Via Paul Campos’ lovely post on the documentary 20 Feet From Stardom at Lawyers, Guns and Money.
Sarah, Proud and Tall wrote at Balloon juice from 2011-17.
Shameless self promotion thread
I can’t see that we’ve done an Artists in our Midst thread, or a job thread, for quite a while. Then again, I may just be too drunk to find them.
Anyway, lets combine the two and have a free thread for Juicers – artists, Etsyists, writers, job seekers, freelancers, businesses seeking workers, community groups seeking assistance, whatever, lurkers more than welcome – to give themselves a plug.
[Image – Francisco de Goya (1746-1828) The Pottery Vendor]If we let them sing, we might have to let them talk, and then where would we be?
Via our David Koch, Electablog’s on-the-spot perspective on the Netroots Nation brouhaha is well worth a read.
Sitting in the middle of this maelstrom was a fascinating experience. I, like many of the others there, was initially irritated by the protestors. I was there to hear the candidates and was frustrated that they weren’t being heard. Even a bit angry, in fact. “These are your allies,” I thought. “Why on earth are you attacking them? Why are you disrupting an event where the people there are sympathetic to your cause?”
Frustration. Anger. Being silenced.
Frustration.
Anger.
Silenced.
Talked over.
Ignored.
Every single one of these emotions that ran through my white privileged brain in the first few moments of the protest until I was slapped across the face with what I was being forced to confront. Every single one of these emotions are felt acutely and painfully every single day by racial minority groups in our country. But, instead of being inconvenienced by not being able to hear a politician speak, they face them in the context of being slaughtered in the streets by the police officers who are tasked to protect them, incarcerated in astonishingly disparate numbers, and blamed for not being able to escape from the prison of poverty that holds far too many of them in bondage.
If you’re not able to cope with a group of black women singing songs at you by, say, respectfully listening to what they have to say, inviting some of them onstage, listening again, answering their questions and opening up a dialogue, all without resorting to all-lives-matter bullshit or dropping the mike and going home, you may not be ready to be President.
Unrelatedly, is this the first Myiq2xu sighting for Election 2016? Remember, if he can see his shadow we get six more months of Donald Trump.
Happy Saturday Night Music Open Thread
Hello kiddies… Some music for your evening. This is what I have been listening to this week.
Robert Delong – Don’t wait up for me – New album on its way.
MS MR – Criminals – New album out now….
Happy days
So, Roberts, despite my fearless prediction, went all Fat Tony with his “evil judicial lawmakers” rant, apparently deciding his reputation as a Republican needed the buffing more than his judicial legacy did. Not that it will do him much good now he has perpetually branded himself as Obama’s healthcare enabler to generations of bitter wingnunts. The best bit – thanks to Obama and John Roberts, the life expectancy of bitter wingnuts in many states has skyrocketed. That’s a lot more sweet, sweet tears to savor.
I was going to mine the Supreme dissents (pdf) for yucks, like how Scalia thinks hippy jokes are cutting edge comedy and California has broken off the West Coast and is rapidly sailing east on a magic cloud of potsmoke and buttsex, but thankfully the Wonkettes got there before me and saved me the trouble. Scalia’s dissent is worth a read if you want to see angry, ranty hypocrisy at its funniest, but is perhaps best left for gleeful contemplation at another time.
For tonight is a night to celebrate a fine and happy day – a day to marry, to be married or hunt down sweaty monkey sex with the one you’re going to marry – so I am just going to leave you with this, because Biden:
Joe is running through the halls with a rainbow flagged tied on like a cape high fiving everyone. #MarriageEquaility #LoveWins #SCOTUS
— Jill Biden (@JillBidenVeep) June 26, 2015
[ETA: Yes, I know it’s probably a fake twitter feed, but I’d lay money that this is actually what Joe Biden is doing right now…]
And this, because it’s sweet and simple and it made me cry. It’s celebration time, kiddies. Kiss your husbands, kiss your wives, kiss whoever will let you. Straight people, enjoy your marriages while they’re still legal.
Cheers, and mine’s a margarita.
Open Thread
I’m having a Friday afternoon cocktail dilemma. I’ve used all my limes, so my usual gimlet or margarita isn’t going to happen. At the moment, I’m eyeing off the spiced rum and wondering how it would go shaken up with some peach syrup, tequila and lots of ice.
His master’s voice
So, a man is sitting in the park eating his lunch and checking out the local talent, when this old man appears, coming down the path towards the bench where he’s sitting.
Now this old guy is old money, you can tell. The kind of money that bought a dozen very good suits on Savile Row in 1956 and is going to get every damn cent’s worth out of them. He’s a little old gent, well into his seventies, but wiry and strong, all decked out in a tweed suit, a smart green waistcoat, matched silk tie and pocket square, fob chain, and a spotless green homburg — the whole production – and he’s striding down the road like he’s being charged by the foot.
In his left hand, he’s brandishing a stout silver-tipped walking stick, and as he gets closer, the man can see that his other hand is cradling the end of a smallish house-brick which he has tucked into the crook of his elbow. It’s a perfectly nice brick – red, quite new, but with a couple of chips out of the near end. The brick has a piece of bright red string tied around it with a careful knot. The string loops down toward the old man’s knees and then back up, the end clutched in the same hand as the walking stick. The string dances and jiggles as the old man waves his stick at young people and rapscallions.
So he harrumphs up to the bench, stops with a crunch of gravel and an excuse me, young man, dreadfully sorry, do you mind? so the man says, yes, of course.
The old man rests his walking stick up against the bench, takes the square out of his pocket and brushes a speck of dust off the bench, leans over, still cradling the brick carefully with his arm, flicks a few leaves off of a patch of grass in front of the bench, replaces the pocket square and plops the brick down right in the middle of the patch of grass. He looks at the brick, moves it a bit to the right, loops the string around his shoe and tucks the end into his pants pocket, then settles back with a sigh of contentment to survey the view.
Now, the man has just about finished his sandwich, all except the dried up crust at the end, so he looks at the brick and thinks, why not? so he goes would your dog like a bit of my sandwich?
The old man looks round at him and says, I beg your pardon?
Your dog. Would it like the last bit of my sandwich?
I don’t have a dog, young man, says the old gent, his eyes boggling out a little.
Sorry, says the man, I just thought, and he points at the brick.
The old man looks down at the brick in front of him like he’s never seen it before in his life. He says, that, young man, that is a brick. You can tell from the fact that it is a damn brick. Does it look like a dog to you?
Well, says the man, it’s got a string tied around it.
The old guy is up out of his seat now. I hope, he says, that you are not suggesting I don’t know the difference between a brick and a dog? He grabs his walking stick and he’s waving it in the air, big random swings.
It’s all too much for the other man, and he bolts for it, shedding crusts and papers as he goes.
The old guy reaches down and picks up the brick.
“That fooled the little fucker, Fido. Good boy.”
[Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec – Old Man at Celeyran]