One poppy blooms for Memorial Day.
Nice timing, Momma Nature pic.twitter.com/9CSWW5j52C— Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) May 27, 2018
The first #MemorialDay was started by former slaves on May 1, 1865 in Charleston, SC to honor 257 dead Union Soldiers. The freedmen cleaned up and landscaped the burial ground, building an enclosure and an arch labeled, “Martyrs of the Race Course.” pic.twitter.com/0PMB08h4eV
— 3ChicsPolitico (@3ChicsPolitico) May 28, 2018
NotMax
Annual Memorial Day obligatory clip.
satby
@NotMax: Good evening! It’s still late evening for you, right?
satby
We’re in day 2 of a 3 day hot streak of temps in the 90°s, more suitable for August than May. Tomorrow is a big event at the market, which isn’t air conditioned. And has been shut up in the broiling sun for two days. I’m hoping all my soap hasn’t melted.
raven
Andy Stein nearly 50 years ago. RIP Brother.
raven
JPL
@raven: Thank you for the story.
satby
@raven: RIP Andy and all the boys (and now girls) taken too soon while serving.
rikyrah
Good Morning,Everyone ???
Baud
I’ve never served or lost anyone who has, and even I always found Happy Memorial Day to be odd sounding. And the sales are rarely very good.
Baud
@rikyrah: Good morning.
Brachiator
I salute the fallen.
I pay my respects to all who have lost friends, family, comrades.
I look forward to the time when the Biblical wish might be fulfilled.
NotMax
@satby
Yes indeedy.
Did a round of preemptive lawn mowing Sunday. Only the most troublesome areas (which are also the fastest growing). Very noticeable vog visible in the distance, hanging heavy at sea level.
raven
@Baud: I’m actually tired of the holier than thou bullshit of telling people what the “real” meaning of Memorial Day is. It’s whatever people make it.
Baud
@raven: Sure. I’m not going to preach to anyone. I’m just saying “Happy Memorial Day” sounds like an odd things to say. Probably, most people don’t understand the difference between Memorial Day and Veterans Day, however, so I get why it happens.
Schlemazel
@raven:
My grandfather served in the Great War. My dad would have served in the second except he had a wife & 2 kids by ’41. They were all affected by those wars and lost people they knew. grandma still called it Decoration Day and we would troop out to Union Cemetery in Maplewood and tend to the patches of people whom I had never met. Some had served, most had not. It never stuck me as a military holiday until the last few years. I don’t know how it was for other people, for me it was a day of rememberence.
evodevo
@Schlemazel: Yes. Here in Ky the husband’s family all went to the local cemetery and decorated the graves of family members, not necessarily military. It was an annual event – everyone called it Decoration Day. When I moved here in 1956, (from more civilized climes lol), the local banks still closed on Confederate Memorial Day – June 3 (also Jefferson Davis’ birthday – a local boy, dontcha know). That slowly fell into obscurity over the intervening years, though the statute is still on the books…
Julia
I grew up also thinking of it as Decoration Day, and we always visited the graves of family members (veterans and non) to tidy them up and bring flowers. I never thought of it as associated with military dead specifically until I was much older.
Thoughtful David
I always think of this song on Memorial Day:
And the Band Played Waltzing Matilda
True, it was written by a Scot living in Australia about Anzac soldiers and for their November 11 Rememberance Day, but the sentiments I think are valid and the same as our Memorial Day.
ETA: YouTube link
Steeplejack
The day’s off to an early but lazy start. Fed the housecat early, as usual—she’s crepuscular!—and decided to stay up. Made coffee and had a cup with an apple turnover from the bakery while I did the crosswords. Real breakfast later.
It’s overcast but only 62° outside (but 97% humidity!), so the windows are open for the breeze until it gets too hot and/or humid later. But the high is supposed to be only 75° or so. Sounds nice.
No big plans, but if I get sufficiently motivated I might hit the deli. I’ve been jonesin’ for a pastrami sandwich for a while.
Thoughtful David
@Thoughtful David:
Sorry, it’s actually for Anzac Day, not Rememberance Day. Same dif.
Ladyraxterinok
In the late 40s/early 50s (when we kids were in grade school) we would go to gramma’s house early in the morning . She would have tubs of water with flowers from her yard. We’d take them to the cemetary and decorate the graves of gramma’s parents, her husband, and 2 of her sons (1 who died at 6 months of age). Then we’d go to the cemetary with a mauseleum where another son was buried.
My 2 brothers are going later today (i have a walker and can’t navigate the terrain). Now there are also the graves of my gramma, my mom and dad, my mom’s father, and my aunt and her husband.
When the baby died at 6 months in 1906, my grampa bought a plot with 8 places. My mom was the 8th and last to be buried there in 2005.
lahke
Video tells me that it’s not available in my country. I’m temporarily in Canada–what has YouTube got against Canada?
germy
Look at their faces. So young!
Kay
That’s big news, I think. None of them have admitted the Russia investigation is even important up to this point but Giuliani admits impeachable offenses will be revealed. I know you’re all going to tell me “of course it’s true” but I don’t know what Mueller found- we get zero real news about it, other than indictments.
The reason I think it’s true is because raising impeachment publicly is against Trump’s interests but bigmouth Giuliani probably couldn’t resist blabbing since having inside info makes him important. I wonder if he’s telling Trump that and that’s why we’ve seen the big increase in lies and accusations the last couple of weeks from the President- something is rattling Trump- the lies are escalating like crazy.
If it is true they know that “the decision will be whether to impeach” his lawyers should be telling Trump that- that’s their job- but I never know if any of these people have actual jobs or follow ordinary rules.
Ladyraxterinok
My dad’s grandfather was born in 1842 in the Shenandoah Valley of VA; when he was 7, the family moved to IA. He fought in the Civil War with the 11th IA Infantry. (Some of his relatives back in VA fought for the south; I think at least 1 died at Gettysburg.)
A veterans group used to put flags on all the graves of veterans buried in that cemetary. My brother remembers there were confederate flags on the graves of those who fought for the south. I don’t recall that.
germy
@Kay:
Wasn’t he doing that during the campaign? Saying “Some big news is coming out tomorrow, bad news for Hillary!” which later incriminated him? Or am I thinking of Stone?
Jeffro
@Brachiator: well said
MattF
@Kay: I agree that Giuliani is probably pumping Trump up– it’s probably mutual. The old gang, Ailes, Gorka, etc., et. al., is mostly gone and Trump has had to find new playmates. And new lawyers.
germy
We saw Avengers Infinity War yesterday. There’s a scene in Wakanda. The force field has been opened and giant spaceships are entering. The lady general says to the king “When I suggested opening Wakanda, I didn’t expect this.”
“What did you expect?” the king asks.
“The olympics. A Starbucks, maybe.”
debbie
@MattF:
Stephen Miller just doesn’t do it for him anymore? //
debbie
@satby:
Same here with the temperatures, yuck. I held off on my daily walk until right before sunset and it was still in the upper 80s. August will be hell.
Good luck at the market. Hydrate, and then hydrate some more!
Mai naem mobile
@Kay: if there was anything to the informant stuff the Republicans attending the meeting on Thursday would have been running talking points all weekend long. Trumpov has also been tweeting,not quite off his rocker, but he’s obviously freaking out. There’s shit about to drop this weekend. It also must be freaking him out that nothing seems to be taking the story off the front page – not the Venezuelan hostage, not the North Korean stuff, not Kiluauea,nothing.
MattF
@debbie: I’m not really a fan of Rick Wilson, but he’s smart and knows both guys.
El Caganer
@Thoughtful David: I like this version, too: https://youtu.be/GPFjToKuZQM
Baud
Perhaps of interest to some here.
https://balkin.blogspot.com/2018/05/two-new-collections-of-documents-about.html
oldgold
I spent a decade working in a cemetery.
