Frame and Fortune

 

"You shall not crucify mankind on a cross of gold!"

As it turned out, the nails were needed elsewhere.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Signing Off

 

The show about nothing.

The war about nothing.

Wrap party

Quips and Quotations (Say You, Say Me Edition)

 

Those of us who shout the loudest about Americanism in making character assassinations are all too frequently those who, by our own words and acts, ignore some of the basic principles of Americanism:

            The right to criticize;

            The right to hold unpopular beliefs;

            The right to protest;

            The right of independent thought.

The exercise of these rights should not cost one single American citizen his reputation or his right to a livelihood nor should he be in danger of losing his reputation or livelihood merely because he happens to know someone who holds unpopular beliefs.  Who of us doesn’t?  Otherwise none of us could call our souls our own.  Otherwise thought control would have set in.

--Senator Margaret Chase Smith (R-ME), "Declaration of Conscience" speech, 6/01/1950

Quips and Quotations (Served with Distinction Edition)

 

1940-2026

I'm used to being in the minority. I'm a left-handed gay Jew. I've never felt, automatically, a member of any majority.

--Barney Frank, 16-term congressman from Massachusetts. 

This Day in History

 

On May 19, 1536, Anne Boleyn got her head lopped off over trumped-up (no pun intended) accusations of treason, adultery, and incest, though of course the real reason had to do with her inability to provide King Henry VIII with a male heir to the throne (a female heir considered too scary a proposition.) Such was the problem of trying to ensure an orderly transfer of power back in the day. You know, I sometimes get frustrated with democracy. After all, there's been some huge blunders committed on Election Day, but all it is I have to do is look at a picture like the one above reminding me what we're trying to avoid that restores my faith in popular sovereignty.

Oh, and another thing is we've totally gotten over our fear of a female succeeding a male as head of state.

Um...er...hmm...Well, at least they kept their heads. 

Graphic Grandeur (Weighing the Evidence Edition)

 

Meanwhile at the Justice Department:

 

Cartoon by Mike Luckovich

Graphic Grandeur (Lip Service Edition)

 

If Penguin sez it's a classic I guess it must be, though I confess I haven't gotten around to reading it yet. I did see this Nick Anderson cartoon:

 That should tide me over until I can find time for Niccolo.

Graphic Grandeur (Asymmetrical Warfare Edition)

 

The question must be asked:

Cartoon by Clay Jones.

Senate Minority Pride

 

You may have heard the Trump administration removed a rainbow flag from the Stonewall Inn, the site of the famous LGBTQ uprising ("the hairpin drop heard around the world" as journalist Dick Leitsch put it) and nowadays, per President Barack Obama, a national monument, a good thing until you realize that Obama is no longer president, and the man who is can do, or thinks he can do, whatever the hell he wants with a historic landmark. Still, his lackeys put in charge of running the National Park Service felt they at least should give a reason--thank you for that! --and the reason given is that "only the US flag and other congressionally or departmentally authorized flags," can be flown on "NPS-designated flagpoles." Well, then, the solution to that is to somehow make the rainbow flag authorized.

That's where Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) comes in. Like a lot of old guard Democrats, Schumer has been criticized for blinking when confronted with the threat of imminent dictatorship. Well, it looks like he might have been administered some eye drops recently. Schumer and U.S. Representative Dan Goldman (also D-NY) have introduced legislation making the rainbow flag a congrssionally-approved flag that can be flown at national monuments, including, and especially, Stonewall. Way to go, Chuck! Still, there's a rub. As the title of this post indicates, Schumer is Senate Minority Leader. The GOP control both houses of Congress. So you need bipartisan support, and let's face it, Schumer may occasionally blink, but those Republican eyes are epoxied shut. Thus, passage seems unlikely, but not impossible. Life is full of surprises. Just ask any NYPD cop who happened to be at the Stonewall on June 28, 1969. 

 

Somebody

 

 

 

It's said Martin Luther King Jr was a bit leery of the man and hesitated some before finally bringing him into the fold. Jesse was a bit of a showboat, a bit of an attention hog. And so he was. I mean, he was everywhere, and in the thick of everything for a while, one of the most public of public figures of his time. And like anybody, no matter how smart or how serious or how well-meaning, who spends too much time in the public eye, he could seem buffoonish at times. For all of that, I'm glad he was around for all these years. As the country turned to the right...and more to the right,,,and more to the right still, Jackson reminded us that there was still such a thing as a Left. And not just the African American Left either. By the end of the 1988 Democratic primaries, Jackson had won 11 primaries or caucuses and had received 6.9 million votes. At least some of those 6.9 million voters must have been white! Michael Dukakis eventually prevailed, but that eventuality took a lot longer than any pundit expected. It would be another 20 years before a black man running for president made that strong of a showing again (in fact, that later black man did even better.) Jackson never ran for president again, and seemed satisfied in role as a gadfly, a political provocateur. Well, I'll take Jackson's brand of political provoking over God-knows-what we got now. 

