A little light reading?

Friends, I have another insane evening and busy day tomorrow, and I have simply no time to blog here. Part of the reason is, I spent most of the day at a local hospital, waiting on Alan as his designated driver for a little outpatient stuff — nothing worrisome, but even with a wifi connection, phone and laptop, I didn’t get much done, not with the TV and the various incarnations of the Loud family who filtered in and out.

I considered working in the chapel but figured that wouldn’t be included in the practice of a respectful agnostic.

Not that there wasn’t lots to read for when I simply had to shut down and reboot my brain. Like this:

50ways

And this:

firsttestsofipad

I kept looking at that U.S. News, thinking of the cleaning crews, the hundreds of families who have drifted in and out of this waiting room over the last decade. How many hands have straightened that issue and put it back in a stack for the next day’s influx, never thinking to look at that giant date on the cover and ask if maybe this one could be pitched? I didn’t even want to consider the germs that might be on it. (I washed my hands four times over the course of the day and didn’t put them near any mucous membranes.)

The iPad was introduced in 2010, if you’re interested. Steve Jobs did the rollout in San Francisco. Sunrise, sunset…

So back to work for me, and high hopes I can pick up this burden again tomorrow. Talk amongst yourselves.

Posted at 7:45 pm in Same ol' same ol' |
 

115 responses to “A little light reading?”

  1. alex said on October 5, 2016 at 9:56 pm

    You’d think with all the creative charging that goes on in hospitals these days that they could afford some new magazines at least every ten years. Sheesh.

    They can’t isolate sources of MRSA and flesh-eating strep in those places? Maybe they should go check the waiting room side tables.

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  2. BigHank53 said on October 5, 2016 at 10:29 pm

    Now I’m actually curious about what I could have done to make my life better in 2006. With a decade’s perspective I bet most of us could figure out if they would have worked or not.

    Ah, who am I fooling? Given that whoever wrote the thing has a whole new career since USN&WR steamed into that iceberg at top speed, it’s hard to imagine a bigger waste of time.

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  3. basset said on October 5, 2016 at 11:13 pm

    Just by coincidence, Basset Jr & I were getting something out of our storage locker this afternoon & ran across a box of Whole Earth Reviews from the 90s. He seemed quite interested.

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  4. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 5, 2016 at 11:25 pm

    *Those* I wouldn’t throw out.

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  5. Jakash said on October 6, 2016 at 12:21 am

    A little more current magazine reading… I’d highlight some quotes from this, but it’s short enough and so strongly worded that it seems like it would be doing it a disservice. The Atlantic magazine makes its third endorsement since 1857. I hope that the folks in Tribune Tower that saw their way clear to the ridiculous backing of Gary Johnson read it and weep:

    http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2016/11/the-case-for-hillary-clinton-and-against-donald-trump/501161/

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  6. Dexter said on October 6, 2016 at 1:18 am

    Old magazines…I opened a shoebox in a closet a couple months ago and saw stacks of my old Grapevines, the pocket-sized shared stories of drunks who like to write letters. I know I had read every word, but these went back to 1994 up to 2000. I only vaguely recalled a few of the stories. When I read books, I never forget story lines. Years ago I read Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket”, and I remember the whole thing. I guess a regular person writing his/her story didn’t carry the weight for me, didn’t drop anchor in my brain.
    Sensibility and ease…Nik Lidstrom, a Swede, was a superstar defenseman for the Detroit Red Wings for twenty seasons. He was a perennial all-star, defenseman of the year many times, and he surely made millions of dollars. He is married, and he had kids who played youth hockey. So that he could spend as much time with the kids on ice and at home, he did not use his cash to buy a McMansion, he lived among regular working folks in someplace like Livonia or Redford Charter, can’t recall. A TV crew interviewed him at his home and he lived in a modest ranch style home, very nicely appointed but really, it seemed apparent they lived there to be close to whatever ice rinks and arenas where kids play. He’s been retired a few years now, we can assume the kids are away at college or busy with high school things, and maybe they just packed up, back to Sweden. But no McMansion. Ever see LeBron James’ home in Akron? Holeee Shit! https://billionaireaddresses.files.wordpress.com/2013/03/lebron-james-mansion-in-montrose-ohio-8.jpg
    Maybe Jeter’s Florida monstrosity is bigger, maybe not.

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  7. David C. said on October 6, 2016 at 7:38 am

    The papers endorsing Gary Johnson are doing it to preserve their Bristol Palin virginity. They and everybody else knows they are endorsing Hillary with a bank shot. It’s just a hope that the deplorables won’t phone en masse with “cancel my subscription”.

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  8. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 6, 2016 at 7:46 am

    If I’ve noticed a common thread in my conversations with Trump supporters this past week, it’s a frustration that people can’t understand why they support him not because of but in spite of his many obvious personal flaws. If I come back with “but do you understand why those flaws seem more dangerous in sum and in office than Hillary’s flaws,” that’s where I hear a mix of anger and panic: no, you just don’t understand how dangerous Hillary is. My response to them (reminder: I’m still a Republican, flawed as I am myself) is that she’s not going to come into office with the same mandate Obama had, she’s not going to have the sort of ability to drive change that was in Rahm’s hands from the start. To which they say “Supreme Court, judiciary, Supreme Court, judges, Supreme Court.”

    And then I have to ask: what is it you think she’s going to do, how are her picks going to bend the arc of America beyond where we’re already at, that makes it viable to put a monkey with a machine gun on Pennsylvania Avenue (remember, no one ever argues with me he’s an erratic and not entirely reliable keeper-of-promises let alone sticker-to-lists-of-judges). And their answer is that they think she’s going to put on the bench judges who will push for more restrictions of religion in public life, active harassment of religious bodies in their own activities and speech, and deepen the intrusion of federal regulation and mandates into everyday life and business.

    Foreign affairs, overseas intrusions, Benghazi – those things come up glancingly, along with Obamacare’s failures (as they see them). But what I think is most interesting once you get the conversation down into the details is that, to me at least, it becomes clearer that passionate support for Trump is not so much based on wanting to “deny Obama a third term” as it is a desire to end seven terms and not go to an eighth of the Bush-Clinton-Bush-Obama “business as usual” in Washington. It’s a sense that it has been since Reagan that the average voter (they themselves, that is) has felt there was someone in the White House who was not beholden to so many interests and angles, agendas and special carve-outs and exemptions.

