Keith is still busy planning to take over the world...er...uh...just MSNBC, so, for your viewing & listening pleasure, I present the following "re - runs" of a couple Fridays with Thurber.
BUT FIRST...
It is National Cheesecake Day! Why this day isn't a national holiday just astounds me because it's a big sparkin' deal - talk about nature's most perfect food {insert drool here}... So, we need some sweet...
with some sweet.
And, some more sweet...
with more sweet.
Of course, feel free to post a couple more Fridays with Thurber in the comments; hell, I could've posted way more!
Let's get to "this day in history." Did I mention today is National Cheesecake Day?
On July 30, 1945, the USS Indianapolis, which had just delivered key components of the Hiroshima atomic bomb to the Pacific island of Tinian, was torpedoed by a Japanese submarine. Only 316 out of 1,196 men survived the sinking and shark-infested waters, and those survivors are meeting in my fair city this weekend.
On this date in 1975, former Teamsters union president Jimmy Hoffa disappeared in suburban Detroit. His remains have never been found, but the Mythbusters proved he's not buried at Giants Stadium. ;D
On this date last year, Harvard scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Cambridge, Mass., police Sgt. James Crowley, who had arrested him for disorderly conduct at his home, met with President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden at the White House for a "beer summit." What kind of "summit" will Shirley Sherrod get?!
Baseball commissioner Bud Selig is 76 today. He of the jelly spine probably won't move the 2011 MLB All - Star game out of the "Show Me Your Papers" state if SB 1070 actually becomes law, but I'll give him some cheesecake anyway. :)
Let's Countdown...
#5 "Never Forget" - Ever since the attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and the aborted attempt on Washington, DC that was thwarted by the brave passengers aboard Flight 93, the GOBP’s bread & butter has been national security, "doing what was best for our troops," and scuttling any speech or activity that seemed to run afoul of what THEY deemed was in our country’s & our country’s security’s best interest. OK...so what happened to that GOBP last night when they denied funding to help 9/11 survivors & 9/11 first responders at the World Trade Center? I am confused! Well, no, not really, I’m not. Again, country first my a$$; it has been & always ever shall be party first.
$7.4 billion in aid was part of last night’s bill. Huh...I wonder how many hours or days in Iraq & Afghanistan can be bought for that amount of coin? Rep. Peter King, one of the bill’s co – sponsors, announced before debate began that his "honorable colleagues" in the House would just be saying no – AGAIN. Rep. King linked this bill to the Dems being afraid to vote on "illegal immigration"? SAY WHAT?! Has he been roasting his brain in the same tanning bed as Small Price to Pay Goldilocks for way too long??!! He also brought up the stimulus bill, "cap & trade," & a bunch of other stuff that have absolutely jack $hit to do with the health of 9/11 first responders & other survivors.
Damn, I don’t think I could’ve held out as long as Rep. Anthony Weiner did; someone would’ve had to forcibly drag me out of that room during Rep. King’s little shtick! A whopping 10 GOBPers in the House voted "yes" on the bill. Joseph Cammarata was a New York City police officer & one of those first responders on Sept. 11, 2001; he spent days not only looking for his little brother, a NYC fire fighter who sadly did not survive, but for ANYONE who could’ve survived that horror. Thankfully, Mr. Cammarata hasn’t had to fight a whole lot of insurance bureaucratic bull$hit in getting his illnesses taken care of. OK, let me try to say what I want to say as diplomatically as I can. Yes, absolutely, any workers at the World Trade Center site should’ve been protected with appropriate breathing gear, work breaks, or whatever else was deemed necessary. However, and I pray I don’t have to experience this feeling for myself EVER in my lifetime, I think in those immediate hours & even a couple days after the worst attack on our nation’s soil EVER, the last thing on my mind would’ve been to find appropriate breathing gear; I would be more frantic & concerned about finding someone – ANYONE – who was still alive. Many rescue workers have been sickened & have died subsequently. Wow, Mr. Cammarata didn’t seem overtly angry at all; he was very calm about what happened last night.
