Whatever happened to "Audrey Rouget"?: A screen biography of actress Carolyn Farina - The O'Dea Fixation

Here is the long, un-awaited review of Whatever happened to "Audrey Rouget"?: A screen biography of actressCarolyn Farina. Actually, it isn't a review, just a few rambling thoughts.

If you follow the blog of a fellow named Julian O'Dea, you might notice he has a tendency to write about an actress whose career as a star spans one movie. The obsession he has might lead one to think him a bit strange and well he might be.

The movie in question, however, is a jewel and said actress he has a thing for played her role to perfection.

Julian's blog ranges to a number of subjects from haiku, to art and nature and movies and women among other subjects. It is women and movies that he often dwells on, especially one.

The women thing is not something we who have only a superficial knowledge of the Aussie world understand. The men from down under have a rep as macho mateship types. As a rule, stereotypes can be relied on to a great extent, but those we get from movies and TV might not be too reliable.

Whatever happened to "Audrey Rouget"?: A screen biography of actress Carolyn Farina is a collection of information about the movie Metropolitan and the woman who played a, if not the, central role.

I can't say, I have the same fixation as Mr. O'Dea. There are other movies I like a lot, but would never read a whole e-book about, let alone write one.

That having been said, I must agree with the author that it is a great film. One I think about a lot, though differently in some ways. After all, it takes place in my country and in a city I've visited often.

Among the links about Metropolitan is one for Udolpho. The man had an interesting blog that I would read. The ebook link is now dead as the impresario of Udolpho has gone on to host a website called MyPosting Career that can be described as a club of folks frothing at the mouth. It can be interesting, but is unworthy of him.

On the Udolpho site, there was, if I remember correctly, an Amazon link to Metropolitan. Udolpho wrote about it with a lot of care and made me wish to see the movie, which I borrowed through our inter-library lending system.

It was back in 2007 and I wrote about it on this blog. Viewing the movie led me to concur with the man's thoughts, though at this remove, I can't say I clearly remember them all.

Another blogger, the Black Sea, commented that I should also watch Barcelona and though I liked it, it did not feel the same.

The Black Sea also noted the Whit Stillman interview with Charlie Rose. Stillman spoke of the self-sacrificing of the men of the upper-crust as the Titanic sunk and contrasted it with Cameron's view of the plutocrats in his movie. Stillman had it right, but today's. 001% probably would take a sauve qui peut attitude.

Now the ebook itself has value as the place to go to find out everything Mr. O'Dea has written about Carolyn Farina, the movie and the character of Audrey as well Whit Stillman and some tidbits about the other actors.

Mr. O'Dea also was influenced by the Udolopho blog. I was surprised that is where he found out about it.

Julian writes of Metroplitan, “It is a surprisingly hard film to parse and interpret. I think this is because it is hard to place it in time; it was a time of rapid change anyway; and Stillman’s intent, and his level of irony, are hard to determine.”

I suppose so. There are some markers of that dizzyingly rapid change that Americans from the Northeast of a certain age (mine) might get, but not many unless they were born into that life (I was not).

It is a tale of decline. The lads were sent to prep schools to become gentlemen and that is noble, but not much help on Wall Street. They, especially Charlie, know it. The boys might take solace from the fact that most of the villains of the 2008 crash were not high-Sassenach, but they probably are not hanging out at the Hamptons these days, let alone hitchhiking return trips.

The young ladies were also sent away to boarding schools, more probably to be “finished” rather than career women, other than, say, in publishing.

For the men, and women, as well as the rest of us, it is a different world now.

I've never read any of Jane Austen's books so I am at a loss for some of what Mr. Stillman is trying to convey. I do think I get it from the scene where Carolyn defends convention. It was an important part of the movie and I may not have got it had I not been prepped for it by Udolpho.

Audrey loves Tom.  This is the part I don't get.  Mostly what comes out of his mouth is drivel and he not especially forceful.  He comes into his own at the end, sorta.  His letters to Serena that came into Audrey's possession must have been brilliant.

In a not overly large e-tome. Mr. O'Dea has compiled as many links as he could as well as his own thoughts as gleaned from his own pages. This is not to say he is done. there are a number of entries on his blog about Audrey that were posted after the ebook came out. I for one encourage him to keep at it, otherwise it would probably be a life down at the pub with his mates.

Actually, that doesn't sound all that bad.

Paul Graham is no gentleman

Paul Graham is a startup guru who writes about that culture and reveals something about himself and his class.  In a recent

post on his own site, he argues to let the floodgates open to talent.

He posits that as;

The US has less than 5% of the world's population. Which means if the qualities that make someone a great programmer are evenly distributed, 95% of great programmers are born outside the US.

Though he says if certain qualities are evenly distributed, he is not arguing whether or not that if is correct. Without doing that, there is no point in opening the sluices. Of course, as he has said the technology companies are right, so that implies he is using his words in the paragraph quoted as justification.

Now Mr. Graham is not so much an idiot to believe much is evenly distributed in this world.  It is possible that it was something off the top that he didn't pay much attention to.  Not a quality prized in someone in the business of choosing startups.

