Tag: Coverville

April rambling: No irony

Clarence Thomas

The Party of “Family Values” Sees No Irony in Axing Child Labor Protections

In an extraordinary act of political retaliation, Tennessee Republicans expelled two Democratic lawmakers,  Reps. Pearson and Jones, from the state Legislature for “breaching decorum” in their role in a protest that called for more gun control after a school shooting in Nashville.  This move has occurred twice in the state since the aftermath of the Civil War. Rep. Johnson maintained her seat. Outrageous, even though they were both reinstated,

Related: Education Week’s 2023 School Shooting Tracker. One Nation, under gun violence: America tops 100 mass shootings in 2023. Also, radicalizing against guns

Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas has reportedly spent decades accepting exorbitant gifts, luxury vacations, and yacht rides from a major GOP power player—none disclosed to the American public. It may be legal, though unethical,  bribery. Ought he be impeached?

The djt indictment, annotated

Candace Owens—Friend of Kanye, Power Troll, Parler “Trad Wife” – Owens was the source of a bizarre family debate.

Debunking the myths and dangers of qualified immunity

From 1440: The Maryland attorney general has accused officials of covering up and failing to act in the sexual abuse of at least 600 children in the Archdiocese of Baltimore since the 1940s. The 463-page report named 156 former clergy, deacons, teachers, and other employees and revealed some children were subject to abuse by multiple abusers. Church officials were also accused of silencing victims and dismissing or ignoring abuse claims.

‘Poverty, By America’ shows how the rest of us benefit by keeping others poor

High Unemployment Continues for Young Minority Men 

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver: Solitary Confinement and  TANF and Timeshares

A Government Witch Hunt — Masood Haque’s Film Witness. This was a terrible miscarriage of justice in Albany, NY.

‘Hopeless’: Parole denial for 71-year-old Alabama woman with terminal illness highlights ‘tremendous injustice’

More links
He Wanted to Unclog Cities. Now He’s ‘Public Enemy No. 1.’ Researchers like Carlos Moreno, the professor behind a popular urban planning concept, struggle with conspiracy theories and death threats.

Russian defector sheds light on Putin paranoia and his secret train network

If Family or Friend is Arrested

How Generative AI Will Transform the Worlds of TV, Film, Music, and Gaming versus Hollywood’s AI Anxiety Is Showing

A Scammer Who Tricks Instagram Into Banning Influencers Has Never Been Identified. We May Have Found Him.

Hollywood Reporter Critics Pick the 50 Best Films of the 21st Century (So Far)

DNA Stories | Storytelling Tips and Examples. DNA Day is April 25

Seymour Stein, Sire Records Co-Founder Who Signed Madonna, The Ramones and More, Dies at 80

Mark Russell, Piano-Playing Political Satirist, Dies at 90

Louisiana Army base to be renamed for Albany’s Henry Johnson. Currently known as Fort Polk, the base in June will bear the name of the World War I Medal of Honor winner

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: Best Fiction Sports Movies Ever Made, Part 1 and  Part 2

“You Must Have Learned Something in 20 Years”: reflections on two decades of blogging by Doug Muder

Kelly’s Tabular Resolution

Speedway math strikes again

Now I Know: The $1 Hotel Where Privacy Isn’t Included and The “I Don’t Care” Collect Call Scam and The Man Who Didn’t Work For a Living and When Make Up Boxed Out Makeup

MUSIC

Grumpy Trumpy Felon from Jamaica in Queens!- Randy Rainbow

Gordon Lustig‘s Randy Rainbow (You’re Annoying to Me) A PARODY PARODY! and Help Me, Randy (Rainbow)

Prelude in C-sharp minor and The Crag by Sergei Rachmaninoff

Naive Melody (This Must Be The Place) – The Choir & The Chorus

The Place Where Dreams Come True/End Titles from Field of Dreams by James Horner

A World Without Love – Peter Asher ft. Lyle Lovett, 3-14-23 City Winery, NYC

Put on a Happy Face  – Dick Van Dyke, from the then-running Broadway show, Bye Bye Birdie

Bits from You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown and Guys and Dolls and Jersey Boys and Grease, and Little Shop Of Horrors, all in Japanese

