Dead eyes on this one, don’t you think?
Well, you better angels were right: The reaction to this shooting on one side of the cultural divide was hardly the shrug that I’ve come to expect. There was the odd Facebook page, and surely there’s something more out there, but to my relief, the country does seem to believe that shooting an unarmed fleeing man in the back is a bad idea.
Glad that’s settled.
Man, this Proposition 1 business has wrung me out. Today I started back to work on other things, and I am happy not to be nose-to-nose with a policy story. But as long as we’re on a dog theme this week, and a photo theme, let me reproduce here a photo shared on Twitter by Charlotte, our commenter. I hope she won’t mind. It’s her dog with a prize he’s been carrying around for a while:
How beautiful is Montana? The gravel road, those driftwood-y looking fenceposts, the blue sky — oh, how I’ve missed those ere this long long winter — and, of course, the deer leg in his mouth. (I remember a hilarious story in Outside magazine a few years ago, where a writer in rural Montana attempted to follow his free-roaming dog through a few typical days, to learn exactly what lured him hither and yon in that amazing landscape, as well as what he was eating — it was one of those dogs that would let loud, repulsive farts and then turn around and bark at its butt.)
On the other hand, Michigan has water, which is more than I can say for the American West these days.
Another rough night, and I don’t know why. Sometimes you just have to push through insomnia. I haven’t been taking the best care of myself the last few days, but I’ve hardly been on a bender. Oh, well, this much I know: One rough night is often followed by a great night’s rest, but two rough nights always is. So I have that to look forward to.
So, bloggage:
When Obama announced our rapprochement with Cuba, a friend and I decided this was the beginning of the Fuck All Y’all phase of his presidency, and that we liked it. With the White House bully pulpit now being used to condemn “conversion therapy” for LGBT people, especially teenagers, I’m liking it even more. (The Scott Walker stuff is just the cherry on top. Bone up, son.)
There was a small dust-up here yesterday over whether the University of Michigan should screen “American Sniper” to a student audience as part as some sort of social event. First it was cancelled, then it was un-cancelled, and of course no story out of Ann Arbor is complete without the football angle. It was one of those stories where you can feel equally contemptuous of both sides. Mmmm, misanthropy.
Finally, the return of “Mad Men” means the return of T-Lo’s Mad Style, the appearance of which yesterday nearly made me weep with joy.
Off to work with a lighter heart, but sandier eyes.
Dorothy said on April 9, 2015 at 9:17 am
We spent the Easter weekend in Virginia Beach/Norfolk and I just L-O-V-E the scenery coming through northern Virginia on that drive! It’s glorious, and cell phone pictures just don’t do it justice. And I had my Nikon with me, but we never would have made good progress if we stopped every 3-4 miles just to capture another image on a digital camera. I soaked up as much of the view as I could to savor in my brain for awhile.
The President arrived in Jamaica yesterday and apparently, first order of business was to visit the Bob Marley museum! “I still have all the albums” he reportedly said. That’s so great, mon.
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Bitter Scribe said on April 9, 2015 at 10:22 am
It never ceases to amaze me how Obama’s opponents feel free to bloviate and sneer to their heart’s content about his “failed leadership” and “incompetence,” but when he pushes back in even the mildest way, they become hysterical with indignation about his “partisanship” and “divisiveness.”
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alex said on April 9, 2015 at 10:46 am
T-Lo’s dead on about them pointy stilletoed things. Circa 1970 it was Cuban heels and square toes. By 1979 it was platform stilletoes, then back to the old pointy stilletoes in the 1980s, which looked downright raunchy with the brief comeback of the mini-skirt at that time.
Will the show last for enough more seasons to see guys in Qiana shirts open to the navel?
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Jolene said on April 9, 2015 at 11:07 am
Seems pretty lame of Harbaugh to weigh in on the controversy over showing “American Sniper”. Why put yourself and the football program in the midst of a campus controversy that’s not relevant to your role on campus, regardless of how small-time or unwarranted the controversy is? More immature jingoism–just what we need?
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Icarus said on April 9, 2015 at 11:10 am
my Facebook pundits have assured me laws like this get thrown out before they happen and the Supremes have even weighed in favor of the citizen
http://thefreethoughtproject.com/texas-representative-seeks-filming-police-illegal/#iV7PWwuLIGXfIEBh.01
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Dorothy said on April 9, 2015 at 11:33 am
alex this is the last “season” for Mad Men. The final 6 episodes are currently underway. I think it’s six. The first of the final eps started on Easter evening. (And for that I’m grateful we won’t be subjected to Qiana shirts open to the navel.) I’m befuddled by calling 13 episodes a “season”. Television parameters are all over the place these days.
