Joe Biden: 50 Million Americans Are “Not Very Good People”
Planet Berkeley: Strawberry Creek
My Boyhood Sports Icons Are Dying: Wes Unseld
Wes Unseld was the second overall pick by the Baltimore Bullets in 1968. He was the only player other than Wilt Chamberlain to win the NBA Rookie of the Year Award and the Most Valuable Player Award in the same year. At 6-foot-7, he played center and averaged 14 rebounds a game for his career. He played in four NBA finals with the Bullets, winning one, in which he was voted MVP, in 1978.
He was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame in 1988.
RIP Wes Unseld
Milwaukee Police Chief Accused of Being Inattentive. His Response May Surprise You!
Protests Considered Harmful?
I saw multiple people on TV this weekend looting stores, running out with a “Black Lives Matter” sign in one hand and stolen merchandise in the other.
Maybe we should stop having these Black Lives Matter protests. The majority of the TV coverage is black citizens stealing things and setting things on fire, which doesn’t improve anyone’s lives and probably, in terms of prejudice and race relations, makes things worse.
In this case, the George Floyd case, I haven’t heard one person say that kneeling on someone’s neck and killing them is good police work. So it’s really a protest against no one, except the one guy who did it and he’s already been fired, arrested, charged with murder and condemned by everyone from the president of the United States on down. There’s no opposing viewpoint to protest against.
The mayor of Atlanta, who is a black woman and therefore allowed to say things like this, said at a press conference a couple of nights ago:
You’re not honoring a legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. and the civil rights movement. You are not protesting anything running out with brown liquor in your hands, breaking windows in this city. T.I., Killer Mike owned half the West side, so when you burn down this city, you’re burning down our community.
If you want change in America, go and register to vote. Show up at the polls on June 9th. Do it in November. That is the change we need in this country.
You are disgracing our city, you are disgracing the life of George Floyd and every other person who has been killed in this country. We are better than this. We are better than this as a city, we are better than this as a country. Go home. Go home.
What Does a Man Really Need?
Little Richard, 1932-2020
[Trigger warning for language :o]
It’s very easy for people to forget what rock and roll really is. Look man, I’m forty-seven years old, and I grew up in Wyoming, and I stole cars and drove five hundred miles to watch Little Richard, and I wanna tell you somethin’ — when I saw this nigger come out in a gold suit, fuckin’ hair flyin’, and leap up onstage and come down on his piano bangin’ and goin’ fuckin’ nuts in Salt Lake City, I went, “Hey man, I wanna be like him. This is what I want.”
RIP “Little Richard” Penniman
Happy Mothers Day
I have so many dreams of my own, and I remember things from my childhood, from when I was a girl and a young woman, and I haven’t forgotten a thing. So why did we think of Mom as a mom from the very beginning? She didn’t have the opportunity to pursue her dreams, and all by herself, faced everything the era dealt her, poverty and sadness, and she couldn’t do anything about her very bad lot in life other than suffer through it and get beyond it and live her life to the very best of her ability, giving her body and her heart to it completely. Why did I never give a thought to Mom’s dreams?
Souplantation, 1978-2020
Souplantation is closing all of its restaurants permanently, a casualty of the coronavirus pandemic.
I was probably one of their last customers . . . we had dinner at the Irvine location a few days before restaurants had to close for in-person dining. The place was at least 70 percent empty at that time. It is hard to believe we’ll never be able to go there again.
Souplantation was one of our favorite family restaurants, maybe the number one favorite. This feels like the death of a family member . . . so many Souplantation memories . . .
RIP Souplantation
I’m Going to Start Robbing Banks
Why do you rob banks?
Because that’s where the money is.
I’m going to start sticking up banks. Not long ago, if you walked into a bank wearing a mask over your face, someone would immediately reach for an alarm or a gun. Now it’s required.
I could walk in and clean out the teller before anyone suspects a thing.
I think I’ll hone my craft first by knocking off a few gas stations and convenience stores.
“Can you describe the suspect?”
“I can’t, officer. He was wearing a mask.”
One Thing Is Certain
I used to write for a news magazine and most big analytical stories would end like this: ‘X might happen or Y might happen, but one thing is certain: things will never be the same.’ Then, once time had passed, things would be the same
Over and over
— Walter Kirn (@walterkirn) March 29, 2020
Ship It
How the Media Completely Blew the Trump Ventilator Story
FEMA acted quickly — much faster than is possible in the regular process — to get so-called notifications to purchase to ventilator manufacturers, so they could start work and hold their inventory, which ensured it wasn’t lost to foreign countries. The Defense Production Act was invoked with General Motors to get production moving as quickly as possible, and not back-loaded later in the summer.
“We are going to be swimming in ventilators.”Last year, according to administration figures, the country produced 30,000 ventilators. This year, it’s going to produce something on the order of 200,000, and they are already coming in. “The balance now is growing daily,” the White House adviser says of the federal stockpile. “We are going to be swimming in ventilators.”
By any measure, that’s a success, certainly compared with where we thought we’d be less than a month ago. If the media weren’t so devoted to gotcha idiocy, more people might know about it.
Goofus and Gallant on COVID-19
Goofus: I am stuck. I’ll never make it through this situation, and even if I do, I won’t be as successful as I was before. This is a downward spiral.
Gallant: I am Growing. I am making progress – sometimes gradually and other times rapidly – with learning new skills and developing better habits. I am becoming stronger through these trying times, and so are many others in my work organization and community.
Goofus: I am fragmented. I’m being pulled in too many directions to be truly helpful to anyone.
Gallant: I am Integrating. I am drawing upon a broad reservoir of resources from my varied experiences, which can help me navigate new challenges. My authenticity and vulnerability can help me to build deeper connections and establish healthy boundaries with trusted colleagues during trying times.
Goofus: I am incapable. I don’t have enough courage to meet this challenge, and I don’t have the resources to help anyone else in a significant way.
Gallant: I am engaging in Virtuous action. Every day I rise to meet the unanticipated challenges I face. I will seek opportunities to provide compassionate care for others during trying times. I will maintain my integrity, by sincerely trying to activate my best self during trying times.
Goofus: I am diminished. I’m not handling this as well as my coworkers, peers, or relatives. Everybody seems to have things under control except for me.
Gallant: I am Elevating my self-worth. I focus on my own goals and growth, appreciating my personal journey, and savoring opportunities to contribute to my family, organizations and community. In trying times, I resist the urge to demean or compare myself to others. I am strengthened by becoming my personal best – showing up, being present, and making an honest effort to achieve collective goals and higher ideals.
Benediction
I acknowledge my sadness and fear and anxiety. Grant me the courage to be a better version of myself, and the hope to be virtuous to others, to be resilient in the face of tragedy.
Anne Frank on Twitter
Whoa, I saw Anne Frank trending on Twitter and I thought something happened to her . . .
Nobody is Fine Anymore
How are you doing? Remember when you’d automatically say “Fine”? Now nobody is fine.
We’re all programmed from our caveman days with a fight-or-flight system, but there’s a big difference between a predator stepping out in front of us and COVID-19.
They’re both threats, but the predator is what we’d call an acute short-term threat. This is really what our system was developed to handle. There’s something there, I have to do something now and you do something.
With COVID the threat is chronic. It’s there all the time. Not only is it chronic, it’s undefined, it’s ambiguous, and it’s not even just the virus. It’s the economic impact of the virus, it’s the lifestyle changes, it’s the isolation, it’s the not being able to hug people we would like to hug, that is all feeding into this threat system.
We really evolved to take on short-term acute threats. We attack it, we deal with it, or we run away. Either way, within a short period of time, the incident may be over and then we can relax and get down from it. But in a situation like the COVID situation we’re in now, we don’t even know how long this is going to go on, and it’s a threat at multiple levels, very significant levels for a very long time. So it’s a chronic threat of the most extreme kind and that is not what our system was designed to handle.
My Boyhood Sports Icons Are Dying: Al Kaline
Al Kaline played all 22 years of his career as a right fielder for the Detroit Tigers, played in 18 All-Star games, won 10 Gold Gloves, a World Series in 1968, had 3,007 hits, 399 home runs, a .297 batting average and was a first-ballot Hall of Famer.
He died today at the age of 85.
On his 80th birthday, he said: “To this day, I can’t believe the life I’ve had. I wanted to be a baseball player — and do the one thing I was good at.
“Even now, I love it so much.”
RIP Al Kaline
Meditation
I’ve taken up meditation. Or rather I’ve taken to calling taking naps “meditation.” What’s the difference? You close your eyes, clear your mind . . . same goddamn thing.
Gimme Some Truth
I’m sick and tired of hearing things from
Uptight short-sighted narrow-minded hypocrites
All I want is the truth, just give me some truthI’m sick to death of seeing things from
Tight-lipped condescending mama’s little chauvinists
All I want is the truth, just give me some truthI’ve had enough of watching scenes from
Schizophrenic egocentric paranoiac primadonnas
All I want is the truth, just give me some truth