    If I can get that far, that’s where I feel the resistance break down: if you look at your own frustrations and wishes honestly, and at who Trump always has been and still patently is, it is simply not credible to vote for him (in my opinion) or to cast a vote that might allow him into executive authority. Hillary is not going to push conservative agendas in any meaningful way, but I think conservatism will still have a place to stand and a way to speak into the developing national dialogue if she is in the Oval Office, but if by some strange chance Trump does win, conservatism will have box seats on the 50-yard line, but no line down to the bench. And you’ll have a great view of the coach walking over to talk to the cheerleaders as the team falls behind three touchdowns in the first quarter.

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  9. Deborah said on October 6, 2016 at 7:49 am

    “Bristol Palin virginity” ha ha ha.

    I went to bed really early last night and slept like a log. I realized that yesterday was the fourth anniversary of the day I retired. Time flies.

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  10. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 8:05 am

    That they think that Reagan, former Governor of California and someone who had been angling and/or actively running for the Presidency since 1968, ws not beholden to interests, etc, is utterly fascinating and depressing, though I suppose no more surprising. Reagan was no outsider.

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  11. alex said on October 6, 2016 at 8:07 am

    Jeff, I think the problem is that a lot of these folks have taken the bait — hook, line and sinker — that federal marshals are going to make pastors officiate gay weddings with guns to their heads. That is when they’re not confiscating hunting rifles and evicting whites from their homes and jobs so that illegal aliens can have them and then turn around and vote for more free federal goodies.

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  12. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 8:13 am

    I’ve had the same reaction, Jeff, with Trump supporters. Supreme Court nominees are yuuge in their minds. Yuuge! But it’s such a cognitive dissonance because, as you say, they will admit that he’s erratic & changes his mind & misspeaks. So, I struggle to try to understand why they think he’ll nominate Supreme Ct judges that will jive with their agenda (i.e. not take their guns and not shutter their churches). The judges that just slapped down Pence’s ban of Syrian refugees were all conservative leaning GOP appointees.

    My interaction with Trump supporters is not that they are stupid, lazy, or even all that angry, on the whole, but that they see life in very simplistic terms. The modern world is much too complex for them and Trump gives simple, short answers to complex questions.

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  13. Basset said on October 6, 2016 at 8:41 am

    Exactly. Daddy will chase those nean neighbor kids away, increase your allowance, and make sure you have all the ice cream you want.

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  14. brian stouder said on October 6, 2016 at 9:00 am

    …and indeed, that IS what Donald’s daddy seems to have done for him.

    “Awwww – you’re in trouble over a couple of tens of millions of dollars? We’ll fix that, and make the bad men go away, and nobody has to even know how we did it!”

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  15. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 9:04 am

    Comment in today’s NYTimes on Gail Collins’ piece that pretty much sums it up:
    We’re all exhausted by the whole thing, I agree. Maybe we need to be more like my 90 year old mother-in-law. She’s a little hard of hearing, God bless her, and ever since Trump introduced his running mate Mike Pence she asks “why do they keep talking about My Pants?”

    Gov. My Pants. It sounds so…perfect!

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  16. brian stouder said on October 6, 2016 at 9:08 am

    Suzanne for thread win!

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  17. David C. said on October 6, 2016 at 9:29 am

    It seems like all the Presidents in my adult life, except maybe Jimmy Carter because I don’t recall his father being talked about at all, have had moderate to severe daddy issues. Are daddy issues some sort of prerequisite? It sure feels like it.

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  18. brian stouder said on October 6, 2016 at 9:33 am

    President Lincoln definitely (definitely) had daddy issues….not to compare the Donald to Abe!

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  19. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 9:59 am

    It does seem that way, David C. I remember watching the Frontline piece on Bush/Gore. Gore had big time Daddy issues. As I recall, so did Mitt Romney. Both were pretty much running for Pres. because their fathers had, failed to win, and it was drummed into them from little on up that they would be the POTUS that their father never was.

    I’d love to know the relationship between Gov. My Pants and his father.

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  20. alex said on October 6, 2016 at 10:03 am

    Thanks for the earworm, guys…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IEJKZAApbf0

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  21. Julie Robinson said on October 6, 2016 at 10:08 am

    Carter’s dad was a tough man who didn’t spare the rod to maintain discipline, and put little Jimmy on the streets selling boiled peanuts at a very tender age. Jimmy considered him the mentor he could never live up to. Yep, Daddy issues for sure.

    Governor My Pants, Bristol Palin virginity; you guys crack me up.

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  22. Heather said on October 6, 2016 at 10:46 am

    Suzanne @12, I think you’ve hit the nail on the head. I often get overwhelmed by modern life, but I have developed tools to cope. A lot of people haven’t.

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  23. Charlotte said on October 6, 2016 at 11:00 am

    Heard Springsteen on Fresh Air yesterday, and guess what — Daddy issues! It was an interesting listen. He has a great reputation in the horse show world as being a terrific dad, and someone who always puts himself in the background so his daughter can shine. She’s a very good rider, and has very very good horses. (Paul Newman also had a great rep among the horse show folks.)

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  24. Basset said on October 6, 2016 at 1:24 pm

    Something about Springsteen just puts me off. He is one of my three hear ’em and switch the channel right away choices, the other two being the Doors and anything even remotely rap or hip-hop, if there’s any difference between those last two.

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  25. Peter said on October 6, 2016 at 1:44 pm

    Suzanne, is you mother-in-law Emily Latella?

    I forgot who said it, but Bruce Springsteen has to be the best songwriter of all time. Who knew there were that many words that rhyme with factory?

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  26. Sue said on October 6, 2016 at 1:56 pm

    Somebody help me match My Pants and Indiana (In).

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  27. Dexter said on October 6, 2016 at 1:56 pm

    Ronald Reagan was a Cretin who raised taxes, hated and fought unions, took the country into just plain weird misadventures into Grenada, claimed senility over the arms issues, proclaimed the USA needed a giant space shield, a program called “Star Wars”, which scientists thought was a joke but then passionately attempted to get the word out that this would be the biggest folly ever, because it could not work. So he told Gorbachev to take down a wall and he gets credit for being a much-loved father -figure of the nation…yeah, this bastard who , when governor of California, wanted to gas and beat any long-haired “hippy type demonstrator” in sight. Oh yeah, the people loved that son of a bitch alright…the morons did, anyway. And yet, even so-called liberals such as Chris Matthews praise Reagan’s legacy, even Trump pulls the name out once in a while, and Ronald Reagan, in national lore, is a hero forevermore. This little rant just scratches the surface of the hate I had and have for this vile, dead foul human scum. I happened to be in California when Ronald Reagan was governor, living in an army barracks with many Chicanos and Mexicans (mix the two terms up, have a fight) and when the Mateus began flowing and the fat joints began glowing, the mellowness left and the hatred of Reagan overtook the conversation. We need new history books concerning Ronald Reagan.