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beb said on April 9, 2015 at 11:35 am
My daughter showed me a video yesterday of a DARPA project to develop robot dogs, ie, all-terrain, walking vehicles. The video shows a part of the units, which creepily look like headless dogs, walking and trotting over a parking and up a hill … just like a pair of very contented dogs. I’m impressed by the technical skill put into the machines. It was just creepy and awesome.
The South Carolina thing shows why the police hate to be videotaped. You can’t argue with videotape (well, you can but it generally doesn’t work.) And I know none of this was taken on actual video tape but the word seems so much more clear and precise then “recorded.”
I do love the Fuck Y’all phase of Pres. Obama’s administration; the little jobs at Scott Walker about his need to bone up on Foreign Policy before making dumb foreign policy statements…, the reminders that Republicans have been wrong, wrong and wrong about every prediction about the Affordable Care Act and so much more.
“NAFTA superhighways,” road tax money going to black Detroit schools… The objections to proposal 1 runs the usual gauntlet from A to B.
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Deborah said on April 9, 2015 at 11:45 am
I was blown away by the Ta’Nesisi Coates lecture last evening sponsored by the Lannon Foundation. I can’t begin to express what he said in any way as eloquently as he did. There was a video set up there so I hope you can go to the Lannon Foundation website and watch it yourself sometime soon, it will be well worth the hour and a half that you will invest in it.
In a nutshell it was very timely, he talked about recent events, Walter Scott, Mike Brown, Eric Garner and ALL the rest. He started out by asking why our society chooses to address every issue with force. Why do we send out the police, who are allowed to use the most extreme force – to kill, for selling cigarettes, for having a burned out tail light, for walking in the street etc, etc. Instead of dealing with these issues with counselors or trained mental health professionals, we choose to send out the guys with guns. He is finishing up a book which I’m definitely going to read when it comes out. It is essentially a conversation with his 14 year old son about how to deal with life in a black body, as a young man. He read one chapter which was about the death of a friend of his from Howard University who was one of those kinds of people who light up every room they ever walk in, have all the right stuff and have had the best upbringing possible. His friend was gunned down by a policeman after a traffic stop in Virginia. He visited his friend’s mother in Philadelphia after the death of her son to try to make some sense of it. All I can say is, get the book, read how he describes his visit, it’s extremely moving.
He was introduced by Michelle Norris of NPR, then after he spoke and read from his upcoming book, the two of them sat down for an interview. He spoke about writing, his work on the Reparations piece (which I’m going to reread) and his thoughts on racism in America. Again I can’t do justice to what he said. I’m going to reread everything he’s ever written now.
It was an interesting crowd, the audience was made up of a mix of grey haireds (like me), students and everyone in between, I think I saw Valerie Plame and her husband but I could be mistaken (I forget his name, Joe something?). Santa Fe does not have a large African American community but they were well represented at this event. Just a side note, it was held at the Lensic Theater which is well within walking distance of our place but I drove because I didn’t want to walk back after dark and encounter any skunks.
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Jenine said on April 9, 2015 at 11:52 am
@Deborah: I am consistently moved by Coates’ writing, sounds like it was quite a night. I’m very impressed that you live within walking distance of the Lensic, right downtown.
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Judybusy said on April 9, 2015 at 12:08 pm
Well, Wisconsin just banned some state employees from talking about climate change. Also disturbing, this bit from the article: “Meanwhile, in Canada, it is state policy to bar government meteorologists from talking about climate change in public, as journalist Mike de Souza revealed last year.”
Deborah, thanks so much for sharing some of that content. I’ve also been hearing and reading stories by black men about how tiresome/aggravating it is to be treated with fear in their everyday lives.
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nancy said on April 9, 2015 at 12:12 pm
I’m so, SO with him on the force thing. It strikes me as absolutely fucking insane that my little suburb, as peaceful as municipalities get, recently acquired a MRAP vehicle — an armored personnel character, military surplus from our recent misadventures — from the Department of Defense. No one raised an objection because it was free, and the questions of how the thing would be used boiled down to: Let kids play on it at neighborhood block parties, i.e. PR; and You Never Know, We Might Need It Someday.
And this is one municipality.
