Surreality and Hollywood

The ever-annoying Gwenyth Paltrow announced her separation from her Brit husband this week.  For once, I'm siding with a Brit, although in truth, he should have known what he was getting into years ago.  Ms. Paltrow is one of the most conceited, superficial and insufferable people out there.  That she and her husband are separating is sad for her children, of course, and I really don't have any comment beyond that...other than to congratulate her husband on his newfound freedom.  I just hope he chooses better the next time, assuming he wasn't so traumatized by the experience of being married to Ms. Paltrow that he's not sworn off women entirely.

No, the axe I want to grind on Ms. Paltrow has to do with some incredibly stupid comments she made about her profession.  So as to avoid leaving her to twist in the wind alone, we can bring in a fellow member of the uninformed Hollywood elite, Tom Cruise, also known for the inanity of his self-pity.

Ms. Paltrow apparently said that mothers with office jobs have it easier than she does.  Before picking oneself up off the floor, realize that Ms. Paltrow really believes this.  She also believes that she is more thoughtful than most people, that she has an elevated sense of style and a firmer grasp on reality than the rest of us.

Not surprisingly, my disenchantment with Ms. Paltrow began when she compared American men to British men and found us lacking.  I'll put up with constructive criticism from just about any angle, but I will not take that.  As an otherwise educated American man with some travel under his belt, I'm perfectly comfortable with the way I am, willing to acknowledge my shortcomings but unwilling to denigrate my attributes because I don't have an Etonian education and don't use the redundant U in spellings.  For her to make such a blanket statement was the first inkling that Ms. Paltrow was a few apples short of a full peck.  That may explain her choice of name for her daughter.

Her recent statement, however, suggesting that her multi-million dollar lifestyle, with jet-setting across the globe to be feted in luxurious accommodations with a staff provided by production companies with plenty of time off to do as she wishes between projects is just ridiculous.  Her assertion that working mothers can get things done in the morning before they go to work compared to her hectic life on set is beyond crazy.  I'd love to see her switch places with a working mother for a month and see how she holds up.  She wouldn't last a week.

That people actually like this woman amazes me.  She's the most pretentious, self-centered and clueless celebrity I can remember.

These people imitate people for a living. They get paid gobs of money to pretend.  And the public eats it up, praising them unduly and listening to them like they're latter-day Delphic oracles.  When something stupid like this is uttered, the public recoils with disgust as if it's just learned that the sun doesn't really come up in the east.  Very few of these actors have discernible skills that would be useful in the workplace.  They rely on genetic gifts and learned charm to get what they have in life.  When a Ms. Paltrow or a Jamie Foxx -- our lord and savior Barack Obama -- make comments that would qualify them for a strait jacket in real life, the public is turned off for a bit, but eventually forgets about it and gives them a pass.

Perhaps the foremost example of this is Jane Fonda, otherwise known as Hanoi Jane.  Here are some pictures from Ms. Fonda's past activisim that is largely forgotten today:

For the younger set, that's Ms. Fonda visiting a North Vietnamese anti-aircraft battery during the Vietnam War.  An anti-aircraft battery that was used to shoot down American planes piloted by American servicemen.  Ms. Fonda went on to dismiss American allegations of torture in the Hanoi Hilton as POW's. Of course, those same airmen were defending her right to exercise her First Amendment rights that allowed her to make these ridiculous allegations, but that's a nit to be picked at another time.

So Ms. Paltrow's legacy for inanity can be traced back to Hanoi Jane.  The American public has largely forgotten Hanoi Jane's treachery, rewarding her twice with an Oscar for her art.  She has earned countless millions with workout videos and sundry other projects, forgiven by the American people and rarely taken to task for her treason.  Ms. Paltrow's stupidity pales in comparison to Hanoi Jane's actions, but she can trace its roots to Hanoi Jane's conduct.

Perhaps, just to keep the connection alive, we should christen Ms. Paltrow London Gwenyth.

She likes the British more anyway.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Wisconsin and the Mainstream Media

As a former Illinoisan, I poked a lot of good-natured fun at Wisconsin and their citizens, known locally as Cheeseheads.  In truth, Wisconsin has beautiful parts and its cheeseheads are nice people, by and large, so long as one isn't driving a car with Illinois license plates through Racine County.

But that's another story.

Recently, Governor Scott Walker announced that the state had realized a surplus of nearly $1 billion.  He announced at the State of the State address various measures designed to lighten the tax burden on Wisconsinites.  Money would be put away for a rainy day.  In short, this was positive news that benefited the state and its residents.

Yett you probably didn't hear about it.

The MSM doesn't want to publish success stories emanating from Republican-run states.  Certainly, it doesn't want to run a story praising a governor who stood up to unions in his state.  Nevermind the fact that this positive story arose not from any chicanery but from the imposition of policies, including busting the unions, that many people either oppose or don't understand.

The fact of the matter is that no matter whether there are people that disagree with how Governor Walker got there, he brought solvency to Wisconsin. There are those who say this solvency is chimerical, and they might be right.  Even so, were this a liberal governor, this achievement would be trumpeted from ABC to NBC to CNN.  The View would have the the governor on, Rachel Maddow would offer to switch teams and Piers Morgan would find constitutional support to make the liberal governor king for life of the country. But because a conservative governor opposed to unions accomplished this, it merits their disdain and their ignorance of the achievement as if it never happened.

