July 15, 2021

Sackler crime family about to get away with murder

https://www.vpr.org/vpr-news/2021-06-02/sackler-family-empire-poised-to-win-immunity-from-opioid-lawsuits?_amp=true

In a hard to believe legal maneuver, the individual members of the Sackler family, the inventors of Oxycotin, and their associates, are about to gain complete civil immunity from numerous law suits by order of a suburban New York bankruptcy judge despite the fact that no individual member of the Sackler family ever declared bankruptcy.
. Although the payment for the Sacklers is significant, it is to be paid over many years, allowing the Sacklers to maintain the 11 billion dollar fortune in tact.
If the bankruptcy settlement is approved over the objection of numerous state Attorneys General, the Sacklers will truly have gotten away with The Crime of the Century.

July 15, 2021

Bring Fido!

https://www.bringfido.com/

Just thought I'd mention this site. I guess it's trying to gather the names of every hotel and motel that will take in dogs. It's pretty useful for dog centric families.

July 14, 2021

Jeff Greenfield had an interesting article in Politico.

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/07/11/democrats-trapped-republicans-bend-rules-498854

A few of his points:
1. The 2020 election was much closer than we like to acknowledge. The 7 million votes Biden won by all came from California and New York. The margin that mattered in the electoral college numbered in the thousands.
2. Economic fairness is the raison d'etre for the Democratic Party. A fairer tax system and the benefits of the stimulus program and infrastructure are the winning issues and the program to run on.
3. Issues that have no chance of passage like expanding the Supreme Court, voting rights bills that may be unconstitutional are not going to get Democrats elected. An issue like refund the police is going to get Republicans elected.

Social progress only happens when large Democratic majorities are elected. For that to happen Democrats need to win elections.

July 13, 2021

A Summer Place - Percy Faith and his Orchestra

A truly awful movie with two redeeming features: Sandra Dee and this song written by Max Steiner.

July 12, 2021

Eve of Destruction - Barry McGuire

I thought it would be dated. Maybe not.

July 11, 2021

Has anyone attended a legendary sports event?

I've been to one for sure. The one game playoff between the Yankees and the Red Sox in 1978. The two teams had finished the season in a dead heat tie. The division champion was to be determined in a one game playoff for the first time in 30 years.
The game happened on a perfect fall afternoon on a Monday at Fenway Park. Completely sold out, tickets were impossible. But my brother, a big Boston fan, had been prescient. He had tickets for the last games of the season and foresaw the possibility of a playoff. I think he decided to hang around the box office on Friday night just to see what happened
Sure enough, they put on sale tickets for what was then only a possibility. My brother bought a bunch for friends and family. My parents and I drove up from CT. Then as now parking in Boston was impossible to come by. We parked out in the fens somewhere. The instant we got out of the car somebody approached us to buy tickets for ten bucks a piece (above the face price). The closer we got to Fenway Park the higher the offers went. By the time we got to Fenway the offers were $125 a piece, a lot of money back then.
I remember the game pretty well. I can still see Bucky Dent's (forever affectionately known in New England as Bucky Fucking Dent) bloop hit barely make it into the net over the outfield fence
The game ended in the bottom of the ninth with the tying run on third. The Red Sox great Carl Yastrzemski came up to bat. Everyone was on their feet screaming. Unfortunately Yaz hit a ball into foul territory by third base. The game was over. The curse of the Bambino would not be laid to rest for another difficult twenty years or so.
My most vivid memory though is what happened next. The fans got out of their seats and headed to the exits. There was absolutely no sound. No one spoke a word even when they got to the streets. You could literally hear pins drop. Just utter silence, such was the deep disappointment of the Boston fans.
My father told a story. He was born in 1920 and was a lifelong Red Sox fan. He told me that growing up he would run home from school to listen to games on the radio. If he ever knew that some day tv would be invented and you could see the games live he would have died of anticipation waiting for it to happen.
It was early spring 1939. Red Sox fans all over New England were hearing rumors that the team had signed a kid who could hit like no other. Of course the kid was Ted Williams.
The Sox made there way north from Spring training in Florida. They made a stop in new Haven CT. The Red Sox general manager was hall of famer Eddie Collins and his son was captain of the Yale baseball team. Smokey Joe Wood, another Red Sox legend, was the Yale team manager. It had been arranged for the Sox to play an exhibition game against Yale. My father got a ticket.
He remembered Yale had a promising sophomore pitcher that year who started the game. He remembered before the game Lefty Grove showing the young Yalie a few things about throwing a baseball. Well, the game got underway and wouldn't you know it, the kid from Yale struck out the soon to be immortal Ted Williams three times before being relieved! In the ninth inning Williams did send a mighty blast towards the fences, only to be robbed by a spectacular catch by a Yale outfielder. The Red Sox scraped by with a one run win.
Many years later my father ran into Smokey Joe Wood's son. They got to talking and figured out they had both been at this game. My father asked, "Whatever happened to that young pitcher who struck Ted Williams out three times?"
Mr. Wood knew the answer: "Oh, he got into a fight with one of the coaches the next year and quit the team!"
Now that's the stuff of legends!

July 10, 2021

The Go Go's - Vacation

I think the Go Go's performed at the last rock concert I attended.
Belinda Carlisle! You never called back!

I used to to have a thing for those pretty girls with issues.

July 10, 2021

Gerry and the Pacemakers - You'll Never Walk Alone

And it became the anthem of the Liverpool football team!

July 10, 2021

Gerry and the Pacemakers - Ferry Cross the Mersey

Back from when England swung like a pendulum!

July 7, 2021

Vidal v. Mailer - The Fight of the Century!

It all happened in prime time television: The Dick Cavett Show. Norman Mailer and Gore Vidal do everything but get into a physical brawl on national TV. The woman is Janet Flanner, the long time Paris correspondent for the New Yorker.
What amazes today is that two writers could so dominate the popular culture. Their feud was the stuff of legend.
Mailer later admitted he was pretty much bombed on the show.