I'm Ready For My Closeup, Mr. DeMint

After the boys of summer have gone

In sports news, the NYYankees, a small market team with the lowest payroll in the majors, staged an historic and heroic come-from-behind win, against all odds, to defeat the highly favored Philadelphia Phillies tonight in the World Series.

With their lack of well-known superstars, an old decrepit stadium, and virtually no fan base, the Yankees surprised even jaded sports journalists with their unlikely victory. When asked what it felt like to finally be a winner, catcher Jorge "Chinless" Posada said, voice breaking with emotion: "This is a win for the little guy, the guy who tries harder. We never expected to be here, and we're grateful, and humble".

Owner George Steinbrenner, racked with debt, and having tried unsuccessfully for several years to sell the money-losing franchise, remarked: "This is what can happen when guys have hearts larger than their talent. This is destiny".

Update & bump: While I mock Jorge Posada and his less than Dudley Do-right chin, he's a bad-ass player and a good guy:

In 2003, he hit 30 home runs (one every 16.0 at bats, ninth best in the league) and drove in 101 runs, both career highs. He batted .281 and was also fifth in the league in OBP (.405), and sixth in the league in walks (93; walking 17.5% of the time, a career high). He tied Yogi Berra’s record for most home runs by a Yankee catcher and finished third in the MVP voting. He also made the final out of that year's World Series, a groundout against Florida Marlins pitcher Josh Beckett.

In 2006, Posada posted one of his best offensive seasons and he led the major leagues with 20 pinch hits.^[4] In addition, work with new first base coach Tony Peña, a former catcher, helped him improve his percentage of runners thrown out stealing second almost 60 points above his career average.

In 2007, Posada batted at .338, with 20 home runs, 90 RBIs, and career highs in hits (171) and doubles (42). He joined Iván Rodríguez as the only two catchers in MLB history to record at least 40 doubles in two separate seasons. He was 3rd in the AL in on-base percentage (.426), 4th in batting average, 6th in OPS (.970), and 8th in doubles and slugging percentage (.543). Posada batted .395 in September, and became the first Yankee catcher since Thurman Munson, in 1978, to finish among the top 10 AL batting leaders. His longest hitless streak was only 11 at-bats. Posada is the first catcher to hit .330 or better with a slugging percentage of at least .540 and an on-base percentage of at least .420 since Mike Piazza in 1996-97. On the final day of the 2007 regular season, Yankees manager Joe Torre allowed Posada to act as the manager for the game,^[5] an honor that Torre bestows upon a veteran player if the final game does not matter in the standings. The Yankees beat the Baltimore Orioles 10-4 to give Posada an unofficial win in his 'managerial debut'.

On November 2, 2007, Posada openly backed new Yankes manager Joe Girardi, after reports claimed that he would have a difficult time playing under Girardi.

On November 12, 2007, Posada signed a 4-year, $52 million contract to remain with the Yankees.^[6]

On July 21, 2008, Posada was placed on the disabled list.^[7] Posada intended to recover from this injury in order to perform as designated hitter or first baseman. However, the team decided to acquire Xavier Nady, in order to allow him enough time to operate.^[8] On July 28, 2008, Yankees officially announced that he would undergo season-ending surgery to repair the glenoid labrum in his right shoulder.^[9] Consequently, Posada did not participate again until 2009 spring training. Through 2008, Posada has hit 162 homers from the left side of the plate and 59 from the right side.^[10]

On September 21, 2008, Posada was selected to catch the ceremonial first pitch prior to the final game at the original Yankee Stadium. The pitch was thrown by Julia Ruth Stephens, the only living daughter of Babe Ruth.

On April 16, 2009, in the bottom of the 5th inning, he hit the first regular season home run in the new Yankee Stadium against Cliff Lee of the Cleveland Indians. Teammate Robinson Cano was the first MLB player to go deep at the new Yankee Stadium off of Chicago Cubs pitcher Ted Lilly on April 3, 2009 in an exhibition game.

On May 1, 2009, he hit the first walk off hit in a nine inning game in the new Yankee Stadium against Brian Fuentes to help the Yankees beat the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim 10-9. On October 4, the last game of the season, Posada again served as the honorary manager, as the Yankees went on to win, 10-2 over the Tampa Bay Rays.^{[citation needed]}

On October 11, 2009, Posada hit a tie-breaking HR to give the Yankees a 2-1 lead in the top of the 7th inning against the Twins. This was also the last home run hit at Minnesota's Metrodome. He hit another HR to tie it 4-4 on Oct, 19, in Game 3 of the ALCS against the Angels.