This supports my view that the MSM is not a journalistic monolith but an editorial one.  This is news, pure and simple.  Instead of being as earth-shattering as the Paltrow-Martin split, this affects real people in real time.  It deserves some treatment, perhaps even some investigative journalism, not being totally ignored. What the MSM engages in is not journalism, but editorializing.  It's shameful and harmful to the country.

By publishing this news, it might occur to liberals that liberalism isn't what they thought it was and cause them to switch. It might harden their resolve to be liberals.  But the job of the MSM isn't to mold the public but to provide it with materials with which it can make up its own mind.  By deciding not to publish such stories, the MSM is shaping public thought.  That isn't its role in society.

I don't know whether Governor Walker's surplus is what he claims it to be; critics claim otherwise.  But I do know that the MSM has, once again, abdicated its responsibility.  That is shameful if not downright wrong.

For an industry that claims such widespread protections under the First Amendment, it certainly does a disservice to the country that provides those protections.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Diversity

Recently, there have been a couple of incidents that have cropped up on the issue of diversity.  Apparently, diversity doesn't mean what we thought it meant.

At Puget Sound Community College, a group known as Staff, Faculty and Administrators of Color publicized an event in an email that read:

If you want to create space for white folks to meet and work on racism, white supremacy and white privilege to better our campus community and yourself, please feel free to do just that.

When some people objected, a woman who had a hand in drafting the email, Karama Blackthorn, defended the decision, saying that people of color would be able to have a more honest discussion without the participation of white people.

More on Ms. Blackthorn and her perspective, anon.

Next, the irrepressible Reverend Al Sharpton, he of the Tawana Brawley hoax, declared that Rand Paul had no business commenting on civil rights, as if civil rights only applied to minorities.  That it's the Reverend Al sometime diminishes the importance of the statement, given his proclivity for making outrageous comments and championing ridiculous civil rights cases.  But since the lunatic fringe that runs MSNBC saw fit to give this tool his own show, he has a strong pulpit from which he can spew his brand of reality, and to that extent requires attention.

Both Ms. Blackthorn and Reverend Al are misguided, and not innocently so.  They seem to have bought the fallacy that because of past injuries suffered by minorities in general and blacks specifically, unto them and them alone has the right to decide what is right been given.  In a sense, this is an extension of the concept that blacks use to justify the use of the execrable term nigger, disallowing its use among whites (no matter how benign) while seeing no problem with it being tossed around among themselves.  Since we were harmed by this (nigger, racism, discrimination), only we can use it/decide how to remedy it.

There are a couple of problems with this approach.  First, the remedies to discrimination, although prompted largely by the NAACP and other similar groups, relied upon an all-white Supreme Court for the Brown v. Board of Education decision that rendered separate but equal obsolete.  Without a largely white Congress, the Civil Rights Act, supported by millions of whites, would never have gotten passed.  Abolitionists both at home and abroad were overwhelmingly white.  So to discount white involvement on the subject of diversity is ludicrous.

Beyond that, there's the simple idea that by excluding whites from discussions, diversity loses its meaning. One can no more exclude a group and declare diversity than he could close all the drapes and blinds in a house at noon and declare it night.  There is no doubt that this country was largely racist at its birth, and that racists -- both overt and closet -- exist to this day.  But to deny white participation in a discussion about race makes the participants in such a discussion racist themselves.  Of course, they wouldn't see it this way, because according to them, only people in power can be racist, and blacks aren't in power.

Well....

...check that.  They weren't in power when the discrimination was at its height....

The point is that a serious discussion about ways to resolve racism necessarily involves whites.  As shown above, there are plenty of well-intentioned and kind-hearted whites who earnestly wish to see an end to discrimination.  Barring them from the discussion serves little purpose and in fact may harm efforts to do away with it.

What is to be done with a white person married to a black person?  Is it simply because of the pigmentation that the person is to be excluded?  Shouldn't that person be presumed to share the goals of the group?  If not, then is it fair to brand all blacks as rappers, or athletes, or artists, or, worse yet, criminals?

The position Ms. Blackthorn and her ilk take is antiquated at best and racist itself at worst.  They can employ all the sophistry they want to justify their beliefs, but they're simply wrong.

As for the Reverend Al, he's just whack.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Potpourri of Political Perspectives

There's a lot going on out there, but not enough on any one issue to motivate me to speak at length on the subject.  So today is a potpourri of political perspectives.  You're welcome for the alliteration.

The crisis in Ukraine is interesting from a historical perspective, what with its echoes of the Sudetenland in 1938.  Sure, Mr. Putin's playing chess while Mr. Obama is twiddling his thumbs.  But is there any realistic response that the world can make that would get Russia to back off/

For an election result of 95% in favor of joining Russia to be credible, absolute transparency is required. There was no such thing, and the election was held so fast there couldn't be absolute transparency.  It would appear that Russia seeks to reassemble the old Soviet Union.

Militarily, there is little the West can do.  Moscow has superior interior lines which would make military intervention logistically challenging at best and at worst a disaster in the making.  Unfortunately, the only real solution to this lies in the ballot box without Chicago-style politics.  Unfortunately, the old Soviet regime taught Richard J. Daley everything he knows, and Mr. Putin descends from that tree.

Ukraine, unfortunately, is on his own.

Listening to the empty threats made by the Three Stooges -- John Kerry, Joe Biden and Barack Obama -- only confirms that.

