ARTS FEST - Thursday, June 1, 11:30 a.m.
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:35 PM
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Wednesday, May 31, 2006
ARTS FEST - Thursday, June 1, 11:30 a.m.
The Uke Man & his Prodigal Sons Ride Again !!!
Hey Folks,
It’s Columbus Arts Fest time!!!
This Thursday, June 1st,
Ukulele Man & his Prodigal Sons –
the whole damned band – almost all seven of us
will be playing on the Broad Street Stage
from 11:25 a.m. until 12:45 p.m. (I just got word that Karen & Jon can't make it)
Bring a lunch – or buy one there – sit down under the ample tent, have a beer, eat and enjoy.
You won’t be sorry!!!
I’ve said this before, but I mean it. You need to see the ancient One with his Band soon – if you want to see us.
The stage is on Civic Center Drive just south of Broad Street.
Come have some fun!!! See you there and then !!
- Uke Man
p.s. Ukey is doing some solo things Saturday, June 3 too - more later.
It’s Columbus Arts Fest time!!!
This Thursday, June 1st,
Ukulele Man & his Prodigal Sons –
the whole damned band – almost all seven of us
will be playing on the Broad Street Stage
from 11:25 a.m. until 12:45 p.m. (I just got word that Karen & Jon can't make it)
Bring a lunch – or buy one there – sit down under the ample tent, have a beer, eat and enjoy.
You won’t be sorry!!!
I’ve said this before, but I mean it. You need to see the ancient One with his Band soon – if you want to see us.
The stage is on Civic Center Drive just south of Broad Street.
Come have some fun!!! See you there and then !!
- Uke Man
p.s. Ukey is doing some solo things Saturday, June 3 too - more later.
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:33 PM
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Neil Young "Impeach the President"
Hey Folks,
Show Biz Tonight could use an IQ upgrade for its interviewers, but Neil takes care of that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhT6BIChuXw&search=Phil%20Ochs
- Uke Man
Show Biz Tonight could use an IQ upgrade for its interviewers, but Neil takes care of that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhT6BIChuXw&search=Phil%20Ochs
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 2:07 PM
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Wall Street Anna
Takin' care of business
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:24 AM
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Confused? It's simple!!!
Hey Folks,
Confused by the conflicting views on “the economy”?
Don’t be; it’s perfectly clear.
The new gink elevated Tuesday (if “elevated” applies when one gives up a thirty-eight million dollar salary for a paltry sub-million dollar amount) to Secretary of the Treasury says we need to take steps to be “competitive” in the “global market”; and his cheerleaders say he will work to lower taxes and cut spending in order to continue and improve the wonderful, robust, so-fucking-good economy.
Also Tuesday, the people (known as “consumers” to the upper-crust minority who prey on the people, who feed them credit cards while simultaneously instituting cruel bankruptcy “reform,” who make their fat living based on mindless consumerism but can’t tolerate losing a nickel from overextended shopping-bots) – Tuesday, the people expressed a view contrary to that of the new Secretary, his President-boss, and the Wall Street Swells.
The People (excuse me, the “Consumers”) said their confidence (their confidence in consuming, their “Consumer Confidence”) had fallen. This was reported by “The New York-based ‘Confidence Board’ ” (think about that; the ginks have an official “Confidence Board” – which works for the ginks – not the people/consumers they are monitoring).
Well, how can the economy be wonderful, robust, and so-fucking-good; but “consumer confidence” has dropped? Easy – just like when Wall Street celebrates because thousands of American jobs have been eliminated. Everything is judged by how it affects the ginks – fuck the rest of us.
When my ancestor William the Conqueror – via the rape of a chambermaid by one of his addled sons – defeated and killed King Harold and took charge of England; Anglo-Saxon serfs and Norman serfs “served” in the war of their leaders, killing and being killed to “make a better world" (for one set or other of the parasitical nobility.
But before AND after the conflict the serfs led a miserable existence, and their “heroic” service to god and noble changed not one aspect of their degraded situation. All the serfs before the glorious victory were still serfs after the glorious victory. They all still kissed noble asses; the Norman serfs still kissed Norman asses; the Anglo-Saxon serfs just redirected their lips.
It’s the same with the glorious economy. The "king" and the "barons" are doing just fine and are determined to continue their privilege – the serfs be damned. If serfs are laid off, if their jobs are shipped over seas, if it takes recruiting exploited “guest workers” – further degrading native workers, if “retirements” disappears, if “health care” becomes a joke, if endless wars decimate the children of the unwashed, if taxes must be shifted even more drastically from the powerful to the weak, if services to the least among us must be cut – if all this and more is necessary to continue and improve the wonderful, robust, and so-fucking-good economy – at least as it relates to the American Dollar-Royalty - so be it.
As I said, it’s pretty simple. When the old man died, those who cared about him mourned, but Anna Nicole celebrated – just like Wall Street!!!
- Uke Man
Confused by the conflicting views on “the economy”?
Don’t be; it’s perfectly clear.
The new gink elevated Tuesday (if “elevated” applies when one gives up a thirty-eight million dollar salary for a paltry sub-million dollar amount) to Secretary of the Treasury says we need to take steps to be “competitive” in the “global market”; and his cheerleaders say he will work to lower taxes and cut spending in order to continue and improve the wonderful, robust, so-fucking-good economy.
Also Tuesday, the people (known as “consumers” to the upper-crust minority who prey on the people, who feed them credit cards while simultaneously instituting cruel bankruptcy “reform,” who make their fat living based on mindless consumerism but can’t tolerate losing a nickel from overextended shopping-bots) – Tuesday, the people expressed a view contrary to that of the new Secretary, his President-boss, and the Wall Street Swells.
The People (excuse me, the “Consumers”) said their confidence (their confidence in consuming, their “Consumer Confidence”) had fallen. This was reported by “The New York-based ‘Confidence Board’ ” (think about that; the ginks have an official “Confidence Board” – which works for the ginks – not the people/consumers they are monitoring).
Well, how can the economy be wonderful, robust, and so-fucking-good; but “consumer confidence” has dropped? Easy – just like when Wall Street celebrates because thousands of American jobs have been eliminated. Everything is judged by how it affects the ginks – fuck the rest of us.
When my ancestor William the Conqueror – via the rape of a chambermaid by one of his addled sons – defeated and killed King Harold and took charge of England; Anglo-Saxon serfs and Norman serfs “served” in the war of their leaders, killing and being killed to “make a better world" (for one set or other of the parasitical nobility.
But before AND after the conflict the serfs led a miserable existence, and their “heroic” service to god and noble changed not one aspect of their degraded situation. All the serfs before the glorious victory were still serfs after the glorious victory. They all still kissed noble asses; the Norman serfs still kissed Norman asses; the Anglo-Saxon serfs just redirected their lips.
It’s the same with the glorious economy. The "king" and the "barons" are doing just fine and are determined to continue their privilege – the serfs be damned. If serfs are laid off, if their jobs are shipped over seas, if it takes recruiting exploited “guest workers” – further degrading native workers, if “retirements” disappears, if “health care” becomes a joke, if endless wars decimate the children of the unwashed, if taxes must be shifted even more drastically from the powerful to the weak, if services to the least among us must be cut – if all this and more is necessary to continue and improve the wonderful, robust, and so-fucking-good economy – at least as it relates to the American Dollar-Royalty - so be it.
As I said, it’s pretty simple. When the old man died, those who cared about him mourned, but Anna Nicole celebrated – just like Wall Street!!!
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:17 AM
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Tuesday, May 30, 2006
See & Hear Phil Ochs' "I Aint Marchin' Any More"
Hey Folks,
Watch and listen to Phil Ochs and consider War - consider what it truly means to "serve" in war - and consider what has been "gained" by it all, who has gained, who has lost, and how it has made anyone "free."
And consider why we so often celebrate it and why we keep marching, cheering, and commemorating it.
- Uke Man
Click here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5pgrKSwFJE&search=Phil%20Ochs
Watch and listen to Phil Ochs and consider War - consider what it truly means to "serve" in war - and consider what has been "gained" by it all, who has gained, who has lost, and how it has made anyone "free."
And consider why we so often celebrate it and why we keep marching, cheering, and commemorating it.
- Uke Man
Click here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5pgrKSwFJE&search=Phil%20Ochs
posted by Ukulele Man at 8:40 AM
0 comments
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Monday, May 29, 2006
Memorial Day Considerations
Well Folks,
Today is Memorial Day.
According to Wikipedia :
"Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday that is observed on the last Monday of May. It was formerly known as Decoration Day. This holiday commemorates U.S. men and women who died in military service for their country. It began first to honor Union soldiers who died during the American Civil War. After World War I, it expanded to include those who died in any war or military action. One of the longest standing traditions is the running of the Indianapolis 500."
It seems to me that this day should give us pause to ACTUALLY consider those “U.S. men and women who died in military service for their country.”
What I see on TV and read in the papers may “commemorate,” but does not “consider” them. What I have observed is closer to cheerleading for war. As the encyclopedia entry says, the holiday was created in the wake of the Civil War but was later expanded to include EVERY war or military action.
Now, people can disagree over which wars were “good” or “bad,” but only an idiot would say they were all good. So, it behooves us to consider WAR itself as we consider those men and women who served and survived, those who survived but were maimed in the process, and those who were killed in wars.
It is not enough to trot out celebrities and musical acts before the capitol steps to extol patriotism. Waving the flag may be more important in some quarters than the lives and health of altruistic and impressionable young people who willingly go off to kill and be killed; but I can’t believe that patriotism trumps the love we have for our children.
Patriotism plays a role in every death-dealing conflict – on BOTH sides- and so do our children; but while both sides swear that THEIR side (as opposed to the “enemy”) has God, honor, truth, and justice (and sometimes “democracy”) on its side; both sides clearly do have fathers and mothers with children in jeopardy, who were put there by “patriotic” leaders.
It seems to me that Fathers and Mothers who fail to consider the nature of the war in which their children are entangled also fail their children – and future generations as well.
It pains me to say it, but parents who have lost children in ill-advised, unnecessary wars; in wars waged for ignoble or stupid reasons; who nevertheless insist on praising the black-hearted beasts responsible for their child’s suffering or death, are fools. Worse, they are enablers for the deaths of other people’s children as well.
Under these circumstances, comments such as “We support our leader because to do otherwise would mean our child died in vain” are understandable but despicable just the same. A leader should be supported for being right – not to salve the consciences of politically complicit parents with the blood of even more young men and women killed for nothing.
And this applies universally. The insane parents of suicide bombers have the same mentality. They, too, listen to their leaders and send off their children to kill and be killed – with God on their side.
So, on this Memorial Day let us truly consider War – and THIS war particularly - along with the consideration of the “men and women who died in military service for their country.”
If you love your children, you will.
If you love your country, you will as well.
Nothing short of that will EVER slow the numbers of those who truly do die in vain.
- Uke Man
Today is Memorial Day.
According to Wikipedia :
"Memorial Day is a United States federal holiday that is observed on the last Monday of May. It was formerly known as Decoration Day. This holiday commemorates U.S. men and women who died in military service for their country. It began first to honor Union soldiers who died during the American Civil War. After World War I, it expanded to include those who died in any war or military action. One of the longest standing traditions is the running of the Indianapolis 500."
It seems to me that this day should give us pause to ACTUALLY consider those “U.S. men and women who died in military service for their country.”
What I see on TV and read in the papers may “commemorate,” but does not “consider” them. What I have observed is closer to cheerleading for war. As the encyclopedia entry says, the holiday was created in the wake of the Civil War but was later expanded to include EVERY war or military action.
Now, people can disagree over which wars were “good” or “bad,” but only an idiot would say they were all good. So, it behooves us to consider WAR itself as we consider those men and women who served and survived, those who survived but were maimed in the process, and those who were killed in wars.
It is not enough to trot out celebrities and musical acts before the capitol steps to extol patriotism. Waving the flag may be more important in some quarters than the lives and health of altruistic and impressionable young people who willingly go off to kill and be killed; but I can’t believe that patriotism trumps the love we have for our children.
Patriotism plays a role in every death-dealing conflict – on BOTH sides- and so do our children; but while both sides swear that THEIR side (as opposed to the “enemy”) has God, honor, truth, and justice (and sometimes “democracy”) on its side; both sides clearly do have fathers and mothers with children in jeopardy, who were put there by “patriotic” leaders.
It seems to me that Fathers and Mothers who fail to consider the nature of the war in which their children are entangled also fail their children – and future generations as well.
It pains me to say it, but parents who have lost children in ill-advised, unnecessary wars; in wars waged for ignoble or stupid reasons; who nevertheless insist on praising the black-hearted beasts responsible for their child’s suffering or death, are fools. Worse, they are enablers for the deaths of other people’s children as well.
Under these circumstances, comments such as “We support our leader because to do otherwise would mean our child died in vain” are understandable but despicable just the same. A leader should be supported for being right – not to salve the consciences of politically complicit parents with the blood of even more young men and women killed for nothing.
And this applies universally. The insane parents of suicide bombers have the same mentality. They, too, listen to their leaders and send off their children to kill and be killed – with God on their side.
So, on this Memorial Day let us truly consider War – and THIS war particularly - along with the consideration of the “men and women who died in military service for their country.”
If you love your children, you will.
If you love your country, you will as well.
Nothing short of that will EVER slow the numbers of those who truly do die in vain.
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 8:37 AM
2 comments
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Sunday, May 28, 2006
The "L" Word
Hey Folks,
Everybody knows the “L” word, Right!!???
Yeah, “LESBIAN.”
But seriously, Folks.
Up until recently (when the nut-cases started hating Lesbians even more than other L-Folks), “L” stood for “Liberal” – and it was (some would have us believe) a “dirty” word.
Well, “Liberals” certainly ARE – and justifiably - open to criticism: too often they talk the talk but don’t do much to back it up. Clinton talked the union, Black, underprivileged talk and then “triangulated” his way to popularity, deftly failing to deliver while also managing to avoid being found out – which isn’t to say that Billy wasn’t a WHOLE lot to be preferred to Georgie – he DID screw us a lot more slowly; and with class, charisma, and a saxophone (ouch).
Still, were I a “Liberal,” I wouldn’t be boasting that I am more sophisticated, circumspect, and cunning when kissing Rupert Murdock’s ass than are Conservatives.
Liberals can be criticized, too, for hubris. Too many of them – while often well-meaning – take it upon themselves to decide what is “best” for their “less-blessed” brothers and sisters. Too often, they have way too much confidence in their own “wisdom” for the good, health, and well-being of those they are “blessing” (see “the White-man’s Burden”).
Having said all that, let me ask you (Phil Ochs-fans* like Steve, Phyll, and Pam not included): have you heard any such criticism of Liberals lately?
Probably not. No.
Liberals, according to the Right, are much worse than THAT; they supposedly make Satan look like a Cub Scout. I mean, just look at that Michael Moore!!!
It IS possible that Liberals are actually as bad as we are told they are, but we just don’t notice it because of the contrast with Conservatives. Could be . . .
So, let’s look at what Conservatives stand for.
