March rambling: 2008 again?

amateur sleuths

Everything Everywhere All at OnceIs it 2008 again, or not? (bank failures)

US Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) makes his DC entrance

New Governor Sarah Huckabee Sanders (R-AR) Signs Law Gutting Child Labor Protections for Minors Under 16 Years Old

Defiant Woman at the Center of New York’s First Abortion Battle – in the 1840s

How to Make the Hybrid Model Work for Women

The HistoryMakers: Documenting Black history through first-person accounts | 60 Minutes

My City by James Weldon Johnson

The Destruction of Negro Communities and the Birth of the African American

Mapped: Which Countries Get the Most Paid Vacation Days?

Indonesia unveils the construction site of a new capital city, Nusantara.  Jakarta is experiencing overpopulation, infrastructure problems, and chronic flooding. The current capital is quickly sinking into the Java Sea, and parts of the city could be entirely submerged by 2050. But the new “project may lead to substantial rainforest deforestation, threaten endangered species’ habitats, put Indigenous peoples’ homes at risk, and more.”

March is Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month. The Colon Club calls attention to the disease.

Why are nurses quitting? Ask the nurse no hospital will hire.

Idaho Murders: As a Small Town Grapples With Sinister Rumors, Media’s True-Crime Obsession Grows and The Case the Internet got wrong: A new investigation sheds light on Lindsay Buziak’s unsolved murder, revealing a vast web of misinformation. These are as much about the rush to judgment by amateur sleuths as the crimes themselves.

Worst Civil Engineering Failure in US History – March 12, 1928: St. Francis Dam Disaster
And more

John Cleese was confronted with three men who kinda looked and/or kinda sounded like his character, Basil Fawlty. He had to guess which one did the impersonation professionally.

Chaim Topol, Tevye the Milkman in ‘Fiddler on the Roof,’ Dies at 87

Robert Blake, the Combustible Star of ‘In Cold Blood’ and ‘Baretta,’ Dies at 89

Marvel Working to Find ‘Quantumania’ Leaker. It’ll probably be more successful than SCOTUS was. 
My friend Fred Hembeck asks Mark Evanier about Tiny Tim

Is the Beyond Burger Healthy?

Hey, Stewart’s, $5 / 2 = what??

Now I Know: The Dark History of Groomsmen and Baseball’s Strangest Trade and When Space and Physics Don’t Mix and Why Beer Comes in Brown (or Green) Bottles

I’m happy about the results of the Academy Awards, although I did not watch the program. It’s been my experience that people who saw EEAAO in the cinema, as I did, enjoyed it FAR more than those who watched it at home.

To me, it’s all one big, continual story. The Big Lie about the 2020 election, including the allegations about rigged voting machines.The January 6, 2021 insurrection.   Dominion voting machine’s defamation case against Fox News and the information that came out during the trial’s discovery phase.

Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy gave Fox News exclusive access to raw footage of Jan 6. Tucker Carlson, one of the verified liars in the Dominion discovery, had footage of Jan 6 edited to suggest that the insurrection was just a sightseeing event, a claim so absurd that the White House and Senate Republicans from Mitch McConnell to Thom Tillis rebuked Carlson.

Check out pieces by Jake Tapper, Bill Maher, Seth Meyers, Drezner’s World, and possibly most comprehensively, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.

Music

In honor of ME: Adagio and Allegro for Piano and Horn by Robert Schumann, Opus 70!

And this: Sir Roger Norrington Eroica/Happy Birthday surprise from the SWR Symphonieorchester

Afro-American Symphony by William Grant Still

Casablanca suite by Max Steiner

Coverville 1433: The Rihanna Cover Story and  1434: Cover Stories for Nik Kershaw and Nina Simone, and 1435: Album Cover: Dark Side of the Moon’s 50th Anniversary

Wayne Shorter, 1923-2023

Guitarist David Lindley: 1944—2023

K-Chuck Radio: The joy and sadness of Yvonne Barrett

Classical Composer Reaction – Analysis of This is America (Childish Gambino) | The Daily Doug Ep. 542. (Doug Helvering)

Make Way For Tomorrow dance number- Gene Kelly, Rita Hayworth, and Phil Silvers (!)

Carpenters with Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

Don’t Worry, Be Happy – Julien Neel

It’s not Lou Reed … and it’s not Jefferson Airplane, either.

Mr. Ma answers all the cello questions you never knew you had!

Burt Bacharach’s Clever Key Changes – David Bennett Piano

Ten classical music songs you know, but you may not know their names

“We’re willing to sacrifice our egos for the good of the band” – interview with  Simon Le Bon of Duran Duran.

Please keep voting for the niece Rebecca Jade for the San Diego Music Awards daily in categories 20, 21, 25, 26, and 27. Also, vote for Peter Sprague in category 4, which RJ sang on.

February rambling: Candice Bergen

the nominated Rebecca Jade; the death of Dr. Paul Farmer

chorded_keyboard_
From https://xkcd.com/2583/

$778 Billion for the Pentagon and Still Counting

Who Should You Back in the Midterm Elections?

When Discussion and Compromise Don’t Work

Clarence and Ginni Thomas show why the Supreme Court is a problem that can’t be ignored

What if public schools were the target all along? and How the Super Rich Buy Elections to Undermine Public Schools

Walking America: Jacksonville. Community among the expressways, interstates, and boulevards

Nurses’ stories from the front lines of COVID

When Facebook Doesn’t Believe You

In Canada, the Conservative Members of Parliament chose deputy leader Candice Bergen as interim leader on 2 February 2022. This was after the caucus voted to remove Erin O’Toole as party leader by a vote of 73 to 45. Not that one, the performer Candice Bergen. THIS one.

Photographer Nancie Battaglia has captured iconic images at nearly every Winter Games since 1980

Partners In Health announced that its founder, Dr. Paul Farmer, unexpectedly passed away in Rwanda from an acute cardiac event while he was sleeping. Dr. Farmer was 62 years old. John Green on The Death of My Hero. 

He Donated His Kidney and Received a $13,064 Bill in Return

The value of obituaries
An Arizona priest used one wrong word in baptisms for decades. They’re all invalid (May I say this is REALLY inane?)

Ivan Reitman, ‘Animal House’ Producer and ‘Ghostbusters’ Director, Dies at 75. My favorite of his movies was Dave.

It was the most successful Jewish ad campaign of all time — but who was the model?

Did the pandemic change our viewing habits?

Super Bowl commercials 2022

Does the Australian Capital Territory have a coastline? It’s complicated!

A historic townhouse is also a secret subway exit

Should You Use Snow to Water Your Houseplants?

New comic about paper.

BHM

Malverne: The Incomplete Struggle for School Integration on Long Island

Don’t Ban Black History, Teach It

Advancing Antiracist Efforts to Improve an Unequal Health System

How UPN Ushered in a Golden Decade of Black TV — and Then Was Merged Out of Existence

Slave-holding New York State Congressional Representatives

Critical Race Theory: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver

The Problem With Jon Stewart Podcast with Bryan Stevenson 

Now I Know

The Judge Who Intentionally Sent an Innocent Man to Jail and The Checks That Saved 75 Christmases and  The Fake Witch Who Saved Dozens of Lives and The Very Short Flight You Couldn’t Even Take and The History of Being On Hold and The Boo Racket

Music

National anthem of Ukraine

San Diego Music Awards sets 2022 performers; top nominees include Rebecca Jade

Piano Quintet in A minor by Florence Price

Playing for Change: When The Levee Breaks, feat. John Paul Jones

Seven O’Clock Shout by Valerie Coleman

The Lucky One – Peter Sprague,  Pam Pendrell — vocals

Chariots by Ulysses Kay

Cappriccio italien, Op. 45, TH 47. Mr. Bernstein conducting Mr. Tchaikovsky

Questionable – MonaLisa Twins

Coverville: 1390 – Cover Stories for Melanie, Guns N’Roses and John Williams and 1391 – Cover Stories for Sheryl Crow and Roberta Flack

No, John Williams did NOT rip off Dvorak

Everybody Loves A Lover – Arlene Silver and The Vantastix (feat Dick Van Dyke)

The Great Pretender – The Platters

Shimmy Shimmy Ko Ko Bop – Little Anthony and The Imperials 

Zoot Suit Riot   – Cherry Poppin’ Daddies 

Douglas Trumbull

Vivian Carter: Introducing The Beatles To America

Nina Simone

February rambling: Black Present

Sojourner Truth; Kyiv; Colorado isn’t a rectangle

Cosmic Perspective

Walking the World: Kyiv. In a beautiful no man’s land between Russia and the US

Tennessee Pastor Hosts Massive Book-Burning At His Church and McMinn County’s Maus Problem

Trump Makes It Clear He’d Be an Out and Out Dictator If Reelected in 2024

When the Dying COVID Patient Is 23

The New Orleans funeral reminds us that grief is a burden that can be shared

It’s Coming! The 1950 United States Federal Census. Share with family and friends and help ensure their family’s records are accurate and complete.

A Quarter of Children in US Lived With At Least One Foreign-Born Parent

What Kind of Writer Accuses Libraries of Stealing? A wrangle on the topic of Controlled Digital Lending.

Global Ranking of Free Wifi Hot Spots in 2022

Colorado is a rectangle? Think again.

Cartoon: candy polyamory

The secret MVP of sports? The port-a-potty

Mary Tyler Moore Show Reunion – Oprah 2008

Black History

The National Abolition Hall of Fame and Museum (NAHOF) Black History Matters 2022 program

Building Albany’s Free Black Community in the Early 1800s

State Archives find historic court case of Sojourner Truth; Documents concerning Truth’s 1828 fight for her son

Tom Cotton Says Slavery Not About White Supremacy But Was A Necessary Evil

Reconstruction: Why Students Need to Learn and Teach the Truth

Rightwing Anti-CRT Network

Black Present

How Racism, Segregation, and Redlining Has Widened the Homeownership Gap

The possibility of first Black woman SCOTUS nominee prompts misogynoirist pushback

Black Health and Wellness

Understanding mental health issues among Black Teens

Cross-country exploration of Black history

Racism in the NFL

Breaking Boundaries in Black Tennis

Minor League Baseball adds to inclusion efforts with The Nine

Whoopi was Wrong and Wronged

Now I Know

A Different Type of Presidential Mudslinging and The Loch Ness Moose-ster? and The Very Long Novel That Saved a Man’s Sanity and The Green Vines Grow All Around

Music
control_group_2x
From https://xkcd.com/2576/ This is absolutely why I never learned the Macarena.

Mingus Ah Um album – Charles Mingus, plus a nice Howard Hesseman story

Music honoring and celebrating the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

Free Man In Paris – Peter Sprague with Pam Pendrell on vocals

Bylina by Vasily Kalinnikov

The Tango: Vaccine – Randy Rainbow

Mozart: Sinfonia concertante for violin, viola, and chamber orchestra, K. 364.

Bone Music: Forbidden Soviet Records Made From Used X-Ray Films

Meat Loaf – Coverville 1389: Tribute Mini-Episode and a Keef cartoon 

Nachtschwaermer by Carl Michael Ziehrer

K-Chuck Radio: Three songs with hidden curse words (that still get played on the radio)

How John Stamos Came to Record ‘Alone’ Before Heart Did

Black History in Nazi Germany

“Rhineland bastards”

Blacks in Nazi Germany
Afro-German Hans J. Massaquoi tried to join the Nazi youth, per https://www.dw.com/en/the-fate-of-blacks-in-nazi-germany/a-5065360-1

There’s a guy named John Hightower who posted a story on his Facebook page called Black History in Nazi Germany, a story. John is about a decade older than I. We attended the same church, Trinity AME Zion, and the same high school, Binghamton Central, plus I know or knew a number of his relatives.

I wanted to find the location of the piece he shared. Initially, I found it on the Facebook page of  Great Plains Black History Museum in Omaha, NE. It has a lot of interesting artifacts. Its Mission Statement: “To preserve, educate, and exhibit the contributions and achievements of African Americans with an emphasis on the Great Plains region. To provide a space to learn, explore, reflect, and remind us of our history.”

AAREG

But that’s not the original source. Finally, the librarian found it on AAREG, the African American Registry. Here’s just a segment.

“On this date (Holocaust Remembrance Day, January 27) from 1933, the Registry looks into the Black history of Nazi Germany. The Nazis seized power on January 30, of that year with Adolph Hitler’s appointment as chancellor…

“Hitler had a white vision of a Master Race of Aryans that would control Europe. He used powerful propaganda techniques to convince not only the German people but countless others, that if they eliminated the people who stood in their way and the degenerates and racially inferior, they, ‘the great Germans’, would prosper. This included mandatory Sterilization for Black Youth.

“Before World War I, there were very few dark-skinned people of African descent in Germany. But, during World War I, the French brought in Black African soldiers during the Allied occupation. Most of the Germans, who were very race-conscious, despised the dark-skinned ‘invasion’.”

You should read the whole thing.

USHMM

Related, check out the bibliography from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in a section called Blacks.

Part of the introduction: “Though Hitler’s racial policies toward Jews, Sinti, and Roma, have been well documented, researchers have given less attention to actions against Blacks…

“Individuals of African descent living in Germany were socially and economically ostracized. They could not attend university; they lost their jobs; they sometimes lost their citizenship. Mixed race marriages were forbidden, and doctors illegally and secretly sterilized between 385 and 500 biracial children, most of them offspring of French Black soldiers and German women, children derisively referred to as the ‘Rhineland bastards.’

“Blacks, including African Americans, were also imprisoned or sent to internment or concentration camps. There, they were often treated more harshly and subjected to medical experiments or extreme brutality. The SS and Gestapo commonly mistreated Black prisoners of war, working them to death in concentration camps or killing them immediately rather than imprisoning them.”

Most of these references direct the reader to their local library, as well it should.

Finally, check out the AAIHS article, The Erasure of People of African Descent in Nazi Germany, the source of the picture.

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