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Meanwhile, Mr. Obama is preoccupied with the disaster of his own making, Obamacare.  Only eleven days remain for sign-ups for the program, and at this date, the stated goal of seven million enrollees is far short by about 2.8 million.  So now the White House is going to its Hollywood connections for help.

It's comforting to know that we had to wait to pass the bill before we could find out what was in it.  Now that we know what's in it, and people aren't comforted by all the broken promises, higher premiums and lost or unnecessary coverages, it's amazing anyone signed up for it at all.  Then again, considering all the partisans who comprise most of those 4.2 million enrollees, perhaps the only amazing thing is that there aren't more of them signed up.  After all, there were many more than 4.2 million people that reelected Mr. Obama.

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Recently there was an announcement that the government was reducing the size of our military.  There were a number of things wrong with this.

First, from a historical perspective, anytime we announce we're cutting our military, flare-ups occur around the globe.  After World War I we downsized, and there were brush fires in Latin America and Eastern Europe.  As a result, we were woefully unprepared for World War II.  Then, after World War II, we downsized again, only to be met with the Korean Conflict.  After that, we downsized just in time for the Vietnam War to take off.  After Vietnam, there was about a decade of relative peace until the Gulf War. Since we've been engaged since then in various conflicts.  Now Mr. Obama sees us withdrawing from Afghanistan, despite the fact that a vacuum will result and the inevitable cycle will be revisited.

Second, is it any surprise that Mr. Putin initiated his Ukrainian incursion mere weeks after the announcement?

Third, doesn't anyone in Washington realize that the one thing Islamofascists respect is might?

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There is a need to cut waste across the board with government spending.  Certainly, there is waste in the military.  But why are we only going to give military families a one percent raise when Mr. Obama wants civilians working as contractors with the military to get almost a thirty-three percent raise in the minimum wage?  What does that tell our men and women in uniform?   Does anyone realize how many Democrats voted in favor of this?

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That nitwit Eric Holder wants convicted felons to regain their voting privileges upon their release from jail. I'm actually on the fence about this.  On the one hand, if the goal of incarceration is to rehabilitate convicts, what does it say about our system that we don't trust them upon their release to vote?  By the same token, do we want convicted murderers and rapists voting?  I think we should hold with our word when it comes to those who have paid their debt to society and allow them to vote.  The only convicts who shouldn't be allowed to vote are those convicted of treason, but most of those felons are in for life anyway.

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I thought Dana Perino got off a great line on a recent The Five episode where liberals' criticism of CPAC was discussed.  She noted that liberals just had two such meetings of their own that go by the names of the Golden Globes and the Oscars.

How true that is.

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States are enacting legislation requiring registration of guns.  Gunowners are balking, as are sheriff departments and even state legislatures, such as Idaho.  It's going to be interesting to see how Mr. Holder's dictum to states attorneys general about choosing to ignore enforcement of certain of their laws comes back to haunt him.  In the case of Idaho, if the state's attorney general decides to enforce the state law requiring him to ignore a federal registration law, will this go to the Supreme Court?  Quite probably.  And if it does, that may very well be the death knell for the gun control movement.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Finding a New Church

Karen and I will be a mixed marriage of sorts.  She's an independent Baptist, I'm a lapsed Catholic. We joke that our deceased parents would have had difficulties with our union because of the different faiths, but we've worked around it pretty easily.  I've learned a lot from Karen that went untaught in Catholic schools, and I've demystified some things about the Catholic faith.

I made a promised to Karen years ago that I would never knowingly as her to go to Mass with me.  Once, my niece's eighth-grade graduation, we got snookered into a Mass that I didn't know was coming.  Other than that, we've attended solely Protestant services, something a few decades ago was unimaginable to me.

Karen's particular about the type of service she'll attend.  For me, what's comfortable for her is what matters to me.  Right now, I'm still trying to figure out whether the person on the altar is a minister or a reverend.  I'm still trying to stifle calling someone Father.  It's a lot easier not having to kneel in church, although I find myself more lost than anything.

In our search for an acceptable church, we've been to some doozies.  We've been to Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian and non-denominational Christian churches.  Some have been terribly off-putting, others have been near misses.  But we still haven't found one that is truly acceptable to us.

In Illinois, we first went to a Methodist church in our town.  The best thing about the church was the physical building, and that's not much.  Although Karen's quite used to it, this visit started my annoyance at being approached and quizzed as if I were at a used car lot looking for a ride.  In my experience, there weren't a lot of people who just came up, introduced themselves and then asked me name, rank and serial number.  I would answer their questions tersely, uncomfortable about it, much to Karen's agitation.  I thought I was simply answering the questions, but I wasn't friendly enough.  My take on it was that I was there to worship, not make new friends.  Some habits die hard.  Karen also didn't like the Methodist minister inaccurately describing Baptist belief.

Then we found a Baptist church farther away that was all gilded out.  All the men wore suits.  There was a bell choir in addition to the vocal choir that was fully packed.  They even had instrumentalists on stage.  The problem with this place, beside its distance, was the fact that the person giving the sermon kept referring not only to himself in the third person, but mentioning how he was being asked about things on the basketball court, as he he wanted points for being Reverend Hoops.  Both Karen and I were turned off by it.

We did find a beautiful church at Christmastime, but it too was too far away.  By then, we were close to moving.

