Archive for the ‘culture’ Category

At SOTU Trump Reminds me of Tip O’Neill, Sam Rayburn and Why I’m no Longer a Democrat

Posted: February 4, 2020 by datechguy in Always look at the bright side of Trump, business, culture, economy, elections, politics, trade
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President Reagan & Speaker Tip O’Neill (Left) President Eisenhower & Speaker Sam Rayburn (right)

For a very long time you would have described me as a Tip O’Neill Democrat. We shared the same faith, came from the same state and shared the same values. I read his books watched his speeches loved his fight for the working man, and regretted that I didn’t take a day off to meet him at a book signing not too long before his death.

I left the Democrat party in the 90’s (and the GOP in 2013) but as I watched President Trump’s State of the Union Speech I was thinking of Tip O’Neill and Sam Rayburn who 1st put him on the rules committee and the path to power in the house. Like O’Neill and before O’Neill Rayburn was a man of the people who had never forgotten the American worker and the American Farmer and all the country owed them.

I thought of them as the president talked about jobs, taking care of Americans, protecting freedom of speech, freedom of religion and talking about American manufacturing and striking back at terrorist who targeted Americans etc etc etc.

I was thinking of them because it hit me that with one very prominent exception from Arizona Senator Kyrsten Sinema

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…Democrats remained sitting as they president talked about gains for women, minorities and American workers.

I thought back to my youth watching these speeches as a political junkie and remembered Tip and remembered all I read about Sam and thought of how he would have reacted to all of those things Donald Trump was speaking of.

They would have been on their feet clapping.

Sam Rayburn and Tip O’Neill would be what you might call yellow dog Democrats, people who were so loyal to their party that if said party nominated a yellow dog for office they would vote for it vs any Republican but as much as they loved their party they loved America more.

They would have been cheering American victories overseas, they would have been cheering American jobs, they would have been cheering freedom of religion, they would have been cheering higher wages, more opportunities for blacks, Hispanics and women and both Speaker Tip O’Neill and Speaker Sam Rayburn (unlike Speaker Nancy Pelosi) would have been smart enough to make damn sure that their fellow democrat members were standing for these things as well.

In 2010 at CPAC while interviewing some local transit workers in DC I was asked why I was a republican. I answered on camera that as a believing Roman Catholic I felt I was no longer welcome in the Democrat party. I submit and suggest that neither Tip O’Neill nor Sam Rayburn be welcome in the party either because they were more interested in success for America and Americans than in who got credit for that success.

I think it’s a great mercy that neither lived to see what their party had become.

Footnote While Mr. Sam & Tip would be ashamed of what their party had become they’d be damn proud of Senator Kyrsten Sinema tonight.

Justice Thomas Doc — Not on Netflix

Posted: January 28, 2020 by julietteochieng in American Success Stories, media
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Ginny and Clarence Thomas

by baldilocks

J.J. Sefton of Ace of Spades HQ reviews the new Clarence Thomas documentary.

Besides President Trump, arguably one of the most transformative figures to emerge onto the American political landscape in half a century is Associate Justice of the Supreme Court Clarence Thomas. Yet, it’s not his stellar legal mind, reflected in scores of brilliant opinions he has penned over the course of his nearly 29-year career at the highest court in the land that earns for him that status. Sadly, it is merely for the fact the he is a black man who, after coming of age in the repressive Democrat Deep South and even embracing the black radicalism of the late 60s ultimately had the scales fall from his eyes and dared reject the political Democrat-Left plantation. But when he was nominated to take the seat vacated by Thurgood Marshall on the Supreme Court that he became not only their worst nightmare, but an existential threat.

Created Equal: Clarence Thomas in His Own Words, a new documentary slated for release at the end of the month, is a powerful journey back in time, told mostly by Thomas in his own words, and in some segments by his remarkable wife Ginny and mentor and champion, former Senator John Danforth

I’ve always admired Justice Thomas as do most who have read his autobiography My Grandfather’s Son: A Memoir. By the way, in the book a reader can find yet another display of the character defects of one Joseph Biden.

And I remember Barack Obama’s public and pointless insult toward Thomas during one of the 2008 presidential debates.

Pastor Rick Warren asked each Presidential candidate which Justices he would not have nominated. Mr. McCain said, “with all due respect” the four most liberal sitting Justices because of his different judicial philosophy.

Mr. Obama took a lower road, replying first that “that’s a good one,” and then adding that “I would not have nominated Clarence Thomas. I don’t think that he, I don’t think that he was a strong enough jurist or legal thinker at the time for that elevation. Setting aside the fact that I profoundly disagree with his interpretation of a lot of the Constitution.” The Democrat added that he also wouldn’t have appointed Antonin Scalia, and perhaps not John Roberts, though he assured the audience that at least they were smart enough for the job.

The nerve of some people. It was like a donkey trying to squash an elephant.