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  28. Sue said on October 6, 2016 at 1:58 pm

    brian, tell me about Lincoln’s daddy issues. All I’ve ever read is that he broke contact with him.

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  29. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 2:23 pm

    Peter @25, it wasn’t my mother-in-law who named the gov My Pants. It was a comment I found in today’s NYTimes and it made me laugh. I copied and pasted for your collective enjoyment.

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  30. brian stouder said on October 6, 2016 at 2:29 pm

    Short version: Abe’s dad hired Abe out when he was a kiddo (to the local farmers), and then kept ALL the money that Abe earned. Some of the historians go so far as to ascribe Abe’s visceral dislike of slavery (at least in part) to this – but I think that’s a reach.
    Also, when Abe’s mom (Nancy) died – from tainted milk – his dad abandoned Abe (I think he was around 10) and Abe’s older sister Sarah (I think she was around 18), to go off and collect a new wife. I believe Abe’s dad was gone for more than 6 months – and his daughter and son were essentially fending for themselves in the southern Indiana wilderness (east from Evansville, near Dale).

    One good thing was that ol’ Tom did bring back a very fine wife, who took to Abe immediately, and who seems to have recognized that the kiddo had lots of brains and potential.

    By contrast, when Abe was grown up and an adult, he summed up his father in a somewhat devastating sentence or two – which I won’t quote correctly (something like “He could read, haltingly, and scratch an ‘X’ to sign his own name”)…when Abe was an adult lawyer and doing well for himself, he stayed in contact with his step-mom, a little, but not with his dad.

    Sorry for running on – this evening I head south toward Dale Indiana for the Lincoln Colloquium, so this stuff is a little more ‘front-of-mind’ than normal!

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  31. Bruce Fields said on October 6, 2016 at 2:31 pm

    “And their answer is that they think she’s going to put on the bench judges who will push for more restrictions of religion in public life, active harassment of religious bodies in their own activities and speech”

    Where are they getting this from? Does it have any basis in reality, or is it all just right-wing blogosphere paranoia?

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  32. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 6, 2016 at 3:28 pm

    It all goes back to Barronelle Stutzman. First they came for the florists, and I was silent; then they came for the cake bakers, and I said nothing; then the photographers, but I said it didn’t matter outside of church buildings; then they came for the church-owned but non-worship-site venues, and I didn’t want to look rude or mean . . . and then they came for the preachers, and there was no one left to object.

    That’s the version you’ll get from anyone who will let you carry the dialogue that far.

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  33. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 3:49 pm

    Barronelle Stutzman, Christian martyr. Her tremendous Christian witness was to refuse a longtime customer and friend when she discovered her flowers would be unclean around them. I’m sorry, but do these people not get what evangelical means?

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  34. LAMary said on October 6, 2016 at 4:21 pm

    Dexter, I don’t have the hatred of Reagan that you do, but I have never been able to figure out why people love him. When he died my son was in eighth grade and his social studies teacher devoted an entire week to the canonization of Saint Ronnie.

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  35. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 6, 2016 at 4:27 pm

    2 Corinthians 6:17. When you’re talking to a Christian believer who is of the “don’t bake it for them” stance, it always goes back to that verse. Now, my pastoral and homiletic pet peeve is isolating verses and calling that “what the inerrant Word says.” We can go in one of two directions: what inerrant means in belief and application, or to say regardless of your own flavor of Biblical literalism, how big of a passage do you have to include in your interpretation before you’ve gotten to the inerrant part?

    I actually believe I’m still a pretty darn Biblical and religious person, and I say the aperture setting to get that picture requires you open it up to f66. (Apologies to Catholics and Orthodox readers who hold more than those sixty-six books in your Biblical compendium.) You simply cannot, I believe and affirm and preach, take a single phrase, or verse, or even individual paragraph out of Leviticus or Romans or Revelation and say “and that’s God speaking, I believe it, and that settles it.” The Holy Spirit bids us consider the whole of scriptures, and in the light of the gospel — the good news of God’s love made known in Christ Jesus — and then we decide in community how to bring that saving, encouraging, redemptive word to bear in our common life in this day and hour. Lather, rinse, repeat.

    As Nadia Bolz-Webber says, “the clobber verses” deserve better than that. But if you need the Bible to just reinforce your cultural understanding of rectitude and decency by a Western late-Victorian ethic, you’re gonna have to pluck your bits out and carve a good handle on one end of them to swing it at unbelievers. Meanwhile, and again on a pretty conservative day, I’ll say it now and I’ll say it again, in church and all around the town: gays getting married has not a blessed thing to do with a forty year implosion of the institution of marriage. You find that disturbing? You’re worried about large numbers of kids having to raise themselves in the midst of largely adultless chaos? Great, climb on board. But if you want to drive this ‘dozer across gay marriage, you’ll have to get off the next time I slow down, because that’s not a cause, not a symptom, and not the problem. Trying to make it one is just a handy way to avoid talking about the issues sitting right here on our left and right.

    I realize that’s not the most progressive way to address that issue, but if you’re curious how someone can claim conservatism and still say same-sex marriage neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg, that’s how it sounds when I’m in that mood. But I just listened to a podcast where two local clergy discuss me as one of the ones who “refuse to preach the whole Bible to their congregations, and lead them astray.” So I’m in *a* mood, that’s for sure.

    Off to do a lecture on sex and the 1872 election — wish me luck! And pray for the folks in the path of this hurricane. We have 25 people leaving next Saturday for Georgetown, SC to finish repairing a house damaged by flooding a year-plus ago (our third trip, mostly on just two houses), and we’re all wondering what they will be working on when they get there . . . but they’re still going!

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  36. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 4:34 pm

    To all of you in more liberal minded areas, I cannot stress enough that when it comes the Baronelle Stutzman mentality, these people really, really, truly believe this. Truly. It’s not a schtick. They absolutely do believe that being locked up in the big house for not allowing a flaming atheist transgender and her Hindu drag queen husband to teach the precious kindergarteners at your Christian school is just around the corner unless they can turn this country around.

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  37. Heather said on October 6, 2016 at 5:07 pm

    On Twitter Matt Drudge is suggesting that the hurricane strength and danger is being exaggerated by the government to support the existence of climate change. This is, of course, beyond disgusting in that people are being told to evacuate and there is a good chance of fatalities is more of them decide to stay.