We found another Baptist church that allowed us to time travel.  It was out in the sticks, which was fine, and allowed us to have a scenic drive.  When we got there, all the women wore hats like frontierwomen, and all the children were in line.  There seemed to be a rotation of men who either read or led the congregation in prayer, and then the head minister (the pastor?), got to the pulpit.  At this point, he asked members of the congregation to offer testimonies, and one woman related a story about how she was adrift, went to a Catholic Church, met someone from a choir who led her back to church.  She never said she'd become a Catholic, but when she finished, the minister thanked her for her testimony, complimented her and then hastened to add that this in way was an endorsement of Romanism.  I felt like an interloper and started wondering how many I could take before they overpowered me once they realized I was a lapsed Catholic, but I held my tongue.  The minister then launched into a fire and brimstone sermon that was an inappropriate as it was unnecessary.  Karen got so turned off by that and the length of the service that she began doodling on the weekly newsletter -- which we still have.  Then, at the end of the service, Reverend Fire and Brimstone was at the door to greet us as we left.  I was probably rude to him, but I'm not sure Karen cared this time.

The only comic relief we got at that church was from the rather stout woman who sang with unrestrained yet tone-deaf gusto with every hymn.  I can still hear her braying.

We went to a couple of churches that were either raise-the-roof types (objectionable to both of us), or had women ministers (mostly objectionable to Karen) or too focused on their trappings.  We finally did find one whereat the pastor was marvelous.  We both loved Pastor Tony.  He not only knew his Bible, but he knew how to communicate it to his flock.  He was so good we overlooked (mostly) the wretched musical attempts, which can best be described as Wait For the Copyright.  The four-member Praise Team, as it was known, sang songs that were dirge-like in their quality and repetitive to the point of mindnumbingness.  The only saving grace was that the lyrics were projected on screens on either side of the altar and when the copyright was seen, we'd know the song was at an end.  The musical accompaniment was whimsical, with a teenager keeping the beat on a funky drum set and an old man assisting with a tambourine.  At least the church was close.

When we moved to our new state, we tried a couple of churches.  One had a long-winded pastor who spoke more about political issues than religion, another who thought he was trying out for a TV evangelist spot (and who happened to be conflicted out due to some internal Baptist disagreement that still escapes me) and sundry others that just didn't suit us.  It may sound like we're the Little Red Riding Hoods of the religious set, but the truth is, when one is looking for a place to worship, certain things matter.  Sure, being approached by sixteen different people may not bother some people, but I'm more private with my worship. Hymn choice doesn't matter to some people, but to Karen it matters a great deal.  When I'm in a church and there are virtually no women our age in the congregation, but men our age are, I wonder.  Hearing political speeches turns me off. And so on and so forth.

We think we've found a church that might suit us.  Thankfully, it's only five minutes from our house.  I'd taught a Spanish class there for a group that was going on a mission to Guatemala last fall.  We thought we'd give it a try and made the service populated largely by the blue hair set.  The music was good, although I wondered when the choir director was going to take flight given how much she flapped her arms.  But there was no one who quizzed me on my background, no numbingly repetitive lyrics, no fire and brimstone denunciations of  anticipated behavior.  It was...calm and somewhat comforting.

I'm not sure this is where we'll end up.  I know that when we exited the church we shook the pastor's hand and he'd obviously forgotten me, but recognized the face, because he called me his Spanish Guy.  There are worse things to be called, for sure.

And I've never had to give name, rank or serial number to anyone there.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Hollywood, Politics and the Media

The cognitive dissonance continues.  I don't understand how people who otherwise hold themselves out as intelligent and thoughtful people can continue to support a president whose policies are questionable at best and whose vows of transparency and bipartisanship are lies at worst.  Without a doubt, there are Hollywood types who are disappointed in the president and have had the gumption to say so publicly.  Despite that, it continues to lend a hand to buoy an administration that seems as if it's clueless.

The latest entry in this circus is the a show on Laugh or Die, Between Two Ferns, hosted by Zack Galifianakis, on which President Obama appeared to pitch Obamacare.  From the early reports, the show was a success in getting the so-called invincibles, the young set relied upon by Obamacare to fund the debacle, to check out the website.  But as The Daily Beast states, it's one thing to get the invincibles to check out the website and another to get them to sign up.  Time will tell.

All that is beside the point.  Whether it's Earvin Johnson, Zack Galifianakis, Katy Perry, Robert Redford, Ben Affleck, Beyonce or any of the other self-appointed presidential acolytes, they seem more eager to blame Republicans in Congress for the failed policies and untoward behavior than the President and his cohorts.  Unabashed liberal supporter Robert Redford is already looking ahead to 2016, producing a show for CNN called Chicagoland, which is nothing more than a thinly-veiled attempt at propaganda that seeks to boost the image of the mayor, Rahm Emanuel, two years before the next presidential election. Apparently, quotes from two Chicago-born celebrities, Marlee Matlin and Jeremy Piven, are being used to tout the series.  Interestingly, Piven is best known for playing Ari Gold, the insufferably rude and ruthless agent on Entourage, who was loosely based on a real-life Hollywood agent and power broker named Ari Emanuel. Yes, Mr. Emanuel is the brother of the Chicago mayor.  Amazing how that just happened, isn't it?

So Hollywood is closing ranks to support a president who vowed to raise the country out of what many described as the morass left by President Bush only to press it deeper into a bog of filthy politics, lies and ham-fisted intiatives.  It isn't possible for them to admit that their faith was misplaced, that they were deceived by a smoke-and-mirrors publicity machine orchestrated by longtime political campaign strategist David Axelrod (who will doubtlessly be used by the expected Clinton-Emanuel ticket in 2015).  To lose face would be unforgivable, as it would be equal to pulling the curtain back to show a wizard who had no clue as to what he was doing, or what he was supporting.

Meanwhile, Sharyl Atkisson, an award-winning investigative journalist, resigned from CBS, citing a liberal bias at the network that made her work difficult.  People are criticizing her departure for that reason, claiming that Ms. Atkisson had an obvious agenda against the Obama administration because of her ongoing efforts to uncover information on the Benghazi attack, failed green energy investments and the Fast and Furious incident.  That Ms. Atkisson would be tarnished thus is a joke.

It's odd to me that a journalist who won awards while at CBS for investigating incidents that occurred during the Bush administration can now be accused of having an anti-liberal bias.  Where were accusations of anti-conservative bias when Ms. Atkisson was winning those Emmy's during the Bush years?  Since she has investigated governmental wrongdoing regardless of the party in power, wouldn't it be more accurate to say that Ms. Atkisson has a bias against governmental wrongdoing?  That she's criticized for being too hard on liberals when her record suggests a fair and balanced approach shows that the MSM has been co-opted by liberalism.  The best move would have been to wish her well and say nothing.  But the wonks in MSM had to take a swipe at her because of her comment and, by the way, because Ms. Atkisson is finishing a book that has the working title Stonewalled:  One Reporter's Fight for Truth in Obama's Washington.  I can't wait to hear the wails, the gnashing of teeth and the rending of garments when that book is released.  I predict that the acolytic angst will hit a fever pitch, the tar brushes will see lots of overtime and worse when Ms. Atkisson hits the publicity trail.

It's sad to think that image is more valued than truth nowadays.

To quote Paula Cole, where have all the cowboys gone?

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

An Atypical Concert

Karen really wanted to see one of her favorite bands, so she bought us tickets for a show.  She was concerned that I might not like the main attraction, because the group is the favorite of those who like to throw themselves around a mosh pit.  We wouldn't be near the pit, thankfully, but in the balcony above and behind the pit.  Karen's primary concern was that I wouldn't like the music of the main act, Flogging Molly. She couldn't have been more wrong.

Because of the group's popularity and the fact that seating is general admission, we arrived an hour before the doors opened to stand in line outside the theater.  Needless to say, it was chilly, somewhere south of freezing.  Karen had her down coat on, with handwarmers inside her mittens.  She would have been wise to bring some for her shoes, as he feet froze up.  I had my usual cold weather garb and was fine, but I'll admit it was chilly.  She approached a line thinking it might be where the line began to wait for entry, only to be sniffed at and told it was the VIP line.  As would become readily apparent, VIP stood for Very Interesting Persons.

Despite this, there was some amadan larger than me almost at the head of the line wearing a short sleeved shirt and a kilt.  Well, that and shoes and socks.  But that was it.  We stood in line for an hour, and he was there before us, so you do the math.  He somewhat resembled Hamish in Braveheart, although less hirsute:

As we were standing there, another short-sleeve clad, kilt-wearing guy walked across the front of the line. This guy was short, but built like a brick house.  It would appear that we were overdressed for this event.

A young woman walked up to our Hamish impersonator and told him that they were expecting Gaysian Dan to arrive any moment.  A few minutes later, Gaysian Dan arrived and threw himself up Hamish, hanging from his neck.  His nickname was quite apt.  This came shortly after the local pirate union rep appeared with Samoan tattoos covering most of his face and some huge earring holes causing his lobes to droop almost to his shoulders walked by us with his girl toward the back of the line.  Somewhere in this parade in support of the First Amendment a couple with spiked mohawks, one of which was appropriately painted green, worked their way to the back of the line. No, Toto, we weren't in Kansas anymore.

Finally, mercifully for Karen, the line began to move toward the door.  Upon entry, there were two lines, so I naturally went for the shorter line, completely unaware that some people who were practicing for their future careers as TSA workers were frisking people, and each line was dedicated to either men or women.  I had found the women's line and had to switch with Karen.  Karen got through her line quicker as a result and watched me get frisked.  Of course, I had to mug it up as if I was enjoying this.  I have to remember not to do that when I go through an airport.

We made our way up to the balcony and searched for our seats.  Surprisingly, my bucket fit in any seat that we chose.  The problem was, instead, where to put my longer legs.  We opted for seats along the main aisle in the center of the balcony, two rows back.  Karen went to buy herself a shirt and I watched our seats, waiting for Karen to get back and the show to begin.

As I waited, a kid clear on the other side of the row in front of us, about five seats in from the aisle to our right, chose to step over his seat into our row and ask me to move so he could go somewhere.  I moved without complaint.  Then he came back, so I moved again.  He kept doing this about three or four times, and I was getting annoyed.  Then I thought I'd seen the kid somewhere before but couldn't place it. Then it hit me:  He was missing his banjo:

Dueling Banjos jumped over his seat a couple of more times before the show started, but my scowl convinced him to try the other aisle instead.