Find Your People – Drew Holcomb and the Neighbors

Overture to The Mandarin’s Son by Cesar Cui

Coverville 1436: Cover Stories for Poison and Sugar Ray and 1437: The 60th Anniversary of Please Please Me, and 1438: Cover Stories for Pharrell Williams, The Eels, and Vangelis

Tell Me Why -MonaLisa Twins

Oh, Noah– The Jubalaires

Hi Lilli, Hi Lo – Jimmy Durante

March rambling: something dumb

1099-K

“Good morning, friends. That awful feeling of shame and panic when you remember saying something dumb years ago is your nervous system trying to protect you from perceived danger. Try telling your body, ‘Thank you for wanting to protect me. We’re safe now. It’s okay to let it go.'” from Good Morning, Friends: Gentle Suggestions for the Start of Your Day. I have been there!

US Secretary of State Denounces Uganda’s New ‘Kill the Gays’ Bill

‘Legal Lynching’: ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws reflect legacy of white supremacist vigilantism in Deep South

“A right-wing judge takes aim at medication abortions“

Book ban attempts hit a record high in 2022, the American Library Association says

Teaching on Eggshells

Devin Stone, the “Legal Eagle,” explains the crime-fraud exception to attorney-client privilege and how it applies to djt’s lawyers 

Ten True Stories of Dutch Colonial Slavery

Can the anti-woke mob define ‘woke’?

4-year-old girl shot dead by 3-year-old sister with semi-automatic pistol

CULCHA

Can Movie Theaters Survive? It’s the Most Enduring Question In Hollywood

Stephen Sondheim’s Final Musical to Premiere Off-Broadway This Fall

Aaron Sorkin Reveals He Had a Stroke Last November: “A Loud Wake-Up Call”

How Toy Companies Bribe YouTube Channels

Artificial Intelligence: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

These Are the World’s Happiest Countries in 2023. Finland is #1, and the US is #15.

An 85-year Harvard study on happiness found the No. 1 retirement challenge

Connection Between Alcohol and Sleep

How Loneliness Reshapes the Brain

What Does Blue Light Do to Your Eyes?

Why green might be the most important color for humans. But of course!

Understanding Your Form 1099-K. “The law is not intended to track personal transactions such as sharing the cost of a car ride or meal, birthday or holiday gifts, or paying a family member for a household bill.”

Mark Evanier’s Tales From The DMV

Former Colorado Rep. Pat Schroeder, a pioneer for women’s rights, dies at 82

The indomitable spirit of Willis Reed. I watched that Game 7 NBA Finals game in 1970 on TV. It was remarkable. He died at the age of 80.

‘Fosbury Flop’ high jumper Dick Fosbury dies at 76

John Jakes, Author of the Miniseries-Spawning ‘North and South’ Trilogy, Dies at 90

The attempts to make a modern Little Nemoin Slumberland film

Now I Know: The Slave Who Shipped Himself to Freedom and A Cute Way to Prevent Traffic Deaths and Why Movie Theaters Have Red Seats and The Problem With Living in the Center of America and I Guess You Could Say They… Excel and The Little Bit of P-Word in the Coke and This Cupcake Recipe Isn’t The Bomb

MUSIC

Please keep voting for the niece Rebecca Jade at the San Diego Music Awards in categories 20, 21, 25, 26, and 27. Also for Peter Sprague in category 4 for an album that features Rebecca.

Dry Bones – Delta Rhythm Boys.  A recent Old Testament scripture was Ezekiel 37:1-14. By coincidence, I was playing that week the soundtrack of the movie Rain Man, which included a version of Dry Bones by the Delta Rhythm Boys, though not precisely that take.

Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov’s Russian Easter Festival Overture

Let It Burn from Paradise Square the Musical, featuring Tony Award Winner Joaquina Kalukango

Tchaikovsky’s Symphonic Fantasia, The Tempest

Life’s a F***ing Fantasy for Santos – Randy Rainbow

Coverville 1436: Cover Stories for Poison and Sugar Ray

Woody Woodpecker theme

Music from the Emerald Isle

What’s The Name of That Song from Sesame Street

Franz Von Suppe’s Light Calvary

March rambling: 2008 again?

amateur sleuths

Everything Everywhere All at OnceIs it 2008 again, or not? (bank failures)

US Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) makes his DC entrance

New Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R-AR) Signs Law Gutting Child Labor Protections for Minors Under 16 Years Old

Defiant Woman at the Center of New York’s First Abortion Battle – in the 1840s

How to Make the Hybrid Model Work for Women

The HistoryMakers: Documenting Black history through first-person accounts | 60 Minutes

My City by James Weldon Johnson

The Destruction of Negro Communities and the Birth of the African American

Mapped: Which Countries Get the Most Paid Vacation Days?