And wouldn't you know it? Jackson was a bit of a poet! I leave you with some of his more memorable rhymes

Hope for the brains instead of dope in the veins.

It doesn't matter if you're black or white, only if you're wrong or right.

If my mind can conceive it, my heart can believe it, I know I can achieve it.

1941-2026

 

Origin of Speciousness

 

OK, OK, let's all try to keep an open mind about this.

Hmm...They don't look like apes to me. Do they look like apes to you?

Not that there aren't apes in our future. After all, this remains a distinct possibility:

The Obamas just won't be the ones who bring it about.

Graphic Grandeur (Inalienable Wrongs Edition)

 

There's a new sheriff in town, so to speak. Border Patrol Commander Greg Bovino having been sent into exile, it's now Tom Homan's job to rid Minnesota of undesirables. But where to find them?

Cartoonist Mike Luckovich suggests he start here:

Graphic Grandeur (Star Force One Edition)

 

 

You can fret about what went on at Davos all you want. As for myself, I worry more that...

...Earth may soon be paid an unwelcome visit by otherworldly beings!

Cartoon by Matt Reuter

Graphic Grandeur (You Don't Know Dickens Edition)

 

And then there was Venezuela...

Cartoon by Clay Jones

704 Hauser Street Pride

 

Rob Reiner's violent death is shocking, but no more--in fact, it arguably should be a bit less--shocking than the violent deaths at Brown University and Australia's Bondi Beach, both of which had a higher body count. Interestingly, the All in the Family star and This Is Spinal Tap director did share one characteristic with the Bondi victims. He was Jewish and they were Jewish, but in Reiner's case anti-semitism does not appear to be a motive in his killing (instead, as of this writing, mental illness and the accompanying family strife it so often causes seem to be contributing factors.) Still, Reiner's life is worth your attention not for how it ended but for its contributions to acting and cinema. Eventually it went beyond those art forms. Reiner was every bit as progressive as Mike Stivic, the character he played on AITF. That progressiveness was spun-off not into its own TV show but the real-world body politic. Reiner supported many causes, but I'm going to focus on just one right now. In 2008, Reiner co-found The American Foundation for Equal Rights to help fight California's Proposition 8, which banned same-sex marriage in the state. "We don't believe in separate but equal in any other legal position except this," he said in explaining how same-sex marriage at the time was outside the Constitution. Thanks to a court battle that Reiner's organization pursued, the Ninth Court of Appeals eventually overturned the proposition. Not bad for a "meathead."

1947-2025

 

 

Gilded by Association

 Hot off the Epstein files:

 Steve Bannon, left, and Epstein.

Epstein, left, and Alan Dershowitz

 

 

Left to right: Epstein, unidentified (duh!) woman, and Woody Allen.

Left to right: Segway inventor Dean Kamen, Epstein, and Richard Branson.

   

Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak. Epstein's not in this one, but it's among the photos released by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. 

Larry Summers, Epstein, and Bill Gates in a previously released photo. Summers and Gates do appear in separate photos released by the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, but, oddly enough, without Epstein, so I opted to go with this one instead. 

The Andrew Formally Known as Prince, and Epstein, in another previously released photo.

  

Epstein and supermodel (so where's her cape?) Ingrid Seynhaeve. 

Left to right: Jimmy Buffett, Buffett's wife Jane Slagsvol, Bill Clinton (as the signature indicates), Ghislaine Maxwell, and Epstein.

In the center--what the hell, I'll let you figure that one out yourself.

 

 

My takeaway?

Whether one is a Democrat or a Republican, a liberal or a conservative, an intellectual, artist, or businessman, it may not mean as much as whether one belongs to the clique, a clique variously referred to as the Jet Set, Cafe Society, the Beautiful People, the Rich and Famous, the Glitterati, and the A-List. In his unfinished novel Answered Prayers, Truman Capote refers to it as the "Center of the Earth". Now, not necessarily all of the members of whatever you choose to call it did anything wrong (FULL DISCLOSURE: I've complimented one or two of these people on this blog in the past) but my, oh my, for a bunch some have also referred to as "elitists", they weren't always careful about who they hung around with, were they?  As for Jeffrey Epstein, I suspect he preyed not only on underage girls, but in a different sort of way, this clique as well. There's something to be said for exclusion.

Take it away, Annie: