Monday, May 16, 2016

Truest statement of the week

Not liking Hillary has nothing to do with her being a woman. It has everything to do with the hypermasculine values she espouses.
Hillary is that rare combination, even in our grotesque political landscape, of a smooth-talking neoliberal with the worst tendencies of a warrior-neoconservative. You couldn’t say that about Bill to the same extent, but there isn’t a regime change opportunity, a chemical or conventional arms deal, an escalated aerial (or lately drone) war, or an authoritarian friend in need, that Hillary hasn’t liked. If we get her, we will only be setting back feminism by decades, because her policies—like welfare “reform”—have always come packaged under the false rubric of caring for women and children. It’s like George W. Bush’s “compassionate conservatism,” the rhetorical cover she needs to enact policies, time after time, that erode women’s and children’s standing even as she claims to be their steadfast advocate.

-- Anis Shivani, "Hillary Clinton Does Not Represent Values that Help Women" (HUFFINGTON POST).






A note to our readers

Hey --


A Monday.
 

We had hoped for better.


First, we thank all who participated this edition which includes Dallas and the following:





The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Trina of Trina's Kitchen,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ,
Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends,
Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts,
and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub.



And what did we come up with:










Peace.




-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.









Editorial: Imagine a world without the Iraq War

Lucas Tomlinson (FOX NEWS) reports, "Despite pledges from President Obama and top U.S. officials to 'accelerate' the war against ISIS, the Pentagon admitted Monday that it had retaken only five percent of ISIS-held territory in Iraq in the past five months."

More cold water splashed on Barack Obama's Iraq War.


The American people are told fables of success daily by the White House.

The press more or less dutifully repeats it.

The fables (lies) are used to tamp down on outrage -- outrage that the Iraq War continues, outrage that the US government continues to spend billions on Iraq while the streets, cities, schools and libraries in the United States suffer, while food assistance becomes more of a joke, while those in need go without.

From the 80s forward, the homeless population in the United States has grown and grown.

Imagine if Barack spent money addressing homelessness in the US.

Imagine he took just a month of the millions spent on Iraq and spent them on shelters and job training and health (mental and physical) assistance for the homeless.

Imagine what the country might be like then.

But he wants his war.

And he's got it.


1iraq


[April 16th photo taken by U.S. Army Sgt. Kalie Jones, "U.S. Army First Sgt. Gabriel Montgomery with 524th Combat Sustainment Support Battalion, 17th Sustainment Brigade, Task Force Battle Born, issues an M16 rifle to an Iraqi soldier assigned to Iraq’s 4th Battalion, 23rd Brigade, during an Iraqi Train and Equip Fund issuing point at Camp Taji, Iraq,"]

And he orders the daily bombings of Iraq and orders more US service members into the country.

And he pretends that training and bombing will defeat the Islamic State.

The only thing that will defeat the Islamic State is ending the persecution of the Sunnis that gave rise to the Islamic State in Iraq.

But Barack doesn't want to end the Iraq War.

He wants to play kick the can and gift it to the next president of the United States.



















TV: The fools don't just rush in, they linger


When will they learn?

Seriously, when?


abtv

Like Ellen Barkin before her, Debra Messing tanked an NBC show and put herself, the rest of the cast, the crew, etc out of business.

Was it worth it?

We championed THE MYSTERIES OF LAURA in its first season.  We noted it was reliable in the ratings and could be put on any night and get respectable ratings.

And that was only more evident with season two.

At the start of March, the series was going to be renewed.

And then Debra Messing launched a catfight online with activist and Academy Award winning actress Susan Sarandon.

Yes, Debra launched it.

She deliberately distorted Susan's position.

And because our sexist society loves a cat fight, Debra got a lot of attention.

More attention than she'd received since the 90s.

She was a Twitter star.

Now she could have her Twitter fight with Susan and that would have been mildly entertaining to some.

But having found internet stardom, Debra wanted more.

Knowing the world was now watching, Debra used her soapbox to attack Green Party members, to attack Republicans, to attack non-voters and to attack Democrats supporting Bernie Sanders.

Did she forget that she was in a business where she had to appeal to viewers?

That she lived and died by the audience?

This isn't about free speech -- it's about manners and common sense.

And NBC became alarmed as the e-mails and calls started.

Debra was offending a lot of people.

Some of those complaining to NBC about all the hatred Debra was Tweeting were, like her, Hillary Clinton supporters.  But they would note that their parent or child or spouse or sibling or friend was for Bernie or Donald Trump of Jill Stein or whomever and that they did not appreciate her the hate she was spewing at their loved ones.

Debra was offensive.

She could be a Hillary supporter.

But there was no reason to be pouring so much hate on those who were not.

