So, It's Monday - Polka!

The Bears?  Had to happen.   Sox and Cubs?  Please.  Mortgage due tomorrow?  As always.

Hey,The weather was fabulous all weekend; the kids are all healthy and happy; Leo High School football is 5-0 at the JV and Varsity levels; I got two and half  pounds of Greek (Kasseri and Graviera) cheese in the icebox and polka music in my blood!

Pobierz w Paddy Wagon was Irish drań!






White Boy, grać, że funky music!

Totalitarian Tinkerbell's Top Tomes

Academics can barely determine the proper amount to tip a barista; yet, they can tell cops how to fight crime and President's what trigger not  to pull . . . and when.  Academics comprise Blue Ribbon State panels of tweedy totalitarians who empty prisons of felons and ignore the families of victims.

Academics used to be the sad rumpled dopes that they are in real life.  Only Camille Paglia among the literary lions stands up for real people.  Professor Paglia called the most fatuous fraud in literary studies, Stanley Fish -America's Totalitarian Tinkerbell.  Spot on, Doc.

I was lucky enough to be taught by teachers and only ran into an academic well past the time of being awed by the man's condescension and poor personal hygiene.  I had about tens years of teaching under my pelt, before returning to post-graduate studies.  This one poser taught some PC lit course on gender and colonialism.  He was a faculty pain-in-the-ass and popular with the kids - easy A.

How sad that some people only read what academics find - vital, searing, game-changing and really stupid.
I imagine that the book reviews never get past the covers.
e.g..




“Throughout, Dimock contends that American
literature is answerable not to the nation-state, but
to the human species as a whole, and that it looks
dramatically different when removed from a strictly
national or English-language context.”
I applaud this goal, yet all of the texts drawn
from global contexts “across deep time” are presented in English translations.
Henry James’s novels and
The Epic of Gilgamesh, to give one comic example,
get read together. I know—in this case, who cares?
But this is true throughout. Knowing a text in its
original language and cultural contexts is crucial.
If such knowledge is removed, due to the scholar’s
inadequacies or the assumed reader’s, the result is
readings lacking resonance, depth, weight. Reading
then is like looking at a child’s shaken snow globe,
with the texts-snowflakes gradually settling down to
one common level. All are globally equal now but
equally bland and banal."  Daniel T. O’Hara
Temple University



"Cheesy, laughable, and
iterative: the writer who brought you a fudge recipe
in Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang (1964) introduces the
bondsman of global capital." -Eyal Amiran University of California, Irvine

"How cleverly condescending can one get? A tear falling in a field of snow!" -Marjorie Perloff
Stanford University


"The character of Clyde had been pulled out of Dreiser’s own murky
inner life. Dreiser has never been accused of being
a stylist, so a difference in language is not the question; it is more a matter of Dreiser letting the public
record interfere with his re-imagining ."William A. O’Rourke
University of Notre Dame


"This formulaic knock-off
of fantastic conspiracy theories is a trite study for a
film script—and no wonder the movie was also bad.
I love the chapters that are only a couple of lines
long." Bonnie Wheeler
Southern Methodist University


In a world that depends up Public Televison to determine what restaurant serves really important cuisine, it is always nice to go out and eat some good chow in the Heart of Italy.

Do so likewise with what you read.

Tales of the South Side - Two Nuns Plus Two Jews Equal???? Come on -

In 1964, Sister Mary Sherry, RSM ( the former Grace Magdalen Conroy - Mercy High Class of1958 & B.A. from Mundelein College '62) accompanied Sister Mary Aoileach do Aghaidh, RSM  ( the former Peg Mahone of Galway -on community business, away from the forty children per classroom at Little Flower Grammar School located on Chicago's south side at 81st & Honore, to the bright lights Manhattan, NYC. 
                              Hoods universal -('Gasp) Do see the cheek of her!')

Young Sister Mary Sherry looked like Tuesday Weld and her Irish born superior resembled Charles Laughton in drag.  Sister Mary Sherry taught 1st Grade and Sister Mary Aches Do Ache taught me and my contemporaries in 7th grade.  Sister Mary Sherry had long alabaster fingers like a Dresden China figurine of a Teutonic Princess and Sister Mary Aches had a set of meat hooks on her that resembled a couple of unboned Mickleberrys.  Sister Mary Sherry held a Bachelor of Arts in English and was studying for certification at Parker Teachers College on 62nd & Stewart and Sister Mary Aoileach do Aghaidh could beat the living poop out of the coaching staff at Leo High School and her kindest murmur translated to " I'll Have Your Guts fer Garters!"

Having concluded their business for the community at some old Dutch law firm that held mortgages on some Mercy Nun properties in Mount Greenwood out in the sticks of the city, the pair of woman religious strolled Manhattan.

They passed two tall, dignified men with very long beards, sporting very nice black suits and matching Stetsons.

Sister Mary Sherry remarked, "Sister, those gentlemen are Hasidim  - devout Jewish diamond merchants."

Her porcine superior snorted in Galway-ese,  'Shtuff en Nonshensh. Thems Trappishts, er Carthooshians.  They's prieshtsss.'
(translation:  Stuff and Nonsense. They are Trappists, or Carthusian. They happen to be priests.)

After a dozen or so steps, Sister Mary Sherry summoned up the courage to suggest, ' Sister Mary - the two gentlemen were speaking in Yiddish.'

Her boss stopped and glared before pronouncing -' T'wash Ladin.'
(translation: It was Latin.)

The astonished but cowed little nunette awaited the full judgment and clarity of the homelier Bride of Christ, " Ladin! Da tung of da Chorch! One fella shez, ' Mincus . . .Pincus Fuctus!'  Dare Y'ar."

(translation: Hey, give it a try yourself!)

Father Tony Brankin Answered Mark Brown's Column in the Sun Times today - Two Weeks ago.

Some time ago, the Illinois Coalition of  Immigrant and Refugee Rights ( ICIR) found it had lost its funding from the Catholic Campaign for Human Development (CCHD)after ICIR decided to stand in solidarity with those demanding the redefinition of marriage, via homosexual marriage legislation.

As a result ICIR could no longer fund Albany Park Neighborhood Council's Bike 'N Roses program that helps poor kid fix bikes with the dollars funded by the Catholics. See how this works?

Mark Brown, who feels deeply and writes nicely, took umbrage with the Archbishop of Chicago's Catholics, Francis Cardinal George, OMI, decision not to allow CCHD to continue to toss huge money to ICIR,which peeled off some Catholic Jacksons and tossed them to the poor kids of Albany Park, after ICIR tossed the Cardinal's defense of marriage and teachings from the Catholic catechism under foot once the check was dry.

Mark Brown wrote a heart-tugger about the likely lads of Albany Park and the cruelty of the Cardinal and followed that up with very dissembling interview with Chicago's Shepherd. That's is what a Progressive advocate must do! I guess.