As a young teen I remember the old Sexton bellowing at the crew, “You lazy bustards can sit on your asses all year, but Oak Shade will shine on Memorial Day!” And, it did.
Baud
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2018/05/25/the-men-killed-on-a-single-day-in-the-vietnam-war-and-the-haunting-wall-that-memorializes-them/
Baud
The Hill
Kay
@Mai naem mobile:
Definite uptick in crazy from the President. I laughed out loud when I saw the tweet where Trump says Obama should have done more on Russian interference. What Russian interference, Mr. Trump? The official line is there was none.
Something’s up. I bet they got something on one of his adult children. He seems to freak when anyone gets close to a family member. I think it’s just as likely to be Ivanka as one of the sons. Trump’s biographer said Ivanka’s just as dirty as the boys, she’s a just a more polished phony.
debbie
@MattF:
That is some opening line! If only the same were to befall MIller, this would be a wonderful summer.
Platonailedit
@Baud: Twitler is a dunce is such a good defense.
debbie
Who’s the most out-of-touch person in this country?
Bet they’d be happier to be alive.
Platonailedit
@Kay:
Of course, she is as corrupt as her creepy papa.
MomSense
@germy:
Giuliani seemed to have been getting inside info from the NY FBI office whereas Stone was getting advance Wikileaks info.
Another interesting angle in all of this is Hannity’s contact with Russian Intelligence and whether he is still in contact. He talks to the president every day.
Kay
@Baud:
So funny how there have been no revelations from the radical transparency crowd since Trump’s election. They must be pure as the driven snow, the Trumpsters. Information no longer wants to be free. Instead, no news is good news!
JPL
Trump will lay the wreath on the tomb of the unknown soldier this morning. I’m curious whether or not Melania will be with him, since it appears to be taking a long time to recover from her surgery.
Citizen Scientist
@germy: That’s the school 2 of my cousin’s sons attend. They have an AA father, so she was putting out how upset she was on all the social media. I think she’s a Drump supporter but not sure.
In more casual old white guy racist news: talked to my mom the other day. She lives in a relatively ethnically diverse neighborhood and there’s a new housing development being built across the one lane road from her house. A longtime friend (he’s the old white guy) of my folks stopped by to chat. He said something about selling his house and mom casually mentioned that he should look into those new homes. He replied,”I’m not the right color. ” my mom, was taken a bit aback and asked what that meant. He said something like “I’m not black.” she informed him that she has an AA BIL. His response: ‘that’s ok.’ or some other casual racist remark that means ‘I’m sure they’re fine people, not like those other ones. ‘
I am really sick of how it’s ok to be proud to be a racist in this country now.
Kay
@Platonailedit:
I’ve come to dislike her more than the boys. They’re horrible but they’re openly awful. She’s a phony.
I think she and Jared have hired a professional photographer to frame their family moments. Either that or one of the staff is a really good at taking flattering photos.
Dnfree
@Baud: when I was growing up in the fifties in the Midwest, it was called Decoration Day and families went to the cemetery and decorated graves of family members. There wasn’t a specific military connotation then. So I still think of it that way. There would be a picnic afterwards, so it was a serious occasion, but also a get-together with food and laughter.
Aleta
Thanks for this entire story.
Stan
Well, screw you buddy. Enjoy your safety today, purchased at the cost of many lives better than yours.
Elizabelle
HBO is rolling out a documentary/hagiography on John McCain tonight. And George HW Bush is hospitalized again, for low blood pressure and fatigue. At some point, we are going to be deluged with the Village mourning the last great Republicans. Boy, is it in full (tire) swing with the McCain stuff. (And I do wish him well; brain cancer is tough, and he did stand against Jerry Falwell etc during his 2000 race for president, before he capitulated in later years.)
Just One More Canuck
@MattF: I particularly liked this: “Trump follows a clear pattern with his employees, hangers-on, camp followers, and six-degrees-of-separation edge cases who trail him like chunks of matter kicked off some fecal comet hurling across the political firmament.”
Immanentize
@Kay: Kay,
Did you see this article at Huffpo about paying interns, etc. For political campaigns?. The headline doesn’t fit the article, but it is what you have been saying …
Kay
@Ladyraxterinok:
Our high school band marches thru town to the cemetery and then they play at a memorial service. It’s kind of odd- no parade, just the band. Maybe it’s fitting. It’s mournful, really.
eric
@germy: look at where the paper filed it…holy bugfuck “RACIST TEENS” are there that many, that there is a separate category from “RACIST ADULTS,” and “RACIST PRESIDENTS”?
Immanentize
@Stan:
Oh my. Oh my.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry…
You have no idea who you are trying to fuck with right there, Stan, do you?
eric
My favorite poem:
Dulce et Decorum Est
BY WILFRED OWEN
Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,—
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
eric
@Immanentize: I laughed….loudly
debbie
@Immanentize:
Right! I’ve unplugged my laptop to keep it safe from what lies ahead (as justified as it will be). See you in safer times! //
p.a.
@Immanentize: yowza!
MomSense
@Immanentize: @eric:
I shouldn’t have taken a sip of coffee before reading poor Stan’s comment. It was a hot spittake.
Kay
@Immanentize:
I didn’t see it, thank you. Ugh, this:
The cluelessness just kills me. For a Party who supposedly care about working people they don’t pay a lot of attention to…work. They must know this is self-selecting, right? That they’ll remain clueless as long as they surround themselves with people who can afford to take a year off work?
I’m certainly not telling young people to donate a year to a campaign that raises a billion dollars. That’s a rip off. Cut they pay at the top 10% and pass some down, you dopes. Or, better yet, cut the tv ad budget by 50%.
They have the money. They just spend it poorly. This is like the best problem to have if you’re a manager. “My, WHAT will I do with this BILLION dollars?” That’s a great problem. That’s a very creative space to be in- allocating huge piles of donated money. There should be all kinds of discussion on how to spend it. Instead there’s none. They do the same things they’ve been doing since 1972.
Platonailedit
Yet another proof why UN is so dysfunctional.
Yeah, let’s blame the alphabets.
Immanentize
@Kay: I heard about some democratic campaign that unionized. That sounds like where the Dems should be.
MomSense
@Kay:
I think it comes down to who has time for the time commitments in leadership. It’s people who are retired and/or have money. The youngish people have a spouse who makes it possible for them to volunteer.
The kids who intern now are all wealthy. They don’t need the room and board (I used to offer housing) anymore.
Unpaid internships piss me off. My middle son is currently doing one. Internships are a graduation requirement and it makes me so angry. They don’t have to take an unpaid internship but good luck finding one that isn’t. I sent a diplomatic email to the dean about it. After he graduates I will be less diplomatic.
Yarrow
@Kay: Ivanka is a traitor. She’s also worse than the boys because she’s able to get away with more since she’s female and attractive. After Trump himself, she’s the one I most want to see in an orange jumpsuit.
Mike in NC
Fat Bastard tweeted “Happy Memorial Day”? What a clueless imbecile. Who will dishonor our war dead by pretending to care about laying a wreath? Maybe Jared will get the assignment if Trump prefers to golf.
MomSense
Btw, there is a good news story from
Paris about a 22 year old Malian, Mamoudou Gamassa, who scaled a building to save a small child who had fallen over a balcony and was hanging on to the railing. Mamoudou is meeting with Macron today and receiving citizenship. The video of the rescue is amazing.
dnfree
@Stan: In my youth it was Decoration Day (as noted above), when families honored all their dead. Apparently during the Vietnam era it changed to being in honor of only military dead. I think your reaction is a little over the top.
