Camels.  They are out of place in the book of Genesis.  (“Biblical Archeology” Magazine will have to figure out how the camels died on Noah’s Arc.)

Thousands of years from now, there will confusion about by the technological anachronisms propagated from the work of Steampunkers.

Dave Berg, former producer for The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, tries to up Jay Leno’s legacy by insisting…

He brought in the politicians.

Our grand experiment began with Jimmy Carter, whose candor was a change from Hollywood guests who were often little more than self-promoters. Carter didn’t hesitate to admit to Leno he almost lost his presidential bid in 1976 after telling Playboy that he, a strong Christian, had “lust” in his heart. Carter turned out to be a big draw, so we forged ahead.

This is curious.  Jimmy Carter, I see, was on Jay Leno in February of 1993.  This is, indeed, before Al Gore made his appearance on David Letterman — on CBS later that autumn.  But it is hard to see this “forging ahead” at “full speed ahead”.

By 2000, the major presidential candidates in the primary and general elections were making regular stops on Leno and, to a lesser extent, Letterman, who had followed our lead. “The Daily Show,” picking up steam with new host Jon Stewart, was on the same path. Politicians saw late-night as an opportunity to come across as a regular guy in a way news shows did not afford them.

Interesting.  Bob Dole announced his presidential bid on Letterman in 1995.  Basically.  He would do so officially a little later.  It was noted through the magazine news-weeklies (either Time or Newsweek) as a harbinger of the zeitgeist of politicians making their way into pop culture venues.  By the time we get into the 2000s there’s two good reasons for politicians to gravitate toward Leno: ratings winner, and he’s safer.  (Leno was never going to get into a feud with Sarah Palin).    But by this point, everyone’s on everyone, and, sorry Dave Berg.

I tend to think Letterman revitalized his show slightly for a while by bringing political figures for something a tad harder hitting than Leno (somehow sliding into having political opinions).  But this was brief.

… Then again, I don’t know that Ron Paul ever did Letterman, so maybe that counts for something.

In critiquing the crashness of current popular culture, I sometimes think people don’t give enough credit for the crashness of previous generations.  Take this editorial from the National Review… “Triumph of the Vulgarians“:

(The two most rebellious comedians in my youth were Bill Cosby and Jerry Seinfeld — because they kept it clean or, in Seinfeld’s case, at least kept it suggestive.)

Sure, sure… Cosby… but something about the Seinfeld show and the “suggestive” as opposed to his statement on “nobody watches Miley Cyrus twerk and asks ‘What is she getting at'”…  Had to hedge there, I see…

Sigh.

Just about every other month, Donald Wildmon would put out a full page ad on the back of the Sunday comics section, which greatly rejiggered the comics pages and shrunk everything.  It was annoying, even if reading Wildmon rave outrage at the latest televised offenses was somewhat amusing.  Wildmon knew what he’s seeing… and he knows what “Master of Your Domain” and “Sponge-worthy” means.

Meanwhile, I saw something odd when I briefly caught a minute of the 700 Club.  Currently conservative activist and former star of the show Cheers John Ratzinberger.  Or, Cliff Clavin.  The show host propping up stills from that television show repeatedly, and… I remember an episode which consisted of … erm… Sam and Rebecca trying to have sex, but getting entangled with conflicting psychological advice from Frasier and Lilith.

I think it’s the reason my 6th CCD teacher (the one we had for a few weeks before an absolute nutcase stepped in the breach)  was absolutely horrified by Cheers.

Not that everything is great.  I don’t know how you navigate a child through the popular culture, but it strikes me that nothing is on a downward cliff, so much as right at a plateau.  I honestly don’t know what the difference, in terms of crashness not aesthetics, between Miley Cyrus’s performance and Madonna’s “writhing around in a chopped off wedding dress”.

To a great extent, indicators suggest things are “okay”.  Bullying, for instance, is down.  And that one seems to be something coming out of “political correctness”, ie: quit being mean to gays.  Which brings us to something a little odd…

Putin explains the reason for an “American Style School Shooting“, a tragic event that occurred in Russia, and…

Meanwhile, Putin took a slightly different tack, lamenting the lack of cultural education of Russia’s youth. “The new generation … needs to be raised with good artistic taste and the ability to understand and value the theatrical, dramatic and musical arts,” he stated. “And if this was done as it should be in our country, maybe there would not be tragedies like the tragedy in Moscow today.”