That is not the question the voice of humility wishes to address.  Rather it is that there is a class of vastly successful entrepreneurs who have no sense of fellow feeling for their countrymen.  They probably make some nice noises, but the general tenor is the lumpen Yank is slow and we can't do without the more advanced peoples from exotic locales.

Here at the tvoh we have looked askance at the antics of our foreign policy elite.  Even if our wish came true and the foolish overseas adventures ended, we would still need an army.  None of the startup class would rush to the colors.

this is the point, these men are not an aristocracy.  They are just smart guys who made big money on their ideas.  We are not without libertarian leanings and to a degree many of those who have done well have such a point of view.  One hardly has to agree with Liz Warren to think these guys want a bit of a free ride.

They may see their assets protected in Singapore and could possibly duplicate some of Silicon Valley culture there, but few other places would they feel safe.  The brainiac class depends on the goodwill of their lower orders more than they think.  That they have so little fellow feeling means the class lacks nobility.  That they don't seek out talent among American citizens is damning.  There is probably a pool of gringos out there who could rise to the higher level of programming Graham wants, but he ain't looking for it.

In Downton Abbey, the snobbish dowager says; "An aristocrat with no servants is as much use to the county as a glass hammer."  She knew that not providing employment for those she lived amongst took away some of the rationale for her class.  This doesn't mean I'm suggesting titles be given out, we hardly need Earl Paul of Central Square or Count Sergey of Mountain View.  It would be nice, however, if they felt themselves part of the nation.  Of course, one should not think they lack for servants.

The voice of humility is not against all immigration.  If Gupta is a true super programmer, let him in.  We have average enough that if he is run of the mill, let's not be overly ready.

Winter Camp and panem et circenses

There is little to say about the Yale and Missouri tantrums.  One might find it odd that the football players protest whatever spurious controversy has upset the noirs of privilege when the fellows are being horribly used as unpaid labor.

It's not like all the lads are going into the NFL with huge bonuses other than a few of the real stars.  There's a little notoriety now and then graduation and scrambling for a job with no useful skill.

I know little about college or pro football.  Since I hit adolescence, sports has seemed to me something people obsessed about who need something to occupy them in the time they have until death relieves them of ever having to try and think.  Sort of Oprah or the View for guys.

As I went to a Papist institution back in the day, I can attest that college is winter camp with different names for the office of counselor.  Back then, there was some rigor, but I managed to pull out the gentleman's C, well, C-.

I never cease to be amazed at how little the tykes know.  I had an interaction with a proud honors grad from a well regarded state school.  A poli-sci major, they not only had never read de Tocqueville, the name itself drew a blank.*

There is no reason to keep this charade going, but do not waste time calling for reform.  There is too much money percolating up.  The only thing that can grind this to a halt if the obstreperous graduates inability to pay leads to mass pauperism.  It is devoutly to be wished, and may be happening in slow motion.

In fact, I suspect behind calls to make college tuition free and keep the scam going.

There is no education going on in this country.  If you doubt me, ask a recent bachelor to define education and listen to him make something up.  Heck, my fellow citizen, Most of you can't give it.

Now to the case of the Thug woman Click, she has issued an apology.

Yesterday was an historic day at MU—full of emotion and confusion. I have reviewed and reflected upon the video of me that is circulating, and have written this statement to offer both apology and context for my actions. I have reached out to the journalists involved to offer my sincere apologies and to express regret over my actions. I regret the language and strategies I used, and sincerely apologize to the MU campus community, and journalists at large, for my behavior, and also for the way my actions have shifted attention away from the students’ campaign for justice. 

From this experience I have learned about humanity and humility. When I apologized to one of the reporters in a phone call this afternoon, he accepted my apology. I believe he is doing a difficult job, and I am grateful to have had the opportunity to speak with him. His dignity also speaks well to the Journalism program at MU. Again, I wish to express my sincere apology for my actions on Carnahan Quad yesterday.”

Actually, it wasn't a bad mea culpa.  Usually, in our country the apology goes along the "if anyone feels offended" line and never admits wrongdoing.  This was not one of them.  Is it sincere or fear for the sinecure?

*I do not know a country where there is in general less intellectual independence and less freedom of discussion than in America... In America the majority builds an impregnable wall around the process of thinking.

...
The Inquisition was never able to prevent the circulation in Spain of books opposed to the religion of the majority. The majestic rule of the majority does better in the United States; it has removed even the thought of publishing them.

     -De Toqueville, Democracy in America (1835)

Review of Submissive Women-There is more to Julian O'Dea's life than Audrey

I only accidentally found out about Julian O’Dea, but that is how one comes across a lot on the internet. I stuck with him due to his affection for the movie, Metropolitan. Actually, It is the female lead of the movie, Carolyn Farina that is his true focus.

In the comments of one of his posts he wrote, “Yes, I readily admit to having a “screen crush” on her.” What our Australian friend has is not a crush. His obsession is such that I would be surprised if he went full on John Hinckley, but not by much.

My experience of living sort of stopped when I got here to my exurban backwater. It is quiet and boring here and that is the attraction. Reading the tales from Submissive Women and Other Stories brings up what it was like to be younger and in a different milieu. This is not to say all of his characters are striblings, but none are too old.

The Young Wife reminds me that the young, when given the chance, will do the thoughtless thing.

Old School Friends is a riff on you can never go home again, except when you do. The encounter is what one should expect, I guess.

The Young Nun Visits the Doctor is another of Mr. O’D’s meeting after lapse tales. She is affected, but it changes no life.

YouTube is a bit of a departure as the service becomes a true youtube with an uncanny coincidence, if it is coincidence.

An unexpected bequest changes the course of a young woman’s life in The Woman and Art. Her aunt’s house was left to her and she makes the most of it without realizing it and becomes grateful.

The Bluestocking regards a woman who may be ready to do anything but still has the inner prude.

In The One That Got Away, what did she get away from? The narrator, feminism?

The life moves on, but with memories theme runs through. I am no critic, so what I write take with a grain of sand. Stll, his style is excellent and the price was right. I had a pleasant afternoon.

The Function of NPR as explained by the recent Federal ukase regarding bodily functions in urban areas and our new dictionary definition

Recently in the news was the story of the two women who passed the tough US Army Ranger School.  Skeptics have noted that the media displayed the usual praise for distaff achievement.  The two women who completed the ranger course were tough, but had to recycle and got breaks no guy could expect.  That was not widely noted in the media and someone I know who has knowledge of the Ranger program was upset that "the press got it wrong."

To think the press got it wrong because they did not see or report the obvious is to not understand current reality.  The press got the orthodox line perfectly and reported it exactly as they should.  No where is this more so than National Public Radio.

I listen to NPR because every advanced totalitarian country has a ministry of information and one needs to know how one is supposed to feel on any subject.  Notice, I did not say "think."  

One should hardly be surprised that the official line is that the two women were trailblazers if not goddesses.  America is more and more looking like the words from Alice in Wonderland, “Everyone has one, and all must have prizes.”  Except, that is, actual rangers who are too cis for orthodox comfort.

NPR has devolved into the depths of bizarre   In a rare excursion to the Big Apple, while walking up 5th Ave, we saw a man somewhat normal looking in that he was dressed in typical American bad taste.  For the record he was Caucasian and, thank God, not of our ethnic group.  We are kinda sensitive about that.

Anyway, he walked up to a telephone stand, (there are no more booths) and urinated in broad daylight as if he had entered the men’s room.  

Bums are everywhere so what does this have to do with NPR.  About the same time as the "you go ranger girls" story was in the news they had a segment about the administration’s fight for an important civil right.  It seems holy mother state wants to have urban governments not merely help the homeless, but canonize them.  Arresting people for urinating and defecating on city streets is now a federal no no.  

NPR was true to form and despite the pretend tone of evenhandedness, it was easy to see they were on message as to the government being enlightened and only yahoos would not see the justice of the homeless loosening their bowels when they desire.

MSNBC, CNN or the networks and local stations as well as the remaining press outlets are propaganda organs, as is even Fox to a certain extent.  

NPR is special, however.  NPR is how the Inner Party communicates to the Outer Party what is Goodthink.  Now of course, there is at this point no actual Inner or Outer Party, but there might as well be for NPR true believers.

Here in the Nova Anglia the phenomenon is oft encountered.  There are many in places like Cambridge who readily hear the newscasts and believe.  Maybe in parts of the Midwest this is not evident except in some university towns.  Here it is all too pervasive.

Thus, we shall update our short dictionary when we get around to it with the following entry:

National Public Radio: American Ministry of Information.  Its news apparatus serves as the method the Inner Party communicates to the Outer Party how to feel and believe on issues.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions

Norman Lear has recently spoken of his social conservatism. Maybe he is, but his show, All in the Family was viciously anti-white racism. Every negative stereotype of lower middle-class lumpen caucasia was thrown up. Had he satirized another race in the same manner, he would have never gotten away with it. Maybe the lampooning of the proles was enjoyed in the burbs, but it's been awhile.

Anyway, there was one sketch where Archie Bunker, the series' stooge says to a black neighbor, “I tot you was one of da good ones.” Everybody got the joke, but it has more societal import than that. Not to be discounted is the undertone that for many the president was sold that way in being elected.

For a class of Americans, it is necessary to let others know, they are “one of the good ones” or at least not one of the bad ones. Ted Van Dyk is among them. He must distinguish himself from the unwashed who have no enlightened thoughts. In a Politico article dated August 6, 2015, Ted tells us “School Busing Didn't Work. And To Say So Isn't Racist.” Thanks guy, all along everyone was sure busing had been a roaring success. What took you so long?

Van Dyk wants us to know who the villains were. “In many places, like in Boston as Sokol describes, there was raw racism involved in protests against busing.” He sees the other side, “In many other places, however, there was non-racist consternation based mainly on parents’ concern for the wellbeing of their children.”

Actually, he is being a bit cute. Well, that's the kindest conclusion one can arrive at. I remember the era in Boston well. There certainly was racism, “raw” or “cooked” is how you want to see it and it was not limited to the melanin impaired. Driving a cab while trying to decide on a career, I saw it up close.

Federal Judge W. Arthur Garrity delivered his ukase that racial balance must occur from the lowest grades to the end of high school. I doubt Van Dyk or his ilk had a problem with the use of vast force. His quibble was that it would probably not work.

“Elected officials—even those strongly in favor of civil rights—began to conclude that busing was a well-meant mistake. Presidential candidate George McGovern, in 1971, proposed to his advisers, of which I was one, that he would straightforwardly take an anti-busing position. We prevailed on him not to do so because we believed that the issue then was so emotion-laden that busing proponents would misunderstand his opposition.”

So Ted kinda knew it would not work but didn't want his candidate to say it. Huge sums would be spent chasing a mirage and lives and families would be broken, but McGovern's non-existent electability would be preserved.

Ever the racially pure Van Dyk saw with his bien pensant compassion how it was not working. He had two children in the D.C. System. Recounting the failure as he saw it and noted, “Not surprisingly, parents from the neighborhood began looking for private schools for their kids or moved to Maryland or Virginia suburbs—not because of racism but because their neighborhood school no longer was working.”

Families in Boston left as well, but not surely with the same pure motives. Those without sufficient income who were stuck dealt with as best they could. Some transferred to parochial schools that, possibly to Mr. Van Dyk's surprise, had long been to some degree integrated.

For others it did not work out so well. My cousin, who's mom was widowed was helped into an upscale papist high school normally out of reach of the denizens of his downmarket neighborhood. Years later, he related to me that almost all his old public school classmates had legal or drug problems and had not finished school. Well what do raw racists deserve anyway? Without any resources, one might surmise there was some similar devastation in the minority community.

A woman I worked with about ten years after busing told me how they sent their son to a private academy to get him away from the by then broken system. He quickly became friends with all the black students. It might shock Van Dyk, but the woman said this with no sense of horror.

Mr. Van Dyk has made a window into the souls of white people and found some good and others wanting. He has made a similar inquiry of the leaders of the old civil rights movement and here is where he sees them.

“I have no doubt what brave leaders of the civil-rights revolution would be saying as they witnessed today’s so-called dialogue about race. It would go something like this:

We did not see how hard it would be to truly free black Americans. No more talk please of white racism by anyone or denunciations of past and present political leaders by folk who never risked anything in a tough period when it counted. Let us get on with the work. What good does it do if we have a black president, black attorney general, black judicial, execuctive, and legislative leaders at al levels, successful black leaders in business, labor and the arts if black communities, North and South, are plagued by high black-on-black murder and violent crime rates, narcotics dealing and use, horrific school dropout and incarceration rates, high unemployment, and broken or non-existent families? All Americans need to get on this now with tangible, practical initiatives. Enough grandstanding, self-righteous talk. Time to separate the talkers from the doers.”

He might be right, but the capacity of political leaders and revolutionaries to, like the Bourbons, learn and forget nothing is not to be despised. If the old civil-rights heroes had remained at the forefront, no one knows how they would have felt or acted. Nothing ever goes according to the original plan.

The one big thing Van Dyk and all the other well meaning wonks might want to learn is no big dirigiste social project ever works. Then again, what wonk could ever learn that. Their souls only yearn in that direction. No harm ever comes to them.  Policy people are, as a class, Daisy Buchanans, smashing things up and not having to pay the price.

Whether it's busing or invading Iraq, the grand plan is usually a loser. Going back to ancient Greece, that Syracusan invasion looked like a winner to the Athenian assembly. True, that didn't work well for Alcibiades, but Van Dyk did not lose his career and gets published by Politico and all the Iraq shills have not done badly according to Peter Beinart.

Come to think of it, why would anyone learn a lesson?

Return of the voice of humility's short dictionary

Several years ago we started the dictionary project to define some words or terms.  This is an update. There have been additions and deletions.  We believe what we have defined more reflect the true meanings.

Assisted Suicide: The ultimate reform of the Social Security System. If senior citizens utilize assisted suicide en masse, the system's solvency can be greatly enhanced. 

British Royal Family: Founder of the family, William, started out as Capo di Tutti Capi of Norman Mafia. Descendants and others built the organization into a successful franchise over centuries, despite family infighting. Today, family has no real role as they have been kicked upstairs to mainly ceremonial positions. Currently undergoing branding crisis as members are not terribly appealing as celebrity material. Family should consider new ways of appealing to public. Should study the life of Mr. Frank McCourt who turned a stupid and unappealing childhood into an industry.

Change: 1. Old, To transform or convert. 2. New, Politically, whatever you want it to mean. 

Civil Rights: In truth, there can only be three: Life, Liberty and Property. Anything else is the attempt of one group to secure privileges at the expense of another group or society itself. Of the three above, Property is the most important. If the individual's property is secure, there is little reason for anyone to take his life or liberty. 

Communism: Natural religious progression wherein lower caste man is made into his own god and enslaved in his own name. Lasted far longer than could possibly have been expected. Still claims believers in the professorate. 

Conversation: 1. Informal interchange of thoughts, information etc., by spoken word; oral communication between persons; talk; colloquy. 2. Something always being proposed but never really happening. e.g. Conversation on race or gender, etc. 3. Politically, a desire for a monologue, not a dialogue.

Coverup: Process of investigating government wrongdoing.

Democratic Party: American cargo cult masquerading as a political association. 

Demagogue: Person who appeals to the emotions to gain power or fame. See also: Politician. 