“Originally known as Decoration Day, it originated in the years following the Civil War and became an official federal holiday in 1971. Many Americans observe Memorial Day by visiting cemeteries or memorials, holding family gatherings and participating in parades.”
sdhays
@MomSense: My university had a program that included doing an internship for credits, but those internships were all paid internships as far as I know (I didn’t participate for various reasons). Your comment reminds me of a story I heard about a new policy at Chicago Public Schools: in 2020, you’ll have to have a “plan” before you can get your damn diploma.
This just seems unbelievably stupid and frankly cruel to me. The high school diploma simply establishes that you made it through all the public education that the state provides. When you complete your coursework, the diploma should be yours. It’s a fine goal to encourage these kids to develop a plan, but you don’t need to withhold their diploma. There are plenty of incentives already existing in our society to push 18 year olds to develop “a plan” for post-high school. What they need are better options and more help figuring out what the options are. Instead of treating them with respect, the plan treats the kids as lazy and stupid because they need to be threatened with not getting their diploma to visit the counselor (who, by the sounds of it, will be overworked because their won’t be enough of them).
Rahm Emmanuel is a bad mayor.
JPL
@MomSense: What an amazing rescue, and as many articles pointed out, he looked like spiderman scaling the building. The father left the four year old alone, and you can see neighbors trying to help, but there was a barrier between the apartments.
MomSense
@Yarrow:
I’ve been advising for months that she ease up on the Botox so she can be more believable when she pleads for mercy at her sentencing hearing.
Steeplejack
Looks like I’ve got my motivation to go out later today. Former coworker has a banged-up knee and needs a ride to work at 1:00, so I’ll do that and then head on over to the deli. Problem solved.
Yarrow
@MomSense: I doubt she could ease up on the Botox. Her whole face would fall off.
H.E.Wolf
@Stan:
The commenter you spat on served in Vietnam during that conflict.
I was and am a peacenik and a patriot. Some family members were in the military, some were conscientious objectors and performed alternate service. All of them understood that our Constitution includes the right for each person to commemorate Memorial Day as he or she chooses.
To all the jackals, may your memories of comrades and loved ones be a blessing to you.
Kay
@MomSense:
That the Democratic Party adopted the worst of US business practices in their actual organization just blows me away. They have a rigidly top-down model and they pay people at the top a ton and people at the bottom nothing. As in “zero”. Why does this continue? It’s bad. It’s a bad model. They don’t even have to turn a profit! These are donations.
I would also treat media people better. I know we hate this but it’s true- every campaign book from a media person includes a big bitchy rant about how they have poor accomodations or bad food or whatever. So give it to them. Then at least we can put this to rest and never hear again about how they didn’t get a plane like that other campaign had.
This doesn’t have to be so horrible. They have turned it into this nightmare but that’s unnecessary. Maybe more people would take part if it didn’t SUCK so much? There’s this kind of strange acceptance “oh, US political campaigns are horrible” That’s written in stone? Why? Voters have accepted it too. You go to their door and they’re like “I HATE this whole thing” – no one cares. The voters hate it! Isn’t it supposed to be for them?
If you have a billion dollars to play with why start with “this will be exactly as horrible as the Nixon campaign in 1972, because anything better is impossible”. They’re making something- why not make something that isn’t so bad?
Just start over. Zero out all expenditures and start over. Nothing gets back in unless it’s worthwhile and good.
MoxieM
@eric: I love that poem so much. I’ll add my favorite rendition of a suitable song (yeah, Youtube Link), The Green Fields of France, also called Willie McBride. It seems recollections of The Great (“Great”?) war are especially apt around now–not just for the centennial, but also for the oligarchs, The kleptocrats, the Russians, the racism and racist violence, the anti-semitism, the perversion of populist religion, the isolationism of the US, and the center crumbling in Europe. Well, I could go on but I don’t need to in this crowd..
Elizabelle
@Kay: And the campaigns are too long. Remove a lot of the money and time, and you might be somewhere.
oldgold
@H.E.Wolf:
!
debbie
@Yarrow:
She might be forced to smile!
MomSense
@JPL:
It really was incredible. I hope it can lead to a reexamination of how migrants and immigrants are treated in France. Good on Macron for honoring this young hero.
@sdhays:
The way we force schools to deal with so many of our societal failings while pretending the problems are just with the lazy youngs and their parents is disgraceful.
The assumptions that underlie a lot of these policies like internships, work requirements for assistance, and even community service are just cruel and ignorant. If internships are essential for starting careers and only people with means can participate, then it is just another way we keep poor people from advancing.
When I was still teaching I used to have students come to me upset because they were working to help support their families and didn’t have time to do community service and keep up with their schoolwork. I remember the first time I went to the principal about a senior who was worried about graduating because of the service requirement. He seemed shocked that there were poor kids in his school. You should have seen his face when I told him that our gang of art and music teachers were providing shampoo, soap, deodorant, tampons, etc for the kids who only have showers available at school.
He didn’t know he had been wearing blinders his whole career.
Kay
@MomSense:
My daughter works in health care and she was telling me they’re trying to make physician training less horrible. Eureka right? It is actually not necessary to torture people with sleep deprivation to teach them something. If you’re falling asleep standing up you’re probably not doing your best thinking.
I don’t understand voluntary suffering. There’s enough involuntary suffering. Why make it part of your workplace culture? So the people who “survive” can he heroes and then insist that the next cohort suffer equally?
Kathleen
@Baud: I wonder if PBO knew about Russian interference early in his administration and was quietly trying to address it, and if the Snowald Psy-Ops caper was payback or a warning.
JPL
Someone gave the asshole his phone back. Those who died for us would be very proud of the economy, and the unemployment numbers. Next tweets are about spygate and Sally Yates.
https://twitter.com/RealPressSecBot
debbie
@MomSense:
If that can happen anywhere, I bet France would be the place. People still express gratitude for America’s intervention in WWI. Life still stops when descendants of veterans arrive at a village.
Steve on St. Simons Island
@raven: I’m not a huge poetry fan, but that one was great. And powerful. For whatever reason, WWI generated a lot of great poetry.
Kathleen
@debbie: To paraphrase Adam, blog comments are at def con 3.
Kay
@JPL:
“The President deserves some answers” – always about him. Always.
It came from Fox, of course. They make millions of dollars a year to pump out this garbage. Pure crap.
sdhays
@Elizabelle: Oh, yes! I think the thing I admire most about parliamentary elections is that since you don’t know, necessarily, when the next election is going to be, there’s no cycle of lazy pundits speculating about “who’s going to be President in 2025?” and when the election happens, it’s a month or so, and then it’s over (unless the result forces another election).
With our scheduled elections, I doubt we can fully get away from that nonsense, but at least reducing the money should give elected officials some time to actually govern rather than raising money and campaigning.
B.B.A.
@MoxieM: if only the US had been more isolationist, Europe might have more thoroughly destroyed itself and Versailles and WW2 wouldn’t have happened.
Fuck Woodrow Wilson.
MomSense
@Kay: @Elizabelle: The only benefit to a long campaign was that over time we had a better shot of vetting or of having the candidate’s deal breaking faults revealed. Well that is out the window now, too.
It’s all just a big money maker for the political operatives, consultants, and media corporations. St Bernard’s was probably the worst campaign in terms of money spent on the top operatives, advertisements, and the ad buyers. Right now we have to just focus on the midterm elections and saving our democracy. Then we need to clean fucking house with communications and election laws.
debbie
@Steve on St. Simons Island:
It was the shock of the brutality of war and the realization that it was no longer a gentlemanly pursuit.
Jager
Last year we had a Memorial Day get together, one of Mrs. J’s clients and her husband were invited. The husband is an overall good guy, a Vietnam Vet. He showed up in an Army Aviation cap and a jungle jacket covered with patches, his car is covered with stickers and decals, he’s obsessed with his service, every conversation circles back to 66-67. He knows I’m a Vietnam Vet. The first thing he asked me was “where’s your Army shit”? I told him I thought it was in a box in my sister’s basement. He said, “Aren’t you proud of your service”?