Oh wait …

Anyway, read the entire review. I plan on seeing the documentary when it gets here on the 31st.

Juliette Akinyi Ochieng has been blogging since 2003 as baldilocks. Her older blog is here.  She published her first novel, Tale of the Tigers: Love is Not a Game in 2012.

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6 Quick Kobe Thoughts, Confession, The Difference a Day Makes, Life goes on, Liang Wudong, What Impeachment? and some things never change Under the Fedora

Posted: January 27, 2020 by datechguy in catholic, culture, entertainment, nba, Sports
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What happened to Kobe Bryant is why I don’t get into any aircraft or go on any long trip without going to confession and receiving absolution first.

None of us from short fat lower middle class 56 year old bloggers to 41 year tall healthy rich basketball superstars are promised tomorrow. So if you need the sacrament of confession the best time to get it is now

It’s amazing the difference a day makes, I would wager that 24 hours ago if offered a chance to ride on a chopper with Kobe Bryant and his daughter you could likely count the number of people who would decline such an offer on your fingers and toes.

You could make a very good episode of the twilight zone about a basketball fanatic selling his soul for the chance.

It’s worth noting that moments of silence and tributes not withstanding the NBA games still went on yesterday, the Grammy’s took place yesterday, on Sunday the Superbowl is going to take place and all of the athletes in all the various sports will keep going on as normal. Unless you are one of the family of those who died life goes on as normal. It’s a lesson worth learning if you are one of those taking the court, field or stage yesterday with the crowd cheering you.

Another person died yesterday that should be remembered by likely will not.

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There will likely not many glowing tributes in the news for Doctor Liang Wudong who died treating patients from the disease that everyone around the world is running from.

There should be.

If you thought people weren’t paying attention to impeachment last week today you’d better believe that nobody is paying attention to it today.

This is one of those very rare times when a Monday Morning is the perfect time for anyone in politics or business to dump an embarrassing story and know for a fact that nobody is going to cover it.

Finally I was on twitter while all this was happening and saw this tweet from a DC blue check journalist in reply to the President’s comment:

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Twitchy has a whole batch of such replies I think my initial reaction to this is correct: God what’s wrong with you people?

Cindy McCain Explains why she (and other elites) don’t deserve our respect (and an interesting coincidence)

Posted: January 26, 2020 by datechguy in crime, culture, News/opinion, oddities
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Cindy McCain the widow of Senator John McCain confirms something that all of us have already known:

note that she says that a girl from her daughter’s high school was a victim of him and she hopes he’s in hell but consider, it didn’t outrage her enough to speak out aloud and make a fuss about it, five years, or ten years ago back when it might have made a difference when the odd blogger or two was writing about it.

Remember this is the wife of a US Senator, a Former Presidential Candidate supposedly one of the most respected people in the political world, a “Maverick”.

Nope not a word.

When it comes to Jeffrey Epstien or Harvey Weinstein, or Matt Lauer et/al as far as our elite betters in cultural or political world the actions of these men were not a crisis in their eyes until the general public found out what all of them already knew.

Closing thought. Something hit me when I was writing this piece. I went back and checked the historical stats for my site.

From 2010 to 2013 My site was on a roll, I was growing in traffic, I was being credentialed for national campaigns covering Presidential, Senatorial, Congressional and other campaigns all over the country and able to do it via Datipjar. I had an oped run in the NY Post and even had an appearance on Boston’s fox station (I brought cannoli naturally). In late 2013 I brought on the first batch of my Magnificent Seven added several popular nationally known bloggers as paid members of my team. My Radio show was going strong and was expanding. I attended CPAC in 2014 confident that this was going to be my future.

On April 14 2014 I wrote an article titled

Private Islands, Orgies, Bill Clinton? Nothing to see here

The kicker was this:

What could the media do if this story involving the former father of the year? They would call it old news, not relevant, dirty tricks from a salacious lawsuit that doesn’t even involve him and an attack on Hillary that crosses the line. In fact the left will deploy a plethora of adjectives to discourage further discussion of this story from antiquated to zany, but there is one adjective that could not come out of their mouth to dismiss this story:

Unbelievable

The last few years have proven that the left can convince a low information voter of a lot of things, but even the full power of the mainstream media and the strongest zealots from the War on Women® brigade would not be able to convince the American public that Bill Clinton would have no interest or business on a private island where orgies took place.

2014 ended as my worst year in the Blogs history until last year’s technical issues kept us from posting and updating. Despite the addition of popular well known writers my traffic crashed over 67% in one year. The Tip Jar revenues likewise dropped. My radio show which had been adding stations never grew further and ended. By 2015 I had picked up an overnight temp job to pay the bills which eventually became a full time job in 2018. I dropped the podcast and I resigned myself to the fact that where I am in the blogging/writing/reporting world would never be more than what it was.

I never noticed the timing until today.

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