I sometimes save things in Google reader that have interesting titles and that I want to read later. “The Wrestler and the Cornflake Girl,” written by a wrestler who fell in love with the music of Tori Amos, is one that I actually did read later. I think it’s because of the the “WTF” factor — my reaction to a wrestler/Tori Amos fan made me realize I was totally stereotyping, something I detest and don’t want to do.
Sure enough, reading proved my stereotyping all wrong. I haven’t listened to much Tori Amos, but I completely understood how deeply Mick Foley was affected by Amos’ song, “Winter.”
This entry is part 1 of 3 in the series Eddie Long
Well you may throw your rock and hide your hand
Workin’ in the dark against your fellow man
But as sure as God made black and white
What’s done in the dark will be brought to the light
~ “Run On (For A Long Time)”
The last line in the quote above is one my mother repeated often when I was growing up. She meant that those things we tried to hide, out of shame or deceit, would be found out eventually. Thus, it behooved us to live honest lives, with nothing “done in the dark” that we feared would come into the light.
Spencer LaGrande, 22, filed suit against Long and his New Birth Missionary Baptist Church and, like the other three alleged victims, accused the powerhouse pastor of forcing him into a sexual relationship while treating him to trips around the world, travel in private planes and stays in luxury hotels.
…LaGrande’s lawsuit alleges he met Long in March 2003 during the very first service at a branch Long’s Georgia-based church that opened in a suburb of Charlotte, N.C.
LeGrande said Long agreed to be a father figure for him because his own father was an absentee father, according to court documents, and that Long began asking LaGrande to call him “dad.”
LaGrande was 17 when, according to the lawsuit, Long first made sexual contact with him during a trip to Nairobi, Kenya. The lawsuit alleges several more instances of sexual contact, both before and after LaGrande graduated from high school.
Long’s accusers have said they believe the bishop abused more young men that eventually will come forward. Many people at the church knew what was going on but covered for Long, victims claimed.
Maurice Robinson and Anthony Flagg were the first two accusers, followed a short time later by Jamal Parris.
Parris alleged in the documents, obtained by ABC News, that the bishop would request he be nude while in his presence and would request “sexual massages” and “oral sodomy” when they traveled.
Eddie Long would probably say that my life — a suburban life, with a husband and two children — is one lived in darkness. He would probably invite me to live in the “light.” That is, the “light” as he defines it.
Well, I did it. After waiting about four years, and musing about it earlier this month, in the middle of last week I ordered a Kindle 3. I opted for the Wi-Fi, because I didn’t (and still don’t) feel the need for a 3g device.
It arrived a week ago, Friday, and I’ve been enjoying it since then. Though it’s barely been more than a week, I don’t think it’s too early for me to say I’m completely happy with my purchase. And after a recent trip to Borders, I was even more certain that I made the right decision.
I am not a burned down house. Like millions of Americans, I have a “pre-existing condition.” But I am not a “burned down house”, as Mike Huckabee and those who applauded his recent statement seem, to think.
When Republicans attack health care reform, Democrats like to counter by accusing Republicans of wanting to repeal a law that requires insurance companies to cover people with pre-existing conditions. According to Republican Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee, that’s exactly right. People with pre-existing conditions, he explains are like houses that have already burned down.
“It sounds so good, and it’s such a warm message to say we’re not gonna deny anyone from a preexisting condition,” Huckabee explained at the Value Voters Summit today. “Look, I think that sounds terrific, but I want to ask you something from a common sense perspective. Suppose we applied that principle [to] our property insurance. And you can call your insurance agent and say, “I’d like to buy some insurance for my house.” He’d say, “Tell me about your house.” “Well sir, it burned down yesterday, but I’d like to insure it today.” And he’ll say “I’m sorry, but we can’t insure it after it’s already burned.” Well, no preexisting conditions.”
In keeping with the western-themed title of Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders, allow me to set the scene: It’s well past high noon, and as the dust settles the economy lies bleeding. Looks like it’s all over but the dyin’ and the buryin’. But wait! Here come the "young guns" galloping into the scene. But have they come to save the day, or finish the job.
That depends on what they’re packin’, and it ain’t a first aid kit. It looks like their same old ammo used the first time around.
Digby confirms a suspicion I’ve held since the Clinton years: part of the method to the right’s maddness is to exhaust their opponents with their insanity. It’s related to what I previously dubbed “The Tyranny of the Tantrum.”
C:/Users/theath/AppData/Roaming/e/tmcmd:2: command not found: aspell -a
Those of you who went through the 90s will recognize this phenomenon. It’s when the right’s ferocious attacks are so vicious and relentless that they eventually wear down average, common sense people with normal lives to lead — and even scare them a little.
In Clinton’s case it was defending him from the non-stop personal attacks that was so wearying. It took a brave soul with a taste for political combat to keep fighting in the face of that onslaught. It was called Clinton Fatigue, the sense that even people who were sympathetic to the president’s political plight and understood that his enemies were rabid and insane, just wanted it to end. Many analysts think it was the reason why Gore had such a hard time even though the economy was roaring — normally the country would have not wanted to rock that boat. It was the prospect of four or eight more years of wingnuts shrieking and howling that made at least few people say “whatever… give it to them … anything to shut them up.”
In Obama’s case it’s this moribund economy vs the outsized expectations that form the substance of the Democratic base’s complaint. And there’s good reason for people to be disappointed and worried. But the exhaustion at defending him, at least some of it, comes from the same place as that Clinton Fatigue. The right’s non-stop attacks eventually just wear people down, sap them of their enthusiasm, make them question their own judgment, especially in the face of a negative and less than hopeful future. You have to be pretty committed to want to wallow in this toxic mud every day and most people have better things to do with their time.