Of course, the police would say you never know what you’re walking into, because so many people are strapped now that the immediate reaction is shoot first. To that, the NRA’s solution is MOAR GUNS.
You know I have very mixed feelings about Michael Moore, whose career will eventually be judged as an enormous squandering of talent. But there’s at least one moment in all of his films that gleams like the brightest diamond of truth (right before he shits all over it). In “Bowling for Columbine,” it was the extended sequence about fear, and how it’s whipped up by the media, who will blow a drug-related shooting between two mokes into a threat to the peace of an entire municipality, leading to more people arming themselves, etc. He’s so right about that.
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Jolene said on April 9, 2015 at 12:12 pm
Valerie Plame’s husband is Joe Wilson, Deborah.
Am glad you got to hear Coates and, for his sake, glad that he is gaining a national audience for his work. In the past few months, he’s been making appearances all over the country, mainly at universities, but some other places as well.
His ability and willingness to go to the heart of any matter is so rare. There’s a kind of deep honesty in his work, including in his analyses of his own failings, that is incredibly touching and powerful. I love that he keeps challenging himself to learn new things (Civil War history, French, Eastern Europe in the post-WWII era) and discusses both what he is learning and the process of learning it (especially re French) in his blog.
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Deborah said on April 9, 2015 at 12:38 pm
Jenine, our place is about a half mile from the Lensic. We live about a block from the river, that’s probably why we have so many skunks. I walk a lot, five or so miles a day, sometimes more, so a half mile is peanuts to me. Santa Fe is a small city.
By the way, I keep misspelling Ta’Nehisi.
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Deborah said on April 9, 2015 at 12:48 pm
Jolene, one of the things he talked about during the interview was how he was a bad student, he said he had to leave Howard and all throughout his schooling he made bad grades. He said his parents couldn’t understand how he read voraciously yet did so poorly. Michelle Norris noted that he appeared to have a very curious mind and he said he thought that might be why he didn’t do well in school. He said that when he got his first assignment as an intern in journalism he couldn’t believe you could actually get paid to investigate really interesting things and people and then write about it. She mentioned his learning French and he chuckled in an embarrassed way about it.
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adrianne said on April 9, 2015 at 12:54 pm
TaNehisi Coates is a gem. Met him last year at the Sidney Hillman Foundation awards. He was a presenter and very thoughtful about what’s going on. He is not afraid to examine his own failings honestly. Rare.
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alex said on April 9, 2015 at 12:54 pm
I have a den of skunks in my firewood pile. So far no issues with them, but they’re close enough to the house that it could present problems this summer.
Regarding the armored personnel carriers in municipal police fleets, there also seems to be a trend these days to send in a SWAT team to handle just about every domestic disturbance. Almost every day there’s a “police standoff” in the local news. These things never used to happen. It’s cops playing army with their Department of Homeland Security toys.
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Charlotte said on April 9, 2015 at 1:26 pm
Well, that’s a fun surprise — Hank and his beloved deer leg. Carried it around for a while this morning too … then hid it for tomorrow.
Montana state legislators still fighting the GOP over Medicaid expansion. There are 11 Republicans who have joined with the Democrats, both because they seem to rightly feel that it’s immoral to let Montanans die for lack of coverage, and because they’re furious at the out-of-state dark money: http://billingsgazette.com/news/opinion/editorial/gazette-opinion/gazette-opinion-montana-house-blasts-past-schemes-to-block-health/article_007dd35e-f895-5612-b247-92c0b2668016.html
Dog with a bone indeed.
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Jolene said on April 9, 2015 at 1:42 pm
It’s Ta-Nehisi. He uses a hyphen to connect the two parts.
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Jolene said on April 9, 2015 at 1:51 pm
Handsome doggie, Charlotte.
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Sue said on April 9, 2015 at 2:18 pm
Well, we finally found out What It Takes. Video, but not just video. Video showing a police officer shooting a man running away. But not just video showing a police officer shooting someone running away. Video showing a police officer shooting someone running away… several times… then planting evidence. In broad daylight. Basically in view of anyone happening by.
That’s What It Takes for this to be understood as not acceptable, not excusable, not shift-the-blameable.
In our national discussion on what we will accept from those tasked with protecting and serving us, ALL of us, we have finally reached our live boy/dead girl moment.