. . .

On January 21, 2000, Jorge married Laura Posada, an attorney and former model and actress from Puerto Rico. They have two children, Jorge III and Paulina.

Posada's son, Jorge III, suffers from craniosynostosis, which he was diagnosed with 10 days after he was born, and has endured numerous surgeries to correct the condition. Posada established the Jorge Posada Foundation to help find a cure for the disease and support families with children affected by the condition. Jorge released a charity wine in 2008 called Jorge Cabernet to raise funds for his foundation.^[11]

Any team would be proud to have Posada as their regular catcher. Hey, Tony Reagins . . .

Go Cheney yourself, you Dick!

Compare and contrast:

Cheney told FBI he had no idea who leaked Plame ID

Former Vice President Dick Cheney told the FBI in 2004 he had no idea who leaked to the news media that Valerie Plame, wife of a Bush administration critic, worked for the CIA.
[...]
In the FBI interview, the vice president's memory of key events appeared hazy.
[...]
Cheney's occasional denials that he talked about Plame to various people at the White House are among the few things in the lengthy interview with the FBI that Cheney appeared certain about.

But wait, there's more:

Cheney FBI interview: 72 instances of can't recall

Federal prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald famously declared in the Valerie Plame affair that "there is a cloud over the vice president." Last week's release of an FBI interview summary of Dick Cheney's answers in the criminal investigation underscores why Fitzgerald felt that way.

On 72 occasions, according to the 28-page FBI summary, Cheney equivocated to the FBI during his lengthy May 2004 interview, saying he could not be certain in his answers to questions about matters large and small in the Plame controversy.
[...]
When Libby discovered Cheney's reference to Plame and the CIA in his notes — notes that Libby knew he would soon have to turn over to the FBI — the chief of staff went to the vice president, probably in late September or early October 2003.

Sharing the information with Cheney was in itself an unusual step at the outset of a criminal investigation in which potential White House witnesses were being ordered by their superiors not to talk to each other about the Plame matter.

"It turns out that I have a note that I had heard about" Plame's CIA identity "from you," Libby says he told the vice president.

And what did Cheney say in response? Fitzgerald asked Libby in front of a federal grand jury six months later.

"He didn't say much," Libby replied. "You know, he said something about 'From me?' something like that, and tilted his head, something he does commonly, and that was that."

Cheney's version of the conversation, as related in the FBI interview summary?

Cheney "cannot recall Scooter Libby telling him how he first heard of Valerie Wilson. It is possible Libby may have learned about Valerie Wilson's employment from the vice president ... but the vice president has no specific recollection of such a conversation."

Lying is a sin. Lying to the FBI is a felony. Outing a covert CIA agent is treason.

Why isn't that evil bastard in jail?



Cross posted at VidiotSpeak

'Cause I can play this here guitar

There's a certain connection between sophisticated country music and jazz. Both rely on good musicianship, and improvisation that blurs the lines, yet remains true to the genre. And in the beginning, rock shared most of these roots as well. Rock has moved in different directions, some good, some . . .

And as I've said frequently here, the average country guitarist is miles above the average rock guitarist. But a great guitarist can play anything. Listen & learn.

Here's Merle Haggard doing "Mama Tried", which was a track we covered on the album I recorded in '69 with an L.A.-based group called Wild Oats:

Check out the guitar solo. Jazzy yet appropriate playing from Clint Strong:

His incredible improvisations pay tribute to jazz guitar and sax players of the past, yet are filled with youthful modern explorations. Clint has performed and recorded with numerous jazz and country artists including Merle Haggard, Willie Nelson, Red Garland and fellow guitarists like Howard Roberts, Herb Ellis and Tal Farlow.

While likely self-written hyperbole, Clint does show some mighty skills and musicality. Check this video, Clint's solo is about 1:30:

And for some straight-up jazz, here's Clint playing the sublime "Here's That Rainy Day":

Oh, and any songwriter alive would sell his/her soul to have written "Mama Tried". Sheer country/pop genius. That's Merle.