#4 "Let’s Get Small" AKA "Bye – Bye, Bipartisanship" AKA "The Party of No Tax Cuts" - Last night, there was just a whole mess of GOBPers with their heads up dark stinky places ALL OVER DAMN DC in both the House & the Senate. A bill to help small businesses get back on their feet – a bill that some GOBP Senators HELPED TO WRITE – got the kibosh in the "upper House" last night. The GOBP just said no TO A TAX CUT! OK, my head is truly spinning now.
So, on one end of whatever cesspool street that Capitol Hill is on, you had the House of Representatives denying funding to help 9/11 survivors & first responders; on the other side, you had GOBP Senators just saying no to an almighty holy just short of St. Ronald Reagan tax cut just so Dems campaigning toward the November election couldn’t tout their success at job creation?! Oye...
Senator Olympia Snowe, one of the authors of the bill, or the "other" POTUS considering how so many people felt she was so damn vital to HCR, began the $hit fit by claiming that the big mean Dems didn’t allow for any amendments or discussion. So, Harry Reid allowed 3 amendments to be put in. And, the hits just kept on coming. Lawrence reminded us of the even – more maddening fact that all this hullabaloo was just over beginning debate on the damn bill – NOT ON THE MERITS OF THE BILL ITSELF! Annie Lowrey, a new face – welcome! – gets the "lucky" gig to discuss the cluster spark that continues to be the United State Senate – again, where good bills (or ANY bills) go to die. The Chamber of Commerce even likes this bill, and the Senate GOBP still said no?! HELLO?! So, can the Chamber of Commerce get all...uh...well...chambery {just made up that word} on the GOBP? ;D I know there’s no way in Hades this will happen, but if the Dems still have control of the Senate after the November elections, Harry Reid has absolutely no business being Senate Majority Leader. If he wasn’t going to be in any better position after allowing amendments that had diddly – poo to do with the bill, why the spark did he allow them to begin with when he knew or should’ve known DAMN WELL that the GOBP would not debate in good faith? Can LBJ haunt Harry from now until November or so if he insists on still being Majority Leader? I don’t doubt many people’s observations that Harry might be a perfectly nice guy, but you sort of need to be a horse’s hiney at times in that gig.
#3 "Oil Rigged" - Bob Dudley, the new Tony Hayward of BP/BS, today announced a scaling – back of clean – up efforts in the Gulf. Really? Everyone & everything is OK & back to normal down there? There’s absolutely no oil left to clean up, and everyone has their livelihoods back?! DAMN! Maybe, all this bad press about this company has been wrong! And, St. Sarah from Wasilla gave ME an exclusive look at her new book cover before anyone else, too! ;D
The video feed monitoring efforts around the well that used to be Deepwater Horizon has been dark for the past 3 days. The static kill that was supposed to begin Sunday will begin Tuesday, and what might be coming out of the well leaves way more questions than answers. Admiral Thad Allen was asked by the Great Orange Satan why the camera was no longer on; he didn’t have an answer at the time. Later on, the feed did come back. Here’s Bob Cavnar; gee, he’s managed to write a book about all this already! The leaks may have been getting worse, so that’s why the camera "mysteriously" went buh – bye. Mr. Cavnar is very concerned about the condition of the well head before any static kills can begin – especially since the relief wells are so damn close to being done. He’s also concerned about the possibility of James Witt being yet another buffer between BP/BS & "we, the people" getting the information we need about what’s really going on under the surface of the Gulf.
#2 "Mine Investigation" - Y’all remember that horrible mine disaster at the Upper Big Branch coal mine in WV a few months back? Some mine workers are telling the FBI that criminal activity might have contributed to the deaths of 39 miners & the worst coal mining disaster in history. Machines designed to detect dangerous levels of methane gas may have been disabled intentionally.
Tom Costello gives us the low – down. Massey Energy is, of course, poo – pooing any idea that mine worker safety might have played second fiddle to coal being moved. The MSHA (Mine Safety & Health Administration) has heard these claims & said
If true, such actions would clearly violate the law and would jeopardize the lives and safety of the miners.
An NPR correspondent was the first to report that the shutting down of these methane detectors was SOP in the Upper Big Branch mine, but those who reported the conditions didn’t want to be identified.
** Don’t forget about the upcoming free clinics in that cesspool known as our nation’s capital & in New Orleans! **
*** And, if y’all have been around here long enough, you know how I feel about American Idol, so I say buh – bye to this segment. ***