Indonesia unveils the construction site of a new capital city, Nusantara.  Jakarta is experiencing overpopulation, infrastructure problems, and chronic flooding. The current capital is quickly sinking into the Java Sea, and parts of the city could be entirely submerged by 2050. But the new “project may lead to substantial rainforest deforestation, threaten endangered species’ habitats, put Indigenous peoples’ homes at risk, and more.”

March is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. The Colon Club calls attention to the disease.

Why are nurses quitting? Ask the nurse no hospital will hire.

Idaho Murders: As a Small Town Grapples With Sinister Rumors, Media’s True-Crime Obsession Grows and The Case the Internet got wrong: A new investigation sheds light on Lindsay Buziak’s unsolved murder, revealing a vast web of misinformation. These are as much about the rush to judgment by amateur sleuths as the crimes themselves.

Worst Civil Engineering Failure in US History – March 12, 1928: St. Francis Dam Disaster
And more

John Cleese was confronted with three men who kinda looked and/or kinda sounded like his character, Basil Fawlty. He had to guess which one did the impersonation professionally.

Chaim Topol, Tevye the Milkman in ‘Fiddler on the Roof,’ Dies at 87

Robert Blake, the Combustible Star of ‘In Cold Blood’ and ‘Baretta,’ Dies at 89

Marvel Working to Find ‘Quantumania’ Leaker. It’ll probably be more successful than SCOTUS was. 
My friend Fred Hembeck asks Mark Evanier about Tiny Tim

Is the Beyond Burger Healthy?

Hey, Stewart’s, $5 / 2 = what??

Now I Know: The Dark History of Groomsmen and Baseball’s Strangest Trade and When Space and Physics Don’t Mix and Why Beer Comes in Brown (or Green) Bottles

I’m happy about the results of the Academy Awards, although I did not watch the program. It’s been my experience that people who saw EEAAO in the cinema, as I did, enjoyed it FAR more than those who watched it at home.

To me, it’s all one big, continual story. The Big Lie about the 2020 election, including the allegations about rigged voting machines.The January 6, 2021 insurrection.   Dominion voting machine’s defamation case against Fox News and the information that came out during the trial’s discovery phase.

Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy gave Fox News exclusive access to raw footage of Jan 6. Tucker Carlson, one of the verified liars in the Dominion discovery, had footage of Jan 6 edited to suggest that the insurrection was just a sightseeing event, a claim so absurd that the White House and Senate Republicans from Mitch McConnell to Thom Tillis rebuked Carlson.

Check out pieces by Jake Tapper, Bill Maher, Seth Meyers, Drezner’s World, and possibly most comprehensively, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Music

In honor of ME: Adagio and Allegro for Piano and Horn by Robert Schumann, Opus 70!

And this: Sir Roger Norrington Eroica/Happy Birthday surprise from the SWR Symphonieorchester

Afro-American Symphony by William Grant Still

Casablanca suite by Max Steiner

Coverville 1433: The Rihanna Cover Story and  1434: Cover Stories for Nik Kershaw and Nina Simone, and 1435: Album Cover: Dark Side of the Moon’s 50th Anniversary

Wayne Shorter, 1923-2023

Guitarist David Lindley: 1944—2023

K-Chuck Radio: The joy and sadness of Yvonne Barrett

Classical Composer Reaction – Analysis of This is America (Childish Gambino) | The Daily Doug Ep. 542. (Doug Helvering)

Make Way For Tomorrow dance number- Gene Kelly, Rita Hayworth, and Phil Silvers (!)

Carpenters with Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

Don’t Worry, Be Happy – Julien Neel

It’s not Lou Reed … and it’s not Jefferson Airplane, either.

Mr. Ma answers all the cello questions you never knew you had!