'Lying is forbidden in America'

And I think to myself, what a wonderful world

I think this is really cool:

Like a Skyline Is Etched in His Head

In a helicopter above the city on Friday, Stephen Wiltshire of London looked down at the streets and sprawl of New York. He flew for 20 minutes. Since then, working only from the memory of that sight, he has been sketching and drawing a mighty panorama of the city, rendering the city’s 305 square miles along an arc of paper that is 19 feet long. He is working publicly in a gallery at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn.
[...]
“I always memorize by helicopter,” he said on Tuesday, pausing from detailing the corners of a street on the Brooklyn side of the Williamsburg Bridge.

Mr. Wiltshire sees and draws. It is how he connects. Until age 5, he had never uttered a word. One day, his kindergarten class at a school for autistic children in London went on a field trip.

When they came back, he spoke.

“He said, ‘Paper,’ ” his sister, Annette Wiltshire, said. “The teacher asked him to say it again. He said it. Then they asked him to say something else, and he said, ‘Pen.’ ”

Check out his website, and check out his work.

IMHO, this is the best rendition of What A Wonderful World:


To paraphrase Warren Zevon IRT Tom Waits: I can sing like Louis ... once.



Cross posted at VidiotSpeak

You'd love her too

John Cole at Balloon Juice has become one of my go-to daily reads. For an example of why, here's his latest evisceration of Sarah Palin:

Umm, guys? SHE’S. A. GRIFTER. She quit her damned job to go on the wingnut welfare circuit. Seven in ten people think she is unqualified to be President. She’s just in this for the money, and she is currently having a public feud with the father of her teenage daughter’s child who is himself cashing in by posing for Playgirl.

This isn’t a credible politician. It’s a Jerry Springer episode.

Now, the logical musical reference might be Sara Smile by Hall & Oates, but since those guys suck harder than Jefferson Starship on crack, I won't bother.

Likewise Stevie Nicks' Sara, but she lost all relevance the minute Lindsey Buckingham embarked on a solo career.

Sarah McLachlan? Over-exposed. Sarah Brightman? Kinda hot, but not really.

No, the ultimate musical Sarah is Ms. Vaughan doing a song by some British guys:

Crying Over You

This story is a heart breaker:

Girl's 'Notes Left Behind' Made Into Book

Brooke and Keith Desserich say they never intended to write a book about their daughter.

It started as a parent's personal journal to their younger daughter Gracie, so she would be able to remember her 6-year-old sister, Elena, who was diagnosed with pediatric brain cancer.

"They told us at the very beginning that she had 135 days to live," Keith Desserich said.

Though her parents didn't want her to know the severity of her cancer, they feel that she must have known what was happening. The tumor slowly took away her ability to talk.

But Elena was still able to write.

"That was her way to letting us know everything would be OK," Brooke Desserich said.

After Elena passed away, her parents discovered that their daughter had left a message behind for them -- a lot of messages, actually.

"We started to pull out notes and they would be in between CDs or between books on our bookshelf," Keith Desserich said.

Then the couple started finding them everywhere.

"We started to collect them and they would all say 'I love you Mom, Dad and Grace.' We kept finding them, and still to this day, we keep finding them," Keith Desserich said. "Literally, there are hundreds of notes that we found."

Elena’s parents each hold onto a sealed note they've never opened.

"We always want to know that there’s one more note that we haven't read yet," Keith Desserich said.

There's more, but I've got something in my eye and I can't post about this anymore.

Can't decide on which way to go

Regarding the awfulness that is Lieberman, I re-tweeted something from Katrina VanDen Heuvel of The Nation magazine today, and it automatically posted over to my Facebook account:

I got an interesting response from an old friend, a great guy, who tends toward the conservative:

The Dems dictating that those who do not wish to pay for health insurance pay for those who can not afford it or are not able to get off their intoxicants or asses long enough to get strait and pay for it themselves is the very definition of dictatorship! I feel for those less fortunate, and I do my share when I can, but why can't the Gov. simply supply health care to those less fortunate, why do we all have to be subject to Federal rules and dictates?

While I understand the point, here's the error in logic:

In a democratic republic, we all have responsibilities about which we sometimes disagree. For example, I was opposed to the Iraq Invasion from the beginning. It clearly had nothing to do with 9/11, yet was pumped into the publics' awareness as the War of Necessity. In a perfect workd, I could withhold the percentage of my taxes that went to the war effort.

And I would have likely been audited by the IRS, and maybe sent to Federal prison.

I would like to withhold my share of taxes that goes toward corn ethanol subsidies, since it's a total waste of time, but again, that's the price I pay for the benefits the government provides that I do use and believe in.