Hm.  The thing is a little odd, because as of right now, this is an isolated event.  Not enough Checkov?  I suppose I should just be glad Putin didn’t blame it on Pussy Riot.

Rand Paul is partying like it’s 1999!

Or, probably 1998.

In recent weeks, one Republican after another has come forward to rebut the Democratic claim that the GOP is waging a “war on women.” The responses have ranged from homey (Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers responding to Barack Obama’s State of the Union address by noting that she’d given birth just eight weeks earlier) to creepy (former presidential candidate Mike Huckabee saying Democrats think women can’t control their “libidos.”) But perhaps most puzzling has been the tack taken by Rand Paul, who in interview after interview after interview has accused Democrats of “hypocrisy” for claiming to support women’s rights while giving Bill Clinton a pass for his “predatory” behavior towards Monica Lewinsky.

The pundit-ocracy is speaking.

What Rand Paul needs to stop doing.

Apparently there’s a whole treasure trove of new materials from the Clinton era about the whole brohauhau about Monica Lewinsky.  A right wing blog news source has had a field day publishing a bunch of stuff.

The funny thing about it is… none of it is all that much interesting.

(And check out that photoraph down a ways on the NYT piece of Rand Paul WALKING RIGHT AT YOU.  It needs to be printed in 3D, to give you the total effect of Rand Paul WALKING RIGHT AT YOU.)

You know… when Ron Paul voted for impeachment… he took the opportunity to explain his vote as … erm… War.  What is it good for?  Though, he didn’t follow up on it for Bush.  But Rand Paul isn’t Ron Paul, and Rand Paul needs to somehow appeal to 60 something year old conservative activists in Iowa, and repeating Monica is sexier than repeating Benghazi over and over again.

One of the comment queries that I see from time to time leading to this blog runs along the lines of “Larouche views on FDR”.  I honestly think my blog post which simply posted excerpts from the Larouche book The Case of Walter Lippmann is amongst the most important items in my “Larouche Challenge” categories, as clearly it has cleared the air for a smattering of people googling about to find out Larouche’s historic views on FDR from when he was specifically targetting the far right as they differ sharply from post 1982 or thereabouts when he’s come to find some strategic use for Roosevelt.

I kind of think such a page, a bit more extensive, would be useful to put up on the “laroucheplanet” page (not much updated though it is, having fulfilled much of its perceived obligation in getting a bunch of information out there), as well as… it seems about time to put up a bunch of quotations on where stands Larouche on Kennedy.  Because, you know… what do we have here?

John Sigerson, who directed the concert, said that the concert hoped to expand people’s awareness of the importance of the arts in a classical sense, by reminding people of the high social, moral and innovative standards embodied in the leadership of President Kennedy.

AND…

From A note from Margaret Fairchild:
Long live Mozart and JFK!

Poppy cock.  Feel free to jump to the index page of the Walter Kippmann… looking up Kennedy, and just plucking out a random page number… 40
“the global pattern of the Knnedy administration period is waves of destablizations, tampering in foreign elections and other typically Rockefellar antics”

An interesting note in the review of this big concert, consisting of “mostly NEC students and Boston freelancers, with a smattering of Schiller Institute members”.  I like this one:

In the low-lying portions, he was not helped by the Schiller Institute’s campaign to lower modern pitch to 432 Hz in accord with Verdi’s dictum.

Ba de dum.

A bit of criticism found here.  And naming names.
The current lack of leadership from Cardinal Sean O’Malley.  Specifically, Cardinal Sean has erred by allowing a recognized cult (The Schiller Institute) to co-sponsor an event with the archdiocese in the Cathedral of the Holy Cross.
If you said (d) you are correct.  Maybe you researched the Schiller Institute before answering (d).  If so good for you, it is far more than the Cardinal and his advisors did.
Yes, those LaRouche automatons.  You know them standing in front of your local post office.  They have eager smiles and glassed over eyes. They have a cardtable full of sundry conspiracy literature with large pictures of President Obama and President Bush with Hitler mustaches to attract your attention.  You can find out lots of information about cults and the LaRouche cult online.
So you think the mantle of credibility laid upon the disciples of Lyndon LaRouche is no big deal.  Sure there is something to be said for the fact that most Bostonians will be watching Tom Brady this Sunday afternoon instead of swooning over the symphonic strains of Mozart in the South End.  However, you can bet that this event will be rebroadcast all over the world on various LaRouche websites and maybe even on the Cardinal’s vanity television station.   I believe that Boston is the second diocese (possibly archdiocese) to be taken in by Lyndon LaRouche and the Schiller Institute with this Kennedy concert scam.  Shame on any pastor who lets these creeps into the sanctuary.  I hope this brief blog post will prompt a mea culpa from Cardinal Sean, but I doubt it.  Apologize to his sheep- no way.  It is easier to use his cadre of public relations professionals to explain away this ugly omission in leadership.