Department of Education: American cabinet secretariat responsible for extracting money from the public while convincing them that the decline in public education is being arrested. Judging from the department's growth amidst continuing school failure, policy is an unmitigated success. 

Election: Auction in advance of stolen goods. (With thanks to H.L. Mencken)

Equality: In nature, an impossibility among the human species, which despite evidence is almost universally desired. 

Extreme Right Wing: Anyone or group with a worldview not to the left of the late Pol Pot's.

Feminism: Formerly a movement to secure women rights to opportunities not generally open to them. Today, the movement exists to secure power for women who attend highly selective institutions. Practical effect has been disastrous for less highly placed women who now have access to the same stupid and boring occupations men have had to do for eons. Current philosophy is heavy on misandry. The religious aspect of the cult has one sacrament. 

Iron Law of government: Everything eventually reduces to its absurd. If this is an actual law of physics that exists in nature is not known. In politics and government, it cannot be denied. Whereas in business a company can go bankrupt (unless it is publicly favored), in the realm of government, if (actually, when is more appropriate) a program attains absolute failure, it becomes a candidate for increased funding (e.g. DARE,). 

Microaggression: Trivialities that give an aggrieved population without lives something to whine about.

Nazi: Common smoke screen name for National Socialist German Workers Party, the German variant of socialism. The success of this party in bringing ruin to most of Europe, its own population, as well as racial enemies cannot be gainsaid. Its accomplishment was so complete that the whole enterprise collapsed after only thirteen years of operation, whereas the Soviet version started decades earlier and met its demise several decades later. Impresario of German Socialism was Adolph Hitler, a man with the soul of a ward boss who nevertheless was able to foist his program on a nation with near universal literacy and a very high degree of advanced education. Despite the socialist nature of the ideology, other socialists have had amazing success in making sure National Socialism is not identified as the philosophical soul brother it is. 

Political Correctness: A fear of knowledge. Under the regime of political correctness as practiced in the United States and some other nations, any evidence disproving accepted doctrine must be denied, if not suppressed. 

Politician: In the American democracy, generally a person who lies in seeking election to public office because there is ample evidence of little profit in speaking the truth (e.g. would Woodrow Wilson have been reelected if his slogan had been "He's hasn't got us into war yet, but, he intends to"?). See also demagogue. 

Populist: Highest form of demagogue. 

Reform: Word has no real meaning yet is impossible to oppose. The question, "Are you against x reform?" can never be answered negatively without destroying politically one who so answers no matter the actual value of the reform proposed. The word's greatest value is that it is as an accurate marker for poseurs.

Republican Party: American political association with no other permanent purpose than to secure executive positions, legislative posts and patronage emoluments. 

Reverend: 1. Title marking certain persons who after serious study and piety are ordained as suitable to lead and instruct the faithful. 2. Honorific applied to certain class of charlatans (examples: Rev. Paisley, Rev. Sharpton, Rev. Jackson) 

Revolution: A method by which one elite manipulates the masses to transfer power from another elite due to real or perceived oppression. The success or failure of the revolutionary party, once the ancien regime is overthrown, depends on how well they manage their transition from belief in ideology to practical management of the entity they have stolen. 

Self-esteem: The psychological notion used to justify rampant egotism (with help from Theodore Dalrymple)

Social Justice Warrior (SJW): Voluntary thought police. In Orwell's 1984, the Thought Police were an official part of the security service. It is a tribute to the current system that the apparatus enforcing mental conformity is unpaid, but relentless.

Social Security: The perfection of a system discovered by a Signor Ponzi wherein early "investors" are paid off by the subscriptions of later participants. System requires ever more contributors to stave off inevitable collapse. Due to the default of Ponzi's path breaking enterprise, he eventually suffered incarceration. Managers of our Social Security system expect no such problems as they have tools to deal with eventualities such as invisible default (i.e. one can start collecting at age 105) or monetization.
 
Soviet Union: Several countries that were controlled by an apparatus known as the Communist Party. For approximately seven decades said apparatus was able to rob the people in their own name. Went out of business when there was no more to rob. 

Teachable Moment: Opportunity for captive indoctrination.

Tolerance: 1. Old, permitting free expression of views one does not share. 2. New, suppression of thought, or speech found uncomfortable by favored groups.

Transgender operations: Current form of approved ritual mutilation. 

University - public: A public university is mainly a large scale day care provider. Most do some practical scientific research. 

University - private: Private universities are generally smaller scale day care providers. Very selective establishments exist mainly to mark the children of a certain class or wealth as members of an elite. 

War on Drugs: Growth industry whose constituency is well served by the government regulations that propel it. 

War on Terrorism: Campaign utilizing all the lessons of the drug war while also inventing its own.

Woke: Ideological sleepwalkers.

A reason to vote for Trump!

Our default position at the voice of humility is that most politicians have too much that we disagree with to warrant a vote.  We have mentioned in a previous post that the Trumpster is may be a phony, though preferable to most of his antagonists.

Up until the last few days, there was no compelling reason to cast a ballot in his favor.  Well, that has changed.  I have heard all kinds of bien pensants threaten to leave the country if Mr. Hair wins.  One especially vehement lass said, "I will literally leave the country if Trump is elected."  This person cannot speak a sentence without the word "literally" being inserted.  This happens even when it is obvious she should be using the word "figuratively" instead, but I digress.  The nation would be a better place if they depart.