But there's a schizophrenia in my friend's answer. He doesn't want to pay for:

those who can not afford it or are not able to get off their intoxicants or asses long enough to get strait

Yet follows up with:

why can't the Gov. simply supply health care to those less fortunate?

Yes, well, that's exactly what we're trying to do here. The Federal and State governments already do this. It's called Medicaid by the Feds, MediCal here in CA. The beef with helping out the willing underinsured is a straw man, far more people who are employable go without insurance than addicts or willful indigents.

And the final question:

why do we all have to be subject to Federal rules and dictates?

Because we live in a country with a federal government. That does stuff. Like distribute H1N1 vaccine, build interstate highways, provide postal service, and defends us from enemies.

Here's the real issue: The larger the risk pool, the lower the costs. The for-profit insurance blood-suckers understand this, yet against their own interests do not implement any internal reform.

Now they're thrilled by parts of the proposed HCR legislation that would mandate coverage, since that brings in more customers and premiums. To them, that simply means more profits, since they will not expand coverage like the Public Option would.

If you're a fiscal conservative, HCR with a strong public option lowers costs. The CBO proves this.

If you're a bleeding-heart liberal, providing universal health care is a moral imperative.

If you're a free-market capitalist, HCR means more healthy workers doing productive jobs.

If you're a Randian Libertarian, well, you're an idealogue, not willing to entertain something that benefits the common good.

Thankfully there aren't many Randians in positions of power these days.

And finally, in re: Lieberman, here's what he said in 2006:

"What I’m saying to the people of Connecticut, I can do more for you and your families to get something done to make health care affordable, to get universal health insurance," Lieberman said during a July, 2006, debate.

During that campaign, Lieberman advocated "small business health insurance reform, plus something I call MediKids to cover all the children in America on a sliding fee basis up until the age of 25."

Lieberman also pushed for a plan he called "MediChoice," which would "allow anybody in our country to buy into a national insurance pool like the health insurance pool that we federal employees and Members of Congress have."

Lieberman promised his reforms would cover "95 percent of those who are not covered now, and it will reduce the pressure on rising costs for all the millions of others."

As Eric Kleefeld pointed out at TalkingPointsMemo, Lieberman had a similar platform in 2004, when he promised to cover all American children with a Medicare-style plan, and said under his plan "if you lose your job, you will not lose your health insurance."

And that why progressives are so mad at Lieberman. His current statements in re: HCR seem more like a calculated appeal to obstructionist Republicans than an honest yet divergent opinion.

In other words, craven political posturing.

Bastard.

Lastly, where was the conservative outrage when GWBush was waging war in Iraq & Afghanistan with no intention of paying for it, while giving tax breaks to Donald Trump and other multimillionaires, raising the national debt to astronomical heights.

All My Ex's Live In Texas

Texas Gov Perry never lets the facts get in the way of killing an innocent man:

Controversy Builds in Texas Over an Execution

Questions about whether Gov. Rick Perry allowed the execution of a man some arson experts say may have been innocent, and then hindered an investigation into the evidence, continue to reverberate across Texas, where issues surrounding capital punishment have rarely stirred such controversy.
[...]
Three weeks ago Mr. Perry replaced the chairman and two other members of the State Forensic Science Commission, which was about to hold hearings on the evidence in the case. The new chairman, a close ally of the governor, promptly canceled a hearing at which a second, independent arson expert was to testify. The commission’s expert, Craig L. Beyler of Baltimore, had concluded in a lengthy report that the evidence did not prove that Mr. Willingham set the fire that killed his three daughters in 1991.
[...]
Last week Mr. Perry defended his decision and struck back at his critics. “Willingham was a monster,” he said.
[...]
Governor Perry has also refused to release the memorandum from his general counsel on which he based his decision to let the execution proceed. He says the memorandum is protected by attorney-client privilege.

The only monster I see is a governor running for re-election that refuses to release documents that the citizens of Texas paid for.

But wait, there's more!Governor Goodhair, (big thanks to Molly Ivins wherever you are), AKA Gov Rick Perry R-TexAss, thinks it's OK to have his ABC commissioner solicit bribes campaign donations on his behalf from the very folks they regulate.

I think that's usually called a 'protection racket.' He's as crooked as a snake in a hall of fractured mirrors.

I know most Texans loves them some death penalty, but are they willing to kill an innocent man!? I think not. I lived in Texas. Justice was harsh, but it wasn't crooked.

Think of your better angels. In the mean time enjoy this:




Cross posted at VidiotSpeak