There is no mystery about the cancellation, she brought it on.

And we warned her.

TV -- especially broadcast TV -- needs eye balls.

It needs viewers.

And when you insult huge parts of the population, you limit yourself with regards to potential viewers.

Again, she could have been a Hillary supporter online.

No one would have much cared.

But when you're going around insulting whole groups of people?

Everyone cares.

Debra is still a talented actress.

She is also an unemployed one.

We want to repeat this: You can support a candidate.

You can speak out against a war (we do).

But you can do that without tearing apart WE THE PEOPLE.

It's a lesson Debra may now learn.

After it's too late.

And THE MYSTERIES OF LAURA was not fascinating TV but it could be compelling.

Equally important, it was a rare show anchored by an actress.

What happened to the actresses?

Did anyone notice how they've disappeared?

Where's MURPHY BROWN or ROSEANNE, for example?

Where's the actress playing a woman who's more than an after thought?

Sitcoms are geared around children and adult male actors.

Having 2 BROKE GIRLS and MOM on the air makes CBS almost look revolutionary.

Until we get to the SUPERGIRL thing.

The show is bad.

It should have been so much better.

Actually, it should have been a super hero show about a beloved female character -- Wonder Woman, Batgirl, Batwoman, Storm, Jean Grey, Sue Storm, Spider-Woman, Black Canary, etc.

Instead, one of the weakest female characters in the comic universe was made the focus of a  --

What is it?

It thinks -- in its many cutesy moments -- that it's a romantic comedy.

Viewers were hoping for an action show.

But apparently the show runners can only do action when the one in tights is packing a penis.

So the team that could create ARROW and FLASH had no interest in focusing on Supergirl's powers but did have an interest in tearing her down.

Weekly.

And CBS noted the erosion in the ratings.

The debut was a smash.

Nearly 13 million people tuned in to watch the first episode.


There was a clear desire to see an action show with a female lead.

But this wasn't that kind of show.

By the season finale, the show was struggling to get six million viewers.

It's not cancelled but it's moving over to THE CW.

Again, CBS is not revolutionary -- not even by comparison.

Because not only did they dump SUPERGIRL, they also passed on NANCY DREW.

We honestly don't think there's a CBS show in NANCY DREW.

When ABC cast Pamela Sue Martin in the role back in the seventies, the show aired during the 'family hour' on Sunday nights.

CBS fills that hour  with 60 MINUTES.

So where a teen show would have gone on the current schedule is a mystery.

But the show did test well -- not well enough with men, however, for CBS' tastes.

Again, we wouldn't put it on ourselves.

Nancy Drew makes for a wonderful book but without a serious update the character can come off a throw back -- especially the further you get from the first 25 books in the series in their original editions.  Nancy gets watered down a lot -- to the point of embarrassment.

So we wouldn't have even spent money on a pilot.

But CBS did.

And got a show that, again, tested well.

But passed on it because they didn't think enough men would watch.


Of course, they aren't the most ignorant network.

That would be ABC.

Bad enough that they aired the tired dope opera BLOOD & OIL (forgetting that any real soap opera needs a major female character), they also aired TO REDEAM A PREDATOR aka THE FAMILY in which one pedophile was the good guy and the other was the bad guy.

Continuing their trend of stupidity, they looked at their romantic comedy CASTLE and decided, in April, to sign another contract with male star Nathan Fillion while deciding not to resign female star Stana Katic.  As news filtered out that Fillion would be back without Katic, enthusiasm for a ninth season tanked and ABC was forced to announce that they were cancelling CASTLE.

They could put two pedophiles on the air in 2016 but they couldn't provide you with one show that starred a woman.  (Shonda Rhimes' various pot boilers are ensemble shows.)

When will they learn?

The networks have been losing audiences forever.

As Susan Faludi documented in the trailblazing book BACKLASH, they've lost audiences in part because they've run off women.

When will they learn?

Maybe one network has learned a little.

THE CW announced they were renewing all of their shows.

They have no ratings bomb and haven't for some time.

But season after season, they, and other networks, cancel popular shows that aren't popular enough by their standards.

What replaces these shows often pulls in smaller audiences.

It creates a lot of ill will and mistrust.

THE CW is moving towards year round programming and they are making strong decisions based upon that goal.

They're also the only network that's not working overtime to run off female viewers.















Hillary Clinton's faux feminism

crankyclinton

If it seems hard to find anything Hillary Clinton's done that borders on feminism it's because she -- and her zombie followers -- define anything she does for herself as "feminism."

The crypto conservative is wedded to gender roles though she likes to pretend otherwise.

Take her latest insult to women.