Not paying attention as much as I might, the Trump border plan threatens Mexico with stopping remittances if they don't pay for the fence.  As he is going to expel the people who are remitting, I am not sure how that will work.

Nevertheless, if he wins and the disgruntled want to depart, it may cause a border problem to our north.

Save America and shrink America! Viva Puerto Rico Libre, Vivia Detroit Libre!

So Puerto Rico can't pay the bonds.  Not an economist, my guess that means effectively they are broke if not legally bankrupt.  There is no need for wailing and gnashing of teeth.  This is a golden opportunity that unfortunately will not be taken.

PR wants help which is translated to bailout by guess who.  Hint, it is an avuncular relation named after the great judge of Ancient Israel.

The voice of humilty suggests we pay the debts of that commonwealth, but with a price.  They take independence and never ask for another cent.

We all know, they are asking to be put back on their feet so their corrupt political class can borrow anew.  This on top of all the federal largesse they already receive.  Enough is enough, we have our own supply of regional kleptocrats to deal with on the mainland.

Which is why the solution is to make them not our own.  Detroit went through the process of restructuring and is all better.  We know in our hearts that unless there is always someone responsible from outside motor city with access to the brake, nothing will change in the end.  Therefore, the voice of humility lends full support to the DIM or Detroit Independence Movement.  This is not secession as settled at the end of the late unpleasantness, but expulsion

Any other basket cases should get the same treatment.

I know, I know, but we can dream.

Who you calling clown? Clown.

Memo to Chuck and George; Looking serious, sounding serious is not being serious.

On Fox News Special, they pooh pooh Donaldo calling him a rodeo clown. Yah know, I've always thought the guy was at least giving that appearance. Was he crazy like a fox, using a garish style to attain goals?

I think he's phony. I remember hearing his commercials about how he, along with some guy who I think was named Kiyosaki, was going to teach me to be rich in some seminar or something. If I were a billionaire, the last way I'd spend my time would be going around the country, staying in motels, giving courses on how to be as rich as himself.

That said, our goofy friend is saying things directly that so called serious people merely dance around. We have no southern border and your man has noticed. That strongest field, as Krauthammer put it, is mute.

As to being the jester at the horse competition, one might point out, this is not the first rodeo for either Willie or the Krautster. Both lads were all for going into Iraq. Georgie was sure the reign of heaven would descend and said so in an October 8, 2002 interview with PBS’s Charlie Rose:

I think the answer is that we believe, with reason, that democracy’s infectious. We’ve seen it. We saw it happen in Eastern Europe. It’s just — people reached a critical mass of mendacity under those regimes of the East block, and it exploded. And I do believe that you will see [in the Middle East] a ripple effect, a happy domino effect, if you will, of democracy knocking over these medieval tyrannies . . . Condoleezza Rice is quite right. She says there is an enormous condescension in saying that somehow the Arab world is just not up to democracy. And there’s an enormous ahistorical error when people say, “Well, we can’t go into war with Iraq until we know what postwar Iraq’s going to look like.” In 1942, a year after Pearl Harbor, did we have a clear idea what we were going to do with postwar Germany? With postwar Japan? Of course not. We made it up as we went along, and we did a very good job. . . .

Kind of the crazy talk that would make a real professional clown like Emmet Kelley blush. Of course, wisely, EK never spoke.

Charlie was equally voluble and wrong about Iraq. He never admitted he was wrong, but changed the justification he claimed for the war.

DeTocqueville observed that democracy separated the generations. In our era, not only are the generations separate, but we are different minute to minute, if not second to second. The two pundits' words of a war ago are as distant as Rome's invasion of Britain. By the time you read this, there recent words will be forgotten by most and they will go on to speaking fees and other emoluments.

Krauthammer has not always felt so badly about Mr. Hair. His feelings about Trump evolve as he saw some dignity in the man once,

 Krauthammer took a phone call from Donald Trump in April of 2011 and somehow came away with the impression that Trump was going to make a genuine run for the White House. Krauthammer’s reasoning was this: “But as a person, I thought more highly of him … because of the gracious way and the calm and courteous way he discussed the issues.”

At least Will has learned something as he wrote in a column:

The last 11 years have been filled with hard learning. The 2003 invasion of Iraq, the worst foreign policy decision in U.S. history, coincided with mission creep (“nation building”) in Afghanistan. Both strengthened what can be called the Republicans’ John Quincy Adams faction: America “goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own.”

What is lacking, as far as we can find, is the owning up that he himself has had to learn something. No admission of error.

It does boggle the mind that these men continue to be taken seriously. At least they should be made to wear greasepaint makeup and big red noses as they bloviate on whatever outlet puts them on.

The Atlantic's Peter Beinart, who supported the Iraq war and honestly admits the error put it nicely,

To a degree that will baffle historians, the political-intellectual complex that made the Iraq War possible remains intact, and powerful. Amnesia is part of the reason why. If Bill Kristol, Charles Krauthammer, and Benjamin Netanyahu knew that before denouncing the Iran deal they’d be required to account for their views on Iraq, they might not show up in the green room. If they did, their television appearances would take a radically different course from the course they generally take today.

We all know the accounting will not take place.

Ah well, On to Teheran.

Equal Rights in Soccer-Fifty Cent is still alive-Branding yourself

Soccer

A man of vast gravitas in the US Senate is upset that the US Chick Soccer side is being stiffed as they are getting a pittance for their world-historic victory while the dude team is getting huge bucks even though they were eliminated early on.

Normally, we do not take notice of panem et circuses events.  Nevertheless, we agree the enrichment of the wimpy lads and the impoverishment of the macho babes is an injustice.  Fortunately, we have a solution.

The voice of humility proposes a "grudge" match.  Winner take all the money awarded.  We anticipate justice being served by the trouncing of the boys.  Please, however, do not contact suggesting a wager.

There that is done and Senator Leahy can get back to other less important causes.

Fifty-Cent

I know nothing of the man other than the name of a song that I have never listened to.  It transpires that a news report says he is filing for bankruptcy.

We are sad for his failure as he accomplished neither of the tasks he set out for himself in the title of his signature work.

The late Doctor David Brudnoy said all you need to know about rap.  He noted that Warren Beatty in the movie Bulworth, "Raps badly, which is a redundancy."

Branding

According to The Independent, people are now branding themselves.  Not a big surprise that, you say.  Madonna is a brand as are other celebrities.  Why should not common man or woman be their own brand.

That is not what is meant in the article.  It is that tattoos are not enough and the desired image must be seared onto the flesh.

The voice of humility does not wish to brand himself a prophet, but we were on top of this back in early 2007.  Our reasoning was off from what the article suggests, but so what, we knew it was coming.

The Tenner

This morning on the Western Mass TV outlet, the newslass was waxing poetic about the news that the $10 bill would have the face of a woman.  Oblivious to the fact that her triumphalism celebrated the arrival of a distaff face on a dying currency.  Ah, C'est la vie.

Though we are not overly exercised at the idea of transition, we would aver that, even though it's supposed to celebrate a dead woman, the best symbol is a living, breathing example.

Who more represents change than Caitlyn Jenner.

What is the fascination Jimmy Severino aka Jay Severin

The few readers who arrive at this forlorn venue arrive after searching for Jay Severin.  I have no idea why he is so popular as I found him a mediocrity at best.  That he has landed a gig at the Blaze only reinforces that opinion.

Update: We have not mentioned the man for awhile now and it seems he had vanished from the face of the Earth.  Actually, gravity has not released him, but he has come down in the world.  He has vanished from the elite town of Manchester-By-The -Sea and now resides in Ipswich, not a venue of poverty, but neither is it as posh as his prior digs.

Saps we are and admit to feelings of compassion for the man.

Still, he may be better now, but as I have not listened since he left the air in Massachusetts. Below are the two posts everyone searches for.  

The originals have been deleted as this one will after a bit of time.  Without the ever popular Jay posts, no one will come here.  Oh Well.

Tuesday, August 21, 2012

Jay Severin gone again. It was so predictable. Still, I shall miss the non-entity formerly known as Jimmy Severino.

             So Jay Severin has lost another radio gig.  No one seems to care anymore.  When he lost the tkk job, there were a few comments.  The talk 1200, narry a mention.  Probably has something to do with Limbaugh on rko.

I guess we all should have seen it coming.  I wrote this when he lost the job because of his I slept with the world spiel.  I don’t think he did.  Irrelevant now, but here it is.

Predicting the future is not given to many mortals.  Oh some of us see a bank of clouds and take the umbrella, but few rise to the level of Warren Buffet.  Yet, there is an event that if one had been following it long enough should have been so easy to prognosticate.

Jay Severin was a guilty pleasure for many within his station’s range.  There were blogs dedicated to bashing him by people who could not stand an afternoon without him.  The pleasure at his end must have been short lived.  Indeed, at the finish, his audience probably consisted more of his detractors than fans.  Yet what they despised him for, his hate speech was not the most salient feature of his show.  It was there, but it was diminishing.  He had even taken to saying nice things about gays.  He had seemed to turn himself into the loving family man, albeit with the odd oat sown of youth. 

No, Jay had another quality that he could never escape.  One may disagree on whether it was outright prevarication or Olympic Gold level exaggeration, but it was big.  Were he a fisherman, the minnow that got away would have been turned into a trout, the trout, a shark, and then a whale.

He made his adventures with interns sound like he had serviced a harem larger than a Turkish Sultan and was done in for his brag.  Think about the man.  He has been caught out on boast after boast.  If he has not been awarded degrees and honors he’s claimed, why does anyone believe he was super stud?  It was not what he did but what he said he did that he is vanished.

Some of his foibles are well known.  Probably his most famous is, ''But since journalism began, and up until the time at least that I took my master's degree at Boston University -- and may I add without being obnoxious, up till and including the time that I received a Pulitzer Prize for my columns for excellence in online journalism from the Columbia School of Journalism, the highest possible award for writing on the Web -- right up to and including that in 1998, you still had to practice journalism to be a journalist."