The theater continued to fill up until finally at eight o'clock, what we thought was the opening act took the stage.  Much to my dismay, it was some barefooted Brit folk singer and his silent banjo player.  That, in and of itself, would have been bad enough, but when he launched into his repertoire, I was positively sickened. He began with some anti-war, anti-David Cameron, anti-royalty songs which showed middling talent.  He even sang a song about fellatio, which was a little uncomfortable because a couple had brought their young teenaged daughter to see her favorite group, Flogging Molly, and had her subjected, inadvertently, to this.  It brought back memories of that idiotic group at the House of Blues in Chicago who encouraged everyone to Slut Up Chicago.  At least this one wasn't wearing a trenchcoat with slut written on his bar chest and electrical tape X's covering his nipples.  Then he began with some anti-American song talking about a conspiracy about 9/11.  I went to the bathroom; I had better things to do.  Thankfully, this twit only played a half hour, but it was more than enough.

The true opening act came next, a group called The Drowning Men.  Neither of us was familiar with their music and were willing to give them a try. That experiment didn't last long.  The group consists of a bassist and a drummer (who was very good, by the by) dressed like lumberjacks with long sleeves and blue jeans with the cuffs upturned, sporting civil war beards --

-- the lead singer channeling a preppier Daryl Dragon --

-- and a synthesizer-mad John Phillips wannabe:

whose overkill on that darned instrument induced the need for Dramamine.  There was one other musician whose contributions, from what I could tell, amounted to dancing like he'd been hit by a tazer and balancing his guitar in the palm of his hand.  The music was so loud, so dense, that I never understood a word of what they sang. For all I know, these guys were brilliant.  The most puzzling part of their performance, however, was the introduction of the theremin --

-- a dubious musical instrument better suited to seances.  In fact, when Mr. Dragon began with the theremin I told Karen I thought I saw my recently deceased aunt rising from the mosh pit.

Neither the Brit nor The Drowning Men provoked great responses.  In fact, the people seated behind us shouted to the latter that they should stop being boring.

At around ten o'clock the main show started, and boy did it start.  The lead singer of Flogging Molly is quite the dynamic showman.  In fact, the only thing he and the group did wrong all night was invite the Brit and The Drowning Men to open for them.  Watching the mosh pit in action was a revelation.  I'd seen it in film, but to see it live is another thing altogether.  I found Hamish in the crowd in the front row.  I never saw the mohawks or the muscled kilt.  Watching the little teenaged girl dancing with glee was special.  So many people knew all the words to every song and were just dancing with reckless abandon, even in the balcony, which caused it to vibrate so violently we weren't sure it would continue to support the crowd.  Karen looked at me anxiously a couple of times wondering whether we'd fall any second, and I quietly gave thanks that we hadn't gotten mezzanine seats down below the overhanging balcony.  The sound wasn't so great up there, and getting back to one's seat in the dark was an adventure, but listening to Flogging Molly was a highlight.  Karen shouldn't have been worried; virtually any Celtic music thrills my soul.

It was another musical adventure for us.  The last concert we saw was Ricky Skaggs.  Now Flogging Molly. I can't wait to see what our next concert will be.

If there is one concern about these concerts, it's the bait and switch of announcing when the show begins only to delay it with interminable opening acts.  Ricky Skaggs did do this, but his show featured what I consider the central reason for this:  To hold the audience captive so it will spend more on concessions and paraphernalia.  The doors for Flogging Molly opened at seven, yet they didn't take the stage until ten.  Karen was getting a shirt come hell or high water, so to be subjected to the nauseating Brit and the unintentionally nauseating opening act that followed was completely unnecessary.  Flogging Molly didn't push merchandise like Ricky Skaggs did auditioning his show for the QVC channel, but it had the same effect.  There should be more forthright information as to who's appearing and what time the main act will take the stage.

Still and all, it was another great night out with my girl.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

C. Ray Nagin

Lost in the kerfuffle over Ukraine, the post-Olympics hangover and the narcissism of the Oscars was the news that C. Ray Nagin, the former mayor of New Orleans, was convicted on twenty of twenty-one charges including fraud, bribery, filing false tax returns and other charges.  An appeal will be filed and, based on a technicality, the verdict may be overturned and the case retried.  If the latter occurs, Mr. Nagin would be well-advised to work out a deal for lesser charges and a shorter sentence.  The feds' batting average is pretty high.

What's interesting about this isn't that a city official was found guilty of corruption and sundry other crimes. Look at Chicago, for heaven's sake.  It's a wonder that former Mayor Richard M. Daley wasn't indicted. But political corruption knows not party affiliation -- from Rod Blagojevich to George Ryan to Ray Nagin -- nor color.  That's why corruption convictions usually come in the federal courts, which aren't hidebound to partisan politics.

The interesting thing about Mr. Nagin's conviction, for me at least, is that the whole time he was vilifying George Bush for his handling of the Katrina emergency, Mr. Nagin himself was living fat off the backs of the very people for whom he was allegedly arguing.  He testified in his trial that he took a three hundred percent paycut when he left private business to become mayor, yet while ordinary citizens were homeless because of Katrina, he was dining at the finest restaurants on city credit cards, getting rid of constituents' tax bills in return for perks on private jets and getting investments in family businesses for extensions of mayoral power. The activities for which Mr. Nagin was convicted span his mayoralty, beginning in this private sector career before he became mayor and continuing after he left City Hall.  For Mr. Nagin, the rules just didn't apply.

