The Gourd Dance is a type of Native American celebration dance and ceremony. It is believed that the dance originated with the Kiowa tribe. Gourd dances are often held to coincide with a pow-wow, although the Gourd Dance has its own unique dance and history. Gourd Dancing may precede the pow-wow or it can be a separate event, not directly connected with a pow-wow.
A Kiowa story recounts the tale of a young man who had been separated from the rest of the tribe. Hungry and dehydrated after many days of travel, the young man approached a hill and heard an unusual kind of singing coming from the other side. There he saw a red wolf singing and dancing on its hind legs. The man listened to the songs all afternoon and through the night and when morning came, the wolf spoke to him and told him to take the dance and songs back to the Kiowa people. The “howl” at the end of each gourd dance song is a tribute to the red wolf. The Kiowa Gourd Dance was once part of the Kiowa Sun Dance ceremony.
Other tribes including the Comanche and Cheyenne also have stories about the gourd dance. The Cheyenne believe that the Cheyenne tribe is the source of the gourd dance tradition and have elaborate oral tradition accounting for it. The ambiguity of origins of the dance may be because the gourd is simply a rattle. There are many types of rattles used by many different American Indian tribes, on many different occasions. It is possible that the “gourd” rattle designates a particular social organization of the dance, rather than simply the kind of rattle used. The modern gourd dance does indicate Kiowa influence pertaining both to the social etiquette and especially the songs. In the Southern Plains the gourd dance is dominated by Kiowa presence.
See how the RACISTS come back with reverse RACISM?
SPEAK ON IT,AG HOLDER! Call out these MOFOs
TELL IT!!!!
where’s that church graphic?
This is awesome. This is exactly what is needed. I was thinking about this yesterday, the video of Eric Holder sitting before that committee and having to respond to that nonsense being spewed by that GOP representative. It is time to call out these good ol’ boys for their disrespect of President Obama, AG Eric Holder, and everyone else they have disrespected. And it isn’t a short list.
I can’t even put words to how sick and tired I am of the disrespect, just watching it for the past five years. By the time a person is elected to Congress, that person really should have mastered the art of keeping a civil tongue in his/her head. It’s not about agreeing with other people or even liking them or what they stand for. It’s about treating other people as you would like to be treated yourself, and we the people should demand at least that much of those who represent us in Congress.
Liza, I do believe that certain strain of members in congress have always been like Gohmert.Now that PBO’s president and the rise of the so-called TEA PARTY, they have ENBOLDEN their displays of ignorance, disrespect, dog-whistling, and outright racial animus.
It really is their last attempt to let the other NEGROES know that they are not wanted and will not be accepted into their club. Also, it sends a message to the other white, uneducated hillbillies that they too can ascend to the powers of congress and show their asses.
https://twitter.com/History_Pics/status/453985205825830912/photo/1
This is TOTAL HOTNESS.
And my hair was this long and natural until I got it cut last Feb.
Racial Resentment is illicit stock Conservatives traffic for Profit & Votes
By zizi2
In his recent article about the surge in Racial Resentment during the age of Obama, Jonathan Chait could have spared readers the torture of seeing him contort himself into a beltway “both-sides-do-it” pretzel, if he had asked himself one simple question: — “Who is profiting from racial resentment in the Age of Obama?”.
That fundamental question would have trucked him out of the airy parlor of abstract debate and beltway media myopia where “policy” amounts to wealthy talking heads from left, right and 3rd Way trading barbs on TV, and out into the trail of the billionaire-backed conservative wrecking ball that is stripping minorities of voting rights, women of reproductive rights, blocking millions from access to Medicaid, profiting off criminalized black bodies warehoused in for-profit prisons, eroding workers’ rights in the name of coddling corporations as “job creators,” erasing the history of minority oppression from textbooks and classrooms, and so on.
****
On that trail he would have discovered how those conservative interests are cynically using President Obama and minorities as Rorschach Tests to whip up latent bigotries in order to further their corporate and fundamentalist religious goals, the bulk of which are actually detrimental to those very people whose bigotries they are whipping up. Racial resentment would not exist in its myriad forms if there was no market for it. To understand its lucrative purchase is to seek out who profits from it, and above all who runs the market.
http://theobamadiary.com/2014/04/09/racial-resentment-is-illicit-stock-conservatives-traffic-for-profit-votes/#comment-998344
never EVAH gets old:
https://twitter.com/KPRCLocal2/status/454004674023010304/photo/1
https://twitter.com/dougmillsnyt/status/454003246017695744/photo/1
https://twitter.com/NerdyWonka/status/454008906532941824/photo/1
How many more of these memorial services will POTUS & FLOTUS attend while he’s still in office.