Mark Brown's column was about the domino effect defunding the ICIR for its solidarity with homesexuala marriage was followed in short order by a cadre of Democratic Party lightweights with spray tans condeming the Cardinal and shortly thereafter one heaveyweight and former gubernatorial candiate the same.   Getting a funding cut is never pleasant, but its part-and-parcel of the action packed world of fund-raising.

I too get my shorts in knot every time a 501(c)3, corporate charity arm, or rich guys writes a decline to a proposal for a grant to help poor Black, Latino and Canaryville Irish kids in Auburn Gresham, because we are Catholic in mission and operation. One might call such refusals to help poor kids get a high school education . . .Progressive. Shucks, the very first decline to one of my inquiries came from Barack Obama himself, when he headed the Woods Fund.  Progressives don't do certain faith based initiatives, not unlike, Catholic grant making entities who will not fund fund groups seeking to undo it.  I research and reach out to 501(c)3's, corporations and rich guys unburdened by Progressive symbiotic doctrines.

Today Mark Brown lays out the red carpet welcoming Progressive money to philanthropy.

A group of progressive charitable foundations — active in both the immigration reform and marriage equality movements — will step up Wednesday to announce creation of an emergency fund to replace the $300,000 stripped from member organizations of the Illinois Coalition of Immigrant and Refugee Rights.
I’m glad to see that somebody has got these folks’ back.

Can I get a Harrumph?  Bike chains and seat adjustments will once again signal the dreams of Albany Park's impoverished lads.

Two weeks ago the pastor of St. Odilo's Catholic Church in Berwyn, Father Tony Brankin, preemptively answered the Mark Brown Huzzahs in a published homily. St. Odilo's is comprised largely of Latino ( Mexican), blue collar ethnics and a few Black families.  Father Tony Brankin is a musician, sculptor, scholar and a Catholic priest.
Read this, folks.

Ramblings - Fr. Brankin 
CHD and the Cardinal
Not too long ago the Cardinal asked us to help defend him against the assaults of so-called
Catholic politicians of Chicago—taking place these days in the papers and media.
It seems that some politicians—including Bill Daley—(the one that wants to be governor)—
are protesting the fact that the Cardinal denied charitable funding to a community organization
that advertises itself as working for immigrants. This is grant money that comes from the
Catholic Campaign for Human Development. You remember, this is the collection in October
where the cardinal asks for donations from the Catholic people of Chicago.
Well the problem is that this particular organization has decided to promote homosexual
marriage among the immigrants—all the while it takes Catholic money. Of course we cannot
be involved in any way with something like this.
The Cardinal has made it very clear that it is not right that the money that Catholic people
give to the Church for the purpose of alleviating the suffering of the poor—would be used by
the recipients of that grant to fight against the Catholic Church’s moral teachings. It is in fact
dishonest. And that is the Cardinal’s word—dishonest.
Of course the politicians are crying great crocodile tears: “How terrible of the Cardinal—that
he would deny the poor people this help—this money!”
Well all I can ask is: how dare these conniving Catholic politicians demand your charity—as
if it were theirs—as if it were owed to them. If they want their pet organizations to survive—
then I have no doubt that they could reach into their own pockets and pull out the money they
need. It is chump change for someone like Bill Daley who has been fooling around with the
Clintons and the Obamas for twenty years now.
Besides, it is not poor people who receive any of the money from this grant anyway. Not a
cent would have been given to the poor woman sitting on one side of the desk with three
children in her arms—and her husband being threatened with deportation. Not one cent. That
money goes to the organizer who is writing down all the information and asking her to hold a
sign at the next protest rally.
The money from many of these grants is not going for the poor but for community organizations so that the organization can pay its bills.
In other words, the money we collect for the Campaign for Human Development does not
find its way to the homeless guy who doesn’t have a mat to sleep on—it isn’t given to the
struggling father without papers who is just trying to feed his family—it gets funneled to the
community organization. And then, of course, you have to ask: How did the politicians get involved in all this? Why
have they decided that now is the time to shame the Cardinal and the Church with their
falsehoods? You would have thought they didn’t have a horse in this race.
But there they are—in all the newspapers—all upset with the cardinal—and their shorts in a
knot—because their buddies—the professional poverty crowd—the ones with whom they go to
rallies and fund raisers and cocktail parties—you know—the cocktail parties they never invite
you or me to—they’re upset because their buddies are getting cut off. And what better way to
gain cheap plaudits than to slam the Cardinal for opposing homosexual marriage?
It seems that they are all in on it—the politicians and precinct captains and the community
organizers and the professional poverty hustlers and the media. And here is the likely scenario.
The Cardinal cuts off some free-will funding to a group that now promotes homosexual
marriage. The community organizers panic! They are on the phone to city hall in a New York
minute: “What’s going on? He cut us off! You better do something!”
The next thing you know there is a full page ad in the Tribune—paid for I am sure by the
Democratic Party—a smarmy, lying letter that excoriates the Cardinal for not helping the
poor—a letter that perverts Church teaching about life and love and marriage—a letter that
demands more money for their friends. And they write these greedy lies all in the name of
helping poor immigrants.
What a crew! This is what goes on in this city—and they want you to think it is all on the up
and up! Well it’s not on the up and up. And probably never has been.
But I will say that I hope we rethink our involvement with the Catholic Campaign for Human
Development—because when we don't give our money to the poor, but to those who say they
are helping the poor, we are really vulnerable to these kinds of problems. There will be
no end to such cynical and greedy manipulations and dishonesty. We cannot keep funding
people who just do not believe what we believe about life and love. It is that simple.
And then we can start distributing assistance to people directly and to those who actually need it—just like we used to when the poor were genuinely helped and they had the Gospel
preached to them in the bargain. And Son of a gun! It worked! 

Fred Eychner, a rich guy who owns the Illinois and good part of National LGBTQ agenda is helping fund the Albany Park bike fixers.  That's great; no kidding.

Fred Eychnaer owns a significant piece of both US Senators, most US Reps.the current governor and most of legislature. Fred does Not own a piece of the Roman Catholic Church.

The Catholic Church in Chicago amassed pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters from immigrants and refugees in its churches over the last two hundred and still managed to develop social services being now erased by Progressive lordship over the Democratic and Republican elected officials of Illinois.

I hope that Fred Eychaner's wallet can make up the difference in peoples lives that the Catholic Church continues to do on its dime.

The Cannabis Career Institute - Proves that I am not fully evolved

Push carts slinging dope?  Medical Marijuana Roach Coaches? Sweet.

