I picked the Max Ernst painting as the featured image because it’s been a surreal week. The Trump mishigas ate my week and I have some sort of bug, so this will be a brief Odds & Sods post.
The other thing that made me sick this week was the overtly racist expulsion of two Black state reps by the GOP controlled Tennessee lege. ICYMI, I wrote a raw and rare late night post about it: The Birthplace Of The Klan Strikes Again. Not only was the expulsion racist, it was some deeply stupid Bull Connor shit.
Leonard Cohen wrote this week’s theme song for his 1969 album Songs From A Room. It’s one of his signature songs. It’s been covered almost as much as Hallelujah. Praise be.
We have four versions of Bird On The Wire for your listening pleasure: the Cohen original, Judy Collins, The Neville Brothers, and KD Lang. The last two versions replace the wire with a wire. Whatever.
Let’s stay wired with a swell Dave Davies song:
We begin our second act with a perceptive piece by Slate legal eagle Dahlia Lithwick.
Put Trump In Time Out: The Divine Dahlia makes a strong case for ignoring Trump and his toddler-style tantrums. It’s a prescription for a saner life. For the details slide on over to Slate.
The last word of our brief second act goes to Squeeze:
We begin our third act with our favorite stolen feature.
Separated At Birth Casting Edition: I have bad presidents on my mind. Here’s Andrew Johnson and Van Heflin who played him in the bad 1942 flick, Tennessee Johnson:
In addition to being a drunken racist, Johnson was corrupt. Hence this John Hiatt song:
The List: Looking for the movie list? Not this week. It’s a List List, which has nothing to do with Listomania.
With the exception of Lawrence, the legal analysts at MSNBC are better than the anchors. On Arraignment Day I wanted the anchors to STFU and let the mouthpieces mouth off.
I know they have other legal analysts, but these are the regulars ranked in order of preference. They’re all good.
I omitted Ari Melber because he’s what they call in Hollywood a hyphenate, an anchor-legal analyst. No Beat down intended.
My Favorite MSNBC Legal Analysts
- Andrew Weissmann
- Chuck Rosenberg
- Joyce Vance
- Neal Katyal
- Harry Litman
- Barbara McQuade
- Paul Butler
- Glenn Kirschner
The Puppetmaster not only rocks, he rules. Not bad for a self-described nerdy lawyer with an adorable dog:
I can’t get enough of Innis. I seem to have given myself a benign earworm:
Marxist Clips: I may not have animal crackers in my soup, but I have Groucho wisecracks on my mind.
Your Weekly Oscar: This week, one of OP’s own compositions, Nigerian Marketplace. It’s from a Tokyo show. You can’t get more international than that.
Have I told you lately how much I love Oscar Peterson?
Saturday GIF Horse: Ted Danson in The Good Place has a message for Michael Cohen:
Celebrity Coffin Nail Corner: We have the then managers of the New York Yankees and the then New York Giants, Casey Stengel and Leo Durocher. That may have been one too many thens.
Let’s close down this virtual honky tonk with some more music.
Saturday Classic: I don’t believe in the Easter Bunny, but I do believe in the White Rabbit:
That’s all for this week. The last word goes to Leonard Cohen and Judy Collins:
