Bette Midler on elections and erections

[George H. Smith]

This was posted on the JazzWestCoast list.

Ghs

I haven't left my house in days. I watch the news channels incessantly. All the news stories are about the election; all the commercials are Viagra and Cialis.

Election, erection, election, erection –

Either way we're screwed!

- Bette Midler

[Peter]

Ah, another straight Bette Middler fan. Thank you for the quote George.

I am sorry I missed her in Vegas. I have seen her show in DC and it was great.

During the show, she went up to the people sitting in the center, first row (a man and a woman) and said, "Who did you have to fuck to get these seats?"

Peter

[Reidy]

From the same source: I married a kraut. Every night I dress up as Poland and he invades me.

[Peter]

Someone I consider my best friend once sent me the following, long long ago. I don’t think he will not mind if I quote it here.

Semper cogitans fidele,

Live long and prosper,

Peter

Here is the quote:

O, I shall never forget it. 'Twas on the occasion when my girlfriend Clementine, who was a lady of the evening - and the morning and the midafternoon and any other hour you care to think of - was negotiating with a customer, and she says to him, "'Twill be one hundred dollars, Sir."

"But Miss, the Dutch paid only twenty-four for all of Manhattan Island."

"Sure, but Manhattan just lies there."

Other hall-of-famers:

O, I shall never forget it. 'Twas on the occasion when the delivery boy brought me a dozen long-stemmed roses with a note that said "Love always, your Ernie".

So I says to my girlfriend Clementine, "you know what this means, Clementine? This means that for the next week I am going to be flat on my back with my thighs wide open", and she says to me,

"what's the matter, Soph? Ain't you got a vase?"

O, I shall never forget it. 'Twas on the occasion when my girlfriend Clementine - vulgar old broad like me - went out walking, slipped on a banana peel, caught her dress on a nail, and she is lying there nude and unconscious on the pavement, when a passing biker takes mercy and places his crash helmet over her exposed crotch. When the paramedics arrive, the driver says, "take her into emergency, but first get rid of that cop."

Once, around the time of the Jackson-Presley marriage, she did a monologue about what worried her. "Priscilla Presley. You know, I worry about that girl. I don't think she understands why they call it Neverland."

All her material is by a man named Bruce Vilanch (http://www.wegotbruce.com/), who also does the repartee for the Oscars.

end quote

Back to me, Peter Taylor.

I first saw Bette when she was performing in an officer’s club in Hawaii. I was sneaking through the back rows, (on my way to where I do not know,) and 16 or 17 year old Bette gestured for us to join the audience. I waved and continued on, headed probably for the cloakroom.

Peter Taylor

[Reidy]

All this is of interest to the present audience because the Divine One's former manager is Aaron Russo, who founded a low-rent knockoff of the LP in Arizona.

[Peter]

Peter Reidy wrote:

All this is of interest to the present audience because the Divine One's former manager is Aaron Russo, who founded a low-rent knockoff of the LP in Arizona.

end quote

I missed that. Why is Mr. Russo’s version of the Libertarian Party low rent?

Now, I think, and may agree with you, that the Libertarian Party is seriously flawed, which is why I ONLY acknowledge being a small “l” libertarian. I re-registered back in the late 70’s as a Republican so I could vote in the primaries. What would be a “high rent” LP? Ah! Laissez Faire Capitalism?

I am watching “The Defenders” for the first time. It’s not bad. It is actually about *something* and not just a humorous lawyer show. The science of an auto accident is being explored.

And what if someone stole 10 grand from a mob boss, bet the full amount at a casino and won 14 grand back? Would the mob boss be legally entitled to the extra 4 grand won? Legally, yes. Ill gotten gains.

But what if the thief lost the 10 grand? Would the mob boss be entitled to the lost extra 4 grand from the Casino? Legally no.

Not a bad show, overall. And good night to all.

Peter Taylor

[Peter]

We have won the first battle of the new era. Objectivists must add their voices to the Tea Party Movement and to the Republican Party.

Elections not erections, Bette! Write a letter to the editor. Contribute money. Stand your ground. Ride the wave forward.