CCI was created with you in mind. The eager, cannabis entrepreneur trying to find out the best and easiest way to get into this exciting industry. Luckily, our staff here is ready, willing and able to provide YOU with a personalized ACTION PLAN (tm) and ACTION TEAM (tm). That way you leave our seminars knowing EXACTLY what to do, who to call and who to trust. Not only that, you will have assembled a support network that you can come back to again and again as your project progresses to assure your continued success. We have been helping marijuana businesses to become legal and compliant from the start for over three years now. Our faculty consists of industry veterans with not only a lifetime of achievements, but the seal of approval from their peers. We want to be involved in your business. We will be there for you. There is no other Cannabis University that can say this. Ask us about our successful clients and schedule a one on one consulting or attend a seminar today! CCI

Hey, what I gotta do to get you into a pipeful of medicinal goodness?  Me?  Nah.  I was never much for the jigweed.  I smoked some dope.  Mostly, it was harsher than  month old opened packs of Raleigh's  and fogged over my manly classic Clubman* aftershave scent and aura. I did smoke a a joint of Jamaican an was rendered positively legless from its toxins.  I think that the last time I smoked dope was in  the spring 1974.   I made enough of goof out myself with beer.

I counselled my kids with these commandments.

• You can NOT drink a beer and then start a car engine, let alone drive
• You can not smoke dope - marijuana, weed, or whatever
• You can not take any drugs that do not come from Doctors. Vargas and McEntee.

Everything else is pretty much subject to negotiation.  Marijuana consumption is a spectator sport, because it is an illegal drug.  If you want to be employed, you may not piss hot - fail a drug test.

Medical marijuana is a new loop-hole industry destined to make ambulance chasers a tad richer.  The Hemp lobby is all about effecting historical change under the guise of helping to ease the sufferings of the afflicted and ensure that hipsters get to smoke weed.

Here is opening of the Medical Marijuana circus.

Personally, why not make any and all opiates legal and subject to tax via licensing?  Sick people should have anything that actually eases their sufferings - let's just cut out the dried, cured, most smoke-able and baked bullshit.

* I use only Pinaud-Clubman products.

Cardinal George and Pope Francis Say Exactly the Same Thing - Love Gays; Oppose Redefinition of Marriage

O my God, I am heartily sorry for having offended Thee, and I detest all mysins because of Thy just punishments, but most of all because they offendThee, my God, Who art all-good and deserving of all my love. I firmlyresolve, with the help of Thy grace, to sin no more and to avoid the nearoccasions of sin. Act of Contrition

“We cannot insist only on issues related to abortion, gay marriage and the use of contraceptive methods. This is not possible. I have not spoken much about these things, and I was reprimanded for that. But when we speak about these issues, we have to talk about them in a context. The teaching of the church, for that matter, is clear and I am a son of the church, but it is not necessary to talk about these issues all the time. " Pope Francis I

"Everybody is welcome,"but not everything we do can be acceptable. Not everything I do, and not everything anybody else does." Francis Cardinal George

I missed the part in the Pope Francis interview where he advocates homosexual marriage, a redefinition of marriage, a nod to abortion, or plea for free contraceptives.  However, deep thinkers like Pulitzer Prize winner Mary Schmich and the almost invisible Neil Steinberg are doing hand-stands and hugs over the latest cut and paste job by the social engineers.   

I oppose the idiotic and intellectually insulting Religious Freedom and Marriage Equality bully bill that has gone about as far as the Book of Mormon in making Illinois more like Lincoln and less like Joseph Smith, or Bishop Shiel, but wish all and sundry happiness.  The Civil Union bill was the advent of new dawn in civil and social living until Pat Quinn's ink dried on that legislation; at which point Stonewall became Selma and Illinois just could not wait. 

The Pope said nothing new in the article for the Jesuits run here in the States by America and nothing that Francis Cardinal George has not said at every turn in the twisted road to Illinois homosexual marriage and the necessary redefinition of marriage.  Sex outside of marriage is a sin- gay, straight, or solo.   Sex outside of marriage is not a crime, generally speaking.  The only persons that concern me with regard to sex are my kids and of course old Dad himself . . .as if.

Like I said above, Francis Cardinal George has never once uttered a calumny against any sinner.  Nor, has he ever issued a Catholic  Fatwah upon the heads of LGBTQs ever, or of any sort.  Pope Francis called the priesthood to task about their role as pastors ( read the damn article) and he especially mentioned homosexual sex and abortion within the context of the sacrament of Confession -

"We must always consider the person. Here we enter into the mystery of the human being. In life, God accompanies persons, and we must accompany them, starting from their situation. It is necessary to accompany them with mercy. When that happens, the Holy Spirit inspires the priest to say the right thing.“This is also the great benefit of confession as a sacrament: evaluating case by case and discerning what is the best thing to do for a person who seeks God and grace. The confessional is not a torture chamber, but the place in which the Lord’s mercy motivates us to do better. I also consider the situation of a woman with a failed marriage in her past and who also had an abortion. Then this woman remarries, and she is now happy and has five children. That abortion in her past weighs heavily on her conscience and she sincerely regrets it. She would like to move forward in her Christian life. What is the confessor to do?

Cardinal George explained "I think it's a good examination of conscience," George said outside Holy Name Cathedral, where he had just celebrated a Mass honoring couples married for 50 years. "I also think that he's coming from the viewpoint of a pastor who is close to the Lord and close to the people."

Then we get a Medill treatement of the Cardinal Archbishop's remarks, But George, a vocal opponent of gay marriage, warned that some had gone too far in seeing Pope Francis' interview as a move away from long-held church teachings on homosexuality, abortion and contraception"

Yep, a vocal opponent of gay marriage, just like Pope Francis.

"Everybody is welcome," George said, "but not everything we do can be acceptable. Not everything I do, and not everything anybody else does."

 Hell, I am welcome, even though my thoughts words and deeds can be unacceptable. . .wildly unacceptable. My beliefs are unacceptable to people who demand that I accept the notion that marriage can and must be not restricted to one man and one woman.  Now, what would those Mormons ridiculed in that boffo play think about that?   One man . . .two wives . . . three?  Does Greg Harris' religious freedom bill include Mormon polygamists?  Or, would that cast the LGBTQ community in the role of hot-headed and hysterical bigot?  Must a wife be human?  Some folks worship chicks and ducks and geese what better scurry!  How about a Dutch Wife? Oh, who cares about wives and WHo cares a fig about the Dutch?

Why sailors and members of the news media.

My most desperately wild 'dirty' thoughts are of Matt Helm movie variety; yet, I am thoroughly ashamed of their distracting imposition upon my better angels.  'And I detest all my  sins' including all of the fun ones.

Read the comments in the article concerning this matter in today's Tribune and tell me again  which side spews the real hate.

Something We All Need in a Big Way: American Exceptionalism - Miss Ella Fitzgerald, John Singer Sargent, Lionel Hampton, Sonny Burke Johnny Mercer and Nelson Riddle

, John Singer Sargent's American eye takes in a Street in Venice.



Lionel Hampton and Sonny Burke wrote an exquistite instrumentalwaterfall  in 1947.   One of America's greatest lyricists was driving along the California coast and heard this melody.  Johnny Mercer wrote these beautiful lyrics.

