Open Thread

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I’ll be traveling until Monday night, so posting will be light. If at all. Do talk among yourselves.

16 thoughts on “Open Thread”

  2. “Where da white women at?!?!?!?!?!”

    Ok, I’ll look for maha’s pot stash, you folks see if you can find the keys to her liquor cabinet!

  4. i’ll try to find a link to the John Stewart/John Oliver “Imperialism in the Middle East” skit from 2 nights ago. We can show that over and over.

  5. Swami,
    I suspect that maha’s stash of shoe polish wouldn’t get someone who’s as experienced a polish-huffer as you, too medicated.
    After all, this is maha we’re talking about – not, Imelda Marcos! 🙂

  6. http://youtu.be/dicWmd95PP0

    I won’t be posting much and this might not get through. But, this is where we ate lunch, and the fellows in this video were playing. On top of that, we were seated right where this video was taken. The man in the foreground is Ninine Garcia, one of my current jazz manouche heroes.

    And the food was good. Civilization has its rewards.

  8. Swami, thanks. Like most codgers, I find iPads unkind of annoying. The link doesn’t work at this time. But, I’ll check later.

    It all comes down to Django Reinhardt. His incredible musical talent and the injury of his left hand made him rethink the way guitar was played. So, some think, that some of the harmonies he used simply fell under his left hand n more easily. He loved American jazz and that was the beginning of a great history.

    In more progressive cities in the USA, like Portland, Seattle and NYC, “gypsy jazz” seems to be very popular among talented young guitarists. Ironically, so far, when I hear young people listening to music here in Paris, it’s the same awful stuff they consume everywhere. French “Rap” music seems a little easier on the ears.

    But, it does seem odd that a place like the one in the video wasn’t packed to the gills.

  9. Swami, I tried the link again. That photo reminds me more of Tarpon Springs. But, coincidently, we went to the Marches aux puces de la Porte de Vanves this morning. It’s a great market. I was searching for busted up old gypsy guitars. I didn’t find one.

    Maybe I could get better deals if I dressed like the guy in the photo you posted.

    I can help but admire the ability of the French to have some sort of political discourse. They can disagree passionately, they can be hotheaded. But, they still seem to want to remain a nation and we can see the benefits all around. The people seem astonishingly fit and healthy, especially compared to my fellows in rural NC.

    Well, I am probably being a complete bore, so I’ll stop there. Besides, there’s wine to drink.

  10. I have been reading about the prospects for Syria. Even Glen Beck is opposed to our involvement. Politics makes strange bedfellows. A lot of bloggers are conflicted – which was how I felt. I’ve been looking at the evidence and the rebels are a guilty of atrocities as surely as Assad. So I don’t think the US should ‘back’ the rebels nor do I think we should ignore chemical weapons. What to do?

    There is a monstrous humanitarian crisis with refugees. Bordering countries are taking the brunt of it but they need help. I don’t think the US can end the civil war in Syria or make it more – civilized. We can make life possible for the refugees AND we might try ‘corrupting’ a captive audience with the ideals of democracy and self-determination. When the conflict is over they will return in numbers and if thy and the clerics have an idea what they want the new country to become – MAYBE – they can request UN assistance in a transition. Naturally, the victors will want to hold onto power after a bloody struggle, but they will be weak from a brutal war. The conflict in Syria won’t end soon – we have tried and failed at nation building from the outside. Why not try nation building from the inside – the refugees will be hungry for a decent life when they repatriate their homeland.

    Regarding the cost – providing humanitarian assistance with no strings attached could be a (dare I use the word) stimulus for the US economy. We know how to prepare and package food and emergency sanitation and very basic housing. ALL the materials could be made in the USA.

  11. Politics makes strange bedfellows.

    So true. But where was Glenn Beck ten years ago, I keep asking. These doves-come-lately make me furious. They’re not just phonies, they’re evil phonies.

    NPR indicated this morning that, on the other hand, Samantha Power is making the case for a military strike. What’s that line from the movie JFK? “We’re through the looking glass here, people!”

  12. I just can’t figure out why Obama is so gung-ho about it, when the evidence isn’t solid. This just isn’t his m.o. I suspect that somehow Israel is pulling his chain. I posted an excerpt from David Stockman’s article a few days ago, where he likens Samantha Power to ideologues Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith from the Bush era, a comparison that seems apt.

    Pretty decent article on Where Libertarianism Comes From:

    …It starts just after the end of World War Two, when America’s industrial and financial giants, fattened up from war profits, established a new lobbying front group called the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) that focused on promoting a new pro-business ideology—which it called “libertarianism”— to supplement other business lobbying groups which focused on specific policies and legislation.

    …“Libertarianism” was a project of the corporate lobby world, launched as a big business “ideology” in 1946 by The US Chamber of Commerce and the National Association of Manufacturers. The FEE’s board included the future founder of the John Birch Society, Robert Welch; the most powerful figure in the Mormon church at that time, J Reuben Clark, a frothing racist and anti-Semite after whom BYU named its law school; and United Fruit president Herb Cornuelle.

    The purpose of the FEE — and libertarianism, as it was originally created — was to supplement big business lobbying with a pseudo-intellectual, pseudo-economics rationale to back up its policy and legislative attacks on labor and government regulations.

    ….Milton Friedman….is a founding father of libertarianism….

    …According to Congressional hearings on illegal lobbying activities, 1946 was the year that Milton Friedman and his U Chicago cohort George Stigler arranged an under-the-table deal with a Washington lobbying executive to pump out covert propaganda for the national real estate lobby in exchange for a hefty payout, the terms of which were never meant to be released to the public.

    The arrangement between Friedman and Stigler with the Washington real estate lobbyist was finally revealed during a congressional review of illegal lobbying activities in 1950, called the Buchanan Committee…..The actual details of Milton Friedman’s PR deal are sordid and familiar, with tentacles reaching into our ideologically rotted-out era….

  13. http://news.yahoo.com/russia-push-syria-surrender-chemical-weapons-143023245.html

    Here’s a sound proposal.. but if Congress tells Obama to go shit in his hat then it’s just a meaningless gesture.
    If Assad doesn’t use chemical weapons and won’t use chemical weapons then what does he need them for. Why the reluctance to hold on to something that you’re never ever gonna use?
    I’m in favor of just getting out of our involvement with Syria and the whole Middle East bullshit. And I’d love to see our military industrial complex with it’s accompanying attitude of” we’re murkans” get knocked down a couple of pegs, but the question of dealing with the use of chemical weapons leaves me with a sense that we just can’t turn our backs and act like it’s no consequence to humanity.
    I guess it’s call to each individuals morality and conscience…but for me I’d stand behind Obama because I believe his cause is bigger than politics or personal ambition.

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