Peter Taylor

From Dick Morris:

Now that President Obama has experienced the same baptism of fire as Bill Clinton did in the midterm elections, the obvious question is whether he will move to the center in a bid to save his presidency and win re-election. The move worked well for President Clinton, as he sought to combine the best aspects of each party's program in a third approach that came to be known as triangulation. Will Obama follow suit?

He won't because -- even if he wanted to -- he can't.

The issues today are very different from those that separated the parties in 1994 and do not lend themselves to common ground. Obama's programs during his first two years in office have been so radical, far reaching and fundamental that any compromise leaves the nation so far to the left of where it has always been and wants to be as to make it unacceptable to the American people. It is as if a woman who wants no children is asked to become "a little bit pregnant."

When Obama took office, the federal, state and local governments controlled 35 percent of the American economy. We ranked 15th among the two dozen advanced countries. Now it controls 44.7 percent, ranking us seventh, ahead of Germany and Britain. So where is the compromise? Are we to raise taxes and cut spending so that government is only, say, 40 percent of our economy?

To raise taxes to cover even a part of that increase would be to lock in a level of big government that is anathema to our free enterprise system. You cannot have a free market economy with a government that big sitting in the middle of your economy, hoarding capital, pouncing on all available credit, taking away such a major portion of your national income.

While negotiation is always possible on spending cuts, raising or lowering them or redirecting their focus, the bottom line of sharp deficit reduction is not up for discussion. Both parties are locked into the need to bring down the debt before it strangles our economy. With this imperative in mind, a zero tax increase policy will require budget cuts that Obama and the left will find unacceptable. For them, the slashes in social spending will also preclude a search for middle ground.

And what is the triangulation that is possible on health care? The fundamental building block of the Obama program is the individual mandate to buy insurance. Without that requirement, all that is left is a consumer protection bill that limits insurance company practices. How can the mandate be scaled back but still preserved? Would it suffice to lower the fines the uninsured must pay? Or to reduce the requirements of how much insurance they have to carry? Neither of these proposals would satisfy the American people. Either the mandate is in place or it is not. There is no middle ground.

On cap and trade, the other major pillar of Obama's secular temple, either we tax carbon or we don't. The left will deride and the international environmental community reject any program without coercion or tax increases (even though the evidence suggests that voluntary measures are bringing down our carbon emissions nicely). Once again, faced with a choice between a tax and no tax, there is no middle ground.

The conservatives have America in their corner on all of these issues. We can easily see how far Obama has moved off the center of gravity of the American people by measuring his losses in the House of Representatives. If conservatives stick to their principles and pass their programs in the House, they will set forth an agenda that the nation can follow. If they compromise to suit Obama's big government objectives, they will muddy the waters, antagonize their energetic base and provide no clear alternative to his socialism. It is time for bold and clear contrasts. It's not 1994.

[Selene]

Keep it simple stupid:

KISS

Chris Christie reduced NJ State employees by approximately 4.8 %, primarily by not filling job positions when employees retired. O'biwan increased the federal work force by 2.8% and plans to accelerate that percentage.

Defund the juggernaut which will diminish the deficit and the debt load proportionately.

It is a simple start, but it is within the power of the congress.

Another key fact that I picked up at a seminar was confirmed by Harold Ickes of Clinton fame. It appears that Madam Pelosi, in her staffs haste to ram through the anti individualist health bill, did not include a "severability" clause, which, if my understanding is correct, would mean that if the federal courts strike down one section of the anti individualist bill as unconstitutional, the whole bill is then unconstitutional.

That would have been a major blunder by Pelosi and her staff, but would save us all from real tyranny.

Adam

[Peter]

Adam wrote

Defund the juggernaut which will diminish the deficit and the debt load proportionately.

end quote

Robert Tracinski is saying much the same. He is championing the phrase, “Balance the damn budget.” He must have said it a half a dozen times.

Robert writes in The Intellectual Activist Daily:

If Republicans do choose to take up the slogan "balance the damn budget"—whether it's the leadership or an insurgent Tea Party faction—let me give them one piece of advice: keep the "damn" in there. The American people will love you for it, because it will show that you are finally taking the issue of controlling government as seriously as they do.

End quote

Paul Ryan and Issa were just on Fox and said pretty much the same thing. They have a strategy. They will not compromise.

Peter