Happy Monday, Everyone! This week 3 Chics features the music of Ms. Cyndi Lauper.
Cynthia Ann Stephanie “Cyndi” Lauper[1] (born June 22, 1953) is an American singer, songwriter, actress, and LGBT rights activist whose career has spanned over four decades. Her debut solo album She’s So Unusual (1983) was an instant commercial success. The album was the first debut female album to chart four top-five hits on the Billboard Hot 100—”Girls Just Want to Have Fun,” “Time After Time,” “She Bop,” and “All Through the Night,” earning Lauper the Best New Artist award at the 27th Grammy Awards in 1985. Her success continued with her second record, True Colors (1986), which included the number one hit of the same name, and “Change of Heart,” which peaked at number 3 and earned Lauper two nominations at the 29th Grammy Awards in 1987.
Since 1989, Lauper has released nine studio albums to varying critical acclaim, and has participated in several other projects. Her most recent album, the Grammy-nominated Memphis Blues, became Billboard’s most successful blues album of the year, remaining at number one on the “Billboard” blues charts for 13 consecutive weeks. In 2011, Lauper released an autobiography detailing her battle with child abuse and depression; the book became a New York Times Best Seller.
In 2013, Lauper completed writing both the music and lyrics for the Broadway musical Kinky Boots, which led the 2013 Tony Awards with 13 nominations and six awards including Best Musical. The musical also won Best Score, making Lauper the first woman to win the composing category solo.[4] In 2013, she became the first artist in over 25 years to top the dance charts with a Broadway single. While in 2014 Lauper won the Grammy for best musical theater album for Kinky Boots.
Girls Just Want To Have Fun
“AFRICAN-AMERICAN COWBOY CROONER HERB JEFFRIES DIES”
http://bigstory.ap.org/article/african-american-cowboy-crooner-herb-jeffries-dies
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Herb Jeffries, the first African-American singing cowboy to appear in movies in the 1930s, died of heart failure Sunday morning at a Los Angeles hospital. He was 100.
His death was confirmed by Raymond Strait, who worked with Jeffries on his not-yet-published autobiography titled “Color of Love.”
Jeffries, who was born Umberto Valentino in Detroit in 1913 and was of Sicilian, Irish and Ethiopian decent, appeared as a horse-riding good guy with a thick mustache in a number of ’30s westerns including “Harlem Rides the Range” and “Harlem on the Prairie,” a musical that featured an all-black cast that included actor Spencer Williams.
Jeffries was known for his luscious baritone. In the 1940s, he performed as a member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra and released his signature tune “Flamingo.” In 1941, he appeared in Ellington’s all-black musical revue “Jump for Joy” alongside Dorothy Dandridge in Los Angeles.
His popular solo hits “When the Swallows Come Back to Capistrano” and “Basin Street Blues” were released after he’d served in World War II.
Jeffries appeared in nine films and on television shows like “Hawaii Five-O” and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. He was inducted into the Western Performers Hall of Fame in 2004.
Strait said Jeffries recently had several surgeries that “just wore him out.” He added that Jeffries “believed in one world and one people and was one of the most generous people I’ve ever met. He was always funding something or doing something for kids.”
Jeffries is survived by his fifth wife, Savannah; three daughters; and two sons.
Anti-woman website predicts more Elliott Rogers if society doesn’t provide them with sex
By Tom Boggioni Sunday, May 25, 2014 22:42 EDT
A website popular with the online Pick-up Artist community responded to Elliott Rodger’s murderous Santa Barbara rampage, saying it could have been avoided if Rodger had ‘game,’ like they profess to possess, before concluding that “more people will die” unless society provides men with more “sexual options.”
The Return of Kings article, written by ‘Roosh,’ goes to elaborate lengths to explain that thePUA-hate community that Rodger was a part of held him back from learning the “masculine” art of seduction – which they call “game” – and, combined with the “American media, the blogosphere, men’s rights activists, and progressive organizations like the Southern Poverty Law Center,” Rodger was encouraged to hate and ultimately murder women.
“All these groups are complicit for creating a cultural environment that allowed this massacre to occur, ” Roosh wrote. “It is them (sic) who must accept responsibility for these seven deaths and make the moral change to their ideologies in order to prevent such an act from happening again.”