Burt Bacharach’s Clever Key Changes – David Bennett Piano

Ten classical music songs you know, but you may not know their names

“We’re willing to sacrifice our egos for the good of the band” – interview with  Simon Le Bon of Duran Duran.

Please keep voting for the niece Rebecca Jade for the San Diego Music Awards daily in categories 20, 21, 25, 26, and 27. Also, vote for Peter Sprague in category 4, which RJ sang on.

Jan. rambling: things that don’t work

toaster hoax

January
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2355346-tom-gauld-explores-crushing-darkness-and-inhospitable-cold/

Exhibit on Post-World War II Jewish Refugees 

Lula’s New Government Is Taking Steps to Combat Racism in Brazil

Public Libraries continue to thrive despite defunding and privatization attacks

Why Do People Keep Falling for Things That Don’t Work? — How pseudoscience can affect even those with medical knowledge

Nearly all mass attackers were male and experienced at least one significant stressor in the past five years, according to a U.S. Secret Service analysis of 173 incidents in recent years.

The Best Management Secrets for Impacting Employee Mental Health

This “inflation” is different

For Every $1 Gained by a Bottom 90 Percenter Since 2020, a Billionaire Got $1.7M

The FDA will soon allow gay men in monogamous relationships to donate blood, according to draft guidelines released by the agency.

The Once and Future Sex is “Eleanor Janega’s new history of gender and sex in the medieval age, describing the weird and horny ways of medieval Europeans, which are far gnarlier and more complicated than the story we get from “traditionalists” who want us to believe that their ideas about gender roles reflect a fixed part of human nature. Modern attitudes are an attempt to rewrite history.”

Gas stoves can harm your health — and scientists have known that for decades

Nancy Pelosi, liberated and loving it

A few observations on Biden’s documents

Jane Fonda on Cancer Battle, Privilege and Coming Into Her Own at 85

An appreciation of literary lion Russell Banks

The Oldest People in the World

February 2023 Flyer for the next Death Cafe. Saturday, Feb 11th, from 1 pm- 3 pm at William K. Sandford  Library’s Stedman Room. The address is 629 Albany Shaker Road, Loudonville, NY 12211

Gina Lollabrigida, Legendary Italian Screen Siren, Dies at 95

Cindy Williams, Star of ‘Laverne & Shirley,’ Dies at 75

Royal dysfunction, disorder, and drama are hardly restricted to the British monarchy

Amazon Smile isn’t smiling after February 20, 2023. 

Passenger automobile depreciation tables

Culcha

M&M’s ‘spokescandies’ controversy, explained. I did not know this was an important political issue.

Comic about batteries, sort of

‘The Simpsons,’ ‘Family Guy’ and ‘Bob’s Burgers’ Nab Two Season RenewalsRenewals at Fox. It’ll be 36 seasons of The Simpsons!

HBO Max has removed over 250 Warner Brothers cartoons from that streaming service.

The use of the word “inedible” to mean “I don’t like this food.”

How Doug Liman Directed a Brett Kavanaugh FBI Investigation Doc in Secret

‘Black Panther 2,’ ‘Ant-Man 3’ Secure China Release Dates as Beijing Lifts De Facto Ban on Marvel

The History Behind Captain America Punching Hitler

The Greg Hatcher Legacy Files #4: ‘Friday Anger Management’

The Indecision of Mr. Goodell

The “Greatest” Football Comeback???

Alan MacMasters: How the great online toaster hoax was exposed

All right, who left all these tabs open?

Now I Know: Seattle’s Mystery Soda Machine and The Original Turn Signals and How To Save a Sinking Church and The Birds That Gave The Bird

MUSIC

David Crosby, a co-founder of the Byrds and CSN, dies at 81. Essential tracks

Coverville 1430: The David Crosby Tribute and  1429: The Donald Fagen/Steely Dan Cover Story

Speaker of the House – Randy Rainbow

Barrett Strong, one of Motown’s founding artists and a member of the Songwriters Hall of Fame, died at 81. He was often partnered with the late Norman Whitfield. Here’s his early Motown hit, Money.