I am, but I don’t dwell on it. My dad was a decorated pilot in WWII, my grandfather was a teenage infantryman in WWI, neither one of them spent the their lives reliving their experiences, they did belong to Veterans groups for the service aspect of the organizations. On my mother’s side of the family there was a Revolutionary War Captain, I’m pretty damn sure he didn’t spend the balance of his life reliving the revolution. As a kid I don’t remember any WWII vets (virtual all of my old man’s friends were vets) devoting their lives to constantly talking about their war. This isn’t a Memorial Day thing with him, I’ve run into him on many occasions and he’s always focused on Vietnam. My old Admiral pal calls guys like him “professional Vietnam Veterans”.
Immanentize
@Kay: “Many people are saying….”
Yarrow
@Kay: It’s actually dangerous for patients, which is another reason to make physician training better. No one benefits when a resident who is treating patients is sleep deprived and overworked. People make mistakes when they’re tired, no matter how smart and committed to their job they are. When doctors make mistakes patients pay the price.
Another Scott
@raven: Morning, everyone.
As always, there are cultural landmines when it comes to using flowers for symbols.
David Cameron in China.
Cheers,
Scott.
MomSense
@Kay:
It’s not exactly “patient centered medicine” to have some sleep deprived resident practicing on you.
germy
Kay
@MomSense:
I wonder if it bothers the editors of the NYTimes that their reporter who covered Hillary Clinton for 8 years was actually collecting information for a book that is WILDLY popular with Clinton haters.
I mean, come on. How is his fair to the public? We were all in service to her career goals? For 8 years?
Everyone benefits from this crappy campaign industry except voters. It serves the (upper tier of) people who work in it and no one else. Scrap the whole thing and start over. It cannot be worse than it is. There’s no risk of losing anything.
zhena gogolia
Now the Reply button isn’t working.
I mean the think where you click on the nym to see what the person is replying to. It keeps bouncing back.
MomSense
@debbie:
I hope you’re right that they can change because France’s current treatment of immigrants, especially Muslims, is deplorable.
JPL
@Jager: I didn’t release that my father was at Pearl Harbor until I was in high school. The soldiers returned from war and went on with their lives. imo.
Steve on St. Simons Island
@debbie: but there’s no danger/it’s a professional career
And it can be arranged/with just a word in Mr. Churchill’s ear…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=LrjHz5hrupA
rikyrah
This THREAD on Haberman. Calling her out
https://twitter.com/skepticalbrotha/status/1000921685770539011?s=20
germy
@Kay:
Baud
@Kay: No.
germy
Kathleen
@Kay: I made the mistake of following the link. WTF is with these people?
Jeffro
@Kay: I think you’re right – Don Jr and/or Jared
I like the idea of indicting, trying, and convicting everyone around him, leaving him to stew all alone for however long it takes him to resign in disgrace
Steve on St. Simons Island
@B.B.A.: Staunton, Virginia has a lot to answer for
Immanentize
@zhena gogolia:
I had this problem then I realized that the reply button as you call it was not working because the page had not finished loading. So, to solve the issue, all you need to do is stop he page from (re)loading and then the reply search function works again…. HTH.
Villago Delenda Est
@Stan: raven is a Vietnam vet, FYI.
Steve on St. Simons Island
Looks like trump isn’t the only one striking the wrong tone today. Got this email from an Atlanta restaurant group:
“Happy Memorial Day! Enjoy Double VIP Points Monday & Tuesday!”
Omg!!!
germy
@Steve on St. Simons Island: I remember about forty years ago listening to a radio call-in program on WBAI. All kinds of guys with brooklyn accents would call in to complain about this or that, but it was usually entertaining.
I still remember one caller. His comment was short and sweet: “Everything in this country is tied to a goddamned buck.”
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Fascinating that he’s admitted the Iraq War was a mistake, and I don’t think that’s getting enough coverage.
I don’t think he’s even come close to apologizing for Palin
germy
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
He says he wishes he’d run with Joe Lieberman? I think I read that somewhere.
Immanentize
@B.B.A.:@Steve on St. Simons Island:
The alternatives in 1912 were not any better war-wise. Taft (R) had been Roosevelt’s Secretary of War and Roosevelt (P or B.M.) was in the contest in part explicitly because he wanted to get into the European conflict. Of course, neither Taft nor Roosevelt were the out and out racists that Wilson was.
JPL
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: This is the same person who said bomb, bomb, bomb Iran.
Jager
We have some kind of a fly hatch going on up in the canyon. The goldfish and gambusa in our pond are having an early Memorial Day feast, they seem very happy.
Jeffro
@Steve on St. Simons Island: folks in Harrisonburg feel that way on a daily basis
Kay
@Kathleen:
They spend entire careers using Hillary Clinton as a punching bag. I get it, I really do. I suppose she brought it on herself by …. running but Jesus Christ. When is it enough? Maureen Dowd wasn’t enough? Now there’s a new generation of snobby, sneering NYTimes employees who are wholly dependent on Clinton for their careers?
Good to know the whole time we were supposedly getting “reporting” instead the whole crew were off on their individual career agendas. It showed, BTW. The coverage was such crap because the reporter was actually working on her book.
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: He’s the guy who embraced torturers the deserting coward and Darth Cheney in order to get the 2008 GOP nomination.
He traded in his honor and his integrity to feed his ambition.
germy
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@germy: I’d forgotten about that, he stopped short of criticizing Palin, but as I recall, she was offended anyway
@JPL: and his critique of Benghazi is that we didn’t have a full-fledged occupation. And he joined in and showed the Rs’ collective ass on Merrick Garland, and his vote for tax cuts came weeks after his “heroic” stance on “regular order” (I mean, I’m glad he voted the way he did in that instance, but…). Central to his legendary campaign in 2000 and his brief flirtation with switching parties (before Jeffords stole those headlines) was the idea that the Bush tax cuts were fiscally irresponsible, but he gave trump, Ryan and McConnell his vote for much larger deficits… I don’t want to fight with a dying man, but the tire-swinging, as Elizabelle said, is exhausting.
Village-y footnote: Liz Sidoti, the reporter who was filmed on said tireswing, left Ron Fournier’s AP to become chief flack for BP
Baud
@germy: I’d love to give her all the space in the world, but she keeps showing up.
Kay
@Jeffro:
I don’t know if I’m right but doesn’t it feel like they’re finally getting that this is bad? Ivanka or the rest of the awful nepotism hires wouldn’t indicate “impeachment”- Trump would survive his whole family being corrupt, as long as he wasn’t directly tied. It has to reach Trump directly for “impeachment”.
One thing seems to be coming clear- that there were more countries than just Russia interested in doing whatever it took to get Donald Trump elected. This could be a kind of coalition of Right wing authoritarian leaders who saw an easy to manipulate egomaniac and all jumped in. You can’t really blame them. God, what an opening. They must have thought they died and went to heaven.
Villago Delenda Est
@germy: This stupid treasonous twunt needs to GO AWAY.
Steve on St. Simons Island
@germy:
He should apologize for that too
germy
Jim, Foolish Literalist
The whole thing with the Chinese trademarks are every bit the emolument that the half billion dollar bailout is. And she was almost indicted, with Junior, for lying to buyers about a NYC project– I think the Soho property that wasn’t in Soho. I’ve seen people say that Eric may be the only one safe since he concentrates on the golf courses, but I can’t imagine that business is clean.
Kay
@Jeffro:
If it IS bad and that is sort of sprung on the public I wonder what the reaction will be. I approve of Mueller’s silence but I think people will be shocked that they weren’t given more of a warning, more of a public and transparent build-up. They have so little of this story. What happens if they get it only in the form of indictments?