Conservatives:
Burned, hanged, and ostracized men and women for “witchcraft.”
Instituted slavery in the “New World.”
Allowed only white men with property to vote in America
Instituted “Jim Crow” laws and practices to continue racial segregation and exploitation after slavery itself was ended.
Instituted and maintained the Ku Klux Klan and other White-Racist/Nazi organizations.
Kept women from voting until 1920.
Had union organizers and union members (and sometimes their families) threatened, beaten, and killed to maintain their untrammeled domination.
Resisted the formation of National Parks.
Blamed contemporary Jews for the historical death of Jesus.
Resisted the reform of child labor.
Argued, on Hitler’s behalf, to stay out of WW II – it was good for business, and to hell with the Jews.
Opposed Social Security, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Medicare, Medicaid, interstate highways, fluoridation of water, and the Post Office.
Worked to impeach judges who declared racially-segregated schooling, lunch counters, busses, and other public-services unconstitutional.
Imprisoned thousands of innocent Japanese Americans and stole their property during WW II.
Ruined thousands of careers and lives of innocent Americans during the Joe McCarthy communist witch hunts.
Helped have democratically-elected foreign leaders assassinated.
Demand that homosexuals be denied the rights held by other Americans.
Work tirelessly to reduce both taxes on the wealthy and services to the poor.
Speaking of getting tired, I think that’s enough for now about what Conservatives stand for. AND, it ought to be enough to make it perfectly clear:
“Liberal” may be a dirty word, but compared to what Conservatives have stood for since time began, Michael Moore looks damned good!
- Uke Man
* Love Me, I'm a Liberal
By Phil Ochs
....E A E A
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
....E C#m
Tears ran down my spine
....E A E
I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
....F#7 B7
As though I'd lost a father of mine
....E A E
But Malcolm X got what was coming
....G#m A
He got what he asked for this time
....E C#m A B7 E
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I go to civil rights rallies
And I put down the old D.A.R.
I love Harry and Sidney and Sammy
I hope every colored boy becomes a star
But don't talk about revolution
That's going a little bit too far
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I cheered when Humphrey was chosen
My faith in the system restored
I'm glad the commies were thrown out
Of the A.F.L. C.I.O. board
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
As long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
The people of old Mississippi
Should all hang their heads in shame
I can't understand how their minds work
What's the matter don't they watch Les Crane?
But if you ask me to bus my children
I hope the cops take down your name
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I read New Republic and Nation
I've learned to take every view
You know, I've memorized Lerner and Golden
I feel like I'm almost a Jew
But when it comes to times like Korea
There's no one more red, white and blue
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I vote for the democtratic party
They want the U.N. to be strong
I go to all the Pete Seeger concerts
He sure gets me singing those songs
I'll send all the money you ask for
But don't ask me to come on along
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to the socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
But I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Everybody knows the “L” word, Right!!???
Yeah, “LESBIAN.”
But seriously, Folks.
Up until recently (when the nut-cases started hating Lesbians even more than other L-Folks), “L” stood for “Liberal” – and it was (some would have us believe) a “dirty” word.
Well, “Liberals” certainly ARE – and justifiably - open to criticism: too often they talk the talk but don’t do much to back it up. Clinton talked the union, Black, underprivileged talk and then “triangulated” his way to popularity, deftly failing to deliver while also managing to avoid being found out – which isn’t to say that Billy wasn’t a WHOLE lot to be preferred to Georgie – he DID screw us a lot more slowly; and with class, charisma, and a saxophone (ouch).
Still, were I a “Liberal,” I wouldn’t be boasting that I am more sophisticated, circumspect, and cunning when kissing Rupert Murdock’s ass than are Conservatives.
Liberals can be criticized, too, for hubris. Too many of them – while often well-meaning – take it upon themselves to decide what is “best” for their “less-blessed” brothers and sisters. Too often, they have way too much confidence in their own “wisdom” for the good, health, and well-being of those they are “blessing” (see “the White-man’s Burden”).
Having said all that, let me ask you (Phil Ochs-fans* like Steve, Phyll, and Pam not included): have you heard any such criticism of Liberals lately?
Probably not. No.
Liberals, according to the Right, are much worse than THAT; they supposedly make Satan look like a Cub Scout. I mean, just look at that Michael Moore!!!
It IS possible that Liberals are actually as bad as we are told they are, but we just don’t notice it because of the contrast with Conservatives. Could be . . .
So, let’s look at what Conservatives stand for.
Conservatives:
Burned, hanged, and ostracized men and women for “witchcraft.”
Instituted slavery in the “New World.”
Allowed only white men with property to vote in America
Instituted “Jim Crow” laws and practices to continue racial segregation and exploitation after slavery itself was ended.
Instituted and maintained the Ku Klux Klan and other White-Racist/Nazi organizations.
Kept women from voting until 1920.
Had union organizers and union members (and sometimes their families) threatened, beaten, and killed to maintain their untrammeled domination.
Resisted the formation of National Parks.
Blamed contemporary Jews for the historical death of Jesus.
Resisted the reform of child labor.
Argued, on Hitler’s behalf, to stay out of WW II – it was good for business, and to hell with the Jews.
Opposed Social Security, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, Medicare, Medicaid, interstate highways, fluoridation of water, and the Post Office.
Worked to impeach judges who declared racially-segregated schooling, lunch counters, busses, and other public-services unconstitutional.
Imprisoned thousands of innocent Japanese Americans and stole their property during WW II.
Ruined thousands of careers and lives of innocent Americans during the Joe McCarthy communist witch hunts.
Helped have democratically-elected foreign leaders assassinated.
Demand that homosexuals be denied the rights held by other Americans.
Work tirelessly to reduce both taxes on the wealthy and services to the poor.
Speaking of getting tired, I think that’s enough for now about what Conservatives stand for. AND, it ought to be enough to make it perfectly clear:
“Liberal” may be a dirty word, but compared to what Conservatives have stood for since time began, Michael Moore looks damned good!
- Uke Man
* Love Me, I'm a Liberal
By Phil Ochs
....E A E A
I cried when they shot Medgar Evers
....E C#m
Tears ran down my spine
....E A E
I cried when they shot Mr. Kennedy
....F#7 B7
As though I'd lost a father of mine
....E A E
But Malcolm X got what was coming
....G#m A
He got what he asked for this time
....E C#m A B7 E
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I go to civil rights rallies
And I put down the old D.A.R.
I love Harry and Sidney and Sammy
I hope every colored boy becomes a star
But don't talk about revolution
That's going a little bit too far
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I cheered when Humphrey was chosen
My faith in the system restored
I'm glad the commies were thrown out
Of the A.F.L. C.I.O. board
I love Puerto Ricans and Negros
As long as they don't move next door
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
The people of old Mississippi
Should all hang their heads in shame
I can't understand how their minds work
What's the matter don't they watch Les Crane?
But if you ask me to bus my children
I hope the cops take down your name
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I read New Republic and Nation
I've learned to take every view
You know, I've memorized Lerner and Golden
I feel like I'm almost a Jew
But when it comes to times like Korea
There's no one more red, white and blue
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
I vote for the democtratic party
They want the U.N. to be strong
I go to all the Pete Seeger concerts
He sure gets me singing those songs
I'll send all the money you ask for
But don't ask me to come on along
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
Once I was young and impulsive
I wore every conceivable pin
Even went to the socialist meetings
Learned all the old union hymns
But I've grown older and wiser
And that's why I'm turning you in
So love me, love me, love me, I'm a liberal
posted by Ukulele Man at 5:17 PM
2 comments
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**Dr. Danga Grimaldi's
*****Exhibition Fantastique !!
*****Exhibition Fantastique !!
posted by Ukulele Man at 2:28 PM
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FANTASTIC "Fantastique"
Hey Folks,
What a thrill to have been part of such an unbelievably wonderful show !! The experience will warm me forever.