I’m A Man and Outro (1967) – The Yardbirds (feat. Jimmy Page)

The Last Stand – Sabaton. “Sometimes you need a Swedish metal song about the soldiers who protected the Pope during the sack of Rome in 1527.”

St. John of Damascus – Sergei Taneyev

If You Raise Your Head – MonaLisa Twins

Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet overture.

Not A Day Goes By– Bernadette Peters

The theme song from the sitcom, My Favorite Martian — but with lyrics… – The Satellite Singers

January rambling: India #1 in ’23

Arthur answers my questions

Happy New Year! 2023

The U.S. Census Bureau’s projections

India will overtake China as the world’s most populous country in 2023
Martin Luther King, Jr.: Don’t Sleep Through the Revolution 
Bossism: Revolt of the Oligarch Class
The Debt Ceiling: a (p)review
Social Quitting: How social media barons squandered their lock-in and made themselves obsolete.
Attack of the Chatbots: Screenwriters’ Friend or Foe?
Person to Person with Norah O’Donnell, interview with Jon Stewart

Clint Meneely: 1975 recording about Meneely bells of Troy, NY

Barbara Walters Remembered by ‘The View’ Co-Hosts, Past and Present, in Show Tribute Episode
Pelé, , Charismatic Master of the “Beautiful Game,” Dies at 82

Sign Up To Be An Organ Donor. You can provide lifesaving organs to as many as eight people.

The Curious Case of Nebraska Man

A Plane of Monkeys, a Pandemic, and a Botched Deal: Inside a Science Crisis You’ve Never Heard Of

Now I Know – Grapefruits: The Nuclear Fruit? and 
The Littlest Big Winner and Then, Their Pants Exploded and The Sesame Seed Backlash of 2023 and America’s Secret, Tasty World War II Weapon? and Why Can’t Californians Buy This Snack?
Abortion rights

The Supreme Court’s decision last summer that overturned the federal right to an abortion sent Rachel Sweet into overdrive focused on two states (Kansas, Kentucky) that share traditionally conservative values.

“With those [successful] campaigns behind her, Sweet has had time to reflect on the lessons learned from those hard-fought victories, including what many activists on her side of the issue misunderstand about voters who are persuadable on abortion rights.”

(The takeaway here is that one should not be so quick to pigeonhole people who could turn out to be your political allies on some issues.
2022

overthink

Partying like it’s 1942 – was 2022 a hinge year?
Golden Duke Winner: The Odds Were Never In Your Favor; it celebrates the cartoonishly corrupt and incompetent in American politics
Gallup’s Top Workplace Stories
Pew Research: Striking findings
McSweeney’s countdown of its top 20 most-read articles
Chuck Miller’s Best Photos
Buffalo
People have been talking about Buffalo, the second-largest city in New York State, a lot recently. Part of it has to do with the deadly weather; folks there are used to snow but not that. Some of it surely with the near-death on national television of  Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin, coincidentally, the first game I started watching from the beginning all season. There’s been a lot of “the city’s been through a lot this year,” going back to the shooting deaths of ten black folks at a supermarket in May 2022.
I’m not unhappy about it. It’s just that I hope we can show such concern for each other when there’s no crisis. I know this is an unrealistic ideal.
Quizzes and questions
fillyjonk does the annual quiz I completed
Arthur answered my questions about Nancy Pelosi v. Kevin McCarthy, and Sinema and  ranked voting and sheep
Music
Coverville 1425: The 2022 Coverville Countdown, Part One and 
1426: : The 2022 Coverville Countdown, Part 2 and 1427: The Kenny Loggins Cover Story and 1428: The Jeff Beck Tribute

Hymne (Hymn to the Blessed Sacrament), by Olivier Messiaen

Could It Be Magic – Barry Manilow and My Sharona – The Knack, a couple examples for this quiz
Pale Blue Eyes – the Velvet Underground
The Boxer – Alison Krauss, Shawn Colvin, Jerry Douglas
The Stars and the Moon – Audra McDonald
Sumer is Icumen in – The Hilliard Ensemble
To Whom It May Concern – Lisa Marie Presley, who died at 54

“Weird Al” Yankovic Breaks Down His Most Iconic Tracks

Jeff Beck:  Farewell and Guitar Giant  dies at 78 and his 10 Best Songs: With Yardbirds, Solo & Beyond

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