Another Scott
@Villago Delenda Est:
Meh.
He always, always, traded on his family’s military service (his father and grandfather were both 4-star admirals). Did you know he was a POW? :-/
He never learned the right lesson from his involvement with Charles Keating. (I’d forgotten that Glenn was one of the 5 as well. He was properly chastened afterwards, and didn’t do as much as McCain.)
One has to have a big ego to think that one can be President. But McCain was in a whole ‘nother league. And the country suffered for it.
McCain could have stopped Bush’s torture program. He could have stopped the abuses at Abu Ghraib. He could have prevented the prison from being built at Guantanamo. He could have used his moral authority from being tortured in Vietnam to keep the country from going down that road.
He didn’t.
Picking Palin helped him lose in 2008, and for that I’m grateful.
Cheers,
Scott.
MomSense
@Kay:
Here’s the thing about the NYT. They are in New York City where money laundering via real estate is yuuge. The NYT owns real estate in NYC. I’m old enough to remember when they were in their old building cheerleading Giuliani’s “clean up” ofTimes Square even though the means were despicable. I have friends who were social workers in the city during that time and they were desperately trying to find out what happened to the homeless people they served. There were so many abuses that should have been rigorously exposed but the New York Times owned real estate in Times Square and this “clean up” benefitted them.
The New York Times has had cash flow problems for years now. They spent a fortune on their current HQ. There is a lot of public information about their financial woes, loans, rentals, etc. A company with real estate holdings and yuuge debt in a city rife with money laundering via real estate transactions triggers all my alarm systems.
JeanneT
A day for memories, though I have no family members who died during their time in the armed forces. I just got home from watering the flowers at my parent’s headstone. My Dad’s memorial service was just 1 year ago; I was happy to see that the bronze service marker/flag holder we got was still in place, and the local VFW had put a new flag in it. He was a navy guy during WWII and lived 92 years. There is no marker for my husband, a Vietnam vet (Marines) who died 6 years ago from agent orange fueled prostate cancer. (His ashes are scattered across west Michigan).
I’m STILL REALLY ANGRY that he only got 62 years of life, and I have to grow old without him. I can only imagine how devastating it was for people who lost their young loved ones during the actual wars.
My John worked in concert with other members of the armed forces who opposed the war in Vietnam. Shortly before his death he wrote a little self-published memoir (called Peacemaking Under Fire) about how he decided that joining the Marines was the way to end the war. Anyhow, when I read his stories it brings him and his fellow Marines vividly to mind. Today my thanks are to those who act to end wars and the causes of wars……
Kay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
I don’t understand why they weren’t indicted then. They have communications admitting the fraud. That’s another mystery- why the Trump family were never indicated. Why all their sleaze remained in the civil system where they could manipulate and control the outcomes. I think that’s part of Trump’s bafflement, why he sounds like an injured rhino, bawling his head off- he’s always been able to do this shit before! That’s why he feels persecuted. The fixers aren’t fixing this.
Yarrow
@Kay:
At some level Trump understands he’s in deep shit. The investigation keeps getting closer. It’s accelerating. He’s got to be feeling boxed in. He’s always been able to get out of things before so he doesn’t quite yet get that this time he won’t. Tick tock, motherfucker.
Aleta
My great uncle came to the US as a child with his single mother on a boat from Ireland. She soon died, and he was raised in an orphanage, which he escaped at age 12 by volunteering for the American Ambulance Field Service, lying about his age. Off he went to France and WW1, where he helped load wounded people into ambulances. On the wall of his CT farmhouse he had photos of himself in the war and a recognition or award from France. I was told he was at Verdun and Belleau Wood and went from battle to battle in the Argonne. (At some point his ambulance was assigned to US forces.) After he came home he was a boxer. He married late in life and bought a farm, where he raised one of my cousins who’d lost his own parents. He worked my cousin hard from the age of 8, teaching him carpentry, machinery repair and to fix cars and trucks.
I found some interesting things about the AAFS:
1/3 I like this because of the picture of the banjo. (It looks pieced together, partly homemade?) https://france-amerique.com/les-volontaires-americains-dans-la-premiere-guerre-mondiale/
MomSense
@Kay:
Prosecutors look the other way on all manner of real estate crimes in cities like New York, LA, etc. It’s big money. Really big money.
Jager
@JeanneT: Thanks for the link.
Gravenstone
@B.B.A.: always nice when folks let their inner asshole shine brightly. Now FOAD.
Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady)
@Yarrow: If Melania has truly moved back to NYC, he might be feeling shamed by that too. He’s certainly not admitting it.
No Drought No More
Words of wisdom from a American warrior on this Memorial Day:
“… War is cruelty, and you cannot refine it”…. William Tecumseh Sherman 1864
Kay
@MomSense:
That’s funny because that’s the sense I get from their reporting – “oh, everyone knows NYC real estate is rife with fraud! Grow up!”
I am so, so sick of that. The glib “knowing”, the whole attitude of unseriousness towards Trump, the sighs and eye rolls that anyone would find this surprising or outrageous.
Also, just as an aside, why are they having so much trouble with “lie”? The way to do that is not to call the person a liar. You say “this is a lie”. People will figure out that the person is a liar – there isn’t any reason to agonize over this. The person says the lie and you say “that is a lie”. That the person is a liar follows. People will get there. They just have to peg the lies.
Aleta
@Aleta:
2/3 This diary, started in 1916 by some guys in one of the ambulance services. After arriving, before they could go to the field, they were sent to a French factory to build their own ambulances (each, I think, on top of a Ford chassis).
JPL
@JeanneT: Thank you for your story.
sdhays
@Another Scott: McCain’s shtick pretty much always comes down to: he has had life experiences and said things at different times to indicate that he knows better or really, really should know better, so MAYBE he will do the right thing this time if he feels like it even though he’s a conservative Republican. And he thinks very, very highly of himself, so he can ignore how irritating his sanctimony is to his supposed allies on any given issue.
But, shtick aside, John McCain helped build the Republican Party of Donald Trump. And I hope that thought occurs to him in his waning hours.
Yarrow
@Dorothy A. Winsor (formerly Iowa Old Lady): If Melania has moved back to NYC then we the people should be told about that. We are paying for Secret Service protection for the entire family. If she’s costing us more because she can no longer live with him and has moved to another city then that is not their private business; it’s our business too because we pay for her protection as well.
JeanneT
@Jager:
Ha! The link didn’t show up the way I wanted it and when I tried to edit it I lost it all together. Trying again: Peacemaking Under Fire
MomSense
@Kay:
I would suggest to you that the NYT is not just a bystander on that particular story.
Aleta
@Aleta:
2/3 This gives an idea of how AFS ambulances moved from battle to battle before joining US forces to work with them. You have to copy and paste this: http://www.ourstory.info/2/a/AAFS.html (For some reason, if you click that link it goes to a more general wikip. page about the AES, which is interesting but not the same information, and it’s much longer.)
debbie
@MomSense:
I think incidents like that balcony rescue will make a difference, maybe not overnight, but for sure more quickly than any changes over here.
Jeffro
@Kay: I don’t have quite as much heartburn about it as you might, Kay – there has been so much out there for so long now all it’s going to take is a shit ton of indictments and a reasonably coherent narrative and we’re there.
My guess is that the obstruction referral drops this week along with a ton of indictments on Don Junior and Jared
Brachiator
@germy:
It’s not Haberman’s job to write about Trump and the mob. It’s up to the editors of the Times and other publications.
This is probably, no, definitely, worthy of a separate thread.
Ted Cruz linked Trump to the mob early in the primary on TV’s Meet the Press. The national media only mildly reported this. The GOP could have disqualified Trump early on because of his mob ties, but didn’t do it.