Thanks to Eoin, Kristina, Dave, Meg, James, and Robin for all the comaraderie - and especially to Eoin for thinking to include the Ancient Ukester in the first place. Thanks also to those of you who were there either in person or in spirit!!!
- Uke Man
What a thrill to have been part of such an unbelievably wonderful show !! The experience will warm me forever.
Thanks to Eoin, Kristina, Dave, Meg, James, and Robin for all the comaraderie - and especially to Eoin for thinking to include the Ancient Ukester in the first place. Thanks also to those of you who were there either in person or in spirit!!!
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:18 PM
1 comments
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Two Losers "Make Nice"
Hey Folks,
Check out Rummy and Saddam ! This was back when we SUPPLIED the WMD (chemical weapons) to be used against the Iranians (back when it was OK to use chemical weapons against people whom WE didn't like [either] ).
- Uke Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTldYbqlJc8&search=Rumsfeld
Check out Rummy and Saddam ! This was back when we SUPPLIED the WMD (chemical weapons) to be used against the Iranians (back when it was OK to use chemical weapons against people whom WE didn't like [either] ).
- Uke Man
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTldYbqlJc8&search=Rumsfeld
posted by Ukulele Man at 1:07 AM
1 comments
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Saturday, May 27, 2006
Come on !!!
Leg it out to the show!!!!
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:03 AM
0 comments
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Friday, May 26, 2006
The Circus
Hey folks, friends, & neighbors !!!
You've got one chance remaining!!!
We had another great show tonight!! (Friday) ! If you weren't there tonight or yesterday, tomorrow (Saturday) is your last chance!! And I sincerely MEAN that!!! This isn't Star Trek or Seinefeld; there WON'T be any re-runs!!
If you haven’t made it yet, click here for more info: http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=114774291544968722
So, get your ass out to east Main Street Saturday for the last show!!!
When I'm dead, you can cry, but you can't see me act or hear me sing !!!
- Uke Man
You've got one chance remaining!!!
We had another great show tonight!! (Friday) ! If you weren't there tonight or yesterday, tomorrow (Saturday) is your last chance!! And I sincerely MEAN that!!! This isn't Star Trek or Seinefeld; there WON'T be any re-runs!!
If you haven’t made it yet, click here for more info: http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=114774291544968722
So, get your ass out to east Main Street Saturday for the last show!!!
When I'm dead, you can cry, but you can't see me act or hear me sing !!!
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:47 PM
0 comments
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Ra Ra Ree - Kick 'em in the knee
It's Clinton's fault !!!
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:31 PM
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Hey Folks,
Shake your Pom-Poms and cheer like mad!!! (Show-Biz!!!!)
- Uke Man
(then, click here):
http://funnieststuff.net/viewmovie.aspx?ad_key=BYVLTDBEYCYT&tracking_id=553519&type=wmv&path=/c/cheerleadingaccidents/cheerleadingaccidents.wmv
Shake your Pom-Poms and cheer like mad!!! (Show-Biz!!!!)
- Uke Man
(then, click here):
http://funnieststuff.net/viewmovie.aspx?ad_key=BYVLTDBEYCYT&tracking_id=553519&type=wmv&path=/c/cheerleadingaccidents/cheerleadingaccidents.wmv
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:22 PM
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Barbara Zuck Reviews "Dr. Danga Grimaldi's Exhibition Fantastique"
REVIEW COLUMBUS FRINGE FESTIVAL
‘Circus’ delights despite shoestring budget
Friday, May 26, 2006
By Barbara Zuck - the Columbus Dispatch
This "circus" has no ring. No elephants. No lions, tigers or bears.
And the clowns? Very bargain basement.
Nevertheless, the Dr. Danga Grimaldi Circus’ Exhibition Fantastique, which opened last night at Columbus Dance Theatre as part of this year’s Columbus Fringe Festival, is still lovable.
You have to love the ridiculously small puppets and marionettes, which take the place of live animals and other circus-performer staples, like the strong man.
Texas Red, the performing chicken, is particularly endearing — not to mention agile.
You have to love the stilt walker (Dave Bowling) who does everything from change the lighting and handle the taped music from on high to sing (badly).
You have to love Ukulele Man (Tom Harker) who handles props (badly) and sings (really well).
And, of course, you have to love the stars of the show, Kristina Isabelle, Eoin O’Brien and Meghan O’Brien.
This trio of talented and versatile performers has a wealth of knowledge of circus acts, burlesque and dance history, and they keep the bulk of the show interesting, funny and sometimes amazing.
Isabelle spoofs icons of dance history in her latter-day variations of the fan dance and other spicy numbers society once thought risque. Bangin’ Betty Boom is her imaginative — and challenging — take on striptease. She pops balloons strategically attached to her body — while dancing on stilts. (She wears a body suit; this festival isn’t that fringe.)
Meghan O’Brien follows suit with a clever, ’60s-look dance with lighted hoola Hula Hoops, the kind of number that used to be done with flaming batons.
Isabelle and Eoin O’Brien’s trapeze act has progressed since the first time I saw it. More polished, more daring, more poses.
Their comic bits, one involving nine beautiful boxes and another that’s a bad take-off on escape artists, begin to try one’s patience. Although not as much as Lester E. Booth, the "recently discovered" cowboy poet. Lester might have a life on television, however, where the level of humor these days is even below a corny circus act.
The circus traditionally has struck romantic chords with audiences. It can come at you from so many directions.
It’s entertainment. It’s beauty. It’s humor. It’s danger.
But, like all successful art forms, it depends on the performers carrying the audience away from themselves, from their problems, from reality. And it depends on performers who can dazzle by their being able to do things the rest of us cannot. That’s the "awe factor" — the same ingredient that made Paganini a mesmerizing violinist, Baryshnikov a dazzling dancer, Muhammad Ali the world’s most famous sports figure.
They all were larger than life.
The Grimaldi Circus offers those moments, even when it’s offering satire. It just still has too many times when the reality of a shoestring operation interferes.
bzuck@dispatch.com
‘Circus’ delights despite shoestring budget
Friday, May 26, 2006
By Barbara Zuck - the Columbus Dispatch
This "circus" has no ring. No elephants. No lions, tigers or bears.
And the clowns? Very bargain basement.
Nevertheless, the Dr. Danga Grimaldi Circus’ Exhibition Fantastique, which opened last night at Columbus Dance Theatre as part of this year’s Columbus Fringe Festival, is still lovable.
You have to love the ridiculously small puppets and marionettes, which take the place of live animals and other circus-performer staples, like the strong man.
Texas Red, the performing chicken, is particularly endearing — not to mention agile.
You have to love the stilt walker (Dave Bowling) who does everything from change the lighting and handle the taped music from on high to sing (badly).
You have to love Ukulele Man (Tom Harker) who handles props (badly) and sings (really well).
And, of course, you have to love the stars of the show, Kristina Isabelle, Eoin O’Brien and Meghan O’Brien.
This trio of talented and versatile performers has a wealth of knowledge of circus acts, burlesque and dance history, and they keep the bulk of the show interesting, funny and sometimes amazing.
Isabelle spoofs icons of dance history in her latter-day variations of the fan dance and other spicy numbers society once thought risque. Bangin’ Betty Boom is her imaginative — and challenging — take on striptease. She pops balloons strategically attached to her body — while dancing on stilts. (She wears a body suit; this festival isn’t that fringe.)
Meghan O’Brien follows suit with a clever, ’60s-look dance with lighted hoola Hula Hoops, the kind of number that used to be done with flaming batons.
Isabelle and Eoin O’Brien’s trapeze act has progressed since the first time I saw it. More polished, more daring, more poses.
Their comic bits, one involving nine beautiful boxes and another that’s a bad take-off on escape artists, begin to try one’s patience. Although not as much as Lester E. Booth, the "recently discovered" cowboy poet. Lester might have a life on television, however, where the level of humor these days is even below a corny circus act.
The circus traditionally has struck romantic chords with audiences. It can come at you from so many directions.
It’s entertainment. It’s beauty. It’s humor. It’s danger.
But, like all successful art forms, it depends on the performers carrying the audience away from themselves, from their problems, from reality. And it depends on performers who can dazzle by their being able to do things the rest of us cannot. That’s the "awe factor" — the same ingredient that made Paganini a mesmerizing violinist, Baryshnikov a dazzling dancer, Muhammad Ali the world’s most famous sports figure.
They all were larger than life.
The Grimaldi Circus offers those moments, even when it’s offering satire. It just still has too many times when the reality of a shoestring operation interferes.
bzuck@dispatch.com
posted by Ukulele Man at 2:45 PM
2 comments
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R's & D's Punkin' the Folks
May 21, 2006
The Rove Da Vinci Code
By FRANK RICH
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
IF we're to believe the reviews, "The Da Vinci Code" is the most exciting summer blockbuster since, well, "Poseidon." But the "Da Vinci Code" marketing strategy is a masterpiece: a perfect Hollywood metaphor for the American political culture of our day.
The Machiavellian mission for the hit-deprived Sony studio was
to co-opt conservative religious critics who might depress turnout for a $125-million-plus thriller portraying the Roman Catholic Church as a fraud. To this end, as The New Yorker reported, Sony hired a bevy of P.R. consultants, including a faith-based flack whose Christian Rolodex previously helped sell such inspirational testaments to Hollywood spirituality as "Bruce Almighty" and "Christmas With the Kranks."
Among Sony's ingenious strategies was an elaborate Web site,
The Da Vinci Dialogue, which gave many of the movie's prominent critics a platform to vent on the studio's dime. Thus was "The Da Vinci Code" repositioned as a "teaching moment" for Christian evangelists — a bit of hype "completely concocted by the Sony Pictures marketing machine," as Barbara Nicolosi, a former nun and current Hollywood screenwriter, explained to The Times. The more "students" who could be roped into this teaching moment, of course, the bigger the gross.
Ms. Nicolosi remains a vociferous opponent of the film. On her
blog she chastises Sony's heavenly P.R. helpers for coaxing "legions of well-meaning Christians into subsidizing a movie that makes their own Savior out to be a sham." But you do have to admire the studio's chutzpah, if the word may be used in this context. It rivals Tom Sawyer's bamboozling of his friends into painting that fence. The Sony scheme also echoes much of the past decade's Washington playbook. Politicians, particularly but not exclusively in the Karl Rove camp, seem to believe that voters of "faith" are suckers who can be lured into the big tent and then abandoned once their votes and campaign cash have been pocketed by the party for secular profit.
Nowhere is this game more naked than in the Jack Abramoff scandal: the felonious Washington lobbyist engaged his pal Ralph Reed, the former leader of the Christian Coalition, to shepherd Christian conservative leaders like James Dobson, Gary Bauer and the Rev. Donald Wildmon and their flocks into ostensibly "anti-gambling" letter-writing campaigns. They were all duped: in reality these campaigns were engineered to support Mr. Abramoff's Indian casino clients by attacking competing casinos. While that scam may be the most venal exploitation of "faith" voters by Washington operatives, it's all too typical. This history repeats itself every political cycle: the conservative religious base turns out for its party and soon finds itself betrayed. The right's leaders are already threatening to stay home this election year because all they got for their support of Republicans in the previous election year was a lousy Bush-CheneyT-shirt. Actually, they also got two Supreme Court justices, but their wish list was far longer. Dr. Dobson, the child psychologist who invented Focus on theFamily, set the tone with a tantrum on Fox, whining that Republicans were "ignoring those that put them in office" and warning of "some trouble down the road" if they didn't hop-to.
The doctor's diagnosis is not wrong. He has been punk'd — or Da Vinci'd — since 2004. Though President Bush endorsed the federal marriage amendment then, there's a reason he hasn't pushed it since. Not Gonna Happen, however many times it is dragged onto the Senate floor. The number of Americans who "strongly oppose" same-sex marriage keeps dropping — from 42 percent two years ago to 28 percent today, according to the Pew Research Center — and there will never be the votes to "write discrimination into the Constitution," as Mary Cheney puts it.
The real Republican establishment — including Laura Bush, who has repeatedly refused to disown the many gay families at this year's White House Easter Egg Roll — senses the drift of the culture. "Will & Grace" may have retired to reruns last week, but it's been supplanted by a gay "Sopranos" tough guy who out-brokebacks Jack and Ennis.
The religious right's hope for taming that culture is also doomed, however much Congress ceremoniously raises indecency fines in an election year. The major media companies, heavy donors to both parties, first get such bills watered down, then challenge the Federal Communications Commission's enforcement in court.
The mogul most ostentatiously supportive of Republican causes, Rupert Murdoch, may perennially fan the flames of a bogus "war on Christmas" on Fox, but he's waging his own, far more lethal war on the Christian right by starting a companion TV network this fall to match MySpace.com, his hugely popular and hugely libidinous Internet portal. Mr. Murdoch's new gift to America's youth, My Network TV, "will showcase greed, lust, sex," according to The Wall Street Journal. Conservatives fretting about his fund-raiser for Hillary Clinton don't even know what's about to hit them.
But for all these betrayals, Dr. Dobson and Company won't desert the Republicans come Election Day. If Mr. Rove steps up his usual gay-baiting late in the campaign, as is his wont, maybe the turnout of those on the hard-core right will eke out a victory for the party that double-crossed them not just on cultural issues but also on secular conservative principles (like fiscal responsibility and immigration-law enforcement). If so, they'll
promptly be Da Vinci'd yet again. A Republican retreat on stem-cell research is already under way. If there's electoral fallout from the South Dakota Legislature's Draconian abortion ban — the Republican governor's job-approval rating fell from 72 percent to 58 percent in a single month after he signed it — the pro-life checklist in Congress will suffer as well.
Whatever happens in November, the good news is that the religious right leaders most stroked by Mr. Rove, many of them past 70, may no longer command such large blocs of voters anyway. As Amy Sullivan writes in the latest New Republic, Mr.Rove has reason to worry about "another group of evangelicals: the nearly 40 percent who identify themselves as politically moderate and who are just as likely to get energized about AIDS in Africa or melting ice caps as partial-birth abortion and lesbian couples in Massachusetts." The bad news is that no sooner does the religious-right base show signs of cracking in a youthquake than the Democrats trot out their own doomed Da Vinci strategy.
This idiocy began the morning after Election Day 2004, when a vaguely worded exit-poll question persuaded credulous party leaders that "moral values" determined their defeat (as opposed to, say, their standard-bearer's campaign). Their immediate response was to seek out faith-based consultants not unlike those recruited by Sony, and practice dropping the word "values" and biblical quotations into their public pronouncements. In the House, they organized, heaven help us, a Democratic Faith Working Group.
As the next election approaches, they're renewing this effort, to farcical effect. The Democrats' chairman, Howard Dean, who proved his faith-based bona fides in the 2004 primary season by citing Job as his favorite book in the NewTestament, went on the Pat Robertson TV network this month and yanked hisparty's position on same-sex marriage to the right. (He apologized for his "misstatement" once off the air.)