Your lips were like a red and ruby chalice
Warmer than the summer night
The clouds were like an alabaster palace
Rising to a snowy height
Each star its own Aurora Borealis
Suddenly you held me tight
I could see the midnight sun

I can't explain The silver rain that found me
Or was that a moonlit veil
The music of the Universe
Around me
Or was that a nightingale
And then your arms miraculously found me
Suddenly the sky turned pale
and I saw the midnight sun

Was there ever such a night
It's a thrill
I still don't quite believe
But after you were gone
There was still some
Stardust on my sleeve

The flame of it may dwindle
To an ember
And the stars forget to shine
And we may see the meadow in December
Icy white and crystaline
But oh my darling always I'll remember
When your lips were close to mine
And we saw the Midnight Sun
The Midnight Sun

In 1957, America's greatest voice, Miss Ella Fitzgerald, sang to Nelson Riddles charts with his orchestra.  This is what Americans do.

Tio Con Brio: Uncle Briskly's Voter Guide to the Illinois Primary for Governor

 Quinn and his guru - the Old Red Man of Progressive Illinois -Dr. Quentin Young -made people believe he was friend of Veterans in 2004 by belaboring the obvious.

It seems that Pat Quinn's enablers did a black bag job of some kind on Billy Daley and Mr. Daley opted out of the race.  The Tribune editorial ninnies (Bruce Dold) argue that Pat Quinn's Populist Bare-Knuckle brio scared the bejabbers out of the 'banker, working for a bank.'  No, sweethearts, the Tribune is not engineering this election as it did for Il Sen. Barack Obama.  The Sun Times hired the BGA, or vice versa and it planned to dredge up Axelrodian Tales of woe for the Daley Campaign.  The BGA couldn't find a drunk pay-day unless a politician took Andy Shaw's team into a joint and handcuffed them to chap fully Kreuzened and Jaeger fueled.  The Quinn Camp did a job on Bill Daley, it seems to me, and he did the noble Roman.

That just proves that Bill Daley is no Progressive. Progressives don't do noble.

Progressives survive after back-stabbing their sponsors and all who help them.  Jane Addams would be just another patrician Sapphist, unless Alderman Johnny Powers hadn't appointed her 19th Ward garbage commissioner.  Old lusty Jane turned on her sponsor.  Chart the career of a Mike Quigley, a Forrest Claypool, or a Pat Quinn and read Progressive. Policy trumps everything, but the nest payoff.

Bill Daley will be fine.  His campaign is over and after Friday, the back-stabbers and creeps who tend to be Progressives will have had all the fun at Mr. Daley's expense that they deserve and by Monday will have 'reached out'  to Daley's people and make nice.  Progressives would be tightly packed in Hyde Park, the Lake Front and suburban Evanston  were not for cynical attempts by old time Machine Democrats to co-opt the co-opters back in the 1970's.  Prior to that age of bad hair, worse fashion and too-hip-to be square politics, fellow travelling Marxists May-poled around Leo DesPres, or teased SDS glue sniffers into the barber shops and Northwestern, or University of Chicago law schools.

While the Brothers Daley were growing up, labor leaders wore black suits and packed heat to scare off not only gangsters but Reds, Commies, Fellow-travellers, members of Comintern USA, and university professors considered with the same awe as the house cat.  Once politicians who knew better admitted the Progressives into the tent the pissing hosed universal.  Shakman was taken seriously and larceny went from a hung-over city worker snoozing on the job and grabbing a few extra nickels to Organization suicide.

Dedicated soft-balls like Pat Quinn sat at the feet abortion-intoxicated Reds like Dr. Quentin Young and curried favor with Abner Mikva.  In 1972, the bad guys took over the Party of Andy Jackson and turned it into the Party of Andy Shaw. They did so in Miami.  Creeps, Grifters and Reds became mainstream with the assistance of blow-dried ninnies like Dan Rather and MadMen Ad people.  The recently assassinated Bobby Kennedy became a mythical life-member of Planned Parenthood and JFK became Gandhi G. Once goofs and short-term memory folks understood that RFK was not a deeply devout daily Communicant foe of Planned Parenthood it was a short hop to accepting nitwits like Dawn Clark Netsch, Barbar Flynn Currie, Jan Schakowsky, Mike Quigley and Toni Preckwinkle as intellectual titans.

Bill Daley would have been a good governor in the same manner that Mike Madigan is a great Speaker of the House.  They are competent and serious men.  Instead, thanks to Progressive thought, we continue to find Pat Quinn, Toni Preckwinkle and Barack Obama holding office.

I'd vote for Jack Ketch before I'd again give anything to Pat Quinn other than well-earned derission.  He is a proven Progressive and nothing more - personally and professional disloyal, shamefully incompetent, petulant, mewlingly submissive to enemies of the American middle class. Other than that, he miht just be a very nice man. . .. when he's home.

Read the comments from the Democratic and Progressive hucksters on Capitol Fax Blog about Bill Daley's exit from the race and you get a good feel for what it means to be a Progressive.  Butt-munching sycophants early in the day and howling dogs of prey once the Pavlovian Progressive signal is blown by its site manager.

I'm a Democrat.  I believe in real labor - the skilled and industrial trades who created America's middle class.  I am an unflinching Catholic opposed to abortion and a stupidly legislated bill that redefines marriage.

In the coming primary, I am going to vote for Tio Hardiman, a product of Progressive Democrats, as opposed to hapless Pat Quinn, a Progressive tool.

CHICAGO (AP) -- The man who's now the lone Democrat challenging Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn in the 2014 primary says he's staying in the race.
Tio Hardiman is the only candidate left after former White House Chief of Staff William Daley announced Monday that he's dropping out of the primary.
Hardiman is the former head of a Chicago anti-violence group CeaseFire.
In a statement, he says Daley's decision to drop out shows just how bad Illinois' political situation has become.
He adds Illinois residents "deserve a governor that reflects them" and who is prepared to "endure and not weaken."
Daley is set to discuss his decision during a news conference Tuesday.

Bill Daley is out.  Bruce Rauner? Nah.  GOP toe-shooter Bill Bradley? Nah.  Let's see what's left . . .not much.

God help us, help ourselves.

Tio Hardiman for Governor in Democratic Primary

“Faced with the prospect of five or nine years to try to dig the state out of the mess that it’s in, Bill decided that’s not what he’s wanting to do at age 65,” campaign spokesman Pete Giangreco said.


Bill Daley bowed out of the Democratic Gubernatorial Primary Race, yesterday. Today, Tio Hardiman remains the only Democrat in the race to unseat Gov. Pat Quinn of Planned Parenthood Illinois.Tio Hardiman is the wife beating family man and former chief of the Illinois Gang-banger Pensioners - Ceasefire.

If Thundering Dick Simpson of Mikva Industries says he has NO chance . . ."Hardiman’s efforts at the grassroots level are undeniable, but with no legislative or policy experience, and a domestic violence controversy looming over his head, Washington and Dick Simpson, Political Science chair at the University of Illinois—Chicago say he has no chance of repeating the same statewide success that other black officials like now-President and former Illinois Senator Barack Obama or former Senator turned Mayoral candidate Carol Moseley Braun have.. . . And Laura Washington says that Tio Hardiman is "a true community advocate. He is a true grassroots man,”  I just might be on the side of the angels, for once.