Abby Phillip's "Bill Clinton won't serve in Hillary Clinton's cabinet, but here's the job she wants him to have" (WASHINGTON POST) makes clear how little respect she has for the roles so many women have to play.

Hillary wants to be the President of the United States.

Usually when someone wants to be that, it's understood that their spouse would fulfill the First spouse role.

But that's when it's a woman.

And Hillary won't stand for that when it comes to a man.

No, heaven forbid Bill Clinton have the same duties that Eleanor Roosevelt, Mamie Eisenhower, Betty Ford, Dolley Madison, Michelle Obama, Caroline Harrison and so many other women have performed.

See a man, in Hillary's mind, can't handle these roles.

Yet again, she's creating a male exception.

The same way she did on her husband's cheating and Brett McGurk's cheating and Anthony Weiner's cheating and . . .


With Hillary, there are always strict rules for women . . . and one exception after another for men.





Image of the week


image of the week




Air Force Master Sgt. Israel Del Toro throws a shot put during the 2016 Invictus Games in Orlando, Fla., May 10, 2016. DoD photo by EJ Hersom

More 'feminism' from Hillary Clinton




On 28 July 1975, smeared a 12-year old rape victim by saying she had "a tendency to seek out older men"

What really happened

johnbm


As Jordan's Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh introduces him, elderly US Secretary of State John Kerry struggles to pass a particularly difficult bowel movement.











Deep Thoughts From Roh-Roh Farrow

It's me, Roh-Roh Farrow.

I'm a failed TV host taking to the pages of THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER to whine about fame -- specifically how the famous get stuff other people don't.

Like if you did a really bad job and got fired after a year of repeat chances, you wouldn't get to write a column for THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER unless you were famous.

Or like it's unfair that my sister can't get her day in court.  If she were famous, it wouldn't matter that the statute of limitations had run out.

She's so unfamous and that must really suck.

If I weren't famous, I'd kill myself.


I like being famous but feel like I'd be more famous if my mother wasn't Mia Farrow.


miapia

Her brief moment of fame was in 1968.

Since then, she really doesn't work, she just has work done.


I wish I'd had so much work done that my face resembled a Muppet head or that my lips were permanently swollen.

Mommy's so lucky.

But I digress.

Years ago, when I was too young to know anything, Mommy broke up with my father Woody Allen.

I'm still too young to know anything.

If I have but one life to live, let me live it as an infamously dumb blond.

What was I saying.

Something about how unfair fame is.

My whole life proves that.

I've never had anything to say but I sure do say it a lot.

Over and over.

You can do that with a famous father and a semi-celebrity mother.

(Why couldn't Jill St. John -- or anyone else really talented -- have been my mother!!!)

I call myself a reporter.

Isn't that cute?

I'm like a socialite with a camera calling herself a photographer.




He's got to walk like a camel

BCT


US President Barack Obama decides to celebrate the 2016 NCAA Championship by putting on display his own case of camel toe.







This edition's playlist


benharper




1) Ben Harper's CALL IT WHAT IT IS.


2) Nick Jonas' NICK JONAS.


3) Janet Jackson's UNBREAKABLE.


4) Drake's VIEWS.




10)  Alicia Keys' VH1 STORYTELLERS.






Shaun King explains what happened in Nevada

Debra Messing, failed TV actress and Hillary Clinton cultist, is busy comparing herself to Gandhi and denouncing Bernie Sanders supporters in Nevada.  

What really happened?

NEW YORK DAILY NEWS journalist Shaun King provides the walk through.




  1. So, if we're going to talk about how Bernie's delegates were yelling and were upset, don't tell that story without starting RIGHT HERE.
  2. They need to pass by a "clear majority." Folk were taken by surprise. She then said they "passed" and "cannot be changed." Folk lost it.
  3. Out of nowhere, right in the middle of a woman talking, the Democratic Party proposes "new rules". Nobody has seen or heard what they are.
  4. This video was early in the AM. A woman, off camera is speaking, then at 0:58 seconds into this video, the shadiness really begins. See it?
  5. So, the media account is "Bernie's supporters are crazy as hell and were uncontrollable & raucous for no real reason." LIES.
  6. I need to set the record straight here. All weekend, mainstream media has GROSSLY misrepresented what went down in Nevada. WATCH THE VIDEO.
  7. At 0:58 a man whispers in her ear. She proposes "new rules." They fail to pass, she lies & say they do. Folk go off!
    The exact moment the Democratic Party showed the fix is in
    This is how the Democratic Party started its convention in Nevada. THIS set the tone for the contentious and raucous environment. Bernie supporters didn't come there for ugliness. The Party did this.
  8. I'm about to show you some incredibly shady shit that went down with the Democratic Party. THEY set the tone for the foolishness in Nevada.
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