Ah, simpler times. Remember back when the far-right spun themselves into a tizzy and was outraged (!!) when Barack and Michelle Obama made a supposed fake-terrorist fist bump? The good ol' days. Imagine this from them. I think the screaming would have been even louder and more horrified than when Starbucks changes its holiday cups from red to green.
On the other hand, I did figure out why Trump sent this! He must have been watching an old rerun of Seinfeld and instead of "Festivus" thought they said they were celebrating..."Fistivus" What I still can't figure out though is why, in a family card, it didn't include his wife and children. Just him and his tiny fist.
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Well, that was unexpected. But quite a fun game. Big upset, the beloved Northwestern wins the Pinstripe Bowl, 31-24 in an upset against #24 Pittsburgh. Okay, so the Pinstripe Bowl isn't one of the more epic, but it's a classic venue at Yankee Stadium, and a win helps recruting, as I said earlier.
Clearly they had some lucky breaks, like Pitt losing their star running back (and inspiration, coming back from Hodgkins) James Conner, as well as their quarterback, Nathan Peterman. But Pittsburgh has a very good team, and a win is a win. It counts. One offbeat note. The winner of the game is awarded the Steinbrenner Trophy, named after the late owner of the Yankees George Steinbrenner. Though I was never a fan of his, I mention it for a little-known reason -- very early in his career, George Steinbrenner was actually an assistant football coach at Northwestern! Really. Okay, so I don't think most people will care, but given it's loooong history being dismal at football, the beloved Northwestern Wildcats are actually playing in a bowl game that starts at 11 AM today, Los Angeles time. It's not a particularly big bowl -- the Pinstripe Bowl played at Yankee Staidum -- though it's certainly a high-profile one.
And alas, they are not expected to win. They had a medicocre season at 6-6 -- looking great in some games, and pathetic in others. And Pittsburgh is actually pretty good. They're 8-4, ranked #24 in the country, and beat two Top 5 teams this year. But...hey, it's a bowl game, so that becomes a good selling point for recruiting. And a guy can hope... By the way, in a small historical note, the two teams have played once before in the '70s. Pittsburgh won 21-14 in Evanston, a game that I attended when a student. It might seen odd to remember a game after so long, but this was memorable. That's because Pittsburgh had a freshman who no one had ever heard of, in fact playing in only his second game. And that day he ran for what was then a school-record 265 yards. His name was Tony Dorsett, and he later went on to have a Hall fo Fame career in the NFL. I came across this video totally by accident last week. I wasn't looking for something with Carrie Fisher since she was in the hospital in critical condition. I wasn't looking for something with Carrie Fisher in it, period. I didn't even plan the watch the whole thing. As great as the video was, which got me to keep watching until I saw the whole thing, I wasn't planning to post it here. But with the news yesterday that Carrie Fisher passed away, I thought I should post it. It was too fitting not to. I generally watch the Graham Norton Show on BBC America, and this past Saturday she was one of the guests, the reason she was in England, to promote her new book, before flying back when she had her heart attack. But I wasn't looking for a video clip to post -- I hadn't found that particular episode all that interesting and even fast-forwarded through a bit until I finally turned it off . I can't even tell you right now how I came across it. I was doing some normal browsing on YouTube, when I saw a video that had both Carrie Fisher and her mother Debbie Reynolds together, on Oprah Winfrey's show in 2011. I was intrigued to see them together, since I never had. But I didn't want to watch the whole thing -- I'm not big on "celebrity scandals," and get zero scheunenfreude pleasure from other people's troubles. If there's a scandal story on TV, I generally will click away. If there's a headline online, I'll click to something else. If I'm driving on the freeway and traffic slows down for an accident, I turn my head away and don't gawk when passing the cause. So, I really didn't intend to watch. As I said, I just wanted to see a few minutes of Carrie Fisher and her mother together. I thought that might be nice. As it happened, the two didn't come onstage together. Oprah had Fisher on first. But I didn't know how long that would be, maybe just a brief who minutes for all I knew. So, I watched. And it was fascinating -- open, funny, thoughtful, no self-pity. And it went on for a while until finally Debbie Reynolds made her appearance. And that, too, was thoughtful, open, funny, and no self-pity and even little sense of scandal...even when talking about scandals. And we still hadn't gotten yet to all that much with mother and daughter. And when we did, it was touching, lively, funny, wistful and mature. And by that point, I figured out that it was a pretty fine broadcast -- along with interesting "coming up later" promos spaced throughout. Most especially the last one...which was pure fun, and particularly moving to watch again, but this time after the loss: mother and daughter singing together on stage for the first time ever. And they were both of them wonderful. And so I watched the whole thing. If you want to watch it all, too, here it is. If you just want to see the singing, jump to three seconds before the 40-minute mark. I was tempted to post this without saying who wrote the show and let you try to figure it -- or at least be bowled over by it, since the chances of guessing would be small. But then I figured you'd be bowled over knowing in advance and be able to appreciate it while listing. The show is the recent Broadway muscial, Bright Star. The score had lyrics by Edie Brickell (the former lead singer of The New Bohemians), and she collaborated on the music with Steve Martin, who wrote the show's books. Yes, that Steve Martin. It's a very enjoyable score, mostly bluegrass, and this particular song is especially gorgeous, an anthem of survival that's the show's final number. It's performed beautifully by Carmen Cusack. (To be clear, although Steve Martin wrote the music for the show, this number has music and lyrics by Edie Brickell. But don't worry, keep listening and reading, because I have another one below that the two did collaborate on. Bright Star got generally solid, though mixed reviews. It also received five Tony nominations, including Best Musical and a Best Actress nod for Ms. Cusack. It ran for 109 performances. But this is one fine song. Because the show was uncommon for Broadway, a more-bluegrass and atmospheric musical than most, I thought it would nice to include a couple of bonus videos. This first is from the show's presentation at this past year's Tony Awards. It features Carmen Cusack and has a personable and very funny introduction by Steve Martin (with Edie Brickell at the piano). And then, just for fun, here's the curtain call at the show's final performance a few months ago on June 26. That's Carmen Cusack in a yellow dress who gets the final bows for the cast. And then you'll see director Walter Bobbie (in a beard and dressed in dark gray) come on stage, along with Edie Brickell and Steve Martin. Not all that much happens here, though it's nice to see the enthusiasm and appreciate -- and then around the 3:10 mark the spirit takes over Steve Martin a bit.
For a variety of reasons, I've recently been discussing with several people the famous "Vast Wasteland" speech by then-FCC Chariman Newton Minow, who had been appointed by President John Kennedy and who also was -- and remains -- father to my friend, the oft-mentioned here Nell Minow.
It occured to me that although people remarkably still know of the speech and its memborable line after over half a century, few people have actually heard any of it. So, I figured that that would be A Good Thing and tracked down three minutes of it, including the famous passage. So, here than from ​May 9, 1961 in an address to the National Association of Broadcasters in Washington, D.C., is a bit of Newton Minow. --
Also, I thought it would be interesting to hear some thoughts from Minow about the speech from a perspective of many decades. He always has said that, to him, the point of the speech was not the "Vast Wasteland" line, but rather than of television broadcasting in the public interest. So, here's another four minutes from the good fellow about it all --
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AuthorRobert J. Elisberg is a political commentator, screenwriter, novelist, tech writer and also some other things that I just tend to keep forgetting. Feedspot Badge of Honor
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