No Policy experience, says Thundering Dick - that's a plus. Policy is what killed government and government works best when politics is based upon loyalty. 
What could go wrong?  Illinois.

Gov. Pat Quinn has all of the loyalty and commitment of an English Springer Spaniel; if you want to know where you stand with Pat Quinn, wait until Personal PAC Boss Terry Cosgrove lets him know. That said, I believe that recent revelations printed in the Chicago Sun Times concerning CTA and RTA transportation moguls with a little Breakfast Burge Mythology on the side for post-prandial snacking.were spoon fed to the always hapless BGA by the Quinn-ippiac Clown Posse,    You can call Bill Daley "Banker" six-ways to Sunday, but this other stuff?  Hold the phone.

Given these exciting trends in the race for our Palace of Versailles in Springfield, Tio Hardiman has my vote for the Democratic Primary for Governor.

I do not believe that Emily's List, Planned Parenthood or Terry Cosgrove's Personal PAC will endorse Tio Hardiman.  I know how Tio will spend Illinois dollars and so do the Feds.

Bike Terror - Even Chicks Who Are Tops Get Knocked: Nicole Kidman and a Total Jag Collide

Nicole Kidman can make getting knocked down by a cyclist look good, but I gotta ask, Is  thatpost-it note on her pumps de rigeur?

Cyclists are jags.  They are always decked out in goofy outfits that our Moms would never let us wear out in public for fear of a well-deserved trimming from the tough guys over-by-White Hen. Cyclists tend to be tall, lean, non-smokers with the personalities of dial tones.

Cyclists are public policy darlings: Green, Lean-Cuisine, PC Mean.

They never seem to be African American, Mexican American, Asian American, or Working American Blue Collar-Tight-Knight Ethnics.

Now, that is of course my handy broad brush, or extra-roller screwed to an extendable idiot-stick for hard to reach places.  Good people do ride bicycles, but they tend to do so without the Lance Armstrong EuroTrash Poser rigouts and obey the laws of traffic and physics.

Cyclists, or Bike Terrorists, go where they will in any direction and always against the traffic lights and common courtesy. Here is one that did not get away with his crime:

Nicole Kidman has been knocked over by a cyclist and according to reports, is planning on pressing charges.The actress was returning to her hotel after attending the Calvin Klein show on Thursday as part of New York Fashion Week.Nicole fell to the ground when she was hit by a photographer named Carl Wu, who was apparently racing to try and take a picture for her.

"Uh, Oh! Carl Wu!," you say, " that obliterates your above demographic premise about Asian Americans.

Really?  Carl?  Mr. and Mrs. Wu decided to celebrate their inner-Viking or Teuton by naming the lad Carl. Nope, Cal is a Jag.

Carl is all hog-tied in his ride and while every man-jack with an ounce of testosterone is fighting to help up the leggy rehead akimbo - no one aids Carl until the stunning woman in dove grey frock is pawed by the available lads.

Then, an African American pedestrian offers his manly mitt to Carl


While Carl's stutter-bug accomplice Nils, or Bjorn, or Sigurd Ho shoots pics. He's a jag as well.

Ride a bike; don't be a jag - a cyclist.

Her Sister was Worse - An Actual Obituary Pulled from a Newspaper That Deleted the Text as Too Mean

 

RENO, Nev. (KRNV & MyNews4.com) – It's an obituary like you've probably never seen before. It’s about a woman who died and is survived by her children who, according to the obituary, spent her lifetime torturing them in pretty much every way possible. The obituary goes on to paint a picture of children who are grateful that their mother, Marianne Theresa-Johnson Reddick, is dead.

The Reno Gazette Journal President & Publisher John Maher tells News 4 the obituary was sent in via a self-service online submission. The obituary appeared in the print edition of the newspaper today, September 10th. The on-line version of the obituary has been removed as the newspaper is investigating the circumstances surrounding the placement of the obituary.

The obituary says Johnson-Reddick died September 30th. News 4 has confirmed a woman with that name died on August 30th.

UNEDITED VERSION OF THE SUBMITTED OBITUARY:
January 4, 1935 Sept. 30, 2013
Marianne Theresa John¬son- Reddick born Jan 4, 1935 and died alone on Sept. 30, 2013. She is survived by her 6 of 8 children whom she spent her lifetime torturing in every way possible. While she neglected and abused her small children, she refused to allow anyone else to care or show compassion towards them. When they became adults she stalked and tortured anyone they dared to love. Everyone she met, adult or child was tortured by her cruelty and exposure to violence, criminal activity, vulgarity, and hatred of the gentle or kind human spirit.
On behalf of her children whom she so abrasively ex¬posed to her evil and vio¬lent life, we celebrate her passing from this earth and hope she lives in the after¬life reliving each gesture of violence, cruelty, and shame that she delivered on her children. Her surviv¬ing children will now live the rest of their lives with the peace of knowing their nightmare finally has some form of closure.
Most of us have found peace in helping those who have been exposed to child abuse and hope this message of her final passing can revive our message that abusing children is unforgivevable, shameless, and should not be tolerated in a “humane society”. Our greatest wish now, is to stimulate a national movement that mandates a purposeful and dedicated war against child abuse in the United States of America.

And her sister was worse! 

Old Dead Eyes is Back: Fareed Zakaria's Endless War on Plain English

I like to open Real Clear Politics for my morning break Leo High School.  That fine catalog of good, bad and ugly ( usually Dana Millbank, or Joan Walsh) political essays, polls, op-eds, or reports is a national version of Chicago's own Steve Rhodes and his incomparable Beachwood Reporter; unlike Beachwood Reporter, I can never be sure if Fareed Zakaria might have another verbal abortion popped under my schnoz. RCP will do that.

Today, is no different.  It is ninety minutes to Frosh/Soph lunch and I must keep this away from tender eyes - Obama Seeks to Affirm an International Norm.  The title alone, would put the lads off their feed. Here try it and see if I can force feed myself . . . Obama seeks to affirm an international norm; Obama seeks to affirm an international norm;. . . . Come on!  Be  a Big Boy and Open Up! Obama seeks to affirm an international norm;Obama seeks to affirm an international norm;Obama seeks to affirm an international norm; Obama seeks to affirm an international norm . . .Pwaaaah! Taste like ass, to quote Sal . . .Nope.

I'm still dizzy with my inner demons screaming "WHAT THE @#$% Does that Dead-Eyed Dandy Mean?"

Nothing.  Cable news and network news went daffy for Diversity - Brits, Sons of the Desert, Heathen Chinee, Listhpers and Fareed Zakaria.

This yutz was recently canned from CNN for plagiarism.  I channel surf without his Jungle Book hissing pleonasms sesquipedlian in duration and contemptuous universal.

Elitist creeps love guys like Fareed, MSNBC's Martin Bashir and Flat-top Richard Wolf not only for the cache of tone, the contempt they hold for America. 

American journalists like Chicago Tribune's John Kass make an easy and very profitable to sponsors slide to radio and television, because they speak plain English and have actually had more than one original thought in their lives.

Fareed Zakaria rehashes old Granta excerpts and idiots named Vanden Heuvel eat it up crap like this, "So, Obama’s aim is solely to affirm an international norm. To this end, he already has achieved something important. "   Think of the children, People.  Stop FZ! Stop him before he kills English again.

God willing Fareed Zakaria will do a lengthy immersed report from Mali. 

Treat Yourself to Football with the Chicago Leo Lions -Saturday 1PM at the Kroc Center

Tired of Syria?

Springfield Mansion Rehabs?
Divvy Bikes?
Bike Riding Terrorists ?
Parking Meter Maids?
Twerking Hillbilliies?
 
Leo Lions ( from the left) James Davis Javon Lewis and Mike Connolly share that kind of quiet moment that sensitive men know all too well -' I'd surely enjoy to hit some one.'

Enjoy a Saturday of Leo Football as the undefeated Lions of Leo High School face Lake Forest Academy at the our beautiful new home field - The Ray and Joan Kroc Community Center: - JV starts at 9:30 AM.
I am hitting both games. The Kroc Center is a wonderful facility staffed by great folks.

Football season is upon us. Come out to the Kroc Stadium and enjoy high school football action. The fast pace, hard hitting St.(sic) Leo High School* football team will host their home games.
The Kroc Stadium 

Football season is upon us. Come out to the Kroc Stadium and enjoy high school football action. The fast pace, hard hitting St. Leo High School football team will host their home games.

The Kroc Stadium

Game entry free for ages 10 and younger

$3 for ages 11 - 18 *high school students must have high school ID for this price.

$5 for ages 18 and older

Friday, August 30th at 7:30pm: St. Ignatius

Friday, September 6th at 7:30pm: St. Joseph 

Saturday, September 14th at 1:00pm: Lake Forest Academy 

Thursday, September 19th at 7:30pm: St. Francis De Sales

Friday, October 18th at 7:30pm: Bishop Mac

Game entry free for ages 10 and younger
$3 for ages 11 - 18 *high school students must have high school ID for this price.
$5 for ages 18 and older
Friday, August 30th at 7:30pm: St. Ignatius
Friday, September 6th at 7:30pm: St. Joseph
Saturday, September 14th at 1:00pm: Lake Forest Academy
Thursday, September 19th at 7:30pm: St. Francis De Sales
Friday, October 18th at 7:30pm: Bishop Mac

* A common mistake - Leo High School was named for Pope Leo XIII who has yet to be canonized.  The school building once housed over-flow for St.Leo Parish (now closed) and still features the Chapel of St. Leo portal  on the Sangamon St. side entrance of the building

Former Governor Pat Quinn's Quote of the Weak . . .week.

The Quinn-tuplets sing their latest hit - Guy* Got You, Under My Slin

"This is from a millionaire banker who was working for a bank, he was the Midwest Chairman of a bank that helped drive the American economy into the ditch and created the Great Recession," said Governor Pat Quinn. (emphasis my own)

Pat Quinn's keen grasp of the obvious serves him well and keeps Illinois, unborn babies, and the middle class under the knife.

*This Guy

My Take Aways from President's Syria Lecture and Dinner in Heart of Italy

I spent a wonderful day with my President - of Leo High School - visiting St. Cajetan 8th grade boys about the Leo Opportunity ( affordable tuition and transportation)  and later tramping through a parade ground of school buses at Midwest Transit Equipment in Kankakee, IL.  Thanks to the generous outpouring of treasure from Leo Alumni and friends into the Leo Express to Opportunity campaign headed by Leo grad Sam Leno '63, my President had a blank check for the campaign account.  We bought two vehicles - a 72 passenger school bus and a 28 passenger activity bus.

My President was like an Arab and our Midwest Transit  sales manager was most receptive to Leo's needs and knocked off $ 4,500 from the total. cost.  My President acted.

The bus and the activity vehicle are now being painted to attest to Leo High School ownership.  Once out of the sub-Saharan sun and into the AC of my Malibu we celebrated with a couple of bottles of water. I dropped my President off at St. Cajetan's to retrieve his car and then went back to Leo High School to retrieve my cell phone ( left on the desk when I went for a much needed haircut prior to the St. Cajetan's visit - in the heat and humidity what passes for my hair adds nothing much to my manly bearing) and inform a lovely woman that our evening's assignation had moved from Taylor Street to the Heart of Italy - "We are eating at Bacchanalia!!!!  Park on Oakley over by Ald. Moreno's offices and see you at 6PM, Love!"

I know that squeals of delight had more to do with the splendid bill of fare there than anticipation of this freshly shorn widow-man.

The food at every restaurant in Heart of Italy sparks manly tears of joy, but Bacchanalia Ristorante's is especially compelling. We shared ( well, sort of) baked artichoke and parted ways at main course. I taking the road most travelled - *Porterhouse Vesuvio (Charbroiled, Topped with our Signature Vesuvio Sauce & Potatoes) and she with Veal Cutlet Milanese (A crisp Veal Cutlet platter).  Again we spooned in alliance over a platter of the House flagship side - Sautéed Spinach (Spinach Sautéed in Garlic and Spices).  We both hefted home sizeable portions of the delicacies.  My leftovers never seem to live through the night as my 23 year old Son gets home from work shortly after my retirement.  A good meal is not a gorging, but an event marked by talk and punctuated by forkfuls.

Conversation sparkled throughout the shared meal, touching upon the Leo vehicle purchases and the upcoming Leo/Lake Forest Academy Football, abusive male cads and bounders, sacred and choral music, jazz, The Humpday Camel commercial and Syria.

Syria is no place for Americans, no place for indigenous Christians, a horrible place for Jews and what might be the  Arab Spanish Civil War  for another global war. President Obama is finally being understood as the career anointed appointee that is his CV.  The poor man is was and ever shall be in over his head and pay-grade; unless, of course, you are All In With Obama*.

Following the lush meal that only Americans can enjoy, we sat on the benches of Oakley Street and chatted before I accompanied my lovely table mate to her car.  She headed north on Western Ave. to the Congress Expressway and I south to Morgan Park.  I cranked the AC and left the radio on to the President's Syria speech.  I listened attentively and here is what I took away.

President Obama has yet to master History "In World War I, American GIs were among the many thousands killed by deadly gas in the trenches of Europe."

The collective reference, G. I.s, did not come into common parlance  until the 1940's, as American troops were commonly termed Doughboys in WWI. The self-styled rhetorical wonder of a President engaged once again in misrepresenting historical fact., not unlike his gaffe of praising the Navy Corpsemen who saved their Leaterneck brethren in WWII. well, that rhetorical nit picked, The President droned on in syrupy humanitarian tone, crafted no doubt by Samantha Powers, until he poisoned his waterhole with this hypocrital flourish -

" The purpose of this (rhetorical?)  strike would be to deter Assad from using chemical weapons, to degrade his regime’s ability to use them, and to make clear to the world that we will not tolerate their use.

That’s my judgment as Commander-in-Chief. But I’m also the President of the world’s oldest constitutional democracy. So even though I possess the authority to order military strikes, I believed it was right, in the absence of a direct or imminent threat to our security, to take this debate to Congress. I believe our democracy is stronger when the President acts with the support of Congress."   

( emphases my own) Really?  Like HHS mandates, EPA weapons, IRS shenanigans?

Back to the issue - President Obama drew a red-line ( several) against Assad, people were horribly gassed, Congress was tossed the ball, the Administration twisted the need like a Hanover pretzel, 70 % of the public are against any intervention tiny pin-prick or not and Vlad Putin caught John Kerry's Inner Biden.  Now, Putin has brokered a deal what to do . . .""I have, therefore, asked the leaders of Congress to postpone a vote to authorize the use of force while we pursue this diplomatic path. "

Postpone the vote that world demands, for a strike against whom and what?

I took away much more wholesome goodness from the Heart of Italy neighborhood than in all of the empty calories of The President.  My dinner companion took home spinach and veal and I most of the porterhouse, spuds and the sinful artichoke hearts and garlic sauce, from Bachanalia Ristorante. 

From the Syrian Speech?  Much less.


* 

The World Music Festival - Catherine Zeta Jones With Her Purse Full of Ruffies Couldn't Drag Me There

For its 15th installment, Chicago's World Music Festival has recovered from its nadir last year—a hastily assembled and underwhelming lineup that was just one by-product of a clumsy administrative overhaul that left the city's Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events basically rudderless at the start of 2012.  . . .Chicago Reader

Rudderless, since 1999 you mean.  The World (Third, n'cest pas) was the handiwork of Lois Weisberg - the octogenarian Highland Park Luck Strike Gal and Culture Vulture who traded in her Cows on Parade for a full out assault on fun. Lois had the late Maggie Daley bully her husband into giving Chicago Special Events to Lois and her surrogates. Chicago was directed to accept Nigerian Thumb Piano cacophonies over Tom Jones with the Mambo Express.  Lois immediately slit the throat of Celtic Fest, Country Music Fest and other activities that people actually enjoyed and attracted revenue to the City coffers.

Ethnic music is wonderful.  The music inspires community dance to the polka, Polanez, Céilidh, or blue grass clog and full throat-ed vocal jump-in - VOooooooLare!  OhOH!  

But is not what culture vultures impose. This is a  PC static music festival and as fun as a lecture on Quantum Mechanics, or most programming on WTTW.

The World Music Festival is the entertainment equivalent of post- Hydro-Colonic pucker contests.  I love music and in my opinion the Third World is as sophisticated musically as a  drunken rodeo clown offering a nice little Chorégraphe russe. Hey, but that's just me. I do get bugged being lectured by tweedy geeks and Euro-trash posers concerning the canons of taste; especially, when such toe tappers as LapLander Goat Bladder Balladiers make the Lakefront sound like a Congress of Vegans following an all you can eat Kimchi Buffet. Oddly, the World Music Festival features musicians who might be considered sing-along pals of Al Qaeda.

Here's some of Headliners

QAWAL NAJMUDDIN SAIFUDDIN & BROTHERS It's been more than a decade since the World Music Festival booked a qawwali group—not that surprising, considering the crippling tensions between the U.S. and Pakistan, where qawwali arose and maintains a dominant cultural position. So it's encouraging to see Qawal Najmuddin Saifuddin bringing this form of Sufi devotional music to Chicago. This group of powerfully voiced brothers from Karachi—Ehtishamuddin Hussain, Zafeeruddin Ahmed, Muhammad Najmuddin, and Saifuddin Mehmood—claim to be blood relations of 13th-century poet and composer Amir Khusrau, widely . . . yadda, yadda, yadda and praise be the Prophet's sphincter.


DEBASHISH BHATTACHARYA Debashish Bhattacharya isn't the first to develop a slide-­guitar practice within the Indian classical tradition—that distinction belongs to his principal mentor, the great Brij Bhushan Kabra  Boy Howdy!!!!! Could Spade Cooley *have used this Buckaroo's twang.


KARDEMIMMIT The four young Finnish women in this terrific combo write their own songs, played largely on the kantele (a native zitherlike instrument, here in 15- and 38-string versions), and their inviting, accessible arrangements ring with sweet, precise vocal harmonies. Imagine sitting through a marathon showing of The Third Man  Anyway,  one could get glimpse at some Finn Shins.

Consider the source; please do.  I missed the whimsy of Cows on Parade.   Enduring a-tonal clangs, whizzing and buzzing for forty minutes, or minutes and being expected to search my soul for the darker societal sins while clapping with gusto is not my plate of wholesome offal.

Were the enchanting and available Star of Chicago (the movie), Ms. Catherine Zeta-Jones to offer her alabaster Welsh arm to accompany a night of World Music Festival, I'd demure. Unless, of course, the evening entertainment included Terry McEldowney and Volga Boatmen, or Johnny and the Fat Boys of Polka Nirvanah.


*

The Ballerina and Bicyclist: Rahm Recycles Oberman's Empty Resume with Metra Appointment!

 “I’m not there as a person who rides Metra every day,’’ Oberman, 68, told the Chicago Sun-Times on Sunday. “I’m a bicylist.’’

A Metra rider asked me about Rahm Emanuel's appointment of Marty Oberman to the Metra Board.  I said that was an homage to Dr. Quentin Young and his disciple Abner Mikva.  The ballet of the bicycle!  The photo above pretty much tells it all.  That get up in any neigyhborhood but Lincoln Park would spark thousands of  calls to 911 from concerned parents. 

On Marty it works.

Bicycles were all the rage in Mao's Red China and Progressives want America to return to those thrilling days of yester-year.  The Reds how ever went all Adam Smith recently and are happily killing the biosphere with auto-emissions as well as babies.

In the very special world of the Cook County Progressive, Marty Oberman is the cherry on the bullshit sundae.  A self- stamped Reformer, Oberman is notable for riding bicycles and having occupied the aldermanic sinecure that is the 43rd Ward.  Abner Mikva is the Progressive Wizard of our bankrupt, stooge-stuffed, incompetent and ninnie/nannies of Illinois.