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  38. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 5:45 pm

    I understand very well how the clobber verses work. My problem then and my problem now is that for a people who consider the saving of souls their paramount duty and moral obligation, they are so obsessed with establishing boundaries around the acceptable people. I saw pretty early on the disconnect between the constant push to “share your testimony” and go out knock on doors to get people to church with the “unclean” idea. I also saw the irony of constantly accusing liberal churches of picking and choosing which scripture to follow when I could plainly see that they were doing the same thing. And inerrancy, that drove me crazy. When our pastor told me that we could know,the Bible was true because it said so right there in John 1:1, all I could do was nod my head and back away.

    I can distinctly remember my father saying that Jonah really was in the belly of that whale, and thinking can’t you see that that’s not the point? Needless to say, I don’t discuss religion or politics with my parents.

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  39. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 6:06 pm

    Okay, now we can all come together in our outrage over the Hillary emails. The latest scandal to emerge is that neither Doug Band nor Huma Abedin knew who Dave Brubeck was.

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  40. LAMary said on October 6, 2016 at 6:31 pm

    Not knowing who Dave Brubeck was? That tears it.

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  41. David C. said on October 6, 2016 at 6:33 pm

    Since we’re in a bit of a conversion about religion, all I can say is oh, Jesus Christ on a cracker.

    http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/hurricane-truthers-downplay-matthew

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  42. Colleen said on October 6, 2016 at 6:34 pm

    OK, I don’t know who Doug Band or Huma Abedin is.

    But I surely do know Brubeck.

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    • nancy said on October 6, 2016 at 8:03 pm

      That’s because of all those years listening to Leah Tourkow.

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  43. alex said on October 6, 2016 at 8:38 pm

    And Huma probably knows all kinds of Indian, British and Saudi musicians we don’t know the first thing about.

    I wouldn’t know jack about Brubeck if I’d never lived in Chicago and hadn’t experienced the guilty pleasure of listening to the defunct WNUA. Wonder whatever became of Danae Alexander, who always sounded like she was six sheets to the wind as she presided over her evening show and exercised her wonderful husky pipes hyping Richard Elliot concerts and Kenny G CDs. She did vocal fry before it was cool. And kind of reminded me of my Freudian analyst, which is probably why I found her so comforting.

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  44. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 9:37 pm

    This article about the post-factual world ignores the big elephant in the room: Fox News.

    http://time.com/4520918/truth-out-there-2016-election/

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  45. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 6, 2016 at 10:45 pm

    Suzanne, I will stick my neck out a bit to say: and keep in mind, there are lots of people around the country who, other than watching “The Birdcage” had never thought about issues of sexuality and gender who are suddenly hearing the federal government is saying that boys can use the girls restroom, and they’re truly and completely shocked that government is pushing so hard on something like this. I think there’s a path forward, but it’s going to be education and some mutual accommodation — because this has really come around quickly. When they say “what’s next?” they’re truly bewildered . . . and some very good, heart-for-kids administrators are asking how to manage this sort of request from a student and getting no feedback from above them other than “make this work.”

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  46. Deborah said on October 6, 2016 at 11:10 pm

    Reading these comments about people you all have to interact with who have outrageous beliefs, who cherry pick bible verses etc makes me really thankful that I live in the liberal bubble I inhabit. Yes, on the one hand it makes me ignorant of their issues, and maybe I need to spend some time reading up on it. But on the other hand, thank goodness I don’t have to listen to that.

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  47. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 11:23 pm

    The “religious liberty” crowd as exemplified by our florist in eastern WA predates the transgender bathroom issue by a couple of years, so that excuse doesn’t work. She’s fighting Washington’s anti-discrimination law, and has appealed it to the WA Supreme Court. In interviews, she talks about how she stands to lose everything and how she’s being bullied by the ACLU, but the law in WA is pretty clear, and she could have settled at anytime for a small fine and an agreement to follow the law (the AG also brought suit against her.) She’s being backed by a group that has been fighting the “homosexual agenda” for some time, the Alliance Defending Freedom. They’re also going after transgender bathroom bills, too, but they’ve been around for quite a while.

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  48. Sherri said on October 6, 2016 at 11:31 pm

    I just saw a Trump ad for the first time, during the Boston-Cleveland game. Low production values. Sad!

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  49. Suzanne said on October 6, 2016 at 11:46 pm

    Jeff, I’ll agree with you mostly. I agree that the transgendered bathroom thing was a push too far for most people and trying to sort out how you manage it is a mess but I will also agree with Sherri that it started before that, probably when same sex marriage was given the OK by the Supreme Court.
    I’d reiterate my earlier point that much of it goes back to people wanting life with simple answers and, increasingly, those answers aren’t there. When all your friends and neighbors were white, Christian, and heterosexual, it left your mind free for other concerns. But now, society is much more complex and not only do you have to cope with life’s normal ups & downs, you have to consider people with all sorts of other lifestyles & religions & political views, and on top of that new technology (like updating your iPhone and not being able figure out what it means when it says you should “touch home”) which invariably makes you question your own lifestyle & religion & political views & how your job might be gone to China next week or that you won’t be able to master the new technology at your job. All that gives people stresses they didn’t have to deal with 40 years ago and makes them very anxious. If those gays & Muslims & liberals & iPhone updates would just go away, they think, then life would once again be simple like it used to be and we’d all be better off.

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  50. Suzanne said on October 7, 2016 at 12:03 am

    http://www.vox.com/identities/2016/10/6/13188918/trump-voters-white-poll-hometown-geographic-mobility-education

    And I’d say that this does not surprise me much

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  51. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 1:31 am

    There are all sorts of things you can point to and say it began there. I’ve been hearing this all my life. Whether it’s Roe v. Wade or the Supreme Court banning prayer in schools, there’s always something to grab onto and say that the world and my country is changing out from under me. (You don’t usually hear the Bob Jones case brought up too often, but that’s another one that instigated a lot of religious freedom groups.)

    I can understand their point of view. It’s not that I’m unsympathetic. I also recognize that failure to change the country is hurtful to other groups. The people who resist the change because it makes them uncomfortable expect other people to live with discomfort or worse until some indefinite or unlikely point in the future, and history is not optimistic about that process.

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  52. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 7, 2016 at 7:50 am

    Sherri, I agree. It’s my pastoral challenge to figure out what to say to elderly well-meaning people who say to me “but where will it all end?” Sometimes you engage and push, sometimes you say “in front of Jesus, and he will have to explain it to me, too” and sometimes you say “I know how you feel.” I’m still trying to get older folks to stop saying “colored” for that matter, and I worry all I’m teaching them is “don’t say that in front of Jeff” but even that’s a step, of a sort.

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  53. Suzanne said on October 7, 2016 at 8:26 am

    Oh my yes, Jeff. I hear that far too often in my neck of the woods. It’s hard to get people to change when they don’t see anything wrong with using that term.
    I don’t know what the answer is except to keep forging ahead. I feel for the older people as life has changed so drastically in the past 50 years and change gets harder as you get older. I had a conversation with a gentleman in his early 80s just last week. He owned his own small construction business, built a lot of houses, was quite successful at it, raised a great family who are also great people with successful careers and families. He’s no dummy. He said he tries to read up on current events and what’s happening in the world, the election, foreign affairs, etc, but, he told me, it’s so hard. He said there are too many “big words” that he doesn’t understand and has to read with a dictionary at his side. At least he did mention he can’t stand Trump!
    Simple. They want it simple in an increasingly complex world where simple isn’t possible.

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  54. David C. said on October 7, 2016 at 9:00 am

    People still say colored? My grandfather used to, but he was born in 1893. When we would talk baseball and he called a player “that little colored boy”, I let it pass. I was 20, he was 85 and it just didn’t seem worth the effort. He was born in a different era and didn’t know any better. My parents are in their late 70s and at least they know that. I sure hope it isn’t a “don’t say that in front of David” thing either. That being said, a couple of years back, my mom was telling me she had some stitches taken out and it hurt. She added the nurse who took them out was “black, not that it mattered”. I don’t know why I didn’t say if it didn’t matter, why did you mention it. I guess I’m a coward. It’s not just this. My dad calls the Hindu temple near them “the raghead church”. I don’t know how to tackle that one without getting wrapped around the axle. “You see dad, they’re Hindus, not Muslims. Big difference. The ragheads are Muslims, and don’t call them ragheads anyway…”. I just don’t want to go there, like I said, I’m a coward. I don’t think they’d say it to their pastor either, so he can’t correct them. Maybe some problems just never get fixed.

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  55. Danny said on October 7, 2016 at 9:35 am

    Off topic, but a nice write up in the San Diego UT about George Pernicano, one of the original Chargers’ minority owners who passed at the age of 98 (or 99).

    Nick Canepa who writes this is also a San Diego icon. He’s an old school newspaper man who reminds me of many of reminiscences Nancy has shared of the “good old days.” I think Nick got a Pulitzer for his coverage of the 1978 PSA plane crash here.

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  56. Danny said on October 7, 2016 at 9:35 am

    Oh, the link.

    http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/sports/chargers/sd-sp-canepa-20161006-story.html

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  57. Jolene said on October 7, 2016 at 10:03 am

    David Letterman thinks Trump needs a psychiatrist. This is a great little statement, actually. Trump simply lacks the decency you’d expect of your family, friends, and colleagues.

    Letterman fans can catch him on a Nat Geo show re climate change in which he interviews the Prime Minister of India later this month.

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  58. susan said on October 7, 2016 at 10:16 am

    Wow. This actually gave me goose bumps. U2.

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  59. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 12:24 pm

    “Where will it all end?” One would hope at the point when nobody is discriminated against because of their out-of-the-mainstream religion, ethnic heritage, sexuality or any other reason that falls easily into the category of doing unto others what you would have done unto you. I don’t understand why that should be so hard for a 21st-Century American of any or no faith to accept, but I realize that it is.

    I also realize that saying that in response to one of Jeff’s comments is preaching to the converted. Sorry! ; )

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  60. nancy said on October 7, 2016 at 12:39 pm

    I felt a little like David C.’s grandpa yesterday, listening to this podcast, a radio diary about a doomed love between a trans-ish man and a trans woman. It was doomed, because both of these people are either deeply troubled or so committed to living a marginal life in every sense of the word that any sort of relationship deeper than one might have with a coffee-shop barista is impossible. By the time I got to the relationship anarchist and the gluten-free, vegan Passover, I was laughing out loud. Mean? Maybe. But sometimes a hot mess is simply a hot mess.

    BTW, this is a story that uses the new-style pronouns, where a he or she becomes a “they” in certain phrases: “She had to tape up their balls,” etc. Drove me nuts.

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  61. Scout said on October 7, 2016 at 12:52 pm

    My parents are as liberal as they come, especially at their age, so that is why it is so extra cringe-worthy to me and my Mom when Dad (84) tells an ethnic joke replete with his version of black dialect. He used to know better before his stroke, but now his joke loop is stuck on some stuff that is from a whole different era. He also thinks blonde jokes are still hilarious. It’s just what he can remember, I guess.

    I grew up on Brubeck, as well as Nina Simone, Paul Desmond, Chet Baker, Sarah Vaughan, etc. My first concert experience was Nina and I met Dave in the 70’s when he played Jazz at Gretna, which my parents helped to produce. He was super nice, but apparently a bit of a player, if you get me.

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  62. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 1:48 pm

    I don’t think it’s cowardly not to tackle the issue with elderly parents. Sometimes es you have to make a choice about fights worth having, and what you want your relationship to be with your parents.

    People on their 80s who can’t adapt to a changing world aren’t surprising, and I think they should be given a break. It’s the people in their 50s and 40s and younger who I don’t know what to do with. I’m sympathetic, but I know slowing down the pace of change, in as much as we can even do that, is not likely to bring them along any more willingly. In the words of Buckley, they want to stand athwart history, yelling stop.

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  63. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 1:55 pm

    On Twitter, Jon Favreau, former Obama speechwriter, notes that Obama’s approval rating is 55%. And that, in October 2008, W’s approval rating was 25%. Which prompts him to say “Stop saying this is a change election.”

    Really, a lot of folks are struggling in this economy. But how any rational person can look at the state of the nation when Obama took office, compared with its current condition, and think “Yeah, let’s go back to the good ole days” is pretty remarkable. Well, not really, of course. The 45% who don’t approve of Obama — what with his reasonableness, well-run administration, admirable family life, etc. — largely encompass the 40%, plus-or-minus a couple points who look at Rump and think “There’s our guy!” Folks like certain Christian conservatives who see a libertine guy with 3 marriages and a hedonistic lifestyle going back decades and decide he’s more to their liking than a woman who’s been married for 40 years and actually lives out her Christian beliefs trying to help people through her life of public service.

    I read somewhere yesterday that some of them believe that the divine plan is for Rump to win so that Pence will get to the White House, and then something will happen to elevate him to the top job. Oy! And here I’ve been assuming that the divine plan is that Rump being the nominee was the only way to ensure a Hillary win. ; )

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  64. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 1:58 pm

    Jolene, thanks for that Letterman post. I watched a couple snippets from his NatGeo thing; very entertaining. I really don’t get what’s up with the beard, but its a distinctive look, that’s for sure. Just good to see him, in any format, and his comments about Rump are spot-on.

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  65. Dorothy said on October 7, 2016 at 2:14 pm

    Jakash – Letterman said he had been shaving twice a day for years (when he had a show, of course) and he swore when he retired that he wouldn’t shave again. That explains the beard. Can’s say as I blame him. I wonder how incognito he can get around these days, though? If he’s at his home in Montana I imagine he doesn’t get pestered by the locals. New York or Connecticut? Maybe not so much.

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  66. nancy said on October 7, 2016 at 2:22 pm

    Guys, seriously, I have to ask: How hard is shaving? Because Alan uses an electric razor every morning and has never once complained about it. Show me a guy who doesn’t shave because it’s such a pain in the ass, and I’ll show you a guy with dirty underwear and food in his teeth. It’s just basic grooming. Don’t even ask a woman what she goes through on a typical day, just to be presentable. I’m not talking about going-out-to-dinner level, just able-to-answer-the-door-and-not-have-the-doorbell-ringer-scream-and-run.

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  67. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 2:27 pm

    Thanks, Dorothy. I’ve got no problem with beards, but one can skip shaving without going to the lengths that he has. Many years ago, I used to have a beard nearly as long as that, myself, and when I look at old photos wonder what I was thinking, too! ; )

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  68. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 2:36 pm

    Well, if you had a personally and socially acceptable way to NOT spend all that time every day, why wouldn’t you be happy for it, Nancy?

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  69. Julie Robinson said on October 7, 2016 at 2:40 pm

    Well, a certain male I know has facial hair that tends toward being ingrown, but never fails to tackle it with the electric razor every morning anyway. But point well taken about all the rest. It’s why I always say that packing for one night isn’t that different from packing for a week. I have to take all my crap with me either way.

    Orlando family members are reporting no damage and that they still have power. What a relief. Lots of board games are being played.

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  70. alex said on October 7, 2016 at 2:42 pm

    I hate shaving. Not enough to go full lumberjack like Letterman, but I like things low-maintenance and find shaving irritating to the skin whether it’s with an electric or a real razor. Those things are just cootie catchers that cause abscesses.

    And my undies and my teeth are quite clean, thank you.

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  71. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 2:56 pm

    Some people’s skin and hair don’t make a good combination for shaving. That doesn’t mean you can’t groom the beard and keep it neat, of course.

    I hate shaving my legs. Despite trying numerous methods, it’s irritating to my legs, especially the backs of my thighs. If I had lighter colored hair or less,of,it, I’d quit entirely. I’m still tempted to quit.

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  72. basset said on October 7, 2016 at 3:10 pm

    I think it was Chet Atkins who said that practicing your instrument was like shaving, because you look like a bum if you don’t do it every day.

    He’s also supposed to have said that he learned to play fast by practicing slow, so make what you will of that.

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  73. LAMary said on October 7, 2016 at 3:17 pm

    I understand Chet Atkins was a bit of a player in the same sense as Dave Brubeck.

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  74. Jakash said on October 7, 2016 at 3:21 pm

    “The Most Interesting Man in the World” does NOT look like a bum. Harrumph! : )

    https://www.google.com/search?q=the+most+interesting+man+in+the+world&biw=1064&bih=915&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwif1fTPtMnPAhVrw4MKHRRpDQkQ_AUIBigB

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  75. nancy said on October 7, 2016 at 3:45 pm

    I have nothing against beards. But a well-maintained one requires shaving, too, unless you’re going with the neckbeard look (and please don’t). Never been a fan of the Full Brooklyn.

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  76. David C. said on October 7, 2016 at 4:01 pm

    I’ve worn a beard since I could grow a decent one, but I’ve never done the mountain man look, especially nowadays when it marks you as a Duck Dynasty fan. I always keep it trimmed. The idea of getting up every morning and scraping my face gives me the willies.

    I think my grandfather would say that podcast was done by sonsabitchin’ potlickers, or goddamndemocrats. Anything he didn’t quite understand was done by one of those two groups, or both. In his mind, there was a lot of overlap. We all say we didn’t know goddamndemocrats wasn’t one word until we got out of high school

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  77. basset said on October 7, 2016 at 4:04 pm

    The home of the Chet Atkins guitar style… he was from eastern Tennessee, but this is where it started:

    http://www.thumbpickers.org/join1.htm

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  78. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 4:19 pm

    The Seattle Times manages to get past its hate of the estate tax and endorse Clinton: http://www.seattletimes.com/opinion/editorials/the-times-recommends-hillary-clinton-the-only-choice-for-president/

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  79. Jolene said on October 7, 2016 at 4:29 pm

    Further evidence of Donald Trump’s deep respect for women.

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  80. David C. said on October 7, 2016 at 5:06 pm

    Wow, I can’t imagine that didn’t work. What a charmer.

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  81. Dorothy said on October 7, 2016 at 5:09 pm

    My hubby over the years has always had a ‘stache. He’s also done beards (shaved his neck always except for when he had his colon cancer surgery), and a goatee. He’s never used an electric razor. Blade, water and soap is more involved than an electric razor, so maybe Dave was a blade guy, too. I don’t blame him for wanting not to shave anymore. To each his own. And I’m pretty sure his looks clean and trim, not ratty at all.

    This new audio tape of Dumpy doesn’t surprise me at all. Once a scumbag, always a scumbag.

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  82. Heather said on October 7, 2016 at 5:17 pm

    Ugh, that Trump recording. As my friend said on FB, “Silkwood shower time.” And as to the excuse some are already making that that is just typical male locker-room talk–yeah, that’s actually part of the problem.

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  83. David C. said on October 7, 2016 at 5:33 pm

    Now that I’ve actually read the whole transcript it’s like he learned about sex from a 10 year old kid who saw some of his old man’s porn through a keyhole.

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  84. Jolene said on October 7, 2016 at 5:55 pm

    Adding to the general disgustingness, this is a sixty-year-old (married or soon-to-be married) man talking to someone 25 years his junior. Bad enough that this constitutes locker room talk in actual locker rooms and college dorms, but a mature man? Well, after Roger Ailes and Bill Cosby, I guess nothing should surprise us. I wonder if Bill really did say those things or that’s just Trump’s perennial habit of blaming others for his shortcomings.

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  85. LAMary said on October 7, 2016 at 6:34 pm

    If Bill said those sorts of things you have to wonder why he would say them to Trump.

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  86. Colleen said on October 7, 2016 at 6:57 pm

    And here we have rape culture and white male privilege tied up in a neat little orange package…..

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  87. alex said on October 7, 2016 at 7:07 pm

    Remember when Mike Wallace and Katherine Graham talked about Bill Clinton and Vernon Jordan on 60 Minutes back in the ’90s? This is one time Trump probably isn’t lying.

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  88. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 7:23 pm

    Hey, Jeb! You couldn’t get your cousin to help you out and leak this back in the primary and kill Trump early? Your brother made up shit about John McCain to get him out of the way.

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  89. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 7:31 pm

    The Christians who continue to support Trump demonstrate how little they value women.

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  90. Suzanne said on October 7, 2016 at 7:40 pm

    Or how little their Christian principles mean to them, Sherri. It started with thrice married Newt Gingrich and Trump seems to be the natural progression.

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  91. Jolene said on October 7, 2016 at 8:19 pm

    Alex, I don’t know the 60 Minutes story you’re referring to. Can you hum a few bars?

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  92. Dave said on October 7, 2016 at 8:40 pm

    Alex, didn’t it have something to do with Vernon Jordan and Bill Clinton being golf buddies and what-not. I vaguely remember a story about that.

    Beards make an old guy look older. I already get senior citizen discounts without asking so I don’t need to make it worse. I don’t find it that much trouble to shave, I’ve used a blade and shaving cream for years and it doesn’t take me that long. I’ve had several beards over the years but eventually got tired of each and every one of them.

    What Sherri said about Christians, I can’t believe a single one would support him. I wonder how the Fort Wayne right wing strong Christian radio host is coping these days?

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  93. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 8:41 pm

    Trump’s remarks about women overshadowed the fact that just yesterday he said that he still thinks the Central Park Five are guilty.

    Racists and those tolerant of racism. One or the other. They can pick which they are.

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  94. alex said on October 7, 2016 at 9:41 pm

    I’m talking about the 60 Minutes story where Wallace and Graham famously said “pussy.” Quoting Jordan’s answer to their questions about what Bill and he talk about on the golf course.

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  95. David C. said on October 7, 2016 at 9:41 pm

    Paul Ryan disinvited Trump to his rally in Wisconsin tomorrow, but seem to still be backing him. What a paragon of virtue and decency he is. I sure hope this is the thing that will put even a gerrymandered House in play.

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  96. Suzanne said on October 7, 2016 at 10:15 pm

    And if he’s asked about the “pussy incident”, Gov My Pants will say, “There is no video, and if there is, it won’t matter because he won’t have said that.”

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  97. Jeff (the mild-mannered one) said on October 7, 2016 at 10:31 pm

    Weird couple of days. I had a guy die in front of me last night, and be brought back by our squad — and the guy was joking with me on the way out about ruining my talk (I told him I wasn’t sure how to end it, anyhow, which made him smile); today I found an old adversary in community discussions resident at a nursing home I’m often in, not having known he was back in town in that place, to which he said “my friends all are afraid to come in here,” and I told him “I’ve got five parishioners in here, is it okay if I keep checking on you?” (he’s semi-atheist) and he said he’d be delighted to see me . . . and that he hopes to make it to Christmas, but has no expectations of making it into 2017, at least with knowledge that it’s come (he’s had a major brain tumor removed that left much which is continuing to grow). So we talked about that, and what he wants to do in these next few months and how I and my cohorts can help him do that.

    And you know what? The election can wait. Although the seppuku continues, I see, and now I hear Paul Ryan is beginning to understand what it means to do the Kobayashi Maru scenario in politics. But between those two encounters with death and dying, I escorted forty-plus fourth graders around our historic downtown, and delighted in their excitement over Louis Sullivan terra cotta, mysteries of criminal justice circa 1910, and the lyrics to “Chattanooga Choo Choo” come to life around them in a refurbished train station. And then worked on a HUD grant to help homeless 18-24 year olds. I’m about done caring about this stupid national spasm other than voting for Hillary and seeing what happens next. I was going to put a Hillary sign in my front yard, and was told at our county party HQ that I can’t have a sign for her unless I also put up signs for Strickland and some other doomed goober running against a popular and locally engaged incumbent, so I. am. out. Bless you Hillary, and stay healthy, and give Joe Biden a good job in your administration.

    And let Nancy Scheibner be the poet who reads a new work at your inauguration.

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  98. Jean Shaw said on October 7, 2016 at 10:46 pm

    I’ve spent the week visiting my 95-year-old FIL @ OHSU. Bacterial pneumonia, and things got dicey overnight on Wed. But he has pulled another rabbit out of the hat–aided by a truly brilliant chief resident–and things are looking much better. And so my tolerance for hurricane conspiracy theories and GOP insanity has completely evaporated. Like you, Jeff, I am done.

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  99. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 11:09 pm

    Trump’s comments about sexual assault are a reminder that women are in much more danger due to people like the Donald than they are from a transgender person using the bathroom.

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  100. Sherri said on October 7, 2016 at 11:28 pm

    The head of the WA GOP, Susan Hutchinson, has a unique defense of Trump’s comments. It doesn’t matter because he was a Democrat then.

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  101. Deborah said on October 7, 2016 at 11:54 pm

    I’m at the Albuquerque airport again waiting for my husband’s flight from Chicago to come in. I tried to read the transcript of the latest hideous Trump remarks. I can’t even. I’m dog tired, Little Bird and I have been refinishing the kitchen cabinets in the Santa Fe apartment and it’s not going well.

    I could use some advice from some of you among us nn.c folks who do social work. We have a new neighbor who is mentally ill and it’s becoming a problem for everyone in the building. I’m flummoxed how to deal with him. If you’re kind he takes advantage and if you’re neutral he goes berserk. He’s the brother of a woman who has owned one of the units for years but it’s been empty as long as we’ve been there until now. The poor guy has HIV, he’s delusional and it’s a big problem for all of us. I’m pretty sure that cops are going to be involved at some point in the not too distant future.