Have Mercy on us, Lord!
Good question, Ametia. This has become so common that most people seem to scarcely notice anymore.
NOT SO FAST ON THIS POST RACIAL BS.
Tell the TRUTH, Mr. Hank Aaron~
Baseball Great Hank Aaron: Obama’s GOP Critics Are Like The KKK
Baseball legend Hank Aaron doesn’t think President Obama’s political rivals are that much different than the racists who threatened Aaron with death as he approached Babe Ruth’s home run milestone.
Aaron told USA Today in an interview published Tuesday that he still has the hateful letters he received as he closed in on Ruth’s career home run record 40 years ago this week. He said he keeps them as a reminder “that we are not that far removed from when I was chasing the record.”
“If you think that, you are fooling yourself,” he said. “A lot of things have happened in this country, but we have so far to go. There’s not a whole lot that has changed.”
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/hank-aaron-obama-republicans-kkk
Mr. Aaron is right. The hateful letters he received probably match up perfectly to the vitriolic and hateful rhetoric of the current times.
True!
Spot on, Liza. And some of my white colleagues question why the movie industry keeps making movies like “42” and 12 Years a Slave.” If they have to ask the question… We need to keep making these movies and tell the HISTORY.
If you don’t know where this country has been, you won’t, can’t understand where we are now and where we’re going.
Republicans remind Hank Aaron of racists who threatened his life during home run pursuit
By Scott Kaufman
Wednesday, April 9, 2014 12:12 EDT
“We can talk about baseball. Talk about politics,” he continued. “Sure, this country has a black president, but when you look at a black president, President Obama is left with his foot stuck in the mud from all of the Republicans with the way he’s treated. We have moved in the right direction, and there have been improvements, but we still have a long ways to go in the country.”
“The bigger difference is that back then they had hoods. Now they have neckties and starched shirts.” Hank Aaron
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/04/09/republicans-remind-hank-aaron-racists-who-threatened-his-life-during-home-run-pursuit/
in today’s edition of WHITE PEOPLE, PLEASE!
https://twitter.com/Lib_Librarian/status/453943190077206528/photo/1
Demint short:
Government of, by, and for the PEOPLE, means NOT FOR YOU NEGROES!
UConn’s men drew inspiration from women in their lives
Nicole Auerbach, USA TODAY
9:06 a.m. EDT April 8, 2014
DALLAS — Kevin Ollie’s voice had gotten scratchier and raspier as the night wore on.
Which was convenient, because in this moment, he just needed to listen. His boss, Connecticut athletic director Warde Manuel, leaned close and reminded his coach, “You know, President Obama is going to call you.”
Ollie nodded. He knew the drill. He’d been on the Huskies’ staff back in 2011, the last time Connecticut had won a national championship. Back then, the President’s call wasn’t for him; it was for Jim Calhoun.
This call will come, likely Tuesday, a final exclamation point on what has been a surreal run and unexpected NCAA men’s basketball title for these Huskies. “I’m going to tell him I know he picked Michigan State,” Ollie said, smirking at the thought of Connecticut’s vanquished Elite Eight foe. But that call still remained hours away.
Here, in the bowels of the Hyatt Regency Dallas, the clock ticked past one o’clock. Ollie ducked into a quiet room that was reserved for Connecticut players and filled with a buffet of fried chicken, fries and broccoli. He scanned the room quickly and found the person he’d been looking for: his wife, Stephanie.
Only Stephanie understood the lows well enough to embrace this high fully; she’d lived them, too.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaab/2014/04/08/college-basketball-uconn-connecticut-huskies-final-four/7452943/
https://twitter.com/TheObamaDiary/status/453938652381327360/photo/1
https://twitter.com/wfaachannel8/status/453934334072729600/photo/1
https://twitter.com/trutherbot/status/453883789475708928/photo/1
LOL Tell it, Neil!
He is contributing so much!!
Brilliant scientist and teacher!
Danny Vinik: House GOP Leader Admits His Party Doesn’t Care About The Long-Term Unemployed
Over the past three months, Republicans have offered one excuse after another for not extending unemployment insurance. With the Senate passing a UI extension on Monday night, House Republican leaders are searching for any reason to oppose the bill—and openly admitting that they only care about the politics of the long-term unemployment crisis. Now Representative Tom Cole, the deputy whip, has come up with a new one: House Republicans don’t feel any pressure to pass it. “I don’t think there is a great sense of pressure on our members,” Cole said Monday.
“The prevailing view in our conference is that there aren’t adequate pay-fors and it’s time for this program to come to an end.” In other words, House Republicans will only help the long-term unemployed when they think there is political pressure on them to do so—not because it is sound public policy.Then again, at least Cole is being honest: House Republicans don’t care about the long-term unemployed. They only care about the politics surrounding them.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117302/tom-cole-house-republicans-need-pressure-pass-unemployment-benefit
I read this story and it screams to me:
OBAMACARE IS A JOBS CREATOR.
But, maybe it’s just me.
……………………
NPR: Wave Of Newly Insured Patients Strains Oregon Health Plan
Millions of Americans who didn’t have health insurance last year now do because of the Affordable Care Act. In Lane County, Oregon, Trillium Community Health Plan is struggling to deal with a huge influx of new patients looking for health care. CEO Terry Coplin says the company figured 26,000 people would sign up in the first few years. Instead, about that many signed up right off the bat. Cheryl Stumph is one of them. She and her husband, Mike, run Green Streak Automotive, an all-service garage in Veneta, Ore. Last November, Stumph’s 27-year-old son had a stroke and died at the wheel of his tow truck. The stroke stemmed from a genetic problem, so Stumph spent the winter worrying about her six other kids.Genetic testing is expensive, and she didn’t have health insurance. But now she and her family get Medicaid through Trillium Health. She’s thrilled to be able to get a mammogram and treatment for a stubborn infection. The kids can get genetic testing.
She says her husband has a chronic medical problem that needs attention, too. Stories like Stumph’s are being repeated across Oregon. Trillium’s Coplin says the health plan has come up with a four-part plan to deal with this unexpected influx. First, it will pay bonuses to doctors who accept new patients covered by Trillium. Second, Trillium is giving Lane County $900,000 to open a new clinic in an existing building. “They have proposed ways that they can get this clinic up and running by mid-year,” says Coplin. Third, Trillium is hiring a consultant to see if existing clinics can increase efficiency, for example, by changing who fills out forms. “Having physicians do clerical work is really a waste of valuable resources,” Coplin says. And finally, Trillium is offering $500,000 to any clinic or group of physicians willing to expand their practice to take on another 5,000 adult patients.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/04/08/300248220/wave-of-newly-insured-patients-strains-oregon-health-plan?sc=tw
Sahil Kapur: Republicans Warn Of New Obamacare Reality: No Repeal Without Alternative
For all the challenges still facing Obamacare and its supporters, conservative health wonks are increasingly cautioning Republicans that the politics of the issue have changed in the wake of the 7 million initial sign-ups. Simply repealing the law is no longer an option, they warn, even if Republicans gain the power to do so. If they want to unwind the law, the least they’ll have to do is coalesce around health care solutions of their own, lest they strip away benefits for millions of Americans without a plan of their own. And the party is far from a consensus on how they’d replace the law. There is internal dissent on whether Republicans ought to come up with an alternative. One congressional GOP health aide, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly, said his party is as determined as ever to fight Obamacare, and will remain so as long as it exhibits failure. He said devising an alternative is fraught with the difficulty of crafting a new benefits structure that doesn’t look like the Affordable Care Act.
“If you want to say the further and further this gets down the road, the harder and harder it gets to repeal, that’s absolutely true,” the aide said. “As far as repeal and replace goes, the problem with replace is that if you really want people to have these new benefits, it looks a hell of a lot like the Affordable Care Act. … To make something like that work, you have to move in the direction of the ACA. You have to have a participating mechanism, you have to have a mechanism to fund it, you have to have a mechanism to fix parts of the market.” It sheds light on why Republicans haven’t yet followed through on the “replace” component of their “repeal and replace” mantra, more than four years after Obamacare was enacted. The popular parts of the law, most notably the preexisting conditions guarantee, are unsustainable without unpopular parts like the individual mandate. Unraveling the parts people dislike means unraveling the whole structure, and rebuilding the well-liked elements is difficult without arriving at a similar place as Obamacare.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/republicans-new-obamacare-reality-no-repeal-without-replace
Alex Pareene: Morning Joe’s Special Privileges: Why Is MSNBC Allowing Him To Help GOP Raise Money?