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/05/25/anti-woman-website-predicts-more-elliott-rogers-if-society-doesnt-provide-them-with-sex/
***********************
LOL RIPP DEM UP Rippa
I am praying that our White-structured society will become a DIVERSITY-structured society and that institutional racism will end!
Message to White supremacists and racists: BEGONE!
Message to me and all Whites: We have a lot of honest reflection, inner examination and work to do!
Did Conservatives Kill School Busing Because It Was Actually Working?
By: Deborah Foster
Sunday, May, 25th, 2014, 9:56 am
News of rampant resegregation of schools has been hitting the headlines. Rothstein, at EPI, gave the wince-worthy news that racial segregation in U.S. schools is the worst it has been since 1970. Hannah-Jones, at ProPublica explains, “Since 2000, judges have released hundreds of school districts, from Mississippi to Virginia, from forced integration, and many of these districts have followed the path…back to segregation.”
The 1980s were associated with the most school integration, and also associated with the greatest declines in the achievement gap for minority students. Since then, the achievement gap has closed much more slowly, sometimes even widening, especially as resegregation was occurring. The mechanism most often associated with integration was busing, but from every corner of the country, conservatives fought it. They went out of their way to make it fail.
In my hometown of Waterloo, Iowa, school desegregation used to be taken very seriously. People believed it had to be. Nearly all of the African American residents in Waterloo live in one corner of the city on the Northeast side. There used to be one high school for them, and one for the white teens. There was also a large, private Catholic high school, but it was also very white. Community leaders joined with the rest of the nation in the early 1970s, and implemented a busing program, as well as opening a third high school where diversity would be emphasized. I was a toddler at the time, so I wasn’t around to hear about grumbling, of which I am certain there was plenty. Most of the children who were bussed were African American, and they went miles across the river to the predominantly white schools. East High remained predominantly low-income whites and African Americans. Interestingly, in a United States Commission on Civil Rights report on desegregation in Waterloo, IA, they explain that school choice was tried, and failed
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/05/25/conservatives-kill-school-busing-working.html
Republicans Admit Their Failure on Obamacare Hope to Distract Voters With Benghazi
By: Jason Easley
Republicans are openly admitting that they have given up on bashing Obamacare, and are now trying to distract voters with Benghazi.
Buried in a AP story about the Republican pivot away from Obamacare are these nuggets:
Several GOP political strategists said revived inquiries into Benghazi and the IRS will probably do their party more good than harm, provided their lawmakers appear more professional than partisan.
Undecided voters might not get excited about GOP accusations regarding the IRS and Benghazi, said Dan Schnur, a former Republican consultant who teaches political science at the University of Southern California. But given the administration’s questionable behavior in both areas, he said, “They certainly don’t line up on the other side.”
GOP strategist Terry Holt agrees. The Benghazi assault, he said, was “the phone call Hillary Clinton warned us about in 2008 when she was running against Obama. They both blew it.”
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/05/26/republicans-admit-failure-obamacare-hope-distract-voters-benghazi.html
If Republicans Really Supported The Troops They Wouldn’t Propose Privatizing the VA
By: Rmuse
It speaks volumes about a nation’s population that they need a special federal holiday to remember and honor the sacrifice of the men and women of the armed services who died while serving their country. Although it is true that not every family in America has lost a loved-one to war, every American has benefitted, in one form or another, from those who gave their lives in service to this country throughout its history. As Americans celebrate another Memorial Day, while they attend parades, have picnics, and remember America’s fallen soldiers, they should keep in mind that over the past 50 or so years this country fought wars of choice over ideology and resources and not because of an existential threat to the United States.
War should be any nation’s last resort to resolve a conflict regardless the circumstances, and yet for Republicans and their conservative supporters, there is never a good reason not to send more Americans to die as if this nation needs more fallen soldiers to memorialize at the start of summer. In fact, despite Americans still serving in Iraq and fighting in Afghanistan, and a war-weary public ready for a rare period without war, Republicans have clamored for more wars with no regard for the men and women whose job it is to put their lives on the line for their country. During the Bush administration, any criticism of the senseless loss of life and resources expended in Iraq and Afghanistan brought swift accusations that advocating for peace was not supporting the troops. However, Republicans have never supported the troops; not while they were in Iraq and Afghanistan and certainly not after they returned home.
