combined. From the Battle of Muye in 1046 BC, through Marathon in 490 BC and beyond Agincourt, scores of thousands of human beings perished by the sword, lance and arrow. Deer, ducks and  pheasant are shot seasonally for the table. Human beings kill one another, because of human evil.

There was and continues to be some serious evil going on with our species.

Time was, churchmen would encourage prayer and changes of heart.  Francis of Assisi was soldier before he turned from Satan. St. Ignatius Loyola, a wounded veteran, did the same.

Evil in men's hearts compels them to take up sword, lance, bow and the monster in Texas's a Ruger AR-556 rifle.

Devin Kelley slaughtered 26 worshippers in a Texas church - A Ruger AR-556 rifle did not.  In fact a brave man with a Ruger AR-556 rifle returned fire on the monster and chased him away from his desire to kill more people.

I venture to say that Devin Kelley was one very evil son of a bitch:

• Kelley was convicted of fracturing his baby stepson's skull and assaulting his first wife, Tessa, in the incident at Holloman Air Force Base in New Mexico.

• He was confined for a year, given a bad conduct discharge and reduced in rank to E-1, or airman basic,  . . .  The military failed to enter the domestic violence case into a database that would have made it illegal for him to buy a gun, officials said.

• Records show his first wife divorced him in 2012 in New Mexico. . . .adding that she did not want to speak about him until she was interviewed by law enforcement.

• Kelley remarried in Texas in 2014. The status of that marriage was not clear, but authorities said there was a "domestic situation" with his in-laws.

This atheist preacher, Kelley, was going to kill worshipers  - and he did - with fire, flood, famine, or an AR-15. 

My Cardinal sees no evil at work here?  Cardinal Cupich sees an opportunity to 'get on the right side ' of the media and the elites who govern what is printed, presented and portrayed.  What troubles me, as a wildly flawed Catholic, is the oddness of the Cardinal's words on this evil event, “The time, however, for expressing sorrow and leaving it at that is over. It’s time to act. Let’s start with these high-powered weapons. Both state and federal law need to change to make these guns not available. We don’t need military weapons in our society. We’re not supposed to be at war with one another.” (emphases my own)

No, we are not. Guns do not go to war on us.  People do.

Things should never take on the qualities of a human being, created by God with a soul.  Human beings are blessed with free will, but an AR-556 is not.  A Ruger A-556, though banned in every Catholic parish in this Archdiocese along with every other ballistic discharging metal/composite tube, will never load its own magazine and make its own way into a Mosque, Synagogue, Basilica, Church, or Meeting House to do slaughter.  An evil human being will use a Ruger AR-556, a can a gasoline, ammonia and bleach, a machete, golf clubs, or a 24" tire iron to do what he wills.

Anthropomorphism is a mental exercise that gives human qualities to inanimate objects ( Demon Rum/Drug Abuse/Gun Violence & etc.) .  It can also help us understand God who is three Persons. It can also allow people to practice anthropomorphism in reverse and say, "It's not a human being/person, it's just a blob of tissue."  Pretend that there is such a thing as 'gun violence' and not criminal violence and we will watch the body count rise even higher. 

I was disappointed that my Cardinal did not demand a war on evil. That is something that my beloved Francis Cardinal George would have done.  He taught all of us that Satan was active in our world and that evil happens when we allow Satan to dictate our actions. No, Cardinal Blase Cupich knows that such a response would be scorned by the likes of Rahm Emanuel, E.J. Dionne, Michael Sneed, Michael Pfleger, Jim Acosta and Toni Preckwinkle.   

Rather, our society is free to continue to pretend that things control our lives.

Like the Late DNA info, Chicago Trib Refuses (Fascism) to Mention Revolutionary Communists

“If you want to know about, and work toward, a different world—and if you want to stand up and fight back against what's being done to people—this is where you go. You go to this Party, you take up this Party's newspaper, you get into this Party's leader and what he's bringing forward.” Bob Avakian - Revolutionary Communist Party

The Tribune is committed to Midwestern values and concerns, and brings that sensibility to the public debate. In both its words and its actions, it seeks out true innovation, but is unimpressed by momentary trend and skeptical of untested theory. This has been a basic hallmark of the Tribune throughout its history and continues to guide this newspaper. It encourages constructive change in the light of tradition and the lessons of history. Experience, as well as intellect, is essential to wisdom. Chicago Tribune Principles

Innovation?   "Innovation, for its part, can refer to something new or to a change made to an existing product, idea, or field.,  says Merriam -Webster 

Innovation like a Revolution"?

How about "give a spoken or written account of something that one has observed, heard, done, or investigated.."  That is the definition of a "Report."  Revolution can come later.

I saw a Malibu and the Malibu is a Chevrolet product.

I saw a Whopper and it is a Burger King product.

I saw a Big MAC and it is a McDonald's product.

I saw a Refuse Fascism (RF) Protest and RF is part of the Revolutionary Communist Party.

I read about the Trump protest organized by Refuse Fascism that was covered in the Chicago Tribune which refused to mention the Revolutionary Communist Party.

Why is that?

Does the Trib assume everyone already knows that Refuse Fascism RF is a product of the Revolutionary Communist Party REVCOM?

Does the Chicago Tribune believe, as the shut-down DNAinfo Chicago did, that people should not know that there is any connection between the two?

I believe it is the later.

