This just in: Fox News has hired Keith Olbermann.
Hey Kids! Catch my act on Joy Cardin's Week in Review program on the State Radio Network (970 AM) from 8 to 9 a.m. this Friday, January 28 (a date that will LIVE ... in infamy!).
Guess who's not coming to dinner?
The Squire of the Stately Manor, the historic and gracious abode worthy of its own coffee table book, cannot say it better than the Isthmus reviewer of that "dark comedy," The Last Supper:
It's almost eerie that a play about extreme political rhetoric and vitriol would open just two weeks after the terrible shootings in Tucson.
Eerie, but more Charles Manson than Vincent Price. And yet another example of liberal death fantasies, these days.
They ... decide that since participating in protests and sit-ins has been a futile way to fight the power, this new dinner party/murder method may be a more effective technique in coping with right-wing adversaries ... by eliminating him and silencing his dangerous words." -- Mercury Players Theatre kills off right-wingers in The Last Supper.
Hey, if you can't beat 'em, kill 'em. That one of the victims is a Desert Storm vet, and that said American military veteran is a Nazi, is worthy of a Havens Center award. You just knew the man was trouble when "he insisted on saying grace before the vegan meal."
Even more eerie (sound of creaking door, chains rattling) is that one of the play's principals is the delightful Ms. Emily Mills, my next-door neighbor here on TheDailyPage. It's the quiet ones you have to worry about.
To the archives, Ruben! This is Emily's Post on 1-11-2011, just three days after the massacre in Tucson when the chatterers ran with the New York Times-driven narrative that the Right had finally gone postal:
"We as a country are in dire need of a serious and heartfelt discussion of our aforementioned caustic political climate. The inflammatory rhetoric of the various right- and leftwing pundits and politicians isn't directly to blame for Loughner's actions, but it certainly plays a role in nurturing the already extant paranoia of the ill."
That brief foray into political ecumenism is soon betrayed by references that are exclusively right-wing -- without actually providing like, you know, real examples:
"... We have TV and radio hosts daily ... drawing links between elected leaders and Maoists, claiming that the government wants to kill your grandparents and steal your guns, that Latin American immigrants are attempt to retake southern parts of the U.S., that gays and lesbians are sexual predators bent on destroying the nation, and that our president is some Kenyan Muslim Socialist Nazi interloper." -- Emily's Post: What cost our caustic discourse 1-11-2011.
Now here is the same gamin blogger appearing in liberal fantasy island at the Bartell Theatre in downtown Madison.
"I stand behind the work we've done -- our play speaks for itself," she says on her Post.
At least it is allowed to speak, unlike some of the protagonists in said play. Think I'll pass, Emily. My presence in the theater might not go unnoticed and I still have to pay for my son's college.
Question for Emily: Do you consider my blog "dangerous words?"
The President's Speech
It won't win the Oscar (speaking of the performing arts). But I rather liked President Obama's State of the Union speech Tuesday night. Reminds me of the Queen's speech to open Parliament in the sense that it seemed written for him, at least partially, by the majority party (in the House, at least).
Scott Walker could have given much of it. Jobs, jobs, jobs. Even Paul Ryan, who gave the Republican response and was excellent, gave Obama some credit. It shows that the President heard the same election results on November 2 that we in Wisconsin heard. (And today, the President is in Manitowoc, an old-line manufacturing town.)
These are conservative words:
"From the earliest days of our founding, America has been the story of ordinary people who dare to dream. That's how we win the future."
Not bureaucrats or think tankers or special interests. Is it morning in America again?
He closed with the Pennsylvania entrepreneur who saw the plight of the Chilean miners trapped a mile below the surface and came to the rescue of people he did not know because he had a new idea. Perfect.
More welcome rhetoric:
"Every day families sacrifice to live within their means. They deserve a government that does the same." Obama would freeze domestic government spending for 5 years to save $26 Billion. But Paul Ryan will save $100 billion. House Budget Director is rock, paper and scissors! Presidents cannot veto IN money.
So President Obama has the words. Now we'll find out if, per Reagan, he has the music as well.
Four irreverent points:
- Good to see that the two men seated behind the President were not popping up and down like whack-a-moles (as in the Pelosi regime).
- We were not cheated of seeing Speaker Boehner tearing up, which he did when the President referenced the two working class stiffs behind him. A grace note, that reference.
- Boehner has the darkest complexion of the three on my video screen.
- Just as I suspected, Obama's speech has given Fighting Ed an upset tummy:
"Egad! Where to start? ... ROTC is back!"
So it must have been good.
Why the Squire does not ride Metro
On the Madison Metro bus on Route 50 at about 5 o'clock Friday evening, January 21, just after pulling out of the West transfer point on Tokay Boulevard, four teenagers pummeled another student bloody in the back of the bus. An adult woman was egging them on.
The bus driver pulled aside on Whitney Way and called her supervisor. At the insistence of a bus rider of my acquaintance, the driver then called police. Police never came. When the supervisor was admitted onto the bus, the four teenagers left through the rear door. Eventually, the wounded student also left.
Yes, this could have been classified as a hate crime under Wisconsin statute.
My acquaintance contacted police herself to learn that "no victim, no perps" means no police action. I assume the bus has camera footage of the incident.
I asked Police Captain Jay Lengfeld why no police response. Police were not dispatched by the county's 911 system, he said.
Captain Jay says police have no victims, no suspects, there apparently is no video.
It is one reason the Squire does not take mass transit.