The recent revelation that severely underfunded Veterans’ Administration hospitals were responsible for Veterans dying waiting for care is an abomination. That is not supporting the troops; it is using and discarding them after they served their purpose of enriching the military industrial complex. The simple fact that VA hospitals were left using creative scheduling schemes because they were burdened with patients should be all the proof any American needs to comprehend that Republicans have never cared about, or supported, the troops after their service was complete. It is important to remember that while Republicans refused to fund new hospitals, Veterans’ jobs bills, or their pensions due to “budgetary constraints,” they always find more than enough funds for tax cuts for the rich, new military hardware the Pentagon does not want or need, or funding to start more wars whether it was in Syria, Libya, Iran, and recently in Russia.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/05/26/republicans-supported-troops-propose-privatizing-va.html
IT’S MEMORIAL DAY AND THE COUNTRY IS AT WAR WITH ITSELF
By Charles P. Pierce on May 26, 201
At the beginning of this Memorial Day weekend, another American decided to make war on his fellow Americans. Elliot Rodger preceded his hostilities by announcing to the world, in terms so firm and clear as to command its assent, the casus belli under which he presumed to make war. It was as formal, if decidedly twisted, declaration of war, which gives Elliot Rodger’s war on his fellow citizens something that no American president has seen fit to request for any military action the country has taken since World War II
http://www.esquire.com/blogs/politics/memorial-day-2014-052614
THIS: “That is what has come home to roost now. This is a country at war with itself because cynical people have told its citizens that their fellow citizens – all of them, because you can never tell, can you? — are the enemy. This is a country in which citizens make war on each other because that’s what they are being encouraged to do. Someone finds it more profitable to maintain the war than they do to stop it.”
Oh dear God heal us, heal our hearts.
https://twitter.com/shannonrwatts/status/470938107697561601/photo/1
THIS,EVERY BIT OF THIS.
http://youtu.be/OnqS-vN7aQ4
Republicans Have Created a Lottery Capitalism That’s Bad For Almost Everyone
Posted on May 21, 2014 by Milt Shook
If we teach voters nothing else this very important election year, it has to be that the Republican Party’s treatment of the economy has no positives for anyone except the very rich. I know calling the only people the GOP loves “the 1%” is convenient, but the reality is, the GOP probably cares about fewer than 10,000 people, all told, and certainly not 3 million, as “the 1%” implies.
The number one problem with Republicans and the economy is, they don’t care about anything that benefits everyone. A truly healthy economy is one where everyone is on essentially equal footing, with an equal opportunity to generate the wealth needed to live freely and comfortably, as well as to create commerce on a level playing field. Unfortunately, the economy Republicans have created with their daft governmental reign is what can best be thought of as “lottery capitalism.” In this system, which Republicans call a “good economy,” everyone pays to be part of the system, but the only people who are rewarded are people who are lucky enough to win. Not only is there no reward for working as hard as possible; Republicans use every trick they can think of to penalize you for it. They like to pretend that hard work brings great riches, but the reality is, those who work the hardest in the economy they’ve created have the least chance of getting ahead.
As the name implies, the problem with lottery capitalism is exactly what’s wrong with playing the lottery. In order for someone to win the huge $100 million jackpot, at least $200 million worth of losing tickets must also be purchased. The elements that make up a successful lottery simply don’t work in a nation’s economy. Put simply, while our economic system used to generate a constant flow of wealth that benefited everyone, it’s now rigged in such a way that only a relatively small number of people control most of the wealth, and a far smaller amount of wealth actually flows through the system. For most Americans, wealth has been stagnant for decades, with small increases in wealth and income having been more than offset by an inflation rate that we have come to accept as “normal” or even “low,” despite the fact that it’s actually quite debilitating for many.
Since the dawn of the Republican era, everything about our economy has changed, and not for the better. Except for a relatively short time during the Clinton years, the only “good times” we have seen have been courtesy of bubbles, and not based on real American wealth. Thanks to modern-day Republicans, increasing numbers of Americans are one pink slip away from total disaster at any given time. Virtually all employment is now at-will, which means, absent a contract, an employer can fire you for any reason, or no reason at all. The right to form a union has virtually been taken away by Republicans, as well, at least in many places, especially in “right to work” states. Whether you realize it or not, the old “American Dream” of working hard and becoming self-sufficient, or even very rich, has largely become a thing of the past, and today’s GOP is perfectly okay with that.
http://pleasecutthecrap.com/republicans-have-created-a-lottery-capitalism-thats-bad-for-almost-everyone/
Rev. Run’s Sunday Suppers?