Name a dope in public life: 

• JanSchakowsky
• Pat Quinn
• Rep. Mike Quigley
• Toni Preckwinkle
• Rep. Danny Davis
• Dick Simpson
• the late Dawn Clark Netsch
• Barabar Flynn Currie
• Julie Hamos
• Deb Mell
• Deb Shore
• Forrest Claypool
• Valerie Jarrett
• Arne Duncan
• Desiree Rogers
• Joe Moore
• Shelia Simon

and you will find the stamp of the Mikva Challenge all over them.  Progressives (IPI/IVI) are the only protected species in Illinois public biology.  Short of public agreeing with Francis Cardinal George any and all crimes/misdemeanors/slapping the help/or acting ass by these loudly trumpeted blow-hards of "Good Government" gets immediate consignment to the Medill Memory Hole.

Marty Oberman is back!  He is going to be Rahm Emanuel's Metra Guy!  Like Forrest Claypool, who knows absolutely nothing about buses or train-cars, not linked to a boon-doggle with Bombardier, or Ventra Cards, Marty Oberman don't takle no trains - he bikes.

Biking is the street-cred for Reformers, who snap fingers at waitresses, leave no tip and manage to have Chicago's media purse puppies write glowing accounts of their purported brains and hearts. These memes go unchallenged even after a Toni Preckwinkle manages to collect cadavers for Cook County, or a Jan Schakowsky manages to tune-up a young Asian volunteer at an Alexi Giannoulias meet-and-greet, or a Forrest Claypool trolls for an appointment.  That is Reform.

Metra evidently needs to pay Marty Oberman in order to right itself and provide commuters with safe and timely public transportation.  Marty Oberman's CV reads like a Wikipedia entry purged of facts.

Lookee H'yar!

As first General Counsel for the Illinois Racing Board in the 1970s, Oberman investigated corrupt racing interests. From 1975 to 1987, he was known as a voice of independence in the City Council and opponent of Machine regulars during Council Wars.
Oberman also served as chairman of the Mayoral Commission on Labor and Management under Mayor Jane Byrne; as chairman of the Shoreline Protection Commission under Mayor Washington, and, more recently, as a member of Emanuel’s Midway Airport Advisory Council.

Rahm knows money and money comes from Progressives.  Now, politics and actual government in the bad old Machine Days required that people who actually knew anything about, anything could help make a difference - Mayor Ed Kelly was an civil engineer;  Mayor Richard J. Daley was a practiced accountant and budget master with decades of experience in Springfield.  The hair-shirts of Progressive Illinois had ties to fortunes and university faculties and the more radical law firms.  When money (political action committees/foundations/coalitions supported by real estate and banking) trumped competency Reform ( read Goo-goo) replace Machine.  Reform is the flatulent  by product of corned beef and cabbage Ward politics and government - it is loud and drifts with the prevailing winds, befouls the atmosphere and chokes the tax-payer.

Marty Oberman is only now breaking wind with his ten-speed.

Explosive Remnants of War (ERW) - Syria and Peleliu

This week a State Department program dedicated to eliminating the dangers of explosive remnants of war (ERWs) continues to remove bombs, landmines and canisters seventy four years after WWII in Palau Island group.

This week and last week Secretary of State John Kerry has made the rounds of TV news, cable and the United States Congress to make the case of  adding explosives to the surface of Syria.

Syria is a former French colony in the Middle East that evolved to become government for the Assad family of tall male John Cleese look-alikes given to looting and killing Syrians as well as Israel.  The Palua Island group is a lush volcanic chain of islands in the Pacific of which Peleliu is memorable for being turned into charcoal biquet and gave of thousands of Americans in 1944.

In Palau, the non-governmental organization Cleared Ground Demining (CGD) operates a program centered on the island of Peleliu, where for 74 fierce days in late 1944, American forces battled the island’s Japanese defenders.  The scorched earth, and the charred remains of trees and vehicles have long since given way to lush greenery on Peleliu.  A few pillboxes and artillery emplacements still stand, and oil drums, canteens and other war relics still litter the jungle.  However, ERW remain the most dangerous reminders of the fierce combat that swept over the island.  Loose bullets, machine gun bands, mortars and large aerial bombs contrast with the beautiful scenery on land and in the waters around Peleliu, making this picturesque landscape dangerous for the locals, for development and for tourists.  U.S. funding helps CGD to build local capacity to deal with the negative effects of ERW by training Palauan teams to conduct battle area clearance, explosive ordnance disposal spot tasks, and risk education campaigns.  U.S. funding has supported the clearance of suspected hazardous land adjacent to Peleliu’s only power plant, and this coming year, CGD will clear unexploded ordnance (UXO) along a planned pipeline that will supply the residents of Peleliu with running water. -  

The Battle Peleliu was a horrific strategic miscalculation described by military historians as 'unavoidable and unnecessary.' WWII memorrialist Eugene Sledge wrote, " The 1st Marine Division was ordered to seize Peleliu in the Palau Islands, to secure General Douglas MacArthur's right flank for his return to the Philippines. D-Day was 15 September 1944. Our commanding general predicted a three-day battle?a gross miscalculation. The Peleliu campaign turned into one of the bloodiest, most vicious battles of World War II."

Syria has been an Arab Spring meat-grinder for years.  The Assad Family has long been allied to Russia and the Soviet Union before that.  Since Jimmy Carter's American Malaise foreign policy of the late 1970's, Syria has been as tight as ticks with Ayatollah's of Iran.  The Ayatollah's spent their exile years away from the Shah in Paris melding Marxism with Mohammad.  Syria is chock full of chemical weapons, just like the ones used by Saddam Hussein on the Kurds of Iraq.

President Obama is now aware of those Weapons of Mass Destruction and is determined to drop ordinance on Syria.  John Kerry, who dined and cocktailed with Mr. & Mrs. Assad,  is doing his patrician best to see that President Obama gets his wish.

John Kerry's State Department task force on ERWs is cleaning up Peleliu's ordinance.

Peleliu and Syria share the month of September.  The strategists who demanded the invasion Peleliu on Sept 15, 1944 are not unlike the folks who can not give straight answer on the Benghazi massacre that took place on September 11th 2012. Peleliu was taken only with valor and blood in a redundant exercise of ego.

The awful struggle was a testament to the skill and bravery of the Marines against a tenacious foe. But our division intelligence section lacked critical information regarding:

• The large coral ridge complex, containing more than 500 connecting caves.
• The enemy plan to conserve manpower and fight a battle of attrition.
• Enemy plans for intensive night infiltration, greater than Marines had previously experienced.

There had never been anything like Peleliu in the Pacific. It set the stage for the bloodbaths of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. But they had strategic significance. As it turned out, MacArthur walked into the Philippines with little opposition. I shall always harbor a deep sense of bitterness and grief over the suffering and loss of so many fine Marines on Peleliu for no good reason. It was my privilege to fight alongside them, fine, courageous, loyal and dependable men who filled the ranks of the finest division in World War II.
We must never forget them. (emphasis my own)

Sadly, Professor Sledge, the people we elect remember nothing.


Oil paintings of Peleiu by WWII combat artist Tom Lea - I asked my Congressman Dan Lipinski (D 3rd) to vote against this looming Syrian Peleliu.