If you do a Google search of “Donald Trump mob ties” you find a boatload of results. One chilling NY Magazine article claims that the Wall Street Journal killed editorials linking Trump to the mob because they feared a Hillary Clinton victory.
How many other media companies made the same calculation??
Link
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/12/wall-street-journal-killed-editorial-on-trumps-mob-ties.html
ETA. Trump is not only linked to the US mob, he has been linked to the Asian mob. And so has Sheldon Adelson, big time GOP donor.
Baud
@Brachiator:
All of them, Katie.
PJ
@Kay: I read a piece by a psychologist about how certain institutions continue voluntary practices that inflict gratuitous suffering (e.g., fraternities, some militaries) because it creates group cohesion (they all went through it and the ones that are inflicting it survived it), and if they were to stop it, it would render their own suffering at the hand of the institution meaningless, which they can’t bear to face. So the cycle continues.
Another Scott
@sdhays: Yup.
Of course, all national Republicans (except for a handful that prove the rule) have helped make Trump possible. I’m convinced that one of the reasons why the eleventy-seven opponents couldn’t lay a glove on him during the primaries and the debates is that he embodies everything that they claim is good about America. He’s rich, he doesn’t pay his taxes, he takes advantage of “suckers”, he says what he wants and doesn’t care about norms and rules, he “grabs” women that he wants, etc., etc., etc. He was perfect for them. Many, many people have made the point that Rmoney and Cruz and all the rest of them would have had the same policies as Donnie – they just would use different words to talk about them. Those that try to argue otherwise just need to look at Watt and Meese and all of the other monsters under Ronnie.
As you say, McCain was more interested in playing the game to try to increase his personal power than in actually standing for anything.
Cheers,
Scott.
Yarrow
@Brachiator:
Yes, Adelson sure doesn’t want anyone to look too closely at those Macau casinos.
And what about the ones in Saipan? Run by a Trump protege. Why would a former CIA director, FBI director and various other former politicians, etc. be on the advisory board? From an article about the raid of the offices in March, 2017:
Seems like a questionable group.
Kathleen
@Kay: I’ve come to the conclusion that all NYT political reporters are “doing their jobs”, jobs being defined as advancing the Rethuglican fascist agenda and enriching themselves. They are not morally evolved enough to feel “guilty about what they did during 2016 campaign.” We are wasting our time engaging with them on the premise they care about enlightening or informing we the great unwashed. I wish more Dems and liberals would just accept this so we can move on to figure out how we can counteract media’s poisoning of our discourse.
Another Scott
@Baud: “Happy” can be fine. E.g. Team Pelosi.
Yeah, sales on holidays is weird. But so is mixing Christian and pagan rituals (bunnies and crucifixes; mangers and trees and men in red suits). ;-)
Cheers,
Scott.
Brachiator
@Another Scott:
As much as I detest these two jerks, this is just speculation. It is simple, but wrongheaded to suggest that all Republicans are the same. Did Rmoney govern Massachusetts like a demented tyrant?
Also, Trump was a racist goon when he was a political independent. He was a racist goon when he contributed to Democrats and was buddies with Bill Clinton.
Baud
@Another Scott: I accept that I’ve lost that particular battle.
Timurid
@rikyrah:
That’s it, I’m officially renaming my least favorite piece of cutlery (formerly Spayd’s Razor).
J R in WV
@Stan:
\
Stan, I’m not going to call the kind of names that burst through my mouth when I read your ignorant comment. Raven is a veteran, and not your average back office read-echelon MF either. He carried a weapon in Vietnam for a hitch with a unit that saw combat for his whole spell in the ‘Nam. He’s worked hard all his life, and still keeps in touch with the men he served with, one of whom just died, RIP.
So now I’ll just wait for you to post you apology to a veteran who has done more and risked all. I very much doubt you served, veterans don’t usually rant on people like you just did. I personally enlisted in the USN Mar011970 – before you rank on me!
Troll~!!!
prostratedragon
“Ballad of the Fallen” album, Liberation Music Orchestra
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Kinda pointless since I think Paulie’s done as far as electoral politics go, but I truly hate him and the myth he built around himself, so
Most of that six million he married, but let’s look at the first part. Sweet Paulie Blue-Eyes, who as we all know quit school to work in the steel mills to keep a roof over his widowed mawr’s head… it was either that or he worked part time at McDonalds after school, but potayto/potahto… famously never worked in the private sector, but for a few months at his cousins’ massive international construction firm and the adorable Wienermobile thing, we put him through college, he worked in government for a few years, and had almost four hundred thousand in assets before he was thirty.
Kelly
My uncle Walt was a bombardier on a B29 out of Tinian. He was matter of fact about the destruction of the Japanese cities and the civilian casualties. He was even on a reconnaissance flight over Nagasaki a few days after the bomb dropped. It was a nasty job that had to be done. His younger brother, my uncle Norman was navigator of a B17 out of England. The wreckage of the Blitz and the stories of survivors he met haunted him as he rained similar destruction down on Germany. He never held a steady job or married. Seldom slept a full night. He was broken not by the fear of his own death in the sky over Germany but by horror at what he inflicted on the ground below.
Brachiator
@Kathleen:
Reporters are not free agents. They do what their editors tell them.
And the publishers run the entire operation.
Kathleen
@Timurid: Truth.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
well, this is not at all terrifying
Everything was cool after 2008, right?
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Ryan is a hypocrite, but that tweet is silly and would be even if it weren’t his wife’s money.
Kathleen
@Brachiator: Yup. I should have included that fact in my critique. That’s why I keep saying they are “doing the jobs”. They’re doing what their bosses tell them. But I also don’t think they have one problem with it either.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Baud: /shrug/
the gauzy notion that Ryan was a plucky orphan who pulled himself up by his bootstraps was part of his phony image from at least the 2012 campaign. His father was an affluent and well-connected lawyer who left his family more than comfortable. I think it’s worth pointing out the lie.
Ruckus
@H.E.Wolf:
raven served in Korea and Vietnam.
He also marched against the Vietnam war when he came back.
I dislike the use of happy as a modifier for this holiday, because it shows a lack of understanding about honor and death. But our lives are different than when I was a kid. We had had, within a space of 30 yrs, in the same century, two world wars that a huge number of people died in. We had a lot of diseases people mostly don’t suffer from now, no seat belts/air bags/decent brakes, wheel chair ramps, and on and on and on. And people still die from wars, famine, stupidity, weather, time, and on and on and on. It’s possible or should be that we take one day not to worry about being happy and think of others who can no longer be happy or sad or anything. Hell one day a year to think of others period would be a massive improvement for some.
Baud
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I agree with that. I just don’t think the increase in his wealth over an 18 year period in Congress is all that noteworthy.
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Yep, a new high, even as regulations are disappearing. Nothing but good can come from this! //
debbie
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Don’t leave out those SS survivor benefits he got, even though he and his family didn’t need them.
Elizabelle
@MomSense:
Wow. You may be on to something.
And maybe their big series a few years ago on how hard it is to figure out actual ownership of real estate — the layers of shell companies and LLCs — was a bit of misdirection as well as a public service?
I do feel like we are down the rabbit hole.
And the Times is filthy. You see it in their Clinton derangement. A smarter editor would have reassigned Maggie Duranty Haberman by now, because she has a real credibility problem. People are pointing and laughing at her. In public. For attribution.
Ruckus
@Kay:
Seems to be the only reason.
Shell
I love poppies. But its a shame, even in the garden, they only last a day. Maybe thats part of their symbolism.
Brachiator
@Aleta: Great stories. Thank you.