On the Cooking Channel….beginning June 8th
Rev. Run never stops hustling.
LOL Is this for real?
yep. saw the commercial for it.
https://twitter.com/NerdyWonka/status/470975705476390912/photo/1
https://twitter.com/kharyp/status/470974831291551744/photo/1
There you GO!
https://twitter.com/ChiIIVlbes/status/470949589231869952/photo/1
Mitch McConnell’s First Attempt to Soften His Obamacare Repeal Stance Is Highly Deceptive
By Brian Beutler
Now that Mitch McConnell’s emancipated himself from the exigencies of the Republican primary process, he’ll need to figure out how to square his primary-friendly view that Obamacare should be wiped off the books with the complicating fact that over 400,000 Kentuckians obtained insurance through the Affordable Care Act over the past several months.
He just took a new line of obfuscation for a test drive. Assuming it’s been accurately characterized, it’s incredibly misleading.
“McConnell told reporters Friday that the fate of the state exchange is unconnected to the federal health care law,” according to the Associated Press. “Yet the exchange would not exist, if not for the law that created it.”
……………………….
But here’s the hidden ball: If McConnell successfully wipes Obamacare off the books next year (which he won’t), Kynect might not go away. But the Medicaid expansion will. And the private insurance subsidies will. And the rules allowing and requiring uninsured people of all health statuses to become customers will, too. Insurance carriers will follow. Or else they’ll replace the plans they currently offer with much less generous ones. And hundreds of thousands of people will lose their coverage anyhow.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117893/mitch-mcconnells-obamacare-spin-misleads-kentuckys-aca-beneficiaries
#YesAllWomen: What We Should Teach Boys
[ 3 ] May 26, 2014 | Luvvie
The #YesAllWomen hashtag started on Twitter as a result of the 140-page manifesto of the Santa Barbara killer. It detailed his life, his plans and why he decided to go on a murder spree. A good amount of it was him being butthurt about women not wanting to have sex with him.
http://www.awesomelyluvvie.com/2014/05/yesallwomen-tweets.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Luvvie+%28Awesomely+Luvvie%29
https://twitter.com/NerdyWonka/status/470919554667790336/photo/1
Yes; this is not surprising.
We all need to be aware that this is happening:
“Using Jailed Migrants as a Pool of Cheap Labor
By IAN URBINAMAY 24, 2014
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/25/us/using-jailed-migrants-as-a-pool-of-cheap-labor.html?_r=0
So true, Yahtc. and it happens everyday in our prisons, starting with our children.
Mission Critical: Ending the School-to-Prison-Pipeline in Wake County
Judge to serve 28 years after making $2 million for sending black children to jail
Tue., Jul. 30, 2013 2:15 PM EDT
by A.R. Shaw
http://rollingout.com/criminal-behavior/judge-must-serve-28-years-after-making-2-million-for-sending-children-to-jail/#_
Bob Small: First Memorial Day Created By Blacks Here In Hampton Park
Memorial Day may signal the beginning of the summer for many. A time for cook-outs and being with friends and family, but few know that the first widely publicized event, then called “Decoration Day”, was held in Charleston to honor the Union dead and was put together by many of the newly freed Black men and women. On May 1, 1865, more than 10,000 black freedmen and women including 3,000 children gathered at the old Race Track now known as Hampton Park track to honor dead Union soldiers who were buried there. They cleaned up the area and placed flowers on the graves of the unknown soldiers. The event was highly publicized and covered by a number of newspapers nationally. To many of the white citizens it was looked upon more as an Emancipation for the newly freed black men and women. Preachers and white northern missionaries gave speeches and thanks to those who had lost their lives in the Civil War. A war that claimed over 600,000 lives on both sides.