Joe Scarborough, who is definitely not running for president, is going to New Hampshire next month to deliver the keynote address at the Chesire County Republican Lincoln Day Dinner. This follows another visit to New Hampshire last month, where Scarborough delivered a speech to the Northeast Republican Leadership Conference. Joe Scarborough would like you to know that he is not planning a run for president — he just happens to enjoy New Hampshire, I guess, and who doesn’t? (He also recently visited South Carolina.) But as the Huffington Post’s Michael Calderone reports, this totally normal not-at-all presidential campaign-related New Hampshire visit probably violates MSNBC policy on hosts raising money for political parties or candidates. Because it is a fundraiser.
Maybe it doesn’t make a ton of sense to allow hosts to advocate, on-air, for certain parties and candidates, but not to donate to or raise money for them, but those are the rules, and those rules are what got then-MSNBC host Keith Olbermann suspended in 2010, after Olbermann donated money to three Democratic candidates.This year, MSNBC forced liberal host Ed Schultz to withdraw from a Democratic Party fundraiser. This will be Scarborough’s second Republican Party fundraiser of the year. He is delivering the keynote address, not merely moderating a panel. The money raised for the dinner will go to Cheshire County Republicans. It all seems pretty cut and dried.
http://www.salon.com/2014/04/08/morning_joes_special_privileges_why_is_msnbc_allowing_him_to_help_gop_raise_money/
Lupita Nyong’o Is Pretty In Pink For Marie Claire
by Yesha Callahan — Apr 9, 2014
http://www.clutchmagonline.com/2014/04/lupita-nyongo-pretty-pink-marie-claire/
Philip Bump: The Source Of Black Poverty Isn’t Black Culture, It’s American Culture
Americans don’t want to imagine that our racist history is actually an ongoing, racist reality. We like to look at racism as a thing that has gotten better (if not gone away completely) and that the way black Americans are treated in society is actually colorblind. So, if forced to pick between the idea that our country’s structures and systems are biased toward white people or the idea that black communities are flawed, many pick the latter. Some doing so, of course, because they’re racist.
Believing that black culture is primarily at fault means believing that black cultural attitudes
are why the black unemployment rate has always been at least 50 percent higher than white unemployment. Is black culture why this 2003 study found that job applicants “with white-sounding names are 50 percent more likely to get called for an initial interview than applicants with African-American-sounding names”? American history demonstrates countless examples of racist obstruction of black economic success. Ongoing examples show countless ways in which black Americans are still obstructed in the same way.
http://www.thewire.com/politics/2014/04/the-source-of-black-poverty-isnt-black-culture-its-american-culture/359937/
https://twitter.com/IrishEagle/status/453864658345000961
Apr 8, 2014 1:42PM ET / Politics
Eric Holder Disses Louie Gohmert: ‘Good Luck with your Asparagus’
Attorney General Eric Holder angrily and pointedly referred to a famously embarrassing comment from Texas Rep. Louis Gohmert at the end of a contentious hearing on Tuesday. “Good luck with your asparagus,” Holder said — an unusual but obvious dismissal of Gohmert’s entire line of questioning.
Background is in order, obviously. Last May, Holder and Gohmert got into an argument at a House Judiciary Committee meeting. Gohmert, who’s been consistently critical of the attorney general (if largely inconsistent on the reason for the critique), alleged that the Department of Justice had failed to prevent the Boston marathon bombing. Holder criticized Gohmert’s characterization, and Gohmert, flustered, responded: “The attorney general will not cast aspersions on my asparagus.” It was never clear what he meant or what he was trying to say, but the “asparagus” line became a running joke, with Gohmert as the target.
The hearing on Tuesday was perhaps more heated, as Gohmert questioned why he had not been provided with documents he requested — that, despite the House voting to hold Holder in contempt last June.
http://www.thewire.com/politics/2014/04/eric-holder-disses-louis-gohmert-good-luck-with-your-asparagus/360348/
THIS IS WHAT A DEATH PANEL LOOKS LIKE
………………………………….