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  102. Jolene said on October 8, 2016 at 1:30 am

    Deborah, I recommend calling the National Alliance on Mental Illness. They will be able to advise you about what to do next. Contact info for the Albuquerque chapter is at the link below. It’s, at least, a reasonable place to start.

    http://www.nami.org/Find-Your-Local-NAMI

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  103. Dexter said on October 8, 2016 at 2:50 am

    A TV ad I saw yesterday made me laugh a little, as it showed firemen, apparently too busy to get haircuts, cutting their own hair with Wahl clippers. They actually were well groomed, and they definitely had been to hair stylists or barbers. I notice millionaire baseball players in recent years have been getting designs, arcs, stars, cut into their hair. Two noticeable buys are Big Papi Ortiz of Boston and Troy Tulowitzki of Toronto. Sort of a shaved scar with slightly layered and carved accompany smaller scar-like area, then joined with the hair in general.
    Personally, I have not paid a barber or stylist since about 1998. About six mornings a week I shave my head, and I shave my face every day, and have since the 80s I suppose.
    Fanatics about shaving can be a little crazy, too. Military history buffs who know a lot about the American War in Vietnam know of one Colonel Terry Allen. Allen would find a steel pot of water and shave his face several times a day, a real obsession. Many analysts are convinced Allen was a maniac who led several platoons to their deaths in 1967 in the Battle of Ong Thanh. His thinking was flawed as he ordered his men straight into a massive ambush..of course he was awarded the Distinguished Service cross posthumously.
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Ong_Thanh
    He died with a smooth, freshly shaven face.

    The manager of a baseball team I played for years ago had played two seasons with The House of David team. Those guys toured the USA entertaining folkls for years. The requirements: 1) be a really good ballplayer 2) be abled to grow a helluva beard. The man’s name was Frank Nickerson of Kansas City. He passed away at age 94 just seven weeks ago. Frank was called Bobo, he was a famous baseball clown , but also a WWII vet who had seen things and experienced a kind of hell that made me shiver as he held court on overnight bus rides. A true war hero, he was also one of the most memorable men I have ever met. http://northeastnews.net/pages/?p=33151

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  104. Connie said on October 8, 2016 at 7:18 am

    Like Deborah said. I can’t even.

    My husband has always been bearded, cheeks and neck razor trimmed. A couple of years ago he trimmed down to a goatee. It was the first time our adult daughter hadseen that much face, and the first time she really saw those dimples everyone says she has.

    Out here in the west edge of one of the richest counties in the country It is all Trump signs all the time. Plus flags. Don’t tread on me.

    I see Hillary ads online that promise a sign in exchange for a 25 dollar donation. No point, I live on a dead end street with eight houses. My Obama sign was a ten dollar donation at their local office. Jeff you can take the signs and put them up on some crowded corner.

    At my last corner, no roundabout, before work the political signs have been joined by one that says, “not running for anything, just wanted to say Have a nice day. Raz.” It makes me smile.

    My work life is nuts. I am moving to a new building in the new year. Must remove books from shelves, keeping in order and move to new shelving in new building keeping in order. Then disassemble, move, and reassemble existing shelving. Then spread the books out to their final locations, still in order. Our local shelving supplier will do all of this for $59,000. My part timers will be part of their crew.

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  105. Connie said on October 8, 2016 at 7:50 am

    Just saw the ad for the yard sign. https://shop.balanceofpower.com

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  106. Diane said on October 8, 2016 at 9:09 am

    Sherri @93 – I think that is a false dichotomy and you are too kind. I don’t believe Trump supporters are tolerant of anything. Tolerance is just not in their wheelhouse.

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  107. Deborah said on October 8, 2016 at 9:19 am

    This latest Trump fiasco just makes me sick to my stomach. The worst part about it is that people, still after all this, still support him. I haven’t had respect for Trump, ever, but now I have lost respect for anyone who votes for him for any reason they say. The worst part of what Trump said isn’t the lewdness, that’s just creepy. But when he said that as a star you can do anything to women, grab their pussies what ever you want. That is unbelievably disgusting and disturbing and if that’s what guys routinely say in locker rooms, that’s a huge, huge problem. I honestly don’t think that is something guys typically say in locker rooms or on golf courses. It makes me so mad I could scream,

    Thanks for the Alliance link, Jolene, I will definitely look into that.

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  108. David C. said on October 8, 2016 at 9:37 am

    This is sad in the genuine sense, not the tRump sense. It’s also very beautiful. We need to think of better things for a bit. The rest will work out in time.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/06/well/live/a-letter-to-the-doctors-and-nurses-who-cared-for-my-wife.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

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  109. Deborah said on October 8, 2016 at 10:03 am

    And while I’m still in rant mode, I’ll also say I have lost all (ALL!) respect for the Republican party for enabling this abuser. I wish I could say that like Coozledad would.

    And now I’m going to try to calm myself down by reading David C.’s link.

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  110. Jolene said on October 8, 2016 at 11:36 am

    Deborah, it may be slightly heartening to know that lots of men on Twitter are saying men in locker rooms do not speak about women this way. One example: “Men do not speak about sexually assaulting women in locker rooms. That suggestion is ridiculous, and self serving.”

    There is certainly lots of evidence that men, especially men in groups, behave badly or, at least, thoughtlessly, toward women. But Trump’s statement reveals a level of objectification and cruelty that is beyond boorishness. He is horrible, and it’s horrible that it has taken until now to get people in power to speak against him. Even worse, most of those people have not called on him to step down or withdrawn their endorsements, And his supporters are still supporting him. Just look at his Facebook page.

    And what does Donald think today? Here’s what he tweeted just a short while ago: Certainly has been an interesting 24 hours!

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  111. Deborah said on October 8, 2016 at 12:04 pm

    He finally hideously insulted my demographic, women. As we all know he’s done it horribly to Mexican and Muslims, disabled people, overweight people (of both sexes) and probably more that I’m forgetting. He’s a monster. And as I keep saying, this folks, is the Republican nominee for the president of the United States of America. Every last Republican should be ashamed.

    I’m interested to see if he even shows up to the debate and what he’ll say. If he does show up and he brings up Bill’s indescreation I will probably break the TV.

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  112. Deborah said on October 8, 2016 at 12:55 pm

    How could I forget how much he’s insulted African Americans? Shame on me.

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  113. Suzanne said on October 8, 2016 at 1:33 pm

    Apparently Gov My Pants is furious. FURIOUS I tell you! He’s backed out of an event with Paul Ryan. Probably praying for his political career or is trying to figure out why people are so mad that his running mate bragged about trying to grab women’s cats.

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  114. Sherri said on October 8, 2016 at 1:40 pm

    The most entertaining part of this election has been watching Ted Cruz’s miscalculations. He dissed Trump at the RNC, only to get booed off the stage and see his standing among Republicans plummet, then finally caved to pressure and endorsed Trump at his peak, just in time to go along with the spectacular crash and burn.

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