Charleston had been a holding place for captured Union Soldiers and at least 257 soldiers died while in the custody of Confederate soldiers. They were buried in hastily dug unmarked graves around the race track as Confederates fled the city from advancing Union troops. Northern missionaries who helped organize the events for Decoration Day participated in songs and speeches. The response by the Black population was tremendous. Freedmen came from all over the state to participate. Many feeling that the Union soldiers had given their lives for their freedom rather than to bring the seceded states back into the Union. They cleaned up the burial grounds and erected an enclosure with an arch that read, “Martyrs of the Race Course.” Many of those in attendance brought flowers to lie on the graves. For the newly freed people it was their way of honoring those who had given their lives for their beliefs and the black population’s newfound freedom.
http://www.charlestonchronicle.net/83047/2152/first-memorial-day-created-by-blacks-here-in-hampton-park
I Am Optimistic About Senate Races
by BooMan
Sun May 25th, 2014 at 11:14:57 PM EST
We had an old friend over for dinner tonight. He’s a regular reader of the blog and he likes to pick my brain about politics whenever we get together. It’s a good exercise because he forces me to really think about my assumptions. For example, he wanted to know why I am so optimistic about the Democrats’ chances in this fall’s Senate elections. And he was willing to challenge me on pretty much the entirety of my position.
So, having spent my evening talking about the Senate races, I’ve concluded that I really only see one seat as irretrievably lost, and that is Sen. Tim Johnson’s seat in South Dakota. I think Rick Weiland is a good candidate, but he’s far behind in the few polls that have been taken and former Governor Mike Rounds just seems like he’s too popular to lose. The only way that I can see Weiland preserving this seat for the Dems is if some kind of scandal erupts.
There are two other seats that I am not optimistic about. Sen. John Walsh in Montana is going to have a tough time fending off Steve Daines. The polling has been sparse, but it also hasn’t looked good. It’s unclear to me whether Sen. Walsh can use his incumbency as an advantage or not. We just saw Jon Tester win a second term even while sharing a ballot column with Barack Obama, and Montana has a Democratic governor. So, we know that this race is winnable, but Walsh has to build up his name recognition and earn some trust.
In West Virginia, the polls are similarly discouraging, but it’s early. Natalie Tennant is a strong candidate who outpolled Barack Obama in 2012 by 160,000 votes during her reelection bid as Secretary of State. She actually won by a slightly higher percentage (62.4) than did Mitt Romney (62.3). West Virginia is certainly trending Republican, but they have almost no track record of electing Republicans to statewide office. Nonetheless, I have to put this race in the Republicans’ column for now.
So, there are three races where I think the GOP has a clear advantage. But that’s it. I am concerned about the reelection prospects of Mark Begich of Alaska and Kay Hagan of North Carolina, but I’d put my money on both of them if you forced me to make a choice. Mark Pryor of Arkansas has opened up a double-digit lead in the polls, and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana had a 24% lead in the April New York Times/Kaiser Family Foundation Poll.
We obviously have to keep our eyes on races in Colorado, Iowa, Michigan, and New Hampshire, but things look positive in all four states right now.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2014/5/25/231457/666
https://twitter.com/NewDay/status/470883999863537664
Christopher Martinez is another father/parent whose child DIED because another gun-crazed white male thought he was the KING OF THE WORLD!
My hope is his and Trayvon and Jordan’s parents, ron Davis, Lucia McBath, Sybrina Fulton, and Tracy Martin, and countless other parents who had children murdered, find some justice and peace.
Beautiful tribute.
From November 2, 2011
https://twitter.com/NoShock/status/470915769014833154/photo/1
Little DARLINGS…
Good Morning, Everyone :)
Thank you to all our Veterans and those still serving and their families!
http://api.ning.com/files/N9OIJZvyB1Ra0o2NvvNYJjIvDgzCoD8jQO9XxQjn9t4jngP*lrklzNL-H3dHlq3EPR5MSriXUq8js*9wyBGNTb6JOiwXrX34/honor4.jpg
http://epmgaa.media.lionheartdms.com/img/photos/2013/06/02/MemorialDay.KhalidNajiAllah_3_t620x620_c620x620.jpg?78e3869752b9102840ee1b8517bd885f068dd77f
Good Morning, Everyone.
http://epmgaa.media.lionheartdms.com/img/photos/2013/06/02/MemorialDay.KhalidNajiAllah_2_t620x620_c620x620.jpg?78e3869752b9102840ee1b8517bd885f068dd77f
http://a.abcnews.com/images/US/gty_memorial_day_cemetary_family_thg_120524_wmain.jpg
Good morning. I think she loved colors! 😎 ;)