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Bitter Scribe said on April 9, 2015 at 3:02 pm
Turns out the idiot Texas rep who wants to make it a crime to film cops is Hispanic. Gee, nice to know no Hispanic people in his district have never had a problem with out-of-control cops. Now he’s trying to walk it back by saying “it’s just 25 feet” and “it’s to protect police from interference with their duties.” Right.
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brian stouder said on April 9, 2015 at 3:05 pm
Sue – well said.
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Deggjr said on April 9, 2015 at 3:40 pm
The Wisconsin ban on agency employees (not) talking about climate change is intriguing. Certainly employees can inappropriately represent their own views as the views of their agency/employer.
However.
From the Newsweek and Bloomsburg articles about the ban: “It’s not a part of our sole mission, which is to make money for our beneficiaries,” said State Treasurer Matt Adamczyk, a Republican who sits on the board. “That’s what I want our employees working on. That’s it. Managing our trust funds.”
The State of Wisconsin Board of Commissioners of Public Lands has a website. The home page has a section ‘Who we are and what we do’. This section includes Adamczyk’s name as well as four primary responsibilities of the board. One of those responsibilities is managing trust funds.
The other responsibilities include: “We contribute to Wisconsin’s sustainable timber economy, combat forest fragmentation, protect unique natural areas, and secure public access to large blocks of northern forests.” Climate change will directly affect this responsibility.
It appears Adamczyk doesn’t even know that website page exists. Maybe he should google himself.
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brian stouder said on April 9, 2015 at 4:23 pm
Well, and for all the 2nd Amendment acolytes that surely live out that way, maybe they should give some thought to the 1st Amendment, too!
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BigHank53 said on April 9, 2015 at 4:50 pm
Ah, dogs with animal parts. “Dogs in Elk” is an old story but surely a classic:
http://www.experienceproject.com/stories/Love-Jokes-And-Riddles/1829194
The MRAPs were ordered for Bush’s wars in the Middle East. We already paid for the damn things, so it was either let them sit and rust on an Army base somewhere or give ’em away. You’ll notice they’ve never been used in the one situation they’d be best suited for: The Walking Dead. Our plucky survivors could use one to just run over zombies while they enjoyed the air conditioning, which would be far too boring to make a good TV show.
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Charlotte said on April 9, 2015 at 5:08 pm
OMG. Dogs in Elk. I am weeping with laughter.
Sad news — local writer Ivan Doig has died http://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/obituaries/award-winning-author-ivan-doig-dies-was-dean-of-western-writers/
This House of Sky is set just north of here, up in the Sheilds valley. I never met him, but hear from folks who had that he was a lovely lovely man. Melanoma. Time to get the sunscreen out again.
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Connie said on April 9, 2015 at 5:37 pm
Sorry to hear about Doig. His”Dancing at the Rascal Fair” is on my personal best novels of all time list.
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Deborah said on April 9, 2015 at 5:41 pm
Dogs in Elk is hilarious.
Thanks Jolene, I saw it somewhere with an apostrophe and for some reason it stuck with me. Weird how that happens sometimes to me. I can’t explain it.
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Sherri said on April 9, 2015 at 5:55 pm
Get the sunscreen out anyway, Charlotte, but the obit says he died of multiple myeloma. Connie, I love “Dancing at the Rascal Fair”, too.
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Sherri said on April 9, 2015 at 6:06 pm
Another recent death: Rie Munoz, an Alaskan water color artist. Coincidentally, I just dropped off this print at the frame shop today. I bought it several years ago, but hadn’t gotten around to framing it yet.
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Dexter said on April 9, 2015 at 6:24 pm
The evil force that rules me is a punishing god-force at best.
After enduring an hour of physical therapy at the local hospital, I treated myself to a small vanilla-choco cone, pulled into a parking spot to enjoy it, and then had to deal with a dead car. Apparently this evil force punished me for eating a few licks of custard-freeze by killing my car starter. Two mechanic-type men tried to help me after jumping the battery failed, then I had to summon a wrecker to haul the car away. I had just had my car go through a trip-check as I made the drive to Columbus and also on the agenda is a drive to Battle Creek for my VA appointment, plus three jaunts to Toledo VA for various appointments. Ya know what? I gotta bite the bullet and get a new car. Maybe just not TOO new.
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LAMary said on April 9, 2015 at 7:06 pm
Dancing at the Rascal Fair is a favorite. Sorry to hear he’s gone.
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Julie Robinson said on April 9, 2015 at 9:52 pm
Also The Whistling Season, among others. Evocative prose.
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