Admittedly, since I've never been to New Orleans, my pique with this has to do with Mr. Nagin's race-baiting.  He infamously declared that he was going to remake New Orleans as a chocolate city once it recovered from Katrina.  He reviled whites from sections of the city and yet pandered to them to win elections.  He allegedly wanted to help the black community but benefited from it through his corruption instead.  He never ducked an opportunity to take President Bush to task, but in the meantime, he was profiting from his position of power and influence.

That Mr. Nagin's conviction might be overturned on a technicality will provide him the forum for crowing that he is innocent.  The two are not equivalent.  From testimony given at trial, Mr. Nagin was reckless at best, corrupt at worst.  Either way, a conviction in a second trial would appear likely.  Mr. Nagin, however, would be well advised to seek some sort of a deal to spare the feds the trouble and expense of a second trial and get a reduced sentence in the bargain.

One other note regarding this:  Kanye West, the self-proclaimed musical god, infamously declared that George Bush didn't like black people for the way he was mishandling relief efforts for New Orleans.  Putting aside the fact that New Orleans is as much a white city as a black city, what would Mr. West think of Mr. Nagin's corrupt activities at the time his fellow black citizens were starving, homeless and destitute?  Would Mr. West declare that Mr. Nagin didn't like black people, or was Mr. Nagin's corruption directed only at the white portion of the populace?

I'm sure there's sophistry in there to allow for that because, after all, Mr. West is a musical god.  And gods, as we've learned, can do whatever they want.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Fun Words

Every so often I find, through my reading, words that just sound good to me.  Whether they are new words to me or words that I always accepted but never really understood, I enjoy looking into them and discovering new uses for them.  This gives rise to Karen calling me Webster, after Noah, thereby defaming a man of immense industry and probably moral rectitude by comparison to me.  In no way am I as wordy as old Noah.  Thankfully, I don't compare to William F. Buckley, either, on any level.  About the only three things we have in common is that we're all white, all men and all American.  The similarities end there.

So here are the words that have piqued my interest lately:

Adumbrate:  To foreshadow, to suggest, to intimate, darkly.  Who knew?  And to think I thought portend was haughty.

Dint:  As in, by dint of...another headscratcher.  It means power.  That's not one I saw coming.  Then again, I can be pretty dense.

Autarky:  For political states, self-sufficient.  Thanks to the biography of Alexander Hamilton that I'm reading, this is a new word.  Boy, they sure did speak funny way back when.

Condign:  Deserved, appropriate.  Again, I'd use this in a sentence because it has less syllables, but then I'd probably be thought snooty.  Aw, heck with it.  Snooty it is.

Fractious:  This I could have guessed by context -- troublesome.  One could say that use of the word condign is fractious...but that would be piling it on.

Trenchant:  Keen, sharp.  That sounds right.

Ken:  When not paired with Barbie, this means ambit, knowledge.  Or just ask a Scotsman.

Conflate: To bring together, usually to confuse.  That makes sense.  This is a hot word right now in political circles which, actually, is useful.

Turbid:  Deficient in clarity or purity, which is appropriate.  I'm sure I'll mix this and turgid up plenty.  

Insouciant:  It means nonchalance, but if one's using insouciant to mean nonchalant, there's nothing nonchalant about its use.

Akimbo:  This means to stand with one's hands on his hips.  I already knew that; I just like the look and the sound of the word.

Victual:  I learned this one reading Plato's The Republic.  Many people are not familiar with it until they realize it's pronounced vittle.

Bawd:  Coarse or suggestive, hence bawdy.

Fillip:  To stimulate, not what I would have thought.  I guess this would suggest Phillip Phillips doesn't need to drink coffee.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Ukraine

The Russian incursion into Ukraine is instructive on a couple of different levels.  As an adherent of George Santayana, this proves his maxim once again.  Anyone with a sense of history recognizes this as the same sort of pretext that Hitler used to invade the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia in 1938.  Vladimir Putin has trumped President Obama again and made him this century's Neville Chamberlain.

President Obama is correct:  Russia is violating international law, national sovereignty and is doing so on the wrong side of history.  In that, Mr. Obama is correct.  Russia's convoluted justification for entering Ukrainian territory meets none of the requirements for justification.  The problem is that now that it's done, what can be done to undo it?

Sadly, precious little.  The United States is stretched too thin militarily.  Even if it weren't, Russia would have far better interior lines from which to counter any move the US might make.  The EU?  Please.  They can't agree on anything, much less military action.  And with the potential consequences of a failed reply to the Russian incursion staring them in the face, the Euros lack the testicular fortitude to do anything militarily...not that it would do much good.  Even if all of Euroland's militaries participated, it wouldn't be able to dislodge Russia from the Crimea.  China?  It values Russia's oil and natural gas reserves too much.  Besides, China's focused on the Pacific, not Europe, and with the United States focused on Ukraine, it provides the necessary distraction from any action China might take in the East.

Almost by default, that leaves the US as the only viable deterrent to Russia, and that's in theory only. Realistically, there's no one available.  And don't even suggest the impotent and corrupt UN.  What are some blue helmeted troops from Kenya and Norway going to do to deter Putin?

The problem is, beside the obvious logistical nightmare, the US has shot its bolt already on Syria.  By evoking the imaginary line in the sand and then cowering behind legalese, the US lost the moral imperative that it used to own.  What's more, it showed that it has no concept of how to play game of foreign policy chess.  If a bluff is to be made, it has to be backed up by instances showing the consequences of calling the bluff.  With Libya and Syria as sterling examples of the weakness of American foreign policy, Putin had nothing to lose.  At worst, he looks bad, which matters not to him.  At best, he's begun the annexation of Ukraine, and there's no one there to stop him.