I’m not saying that if the GOP wasn’t relentlessly attacking Obama that this woman would feel good about him. He hasn’t been very successful at addressing her concerns and there are plenty of liberals who are critical of him as well. But even if he were able to allay her concerns about the economy and the future of the country, the exhaustion that comes from battling back these lunatics is what really takes its toll.
Digby confirms a suspicion I’ve held since the Clinton years: part of the method to the right’s maddness is to exhaust their opponents with their insanity. It’s related to what I previously dubbed “The Tyranny of the Tantrum.”
Those of you who went through the 90s will recognize this phenomenon. It’s when the right’s ferocious attacks are so vicious and relentless that they eventually wear down average, common sense people with normal lives to lead — and even scare them a little.
In Clinton’s case it was defending him from the non-stop personal attacks that was so wearying. It took a brave soul with a taste for political combat to keep fighting in the face of that onslaught. It was called Clinton Fatigue, the sense that even people who were sympathetic to the president’s political plight and understood that his enemies were rabid and insane, just wanted it to end. Many analysts think it was the reason why Gore had such a hard time even though the economy was roaring — normally the country would have not wanted to rock that boat. It was the prospect of four or eight more years of wingnuts shrieking and howling that made at least few people say “whatever… give it to them … anything to shut them up.”
In Obama’s case it’s this moribund economy vs the outsized expectations that form the substance of the Democratic base’s complaint. And there’s good reason for people to be disappointed and worried. But the exhaustion at defending him, at least some of it, comes from the same place as that Clinton Fatigue. The right’s non-stop attacks eventually just wear people down, sap them of their enthusiasm, make them question their own judgment, especially in the face of a negative and less than hopeful future. You have to be pretty committed to want to wallow in this toxic mud every day and most people have better things to do with their time.
I’m not saying that if the GOP wasn’t relentlessly attacking Obama that this woman would feel good about him. He hasn’t been very successful at addressing her concerns and there are plenty of liberals who are critical of him as well. But even if he were able to allay her concerns about the economy and the future of the country, the exhaustion that comes from battling back these lunatics is what really takes its toll.
Digby confirms a suspicion I’ve held since the Clinton years: part of the method to the right’s maddness is to exhaust their opponents with their insanity. It’s related to what I previously dubbed “The Tyranny of the Tantrum.”
Those of you who went through the 90s will recognize this phenomenon. It’s when the right’s ferocious attacks are so vicious and relentless that they eventually wear down average, common sense people with normal lives to lead — and even scare them a little.
In Clinton’s case it was defending him from the non-stop personal attacks that was so wearying. It took a brave soul with a taste for political combat to keep fighting in the face of that onslaught. It was called Clinton Fatigue, the sense that even people who were sympathetic to the president’s political plight and understood that his enemies were rabid and insane, just wanted it to end. Many analysts think it was the reason why Gore had such a hard time even though the economy was roaring — normally the country would have not wanted to rock that boat. It was the prospect of four or eight more years of wingnuts shrieking and howling that made at least few people say “whatever… give it to them … anything to shut them up.”
In Obama’s case it’s this moribund economy vs the outsized expectations that form the substance of the Democratic base’s complaint. And there’s good reason for people to be disappointed and worried. But the exhaustion at defending him, at least some of it, comes from the same place as that Clinton Fatigue. The right’s non-stop attacks eventually just wear people down, sap them of their enthusiasm, make them question their own judgment, especially in the face of a negative and less than hopeful future. You have to be pretty committed to want to wallow in this toxic mud every day and most people have better things to do with their time.
I’m not saying that if the GOP wasn’t relentlessly attacking Obama that this woman would feel good about him. He hasn’t been very successful at addressing her concerns and there are plenty of liberals who are critical of him as well. But even if he were able to allay her concerns about the economy and the future of the country, the exhaustion that comes from battling back these lunatics is what really takes its toll.
A few things become clear upon picking up Young Guns: A New Generation of Conservative Leaders, the new book by Republican House members Paul Ryan, Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy. First, "young" is apparently a relative term in the GOP. Second, a better title might have been, Half-Cocked: Old Ideas From a "New" Generation of Conservative Leaders. And finally, half-cocked though they may be, these "young" guns are not shooting blanks. Their "ammunition" is as old as they are but still quite deadly. And we have the economy to prove it.
My life, lately, has seemed like a bad commercial; one of those where some clueless consumer is using a product that doesn’t really work all that well, and as a result ends up doing twice as much work. That is, until some ultra savvy consumer shows the clueless one the error of his/her ways. Just as the 30-second drama comes to the end, the dawn breaks, the sun shine down on our clueless consumer — who’s no longer clueless, and whose world is a brighter happier place. It might even switch from color to black and white.
But we seem to be stuck in first half of the scenario above, without any sign of a miraculous solution on the way.
Or is it, “People kill people with guns”? Either way, there’s been a bit too much of it going on too close to home for my comfort. Now, people are being shot over speed bumps.
OK. I plead guilty to this When I got my iPhone 4, I gave Parker my old iPhone 3G (with parental controls in place, phone service deactivated, everything restored to factory settings, history wiped clean, and internet access and the App Store on lockdown) to play games on, etc. But does that make me a “Scrooge”? Puh-leeze. An eight-year-old needs the latest iPhone?
It’s happening again. I’m getting that “I’ve got a book in me, if I can make time to write it,” feeling. Of course, that “if” is the big, and the deciding, factor.
It’s not that I don’t trust the guy, and maybe the whole Weinergate thing has me a little gun shy, but am I the only who thinks Obama tweeting for himself may not be the best idea?
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