Friday Open Thread | Because I love them : Luther Vandross

Posted on June 17, 2016 by rikyrah

I MISS Luther. Nobody’s voice comes close. Nothing in this current crop of ‘singers’ comes close to hitting those emotional places that Luther could take you to.

 

These are two of my favorite versions of this song.

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30 Responses to Friday Open Thread | Because I love them : Luther Vandross

  14. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 1:15 pm

    GOP congressman: ‘Muslim community’ wants to kill all gays
    06/17/16 11:02 AM
    By Steve Benen
    The day of the mass-shooting in Orlando, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) saw a partisan opportunity. In a striking statement, the far-right Texan effectively challenged his foes on the other side of the aisle: “If you’re a Democratic politician and you really want to stand for LGBT, show real courage and stand up against the vicious ideology that has targeted our fellow Americans for murder.”

    Soon after, this became a surprisingly common talking point among Republicans, including Donald Trump. As we talked about the other day, the pitch is ugly but straightforward: a Muslim killed 49 people in a gay nightclub; Republicans are anti-Muslim; therefore LGBT voters should support Republicans.

    The trouble is, the house of cards collapses pretty quickly for anyone who pauses to think about the argument. Indeed, to take the pitch seriously, one has to find arguments like this one from Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) persuasive.

    Alabama Rep. Mo Brooks said on Thursday that the American Muslim community would “kill every homosexual in the United States of America” if it had its way.

    Brooks, a Republican, made the comment after being asked on the Matt & Aunie show on WAPI radio about why the left refuses to acknowledge that it is “mainstream Muslim thought” to put homosexuals to death.

    Reply
  15. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 12:55 pm

    Billionaire Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Trolls Trump: ‘I Bailed You Out Twice’
    The prince has offered to bail Trump out a third time, too.
    01/29/2016 03:59 am ET

    A Saudi prince may have just beaten Donald Trump at a game of Twitter trolling.

    Prince Alwaleed bin Talal said on Twitter that he’s bailed the billionaire out twice — and suggested the GOP presidential frontrunner might need his help a third time.

    The exchange was initiated by Trump, who had retweeted a badly Photoshopped image showing the prince with Fox News host Megyn Kelly, calling him a co-owner of the network:

    ……………

    The prince’s tweet included news stories showing that he bought Trump’s yacht in 1991, which had been turned over to creditors when he was $900 million in debt, according to Buzzfeed.

    He also included a link to a story showing that he was part of the group that bought New York City’s Plaza Hotel from Trump in 1995. As part of the deal, bin Talal paid off Trump’s debt on the hotel in what the New York Times said was “a defeat for the real estate developer.”

    Reply
  16. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 11:20 am

    https://t.co/7kVdWEjTzK
    How two tragedies highlight the difference in Black and White.

    Reply
  17. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 10:47 am

    Obama Rejects the “Carly Simon Syndrome”
    Donald Trump thinks President Barack Obama is sympathetic to ISIS. In reality, Obama knows much of the Middle East is outside U.S. control.

    by Nancy LeTourneau
    June 16, 2016 3:21 PM

    No one has interviewed President Obama on foreign policy more often or competently than Jeffrey Goldberg. So when presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump suggests that the President is sympathetic to ISIS, who better than Goldberg to knock that kind of nonsense out of the park.

    Before getting to what he had to say about Obama, it is important to note that Goldberg starts off with a few comments about Trump.

    Barack Obama, to Donald Trump, is, and will forever be, the Manchurian President—Manchuria, by way of Kenya, with a detour in Raqqa.

    He goes on to say that Trump’s critique of Obama is “analysis-free and comprehensively unserious.” So the question becomes, why bother with addressing it at all? My response would be that it provides a way to distinguish President Obama’s approach – not just from the lack of anything coherent from Trump — but from how most Republicans have tried to frame the issue. Here is Goldberg doing a masterful job of providing the really big picture (with some choice takes on Trump thrown in):

    The fundamental difference between Obama and Trump on issues related to Islamist extremism (apart from the obvious, such as that, unlike Trump, Obama a) has killed Islamist terrorists; b) regularly studies the problem and allows himself to be briefed by serious people about the problem; and c) is not racist or temperamentally unsuitable for national leadership) is that Trump apparently believes that two civilizations are in conflict. Obama believes that the clash is taking place within a single civilization, and that Americans are sometimes collateral damage in this fight between Muslim modernizers and Muslim fundamentalists.

    Reply
  18. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 9:47 am

    New Leadership at the DNC
    Meet Brandon Davis.

    by Nancy LeTourneau
    June 16, 2016 4:25 PM

    As the Clinton campaign gets into gear for the Democratic Convention and the general election campaign, they are bringing new leadership to the DNC.

    Hillary Clinton’s campaign is taking the reins of the Democratic National Committee, installing a new top official on Thursday to oversee the party’s day-to-day operations through the general election.

    Brandon Davis, national political director for the Service Employees International Union, will become the general election chief of staff for the Democratic Party. His selection formalizes the coordination of the Clinton campaign and the committee, a stark contrast to Donald Trump who is currently at odds with his party.

    Robby Mook, the Clinton campaign manager, arrived Thursday morning at Democratic headquarters on Capitol Hill to introduce Davis to the party’s staff.

    “We have a lot of work to do over the next five months to make sure that Donald Trump does not become president,” Mook said as he introduced Davis, according to a person in the room. “With so much at stake in this election, we could not ask for a better partner in that mission than the team here.”

    …………………………

    It’s hard to gather much information about Brandon Davis at this point – other than the fact that he has been the national political director for SEIU. Markos Moulitsas writes that he’s known him for years and that he’s “smart, energetic, passionate, and competent as f*ck.” By choosing him, Clinton also continues to tap into young millennials of color to energize both her campaign and the Democratic Party in a way that builds for the future.

    Reply
  19. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 8:40 am

    From Vanity Fair about Trump and his ‘plans’:

    Trump is indeed considering creating his own media business, built on the audience that has supported him thus far in his bid to become the next president of the United States. According to several people briefed on the discussions, the presumptive Republican nominee is examining the opportunity presented by the “audience” currently supporting him. He has also discussed the possibility of launching a “mini-media conglomerate” outside of his existing TV-production business, Trump Productions LLC. He has, according to one of these people, enlisted the consultation of his daughter Ivanka Trump and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who owns the The New York Observer. Trump’s rationale, according to this person, is that, “win or lose, we are onto something here. We’ve triggered a base of the population that hasn’t had a voice in a long time.”…

    Trump, this person close to the matter suggests, has become irked by his ability to create revenue for other media organizations without being able to take a cut himself. Such a situation “brings him to the conclusion that he has the business acumen and the ratings for his own network.” Trump has “gotten the bug,” according to this person. “So now he wants to figure out if he can monetize it.”

    Reply
  26. rikyrah says:
    June 17, 2016 at 5:18 am

    Good Morning☺, Everyone 😉

    Reply

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