It's not as if the Americans are alone looking silly.  The Euros are repeating the errors they committed in 1938 and 1939 by not standing up to Hitler when he annexed the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia and the invasion of Poland.  In both cases, ruses were used to justify the German movements.  Here, the same thing is being done when in reality Putin seeks to prop up a politician who is favorable for Moscow.  Ukraine has expressed its desire to join the European Union, but this represented a threatening encroachment to Putin, whose chosen puppet in Ukraine, Yanukovich, rejected such ties.  Had the Euros acted more forcefully and accepted Ukraine's bid to join the EU, things might be different.  But now, it won't even stand up to Putin. Why? For the same reason China's sitting on the sidelines benefitting from doing nothing in this showdown: Oil and gas.

If in fact Ukraine wants to join the EU, the Euros ought to be more active in confronting Putin.  It's not as if it hasn't seen this movie before.  But given the present ostrich climate, I doubt European resolve to do anything sterner than issue sanctions that will be undercut in short order.  President Obama will huff and puff, but Russia won't back down.  The Chinese will laugh inscrutably but knowingly at all of it as it pursues its expansionist aims in the Pacific.

Mr. Obama is chillingly close to reprising Jimmy Carter's presidency in terms of foreign policy ineptitude.  He has weakened this country through his application of community organizer principles to real world situations. The problem for him, and by extension Americans across the country, is that it puts us in jeopardy of not only losing respect in the world, but emboldening our enemies, whether they belong to an organized state or a splinter organization hellbent on our destruction.

There is one lesson that isn't in the community organization handbook:  Thugs and terrorists only understand power.  It's the universal truth that transcends languages, cultures and traditions.  The United States still is the most powerful nation on earth.  But that power is no good unless it's used.

Meanwhile, Euroland is still dickering over the proper definition of power and doesn't want anyone to be offended.

Reagan and Churchill must be spinning in their graves.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles

Oenophilia

With a name like that, it's little wonder I have no connection to that world.  Well, that and the facts that since I once killed a cactus and have a very weal olfactory sense, I have no business trying to keep and appreciate fine wines.  Heck, I can't even pronounce the darned thing.  I'm much more likely to turn wine into vinegar.

I once worked with a complete and utter narcissist who was a big wine nut.  He could wax authoritative in a highbrow way about wines, theire vintages, their delicacies, their oakey scent with the bouquet of this and the hint of that.  I can barely tell you that reds go with meat and whites with fish.  Beyond that I'm utterly out of my depths when it comes to wine.

Since I'm not derived from French or Latin blood, it's little wonder.  I don't remember being around wine much besides the sacremental wine I handled as an altar boy at Mass.  If my parents ever had wine, I don't remember it, and they were by no means teetotalers.

When I went to Spain I was first introduced to wine, really.  I fell for the Rioja wines particularly which, from what I've been able to glean from oenophiles, have a lot of body.  I then tasted sherries and ports which, again from what I've been able to glean, are also a variety of wines.  Tempranillos I also drink, although not nearly as much as the Riojas.  I love wine from Montilla, Spain.  My wine tastes, then, have little to do with actual knowledge and more about parochialism.

Years after I returned from Spain the movie Sideways came out.  In that movie, love of wine is just a vehicle to move another road movie along, and there's one hilarious scene where Paul Giamatti is tasting wine and refers knowingly to a particular wine that has a hint of artichoke in it.  When I first heard that, I thought it was a bit odd, but considered that my lack of knowledge was to blame.  It turns out that Giamatti was improvising and poking fun at the industry in general and wine snobs in particular.  Between that, merlot, pinot noir and whatever else they go ga-ga over, I just don't get it.

I'll have a glass of wine with dinner once in awhile.  I don't care for stemmed glasses in general (my hands are too clumsy for 'em), so I prefer a little glass to which I refer as my dago red glass.  I can't remember ever downing an entire bottle of wine with a meal.

Admittedly, when I lived in Spain, I'd drink the Riojas that at the time were plentiful and cheap.  I like them primarily because they're less bitter and closer to grape juice than French or Italian wines.  I've also acquired a taste for some domestic wines, especially what oenophiles revile as Two Buck Chuck.  It's cheap and easy to pair with a meal.

I couldn't know the difference between a cabernet, a pinot noir, a merlot, a chardonnay and whatever else is out there.  Is Dom Perignon really that much better than everything else?  What's more, I couldn't care less.  People who get all worked up over this potable crack me up. I mean, I'm glad they have an interest that keeps them busy, but it is, after all, just something to drink.  Wine, like beer and other beverages, was just man's way to find something to drink that wouldn't sicken them, like the brackish water that was being contaminated by man's lack of hygiene.

No matter.  I enjoy my Spanish wines on occasion and domestic wines failing them.  When we're given a bottle of wine I don't know whether the bottle is good or not.  To me, it's wine, something to drink.  So if ever I'm given a bottle of wine and my expression doesn't match the level of wine contained in the bottle, don't be upset.

It's just wine ignorant me trying to figure out whether I should keep the bottle or regift it.

(c) 2014 The Truxton Spangler Chronicles