Jay’s comment was a reflection on the state of journalism, oddly enough.  Globe reporter, Scott Lehigh did the legwork and found out that there is no such prize and that our latter day Mencken had no Pulitzer on record.  Jay had an explanation, ‘‘what I said was, there is a prize that my editor told me is the equivalent of the Pulitzer Prize for Web journalism."  The producer whom he said told him he had won wasn’t sure what award he was talking about and they were sitewide anyway.  To call a Jay connection nebulous is to be kind.

This is not to say a BU grad could not win a Pulitzer, but Jay wasn’t degreed from that school on the south bank of the Charles.  Jay Severin admitted as much in 2005 that "... it would appear I have no degree" after the school denied knowledge of the award.  Maybe he put the frame sans sheepskin up on the wall and said, “Hmm, I wonder what’s missing?”

Oh, maybe his Harvard Law School vellum?  Yup, He had spent time north of the River Chuck to pursue legal studies.  This was reported in the Boston College campus newspaper, the Heights.  When queried about this, Jay had no clue except that, well, he might have gone to a few classes as part of the BU thingee.  A bit of a stretch, but that’s the pattern.

Decades ago, Eddie Andelman said of Jean Shepherd of Christmas Story fame, “He had a longer childhood than Orphan Annie.”  A dated reference to many, but Severin has had a longer childhood than Jean Shepherd as it has never ended. The Heights also reported, "As a young person, Severin was arrested over 50 times while fighting for civil rights."   

Again, maybe a stretch?  After all, Martin Luther King in his career was arrested only four times. Fifty times are a lot of collars and for someone who sounds so self absorbed, it makes one wonder.  Still, There may have been a demonstration that went by Jay’s car while a ticket was being written and he counts that as a pinch and inflated it a lot.

When most boomers were working summer jobs, Woodstock happened.  Kids who were pumping gas while waiting to get back to BC or Northeastern heard of the wild party in a New York sward and many would later claim to have been there.  It was a loaves and fishes field.  Give Jay credit, he’s one of the few of his generation who does not claim to have been in attendance.

Maybe that’s because he had he had tasted blood the year before during the 1968 Chicago Democratic Convention.  He claims to have been at the Battle of Grant Park.  The then 17 year old was trawling record stores and had hardly heard of events, but no matter, he would become fast friends with Abbie and Jerry and who is there to gainsay it now.  Who knows, it may be true, as it appears he was at Abbie Hoffman’s Worcester memorial.  That will always be the question about Jay, is it Memorex?

So is it possible that Jay was the man-god to all the aspiring female politicos?  Maybe, but like his claim to be more than the B-grade political operative Scott Lehigh pegged him as, the evidence is slight.

Still, some of his narrative is indisputable.  Mother Jones in 1983 called him a competitor of his former employer, David Garth.  Just to be able to keep the lights on in a field as tough as political consulting is a feat.

In 1985, jay is part of a triumvirate that is working to get Bush père ready for his run in1988.  The new york magazine article pegs them as “the only people who ever left david garth's organization to establish a republican agency.”  THE Problem is there is another severin in the threesome.  The firm known as Severin Avilles Associates, Inc, included a Kathleen Cooney Severin .  She was not jay’s half sister.  Using French in this paragraph already, another indo-european tongue is in order.  Frau is the word we are looking for.  So it was according to a 1993 new york times article about Rudy Giulani that mentioned their status as man and wife and tapped Kathleen as firm president.

So how does one think the conversation at the dinner table went, “ya know dear, that new intern looks like she needs a bit of mentoring.”  Hmmm.  Not too high on the likelihood scale that.

 ah but a mere four years later, the New York Times noted, jay would be strolling down the aisle with a new Mrs. Severin, Renee Klock.  He is now chairman of Severin Media less Avilles.  Though there is no definitive evidence from the wedding announcement, it is doubtful that the new wife had been a mentoree at the firm.

So there is a four year window where he might have had his romp.  In all probability, it was likely to be only a couple of years when Kathleen was out of the picture and Renee arrived.

So was there that bevy of eager young operatives willing to give it up so that they could learn from the master on the campaign trail?  This is what jay wanted his listeners to believe.  That he cut a huge swath through maidenhood is open to question.

Friday, February 22, 2008

There's one good thing to say about the policy of de-instituionalization.

Those who read a previous post on Jay Severin realize his limiltless capacity for hyperbole. Not the least his claim to have been awarded a masters in journalism at Boston University.

Well, Jay almost killed me last night. I only get to listen to him while driving due to reception issues here in the exurbs. About 4:08 PM, after the news he opened by stating "When I pursued my masters at BU." I almost hit a tree, I could not see as I was laughing so hard. I guess it's no longer. "When I took my masters."

Rich Aucoin of The Truth About Jay Severin also "noticed Jay's not-so-subtle-yet-somehow-seamless switch from "took" to "pursued."" and cautioned me "to leave several car lengths between you and the car in front of you between the hours of 3 and 7."

Of course he was leading into a discussion of the lack of ethics of the grey lady.

There is speculation that one area talk host told a blooper on his resume and will pay for it. Some have guessed it might be Jay. Nah, his cv is all whoppers. If they haven't sent him packing by now, he's safe.

And, I'd hate to see him go. He's nuts, but it's great schtick.