J R in WV
@Jager:
I would expect his was rear echelon service. Guys who served on the pointy end tend not to dwell on the hell that is combat and death. Not to diss his service. I served in Key West and in a shipyard in Mississippi. Lots of sweat, not so much gunfire. But I could have been sent to the brown water navy…
Robert
I think it was a real mistake to make Memorial Day one of the “Monday” holidays. The attitude toward Memorial Day shifted quickly to “Great! A 3-day weekend!” when Congress made that change.
Before the change, Veterans Day and Memorial Day were both somber occasions, that had somewhat different but related meaning for people. We kept Veterans Day as a “fixed date” holiday, and we still retain the old feeling. Memorial Day, which really should be the more meaningful holiday (dying for one’s country is “the last full measure of devotion” whereas serving one’s country is not), has lost its significance.
Shell
Id cut them a tiny bit of slack, in the sense that Memorial Day is also seen as the start of Summer. But the POTUS should somehow know better.
Brachiator
@Kathleen:
In my post about Trump’s mob ties, I linked to a story about Wall Street Journal reporters who had resigned. Media companies will hire people who do what they want.
However, in a dying industry in a weak economy, reporters will not often cut their own throats for the sake of integrity.
Also, in the case of Haberman, she has a book deal to deliver a tome about the Trump administration. This is a conflict of interest, but also Haberman’s taking care of her financial future.
Elizabelle
@JeanneT: Best to you. I’d love to read John’s memoir. Sounds like a great guy.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
This makes me think of a joint interview Tim Russert did with his father, who was never called “Big Russ” until his middle-aged, rich and famous son wanted to sell some books. Pumpkinhead, goggle-eyed and breathless, told Tom Brokaw (his fellow never-served be-daddy-issued baby-boomer and book seller), that “guys like my dad, went to Europe, won the war, then came home and built this great country!” Brokaw, all condescending smarm masquerading as respect, turned to the old man, “Mr. Russert, sir?”. The old man, who came across as a likable regular guy, kind of shrugged and said pretty much, “Yeah, I got drafted, went over there, then came home and got a job”.
Which is pretty much how my own father described his time in Korea. When I asked him why he never talked about his military service, he replied, “It was just about the most boring goddam year of my life.” As an English major who knew how to type, he was in an office in Seoul.
Aleta
@Elizabelle: It’s on Amazon !
J R in WV
@Aleta:
That’s a banjo-mandolin, with the body of a banjo and the neck and tuning of a mandolin, with 4 double strings. Banjo’s have 4 or 5 strings. I live in a heart of old-time string band music and have friends who have such an instrument. A good one is louder than a mandolin, which before amps was a good thing.
Elizabelle
@Aleta: Yes. Just found it and put it in my queue. Looks well written and interesting.
Peacemaking Under Fire. Amazon link.
Ken
@Thoughtful David: I can’t listen to that without tearing up, though that’s mostly because of its use in On the Beach.
HeleninEire
@Stan: OH HOLY HELL. So sorry I just got to the thread. You ignorant idiot. The rest of this thread is gonna ROCK. And here I go to read.
Aleta
@J R in WV: thanks !!
JeanneT
@Elizabelle:
John was amazing, both as the young peace advocate and later, in his life as an anti-hunger advocate and innovator with food banks in the US. Amazon has new and used copies of his book available, but we don’t have an ebook version yet. When we do it will be free, but prepping the manuscript is in my son’s hands and he is over-committed on many fronts.
I just remembered there are pictures of John in ‘Nam and some more info about his food bank career at peacemakingunderfire.com.
Thank you for sharing in my memories of him, Elizabelle!
Ruckus
@J R in WV:
Don’t forget that we had a commenter here who did exactly that. Enlisted in the navy and said that in 4 months he was stationed at the front of a PBR as a machine gunner. You and I were lucky, we got sent somewhere else. When I was a mental health counselor, there was a fellow the same age who had served on a sister ship to the one I was on for 2 yrs, they went to Vietnam and fired many rounds and missiles, took fire from Migs. We were lucky. Like my HS friend who got drafted, asked for his fiancé’s ring back so she wouldn’t have to worry about him every day in Vietnam and got sent to CO, army language school and was kept on as a teacher. Spent his 2 yrs in boot camp and CO. He got lucky.
Jager
@J R in WV: Actually he was a door gunner on a helicopter, Air medal, Distinguished Flying Cross and a couple of Purple Hearts. He wasn’t a REMF. His wife says, he believes now the war was the only significant thing ever happened in his life. She said he was a pretty normal guy until he got in his late 50’s, lost a good job and his focus shifted. to the past. He has a severe limp from his second wound, his doc at the VA noticed the mental change in him and has him going to solo and group therapy. The doc told his wife, it’s not unusual for guys his age to start looking backwards. Like I said he’s a good guy, his second love is cars so I try to keep him on that when i see him. Poor bastard is going to therapy for his leg, group and private therapy for his head and now marriage counseling.
John Fremont
@Another Scott: He started off on a good foot in Congress when he opposed the Reagan Administration and stood his ground on the continued deployment of Marines in Beirut. But yeah, he wavered in the last 20 years.
Several of my DI’s in boot camp did time in Beirut and lost friends the there. On this Memorial Day, to those Marines who died in Beirut, Semper Fidelis.
Gbbalto
Remembering grandfather b who enlisted in the Royal Engineers in 1912 and was paged at the cinema to participate in WWI. Survived unlike 3 uncles and 8 first cousins, joined USACE for WWII. Also my uncle, USAF LtCol, who died in Vietnam when an exhausted ATC vectored his Herky Bird into a mountain – for which I do not blame the ATC. Also my father, who served in the Signal Corps in Europe. I am grateful to them all, and misting up some here. In my thoughts are all those who have served, suffered, and died…
J R in WV
I had 3 uncles, and of course a father. Dad was enlisted into WW II with a program that let him finish his semester at the U, then a long buss ride to the induction center, where when the doc listened to his heart, he heard something and called another doc to come listen. Dad had a heart murmur, which kept him out of service.
His two brothers, one served with the American Friends Service Committee driving an ambulance with the Free French Army in No. Africa, then in Sicily. He got jaundice and was sent home with a Croix de Guerre from the French Army. The other was a Chief on a Heavy cruiser in the South Pacific, which provided air protection for carriers and bombardment for landings. Neither of them ever spoke much of their time in the war.
My mother’s big brother enlisted and wound up in the Army Air Corp, as a turret gunner on a heavy bomber in the South Pacific. I found his wings in my mom’s jewelry after my dad died, and gave them to my cousin, who still had them. He never spoke of his service at all, never. I understand turret gunner was a particularly intense role on the heavy bombers, being alone beneath the aircraft. Before the war he contributed to the family by driving ‘shine into town and delivering to the clubs, Elks, Odd Fellows, Moose, where in the privacy of the fraternal orders good local whiskey was served in the tradition founded during prohibition. I believe it was made by a neighbor way up the hollow behind the grandparent’s farm. There had to be a lot of mutual trust in that line of work.
As I have mentioned before, I was in the US Navy, enlisted as an E-2, honorably discharged as an E-2, served mostly in Key West with a year in the shipyards in Mississippi, where I learned to work hard in horrible weather, hot, humid, drinking a quart of fluids every hour, taking salt pills. I still break a huge sweat when I work, even in the cold.
In 1972 MS was still a racist cesspool. The Navy much less so. It was good for me in a way, I learned a lot about people and work. I enlisted a few days before I would have been drafted.
My uncles were all important to me as a kid, all the extended family really. I miss them. Getting old sucks on many different levels. The last member of that generation of my family was my mother’s older sister, who died several years ago at 94. None of the “boys” made it nearly that long.
Kathleen
@Brachiator: I remember that. I also appreciate people’s fears about losing their jobs. There are good, brave reporters. I need to focus on reading and supporting them.
henqiguai
@Stan(#51):
Stan, dude, m’lad; boy, you done screwed that pooch. I see, with a very brief search, that others have already replied, but for the sake of piling on (because I’m seldom this ‘current’ in reading Bj), boy did you violate that pooch. Looking forward to raven’s response; you know, the Vietnam Conflict, in-country, veteran.