ITEM NUMBER TWO:  CAN KESHA ROGERS BE STOPPED?

So.  Texas Elections calendar.  Early voting for the statewide Democratic primary begins on February 18 and Election Day is Tuesday, March 4.
LaRouche activist Kesha Rogers is also running as a Democrat for some unknown reason.
The reasons are pretty well known, and I’ll get to them in a minute.

Actually, don’t kid yourself.  It’d be a headache if she were in the run-off, but how long did anyone remember the last Texas Senate run-off semi-embarrassing candidate from 2 years ago?  Grady Yarbrough.  It will be a drag on the ticket if she gets into the general election, and you don’t want her to get into the run-off, but don’t

Also nobody remembers the Larouchie who was the Democratic nominee for US Senator in Wyoming in 2000.

Ouch.  We only need to recall the failed challenge by the much more seasoned and credible Ken Paxton in 2011, at a time when Straus’ grip on power was far more tenuous than today, to realize that Democrats David Alameel or Kesha Rogers have a better chance of defeating US Senator John Cornyn in November than Turner has of vanquishing Straus in a battle for the speakership.

Hm…  Commentary and a half.

In light of Lyndon LaRouche’s remarks about former President Bill Clinton during the Monday, Jan. 27, policy committee dialogue, it is worthwhile to once again review the actual strategic context for the Republican impeachment hoax against the President. The strategic consequences of the Clinton impeachment are still reverberating in profound ways today.

This is kind of amusing.

Oregon Rep. Greg Walden is defending fundraising websites set up by the Republican campaign committee he oversees that critics say mislead voters into thinking they’re actually donating to Democrats.

The National Republican Congressional Committee, which Walden chairs, has set up 16 websites that use flattering photos of Democratic incumbents and in many cases the same typography and colors they use on their own campaign sites – as well as web addresses that use the names of the Democrats.

In smaller type under the candidates’ names, the sites describe how they’re raising money to defeat those candidates.

And Greg Walden and the Republicans are not particularly fooling anyone with this rationale:

NRCC spokeswoman Andrea Bozek said the committee didn’t intend to deceive anyone and that the fuss was much ado about nothing.

“I think we give voters credit for being able to read a website and come to the conclusion that they are negative attacks on Democratic candidates,” she said.

Visuals are at times everything in politics — there’s a famous example of a critical news piece from one of the networks which juxtaposed Reagan’s glowing ads with his record, where Reagan’s political operatives than thanked the network for what was a positive piece for them is pushing the visuals forward again.  So here is the irony of this use of positive smiling pictures of your political opponents for, in part, reasons of fooling…

Time Magazine, which posted a story on the websites Wednesday, described it as similar to a “spoofing” telemarketing scam and quoted Kathy Kiley of the Sunlight Foundation as saying:

“If it were a consumer product we were talking about it would be illegal—or at least you’d get the better business bureau all over you…It’s just another example of how un-transparent and shady the system of funding political campaigns has become.”

The alternative, and what we see is typical, is use of the unflattering pictures imaginable of your opponent, set up against horror music for dramatic effect.  And you know what?  This gets a lot of derision from the same people critical of the Republican use of the smiling positive images.

Damned if you do; damned if you don’t, and the only honest method of campaigning is to go to the negative image.  Kind of ironic.

An entire nation sat on the couch after the halftime, the Seahawks leading 22 to 0, and so thinking “Let’s see if Peyton Manning can pull something off here”.

Percy Harvin scores a touchdown on the opening kick-off of the half.  The score is 29 to 0.

An entire nation is thinking, “Let’s just click it over to the Animal Planet and watch the continuous loop of the Puppy Bowl.”

A sign that the Revolution Will Not be covered in the Old Media.  There is this anti- Abercrombie and Fitch activism out there, at time vaguely and at other times specifically left-wing in nature, centered around the various repercussions of their elitist market value … starting with the CEO line of…

“In every school there are the cool and popular kids, and then there are the not-so-cool kids. Candidly, we go after the cool kids. We go after the attractive all-American kid with a great attitude and lots of friends.”

And so it is… curious in its exclusivity.  Basically we’re selling prestige for rich white Suburbanites.