Death of an Orlando woman illustrates perils of Florida’s refusal to expand Medicaid
Charlene Dill is one of an estimated 2,000 people who expected to face dire health issues due to lack of access to care
By Billy Manes PUBLISHED: APRIL 9, 2014
excerpt:
Dill’s death was not unpredictable, nor was it unpreventable. She had a documented heart condition for which she took medication. But she also happened to be one of the people who fall within the gap created by the 2012 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that allowed states to opt out of Medicaid expansion, which was a key part of the Affordable Care Act’s intention to make health care available to everyone. In the ensuing two years, 23 states have refused to expand Medicaid, including Florida, which rejected $51 billion from the federal government over the period of a decade to overhaul its Medicaid program to include people like Dill and Woolrich – people who work, but do not make enough money to qualify for the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies. They, like many, are victims of a political war – one that puts the lives and health of up to 17,000 U.S. residents and 2,000 Floridians annually in jeopardy, all in the name of rebelling against President Barack Obama’s health care plan.
http://orlandoweekly.com/news/death-of-an-orlando-woman-illustrates-perils-of-florida-s-refusal-to-expand-medicaid-1.1665144
University of CT Coach Ollie’s wife and daughter. He is indeed a blessed man
http://fabwags.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Stephanie-Ollie-Kevin-Ollie-Wife-pic.jpg
BEAUTIFUL SMILES, BEAUTIFUL….
Wonderful family!
Lemme guess… HE’S “TROUBLED.”
Did you hear the media refer to him as “young man”? If the alleged stabber had been black he would have been referred to as a thug. The power of the media!
Naturally, he’s a white boy, so that automatically garners him the label “young man.” Wonder if he’s going to be charged as a “YOUNG MAN.”
and they fuzzed out his picture.
I don’t remember any Black child accused anything’s picture being fuzzed out
Here’s the reason for all the OBJECTIONS to AFFORDABLE CARE ACT.
Sliver of Medicare Doctors Get Big Share of Payouts
tiny fraction of the 880,000 doctors and other health care providers who take Medicare accounted for nearly a quarter of the roughly $77 billion paid out to them under the federal program, receiving millions of dollars each in some cases in a single year, according to the most detailed data ever released in Medicare’s nearly 50-year history.
In 2012, 100 doctors received a total of $610 million, ranging from a Florida ophthalmologist who was paid $21 million by Medicare to dozens of doctors, eye and cancer specialists chief among them, who received more than $4 million each that year. While more money by far is spent for routine office visits than any other single expenditure, one of the most heavily reimbursed procedures — costing a total of $1 billion for 143,000 patients — is for a single treatment for an eye disorder common in the elderly.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/09/business/sliver-of-medicare-doctors-get-big-share-of-payouts.html?hp&_r=0
See, this is why they didn’t want the rules to change, and give transparency about who is paid what.
Prayers for the children and their families.
Absolutely NO regard for HUMAN life.
Were there no police on campus?
SG2,
this looks like a suburban school. how many suburban schools have anything other than security guards?
Saying prayers and sending caring thoughts for the children and loved ones.
Breaking News:
FCC To Break Up Big TV Stations
Overriding intense Republican opposition, the Democratic leaders of the Federal Communications Commission voted Monday to crack down on media consolidation. The new rules bar multiple broadcast TV stations in the same market from sharing a single advertising staff. Democratic FCC officials argue that major TV companies around the country are using “joint sales agreements” to undermine the agency’s media-ownership caps. The FCC bars any company from owning more than one of the top four TV stations in a market. By selling ads for multiple stations, companies have been able to dodge the FCC’s ownership cap while effectively controlling several stations, the agency officials said.
The goal of the TV ownership cap is to ensure that viewers have access to a diverse range of views in the media and that no single corporation is able to dominate the flow of information. While the TV stations serve local markets, major media companies such as Sinclair own dozens of stations around the country. “The commission has long imposed limits on concentration of ownership for use of the public’s airwaves,” FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said. “Today, what we’re doing is closing off what is a growing end run around those rules.”
More here: http://www.nationaljournal.com/tech/fcc-to-break-up-big-tv-stations-20140331
Good morning, Everyone :)
Good Morning, Rikyrah & Everyone! Happy HUMP day. :-)
Good morning, everyone!