Not to be left behind, Senator Clinton gave a speech last week knocking young
people for thinking "work is a four-letter word" and for having TV's in their rooms, home Internet access and, worst of all, that ultimate instrument of the devil, iPods. "I hope that we start thinking some very old-fashioned thoughts," she said. (She also subsequently apologized, once her daughter complained, joining the general chorus of ridicule.) However "old-fashioned" Mrs. Clinton's thoughts, don't expect her to turn back Mr. Murdoch's campaign cash in protest against his steamy new TV channel.
The one New York politician even more disingenuous in this
racket is Rudolph Giuliani. He outdid John McCain's appearance with Jerry Falwell by campaigning last week for Ralph Reed in the lieutenant governor's race in Georgia. Any religious conservative who mistakes "America's mayor," an adamant supporter of abortion rights and gay rights, for a fellow traveler is in desperate need of an intervention, if not an exorcism.
But that hypothetical, easily duped voter may no longer exist.
Like the Bush era, the cynical Rove strategy of exploiting faith-based voters may be nearing its end. For proof, just take a look at the most craven figure in American politics: the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist. To flatter the far right, this Harvard-trained surgeon misdiagnosed Terri Schiavo's vegetative state from the Senate floor, and justified abstinence-only sex education in AIDS prevention by telling ABC's George Stephanopoulos that he didn't know for certain that tears and sweat couldn't transmit H.I.V. But increasingly it's not only liberals who see through him. One of his latest stunts, a proposed $100 gas-tax rebate, provoked Rush Limbaugh to condemn him for "treating us like we're a bunch of whores."
When senators as different as Mr. Frist and Mrs. Clinton both
earn bipartisan ridicule for their pandering, you have to believe that there's a god other than Karl Rove watching over American politics after all.
The Rove Da Vinci Code
By FRANK RICH
(a ukethanks to Phyll)
IF we're to believe the reviews, "The Da Vinci Code" is the most exciting summer blockbuster since, well, "Poseidon." But the "Da Vinci Code" marketing strategy is a masterpiece: a perfect Hollywood metaphor for the American political culture of our day.
The Machiavellian mission for the hit-deprived Sony studio was
to co-opt conservative religious critics who might depress turnout for a $125-million-plus thriller portraying the Roman Catholic Church as a fraud. To this end, as The New Yorker reported, Sony hired a bevy of P.R. consultants, including a faith-based flack whose Christian Rolodex previously helped sell such inspirational testaments to Hollywood spirituality as "Bruce Almighty" and "Christmas With the Kranks."
Among Sony's ingenious strategies was an elaborate Web site,
The Da Vinci Dialogue, which gave many of the movie's prominent critics a platform to vent on the studio's dime. Thus was "The Da Vinci Code" repositioned as a "teaching moment" for Christian evangelists — a bit of hype "completely concocted by the Sony Pictures marketing machine," as Barbara Nicolosi, a former nun and current Hollywood screenwriter, explained to The Times. The more "students" who could be roped into this teaching moment, of course, the bigger the gross.
Ms. Nicolosi remains a vociferous opponent of the film. On her
blog she chastises Sony's heavenly P.R. helpers for coaxing "legions of well-meaning Christians into subsidizing a movie that makes their own Savior out to be a sham." But you do have to admire the studio's chutzpah, if the word may be used in this context. It rivals Tom Sawyer's bamboozling of his friends into painting that fence. The Sony scheme also echoes much of the past decade's Washington playbook. Politicians, particularly but not exclusively in the Karl Rove camp, seem to believe that voters of "faith" are suckers who can be lured into the big tent and then abandoned once their votes and campaign cash have been pocketed by the party for secular profit.
Nowhere is this game more naked than in the Jack Abramoff scandal: the felonious Washington lobbyist engaged his pal Ralph Reed, the former leader of the Christian Coalition, to shepherd Christian conservative leaders like James Dobson, Gary Bauer and the Rev. Donald Wildmon and their flocks into ostensibly "anti-gambling" letter-writing campaigns. They were all duped: in reality these campaigns were engineered to support Mr. Abramoff's Indian casino clients by attacking competing casinos. While that scam may be the most venal exploitation of "faith" voters by Washington operatives, it's all too typical. This history repeats itself every political cycle: the conservative religious base turns out for its party and soon finds itself betrayed. The right's leaders are already threatening to stay home this election year because all they got for their support of Republicans in the previous election year was a lousy Bush-CheneyT-shirt. Actually, they also got two Supreme Court justices, but their wish list was far longer. Dr. Dobson, the child psychologist who invented Focus on theFamily, set the tone with a tantrum on Fox, whining that Republicans were "ignoring those that put them in office" and warning of "some trouble down the road" if they didn't hop-to.
The doctor's diagnosis is not wrong. He has been punk'd — or Da Vinci'd — since 2004. Though President Bush endorsed the federal marriage amendment then, there's a reason he hasn't pushed it since. Not Gonna Happen, however many times it is dragged onto the Senate floor. The number of Americans who "strongly oppose" same-sex marriage keeps dropping — from 42 percent two years ago to 28 percent today, according to the Pew Research Center — and there will never be the votes to "write discrimination into the Constitution," as Mary Cheney puts it.
The real Republican establishment — including Laura Bush, who has repeatedly refused to disown the many gay families at this year's White House Easter Egg Roll — senses the drift of the culture. "Will & Grace" may have retired to reruns last week, but it's been supplanted by a gay "Sopranos" tough guy who out-brokebacks Jack and Ennis.
The religious right's hope for taming that culture is also doomed, however much Congress ceremoniously raises indecency fines in an election year. The major media companies, heavy donors to both parties, first get such bills watered down, then challenge the Federal Communications Commission's enforcement in court.
The mogul most ostentatiously supportive of Republican causes, Rupert Murdoch, may perennially fan the flames of a bogus "war on Christmas" on Fox, but he's waging his own, far more lethal war on the Christian right by starting a companion TV network this fall to match MySpace.com, his hugely popular and hugely libidinous Internet portal. Mr. Murdoch's new gift to America's youth, My Network TV, "will showcase greed, lust, sex," according to The Wall Street Journal. Conservatives fretting about his fund-raiser for Hillary Clinton don't even know what's about to hit them.
But for all these betrayals, Dr. Dobson and Company won't desert the Republicans come Election Day. If Mr. Rove steps up his usual gay-baiting late in the campaign, as is his wont, maybe the turnout of those on the hard-core right will eke out a victory for the party that double-crossed them not just on cultural issues but also on secular conservative principles (like fiscal responsibility and immigration-law enforcement). If so, they'll
promptly be Da Vinci'd yet again. A Republican retreat on stem-cell research is already under way. If there's electoral fallout from the South Dakota Legislature's Draconian abortion ban — the Republican governor's job-approval rating fell from 72 percent to 58 percent in a single month after he signed it — the pro-life checklist in Congress will suffer as well.
Whatever happens in November, the good news is that the religious right leaders most stroked by Mr. Rove, many of them past 70, may no longer command such large blocs of voters anyway. As Amy Sullivan writes in the latest New Republic, Mr.Rove has reason to worry about "another group of evangelicals: the nearly 40 percent who identify themselves as politically moderate and who are just as likely to get energized about AIDS in Africa or melting ice caps as partial-birth abortion and lesbian couples in Massachusetts." The bad news is that no sooner does the religious-right base show signs of cracking in a youthquake than the Democrats trot out their own doomed Da Vinci strategy.
This idiocy began the morning after Election Day 2004, when a vaguely worded exit-poll question persuaded credulous party leaders that "moral values" determined their defeat (as opposed to, say, their standard-bearer's campaign). Their immediate response was to seek out faith-based consultants not unlike those recruited by Sony, and practice dropping the word "values" and biblical quotations into their public pronouncements. In the House, they organized, heaven help us, a Democratic Faith Working Group.
As the next election approaches, they're renewing this effort, to farcical effect. The Democrats' chairman, Howard Dean, who proved his faith-based bona fides in the 2004 primary season by citing Job as his favorite book in the NewTestament, went on the Pat Robertson TV network this month and yanked hisparty's position on same-sex marriage to the right. (He apologized for his "misstatement" once off the air.)
Not to be left behind, Senator Clinton gave a speech last week knocking young
people for thinking "work is a four-letter word" and for having TV's in their rooms, home Internet access and, worst of all, that ultimate instrument of the devil, iPods. "I hope that we start thinking some very old-fashioned thoughts," she said. (She also subsequently apologized, once her daughter complained, joining the general chorus of ridicule.) However "old-fashioned" Mrs. Clinton's thoughts, don't expect her to turn back Mr. Murdoch's campaign cash in protest against his steamy new TV channel.
The one New York politician even more disingenuous in this
racket is Rudolph Giuliani. He outdid John McCain's appearance with Jerry Falwell by campaigning last week for Ralph Reed in the lieutenant governor's race in Georgia. Any religious conservative who mistakes "America's mayor," an adamant supporter of abortion rights and gay rights, for a fellow traveler is in desperate need of an intervention, if not an exorcism.
But that hypothetical, easily duped voter may no longer exist.
Like the Bush era, the cynical Rove strategy of exploiting faith-based voters may be nearing its end. For proof, just take a look at the most craven figure in American politics: the Senate majority leader, Bill Frist. To flatter the far right, this Harvard-trained surgeon misdiagnosed Terri Schiavo's vegetative state from the Senate floor, and justified abstinence-only sex education in AIDS prevention by telling ABC's George Stephanopoulos that he didn't know for certain that tears and sweat couldn't transmit H.I.V. But increasingly it's not only liberals who see through him. One of his latest stunts, a proposed $100 gas-tax rebate, provoked Rush Limbaugh to condemn him for "treating us like we're a bunch of whores."
When senators as different as Mr. Frist and Mrs. Clinton both
earn bipartisan ridicule for their pandering, you have to believe that there's a god other than Karl Rove watching over American politics after all.
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:10 PM
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Dr. Grimaldi's Exhibition Fantastique - Day 1
Hey Folks,
Master Thespian reporting!!!
One night down; two to go!!!
Hey!! The show was great!!!! There were giggles, audience participation, fun, fear, drama, musical interludes, unnaturally tall people (stilted – but in a good way), defiance of physical limitations, mystical trances, a chicken who dances, beautiful women (you takes your chances), clever gentlemen, an amazing Side Show in the lobby (with vicious beasts - AND the Ukulele Man !!!
It was such great fun that I intend to go back again tomorrow !!! And Saturday, too.
If you haven’t made it yet, click here for more info: http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=114774291544968722
See you Friday or Saturday!! You ain't seen nuthin' like this!!!!
- Uke Man.
Master Thespian reporting!!!
One night down; two to go!!!
Hey!! The show was great!!!! There were giggles, audience participation, fun, fear, drama, musical interludes, unnaturally tall people (stilted – but in a good way), defiance of physical limitations, mystical trances, a chicken who dances, beautiful women (you takes your chances), clever gentlemen, an amazing Side Show in the lobby (with vicious beasts - AND the Ukulele Man !!!
It was such great fun that I intend to go back again tomorrow !!! And Saturday, too.
If you haven’t made it yet, click here for more info: http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=9617686&postID=114774291544968722
See you Friday or Saturday!! You ain't seen nuthin' like this!!!!
- Uke Man.
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:22 AM
0 comments
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Thursday, May 25, 2006
Which one is screwin US every day?
Which one would You rather hang out with? 
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:45 PM
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Reactionaries 'round the Water Cooler - again
Hey Folks,
Recently the Editor at the Dispatch put on his Propaganda hat to attack an old, bearded cigar smoker who has never gotten ONE of our kids killed in a war or in "spreading" anything around the world.
It made use of the Forbes article I've already addressed earlier here http://www.ukuleleman.net/2006/05/castro-catherine-great.html.
For now I'm sharing the letter I sent off to to "Ohio's Greatest Ho Newspaper."
When "Dr. Grimaldi's Exhibition Fantastique" finishes its run, I'll write more.
- Uke Man
To the Editor,
Are you people out of your minds? "Keeping that many people that miserable for that many years" has been a simple matter for the greedy bastards slobbering over their lost opportunities to share in the exploitation of the Cuban people. The good old US of A is the major reason for any suffering experienced by the mass of Cubans.
What a joke! Steve Forbes, the googly-eyed nerd who inherited his old man's money comes up with an insane fantasy, and you put your dubious credibility behind it. You say the argument is "academic." What Academy did you go to? To say that the head of a socialist state owns everything in that state is beyond ludicrous: it's nuts! In this country evermore increasingly everything IS owned by half-wits like Forbes who inherited it from their (often Robber Baron) ancestors; and the voracious Republicans are bent on making it even more so - see the so-called "Death Tax."
The crap about dictatorship you put out fits our fuehrer G. W. Bush about as well as anyone. Don't you people have anything to do better than fretting over your treasure pile? Don't you think that the deaths of our children in this misbegotten war for empire rates a little bit above bad-mouthing an old man on a tiny island who HAS benefited his people at least in terms of education and medical care?
Couldn't your time be better spent attacking those here at home who believe themselves - because we are at "war" - to be above the law, to be above the Constitution, to be above decency, to be able to do whatever they damn well please to whomever they damn well please here and wherever else they damn well please?
No, I guess not. If you don't keep your eyes open, before long the people will expect to be treated honestly - that could bring about a "new world order" that W's daddy never anticipated.
Your editor is a credit to his class.
Yours,
Tom Harker
"Thief in chief" - the Dispatch Editorial
Fidel Castro, ranked among world’s richest leaders, stole it from Cuba’s people
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Poor Fidel Castro. The Cuban autocrat has spent almost half a century proving that communism is a superb system for creating poverty and distributing it equally. Just ask the 11 million Cubans who squeak by with food rations and an average of $10 a month.
Keeping that many people that miserable for that many years is no easy task. It requires a vast and elaborate police state, and those don’t grow on trees. Creating one requires long hours over many years and unrelenting attention to detail, all the while being harassed by human-rights watchdogs and others who yammer incessantly about liberty and democracy.
Other communist leaders and states have come and gone, such as the Soviet Union and most of its former satellites in eastern Europe. Or they’ve sold their Marxist inheritance for a mess of capitalist pottage, as in China and Vietnam.
So, in his twilight years, Cuba’s 79-year-old jefe maximo has every right to expect that his Marxist credentials would be above reproach.
But no. Forbes magazine, that mouthpiece of the global capitalist order, once again has soiled Castro’s socialist halo by suggesting that he is as greedy as a 19 th-century robber baron. The magazine reported that Castro is the world’s seventh-wealthiest leader, worth $900 million.
The estimate, included in the magazine’s May 5 edition, drew an angry challenge from Castro last week, who said that if anybody can prove he has vast wealth stashed away, he will resign, which presumably would create an opening for somebody else to be absolute dictator.
The magazine admits that the figure is an estimate that is open to question, and, in fact, the editors have never quite settled on what they think Castro is worth. In the 10 years that Forbes has published the annual ranking, Castro’s assets have been pegged at anywhere from $1.4 billion to as little as $100 million.
The $1.4 billion figure came from the magazine’s first estimate in 1997, when editors simply attributed to Castro a percentage of Cuba’s gross domestic product. Since then, the estimate has been derived from various formulas that the magazine defends but declines to lay out in detail. But the estimates are likely based on reports from Cuban defectors that Castro takes a cut from Cuba’s stateowned enterprises.
Forbes notes that the dictator has a fleet of black Mercedes. Anti-Castro activist Maria Werlau, who has studied Castro’s finances and who advised the magazine, says Castro also maintains overseas bank accounts, has numerous houses and controls stockpiles of food, fuel and luxury goods. She believes Forbes underestimates Castro’s wherewithal.
One could argue all day about exactly how to determine the value of Castro’s holdings. But the argument is academic. If everything of value in Cuba, including its people, belongs to the state, and if one man controls that state, then it’s all his to do with as he pleases, which is precisely what Castro has done for 47 years. Practically speaking, this is indistinguishable from ownership.
What’s important is not the total value of all that Castro controls, but how he came by it. The bottom line is that he has robbed the Cuban people of liberty and prosperity for five decades.
Recently the Editor at the Dispatch put on his Propaganda hat to attack an old, bearded cigar smoker who has never gotten ONE of our kids killed in a war or in "spreading" anything around the world.
It made use of the Forbes article I've already addressed earlier here http://www.ukuleleman.net/2006/05/castro-catherine-great.html.
For now I'm sharing the letter I sent off to to "Ohio's Greatest Ho Newspaper."
When "Dr. Grimaldi's Exhibition Fantastique" finishes its run, I'll write more.
- Uke Man
To the Editor,
Are you people out of your minds? "Keeping that many people that miserable for that many years" has been a simple matter for the greedy bastards slobbering over their lost opportunities to share in the exploitation of the Cuban people. The good old US of A is the major reason for any suffering experienced by the mass of Cubans.
What a joke! Steve Forbes, the googly-eyed nerd who inherited his old man's money comes up with an insane fantasy, and you put your dubious credibility behind it. You say the argument is "academic." What Academy did you go to? To say that the head of a socialist state owns everything in that state is beyond ludicrous: it's nuts! In this country evermore increasingly everything IS owned by half-wits like Forbes who inherited it from their (often Robber Baron) ancestors; and the voracious Republicans are bent on making it even more so - see the so-called "Death Tax."
The crap about dictatorship you put out fits our fuehrer G. W. Bush about as well as anyone. Don't you people have anything to do better than fretting over your treasure pile? Don't you think that the deaths of our children in this misbegotten war for empire rates a little bit above bad-mouthing an old man on a tiny island who HAS benefited his people at least in terms of education and medical care?
Couldn't your time be better spent attacking those here at home who believe themselves - because we are at "war" - to be above the law, to be above the Constitution, to be above decency, to be able to do whatever they damn well please to whomever they damn well please here and wherever else they damn well please?
No, I guess not. If you don't keep your eyes open, before long the people will expect to be treated honestly - that could bring about a "new world order" that W's daddy never anticipated.
Your editor is a credit to his class.
Yours,
Tom Harker
"Thief in chief" - the Dispatch Editorial
Fidel Castro, ranked among world’s richest leaders, stole it from Cuba’s people
Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Poor Fidel Castro. The Cuban autocrat has spent almost half a century proving that communism is a superb system for creating poverty and distributing it equally. Just ask the 11 million Cubans who squeak by with food rations and an average of $10 a month.
Keeping that many people that miserable for that many years is no easy task. It requires a vast and elaborate police state, and those don’t grow on trees. Creating one requires long hours over many years and unrelenting attention to detail, all the while being harassed by human-rights watchdogs and others who yammer incessantly about liberty and democracy.
Other communist leaders and states have come and gone, such as the Soviet Union and most of its former satellites in eastern Europe. Or they’ve sold their Marxist inheritance for a mess of capitalist pottage, as in China and Vietnam.
So, in his twilight years, Cuba’s 79-year-old jefe maximo has every right to expect that his Marxist credentials would be above reproach.
But no. Forbes magazine, that mouthpiece of the global capitalist order, once again has soiled Castro’s socialist halo by suggesting that he is as greedy as a 19 th-century robber baron. The magazine reported that Castro is the world’s seventh-wealthiest leader, worth $900 million.
The estimate, included in the magazine’s May 5 edition, drew an angry challenge from Castro last week, who said that if anybody can prove he has vast wealth stashed away, he will resign, which presumably would create an opening for somebody else to be absolute dictator.
The magazine admits that the figure is an estimate that is open to question, and, in fact, the editors have never quite settled on what they think Castro is worth. In the 10 years that Forbes has published the annual ranking, Castro’s assets have been pegged at anywhere from $1.4 billion to as little as $100 million.
The $1.4 billion figure came from the magazine’s first estimate in 1997, when editors simply attributed to Castro a percentage of Cuba’s gross domestic product. Since then, the estimate has been derived from various formulas that the magazine defends but declines to lay out in detail. But the estimates are likely based on reports from Cuban defectors that Castro takes a cut from Cuba’s stateowned enterprises.
Forbes notes that the dictator has a fleet of black Mercedes. Anti-Castro activist Maria Werlau, who has studied Castro’s finances and who advised the magazine, says Castro also maintains overseas bank accounts, has numerous houses and controls stockpiles of food, fuel and luxury goods. She believes Forbes underestimates Castro’s wherewithal.
One could argue all day about exactly how to determine the value of Castro’s holdings. But the argument is academic. If everything of value in Cuba, including its people, belongs to the state, and if one man controls that state, then it’s all his to do with as he pleases, which is precisely what Castro has done for 47 years. Practically speaking, this is indistinguishable from ownership.
What’s important is not the total value of all that Castro controls, but how he came by it. The bottom line is that he has robbed the Cuban people of liberty and prosperity for five decades.
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:18 AM
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Dr. Grimaldi's Fantastique more pictures
Hey Folks,
We practiced Wed. night - the show starts tomorrow. Below are some photo's of tonight's preparation. Enjoy!!
See you at the show!!
- Uke Man
We practiced Wed. night - the show starts tomorrow. Below are some photo's of tonight's preparation. Enjoy!!
See you at the show!!
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 1:56 AM
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L to R: Kristina, Dave, Eoin getting ready.
posted by Ukulele Man at 1:54 AM
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Kristina and Meg: the baloons are done!!
posted by Ukulele Man at 1:50 AM
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Wednesday, May 24, 2006
Folks ! You ain't seen nuthin' like it!!
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:35 AM
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Dr. Grimaldi's Exhibition Fantastique this Thurs., Fri., Sat. !!
Hey Folks,
For the information on the show, times, tickets, etc. click here:
http://www.ukuleleman.net/2006/05/really-big-show.html
Share my "Thespian Adventure" !!!!
- Uke Man
For the information on the show, times, tickets, etc. click here:
http://www.ukuleleman.net/2006/05/really-big-show.html
Share my "Thespian Adventure" !!!!
- Uke Man
posted by Ukulele Man at 11:27 AM
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Happy Birthday, Sondra !!!
I wish I had more pictures of ALL your friends and loved ones, but if I did I'd overload the blog!! There are so many people who care about you and who are thankful for all you do!! I know I speak for everyone in wishing you a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY !!! Enjoy your day, Birthday Girl !!!
- Tom
- Tom
posted by Ukulele Man at 12:01 AM
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