More than 100 protesters marched in a light rain through Chicago's Loop to Trump Tower on Saturday, part of demonstrations in more than a dozen cities scheduled nearly a year after President Donald Trump’s election.
The protestors, who carried signs reading “The Trump/Pence Regime MUST GO!” first rallied at Federal Plaza, at Adams and Dearborn streets, then marched north on State Street. They were outnumbered by uniformed police officers.  A group called Refuse Fascism called for rallies Saturday in more than 20 cities. Speakers at the Chicago rally said they hoped the protests would build until millions of Americans took to the streets in opposition to the Trump administration. Steve Schmadeke for Chicago Tribune

Steve Schmadeke probably knows that there is direct link between Refuse Fascism and the Revolutionary Communist Party and Revolution Books. I know that a Malibu is a Chevy, for God's sake and I know that REVCOM was behind most of the Joshua Beal protests last November.  DNAinfo Chicago knew too, but kept it out of print. DNAinfo Chicago and Gothamist were shut down last week by its owner.  Even Wikipedia know offers the connection between between Refuse Fascism and REVCOM.

DNAinfo Chicago failed, because it did not live up to the expectations of owner.  The owner expected solid local coverage of neighborhood events to give ".written account of something that one has observed, heard, done, or investigated." Joe Ricketts said, "while we made important progress toward building DNAinfo into a successful business, in the end, that progress hasn’t been sufficient to support the tremendous effort and expense needed to produce the type of journalism on which the company was founded.”

DNAinfo Chicago ignored the Revolutionary Communist Party's key role in the Joshua Beal protests all last year, even though the signs (paid for by REVCOM) pointed in that direction.

The Revolutionary Communist Party is as dangerous as any alt-right band of bravos.  It is a thug organization that provides street cover for left-leaning activists, journalists  and politicians, while killing off public debate and free speech everywhere.

Protest up a storm against Trump, or fois gras, 24/7!

Just report honestly . . . for once.

Look at the signs.

Look at the players.

Report what is there.

Leave the innovation and revolution to the Edisons and the Lenins.

DNAinfoChicago R.I.P.: Ye Hardly Knew Ye.

I read DNAinfoChicago from the get-go.   It was, at first. a great news aggregate that offered local coverage.

I gotta go with Joe about its demise, Joe Ricketts, that is, the Cubs' Grandpa, “And while we made important progress toward building DNAinfo into a successful business, in the end, that progress hasn’t been sufficient to support the tremendous effort and expense needed to produce the type of journalism on which the company was founded.”

News coverage of local events became less devout and political hack-work seemed to ooze from every column.

DNAinfoChicago somehow morphed into the detested MEDIA.  Same old, same old.

Solid writers like Mark Schipper and Ed Komenda disappeared and activist group-think writers dominated the coverage.

Most telling for me was the awful coverage of the idiot who pulled a gun on people after he was asked to not block the entrance of the firehouse on 111th Street.

The idiot was shot and killed, when he aimed his weapon at people.

The idiot had been celebrating a relative's funeral by weaving in and out of the heavily trafficked lanes of 111th Street, the commercial district for the Mount Greenwood neighborhood.  Traffic stalled and the Hossier Hothead acted out with his weapon and his mouth.

I had had my haircut on the site of the violence and where the dope met his demise, only an hour before the folly.

However, DNAinfoChicago  reporters, Joe Ward especially. conflated identity politics, race-baiting and social justice warfare with what had taken place - Marist high school was placed in the cross-hairs and community scab-yanking over imagined and occasionally accurate racism became the menu all of the month of November 2016, until the facts un-Pflegered the story.  Joe Ward never once considered covering the Revolutionary Communist Party's orchestration of the post shooting protests.  That would have chopped his narrative.


The DNAinfo Joshua Beal mythology can be found here, because the archived yarns are shut down.
Joe Ricketts owned the site and Gothamist and decided to close shop.

Conflated coverage of the news is what the detested American media is all about.  People want to know what is happening in their neighborhoods.  DNAinfoChicago tried to do that and ended up being another detested outlet for prefabricated opinions.

The Sun Times, owned by the public service unions, did a hit piece on the news of DNAinfoChicago's demise, not unlike the covergae of the late Mr. Beal:

A week before the shutdown, the Gothamist and DNAinfo newsrooms in New York voted to join the Writers Guild of America East, which released a statement Thursday saying “it is no secret that threats were made to these workers during the organizing drive.”
In a September post entitled “Why I’m Against Unions At Businesses I Create,” Ricketts wrote on his personal blog of his belief “that unions exert efforts that tend to destroy the Free Enterprise system.”
“I believe unions promote a corrosive us-against-them dynamic that destroys the esprit de corps businesses need to succeed,” Ricketts wrote. “And that corrosive dynamic makes no sense in my mind where an entrepreneur is staking his capital on a business that is providing jobs and promoting innovation.”
According to a New York Times report, 115 reporters from the websites who are now out of a job will receive three months of paid “administrative leave” at their full salaries, along with four weeks of severance pay.

Joe Ricketts was right.   Joe Ricketts gave his employees a pretty decent severance package.  More than an SEIU janitor can expect when all of the public funding has dried up.

So, we say goodbye to DNAinfoChicago.  Goodbye.

Thanks for the shot at news coverage Joe Ricketts.  It was appreciated by people like me, until the good writers disappeared.

Next time you set up shop, hire writers and tell the 'journalists' to get a union card and get fitted for a purple T-shirt.