Elizabelle
@JeanneT: I am going to order and read the book. Maybe a few of us could do that, and have a book discussion thread.
62 is too damn young, but sounds like he got a lot done in his years allotted. I am sure John would feel gifted, because he’s so aware of the many whose lives stopped at 19-28 or so. All of the postwar years were more than one could expect.
Saw Stanley Kubrick’s Full Metal Jacket last week, and that movie has stayed with me. One of the best, for driving home what a waste of lives, Vietnamese and American, from that awful war. Which we took over from the French. Just waste.
Ruckus
@Jager:
I see this at the VA all the time.
It had to be a significant time in his life. Action, life, death, violence. Civilian life just isn’t the same. Thankfully.
So I’m going to ask, was your service time a significant time in your life? Mine was. And we didn’t have anywhere the level that he did. I get that most people don’t want to remember, can’t forget and they want to. But his life now can not compare to that, and he doesn’t want to be forgotten for it. I go to 2 rather large VA clinics and one very large hospital. There are a lot of guys there (and a few women) and for some of them their service defined their lives, be it 2 yrs or 30. The scariest guy I’ve ever met is one of these guys. He doesn’t wear patches etc but he is defined by his service and thinks he’s a failure because real life doesn’t measure up. It’s very sad that the last 45-50 years has meant so much less than war for some people.
satby
@JeanneT: I need to get his book as well. Condolences, losing such a great guy must have been so hard no matter how long ago it was now.
Brachiator
@J R in WV: I appreciate all the stories here about military experiences.
I had a close relative who served in the Korean war. He never spoke about it to other family members.
I had a boss who sometimes spoke with grim humor about his time in Vietnam, something to do with helicopters. He didn’t speak with any fondness or nostalgia, and he understood how fortunate he was to get back relatively unscathed.
Another Scott
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: What matters about debt is the debt-service payments. We’re nowhere close to the record before the housing bubble burst.
E.g. FRED – Household debt payments as a percentage of personal disposable income. It’s lower now than it has been in a long time.
Of course, that’s an average. Averages hide lots of pathologies…
The economy has lots of issues, but I don’t think the tweet is pointing to one in the top 10.
YMMV.
Cheers,
Scott.
Elizabelle
@satby: How was market today? I hope your soap did not melt!
satby
@Elizabelle: no market today Tu-Th-Sat only, so the place is shut up and probably an oven. I’ll find out what condition my stuff is in tomorrow morning. Right now the temperature is 89° with a “real feel” of 97° according to Accuweather. I venture outside to do some small chores then come inside to cool off. I hate this weather.
Going to clean house instead.
Gah, forget my nym all the time!
HeleninEire
@henqiguai: THIS. This a million times. The pooch, he is screwed.
J R in WV
@Aleta:
There are also banjo-ukuleles and several other oddities derived from banjos. If anyone is interested, there are probably performances on Youtube using all those old-time instruments. I think someone decided banjos were louder, and then rolled it up from there.
The same for National Steel guitars, intended to be louder than wooden top guitars, just before electric amps were invented. But all with a unique sound.
Jager
@Ruckus: Sure it was significant, I learned a lot about myself, about organization, leadership, team building. I learned to listen and I learned to act. I learned I could live with being scared shitless 90% of the time and not have it color my actions and decisions. I also learned I could sleep face up in the fucking rain. When I got home I draft counseled for a time. I spent 4 hours one Saturday talking to a college kid with piss poor grades about why it was a bad idea to shoot one of his toes off to beat the draft. Mrs J has one picture of me in uniform taken at Fort Benning, I’m wearing khakis and my c**t cap at a jaunty angle. She thinks I look cute, I think I look like a 12 year old playing soldier.
J R in WV
@Jager:
Sorry about your friend’s difficulties, I surely understand. Certainly no offense intended to his service!
Old cars sounds safe as a topic. I like them too, but am not a gearhead at all. Barely able to change oil and tires. But I do have a shop that will work on off-beat cars, so there’s that.
Glad he made it home, wish the home life had been more easy for him. Some excitement is better than others…
Jager
@J R in WV: No offense taken. I know what you mean about getting older, I’m the patriarch of my family now on both sides. My old man was a glider pilot in WWII, 2nd glider across the Rhine in Operation Varsity. After debacles in Normandy and Holland they began training glider pilots as Infantrymen. His Glider company once on the ground formed up as an Infantry company and won a battle called Burp Gun Corner and stopped a German counter offensive at a crossroads outside of Wesel. he never talked about it much. He did enjoy talking about his leave in Paris after Varsity when his drunken copilot walked into the glass door of a bistro and broke his nose. I told the old man I had a hell of a time in Bangkok, didn’t give all the details and I’m sure he left some out from his adventure in Paris too.
J R in WV
@Jager:
I loaded torpedoes onto the sub tender I was on, with a crane manufactured in the 1940s. The ship had 600 torpedoes in decks below the galley, to resupply the sub squadron. That focuses one’s mind wonderfully. I learned to work for petty officers I didn’t like or respect, just to do the job as well as I could. I never again had a boss as bad as PO Collins, so that was good.
I learned that you can work 12 hour shifts in the Mississippi summer doing hard manual labor without dying, if you are careful to pace yourself and stay hydrated. June, July, August, just awful.
I was in great physical shape when I got out, except for having been hit by a car 3 or 4 months before. If I hadn’t been in great shape when the car hit me I would have been way more hurt, though. Sunbeam sports car, good that it was a tiny car instead of a Caddy of the times. But I was able to do caving, backpacking, kayaking, all those outdoor sports back home in WV.
I don’t regret it at all. Even though I was against that war, and all the wars since, I obviously still respect those who go to fight.
Ruckus
@Jager:
Sleeping face up in the rain. Never had to learn that one. Did have to learn how to sleep just inches away from the uninsulated hull of a ship, below the water line, sailing in the North Atlantic, in winter, with water temps in the very low 30s and one military blanket. Yours sounds worse. Some of the guys I was in with weren’t a lot older than 12, at least maturity wise.
And I learned those things you list as well, although I had occasions to learn some of them a bit before then. Luck of the draw I guess.
Really for most serving in the military at 18-22 yrs old was a rather quick growth spurt. Some had more growing to do, some used it as a refresher course and some learned nothing. Like life but at a much faster pace. I didn’t have to shoot at or be shot at by anyone but I did end up responsible for the navigation and internal communications systems and 5 people working for me of a medium sized warship. I didn’t earn that, I was there and there weren’t people 2 levels over me like there was supposed to be, so it was my turn. I turned 24 a week after I was discharged. I had no idea 4 yrs earlier what I’d be doing. Or where I’d be doing it.
Ruckus
@J R in WV:
Did you know any good lifers? I met a few, among the many not so good. Those not so good seemed to have stayed in because they would probably never make it anywhere near as far in the real world. They would have been regularly fired or far worse by those that had to work with them out in the real world. And I made E5 so I was one of those POs. That’s petty officer for those not in the know. Man the money! I tried to be one of the good guys, I hope my fellow sailors don’t think of me as one of the bad ones. But sometimes you had to tell people to do something they didn’t want to do. But I worked as hard as they did, stood the same watches and went on liberty with them.
Brickley Paiste
Interesting, if true.
Brachiator
@Brickley Paiste:
Even if is not the first Memorial Day, it is still an amazing gesture of respect and remembrance. From Wikipedia:
This was barely a month after Lee’s surrender.
Summer
By the scholar who found the newspaper article on the first Decoration Day in Charleston: https://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/30/opinion/30blight.html