“Santa Baby” was originally recorded by Eartha Kitt with Henri René and his orchestra in New York City, in July, 1953. It was released by RCA Victor Records as catalog number 20-5502 (in the USA),[2] and by EMI on the His Master’s Voice label as catalog number B 10728. The song was a huge hit for Kitt, and she later said that it was one of her favorite songs to record; she reprised it in the 1954 film New Faces. Kitt re-recorded the sing for Kapp Records in 1963, using a more uptempo arrangement (Madonna‘s popular rendition for the 1987 charity album A Very Special Christmas was based on this latter version). In 1954, Kitt recorded a new version of the song with new lyrics titled “This Year’s Santa Baby”, to no commercial success. Writers listed did not change.
The song is heard in the films Driving Miss Daisy (1989), Elf (2003), and Boynton Beach Club (2005).
https://mobile.twitter.com/USARedOrchestra/status/802162433099972608?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Uh huh
LOL…
Our phenomenal First Lady…
They can’t touch her…they can’t break her…they’ll never …
They tried…
She is EVERYTHING…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J7s83-0JtPM
”…We as black women better be able to do it…because there’s so much that comes at us – all the time and every day – in subtle ways…that could tear your soul apart if you let it…”
-First Lady Michelle Obama
December, 2016
If she didn’t matter…if she were as they insist, a ‘nobody’ …a non-entity…and without power or influence or brains…why or why are they so afraid of her…why are they so concerned about and so stuck …trolling her and tracking and weighing in on her every move, word, deed…and so determinedly focused on tearing her down…
When someone is ‘inconsequential’ and a ‘nobody’ like they insist she is..folks tend to simply dismiss and ignore them…they put them on mute and move on…leave them to their devices …completely ignored and forgotten…but that has not been the case ..
Folks certainly don’t spend 10 years obsessively and viciously targeting and attacking that someone…especially when that someone – is in their opinion, the not ‘consequential’ or ‘important’ or ‘beautiful’ or ‘smart’ or ‘worthy’ …unelected black wife and historic First Lady who’s pretty much spent the past 8 years, not chasing or cultivating or consolidating power and influence – as most human beings in her unique position and even outside of it, would otherwise be doing….She is instead spending time with kids – most, from disenfranchised and forgotten communities and groups…gardening with and listening to them, focused on hearing and seeing them …and hugging and loving them…and getting them to value and get all the education they can muster…
What’s to fear then…why do they in spite of their own huffy and dismissive assertions about her, obsessively persist in tracking and trolling and attacking and fighting and denigrating and dehumanizing and determinedly trying to discredit her…
Why…?
This glorious, historic and much-maligned First Lady…this unassuming, brilliant, sincere, principled, down to earth, disciplined, strikingly gorgeous, clear-eyed, clear-voice, wise, fearless, perspicacious, authentic, grounded …all around amazing woman, wife, mother, daughter, First Lady….there’s a reason they’re so petrified of her…
There’s a reason they have from the very beginning, done their darnedest to try to take her down…there’s a reason right out the gate, they set their sights on her and focused their vicious and dehumanizing attacks on her – and kept up their unrelenting efforts to try to break her…to completely destroy her…doing to her what they’d never done to any other woman – elected or unelected – or any other person for that matter…viciously attacking her unprovoked…in the most personal and dehumanizing of ways…in ways that would have broken any other person… in ways that would have destroyed any other person…wilted their spirit, and caused them to die in any number of ways…but she didn’t…she defied them and is still standing tall and proud….Even in the absence of any iota of protection and rallying that would have been automatically offered and fiercely pursued in defense of any other woman…or person for that matter..
They fear her…they all fear her…
They fear her because she won’t grovel or cower …or ‘conform’ in the humiliating and dehumanizing ways they condescendingly insist that she and most minorities must…they see her as needing to be broken..to be taught a lesson …to show her who her ‘superiors’ are…
They’ve for no reason, relentlessly attacked and maligned her…her mind, her body, her marriage, her children, her mother, her life achievements…everything she’s against all odds, worked hard for – and earned fair and square and without any advantages…everything that defines her…everything she values and holds dear…
They fear all that she naturally possesses and embodies…her determined strength …and strength of character…her discipline …her brains…her foresight…her insight…her wit…her brilliant and clear mind…her fearlessness..
They especially fear that just by being…just by her very presence, and even without ever trying, she holds up a mirror to a very guilty America…and they fume and rage because not only don’t they get credit for making her the phenomenal woman she is today…she won’t play footsie with them in that way many minorities who ascend automatically tend to do…they fume that she won’t ‘cooperate’ …that they can’t co-opt her, her integrity —or strong-arm her into kowtowing…they can’t get her to succumb…to use her important, authentic and clear voice to give their oppressive white supremacy a pass…and to absolve them …or to gloss over or normalize their warped sense of supremacy – or their sins..
They fear her because they secretly admire and respect her …her integrity, her wisdom ..her honor.., her discipline…her fearlessness …her strength of character…they fear her and their guilt and false sense of supremacy causes them to preemptively feel the need to indict her for confidently being…for not just existing, but for living fully, contentedly, and comfortably in her own skin…without ever demurring or deferring to their supremacy…for breathing and living…proudly, clearly and unapologetically embracing her blackness, in the best and proudest and most confident and most comfortable and unshakable sense of that word…A blackness that just confidently strides through life inspite of the many obstacles her race and gender present in a country that still thinks her unworthy simply because of the color of her skin…and yet she just boldly goes about living her blessed life – and on her own terms ..unbeholden and unimpressed with power ..or those who’ve installed themselves at the top, and expect to have and are used to their rings being kissed….
She goes about her life, minding her business….refusing to fall prey to their wiles…never falling into the traps they set …refusing to validate or corroborate – or even feed into or offer disclaimers …about their worst stereotypes of her and her race…generally ignoring them and moving on…living her best and successful life —not because of them as they’d insist…or would prefer …or would believe…but completely in spite of them…
Never giving in to their various attempts to strong-arm her into surrendering to their control – of her and her life …and how and what she thinks….and how she exists …and especially not succumbing to their consuming need to be kowtowed to and revered…and importantly, to be completely absolved of their grievous sins…
They are frustrated that their attempts to break her…to force her to allow them co-opt her …to use her, have her be one of their coons…to have her jig for them…vouch for them…use her to gloss over their never-ending sins…in exchange for them ‘liking’ her…and more importantly, dangling the prospect of not chipping away at or attacking her any more…that’s yielded nothing from her…she remains consistently and unapologetically herself and unmoved…and even digs in a bit more for good measure…and to their chagrin, remaining even more popular – and fiercely and authentically herself…in spite of them and their attacks and shenanigans…
They not only can’t put her in her place…she has even without trying, turned their many long-held, force-fed and installed ‘standards’ and societal dictates …turned them on their head…without ever cowering…or apologizing…
She embodies and represents their worst fears…a FREE black woman who has chosen to determine and chart her own path – even within their confines of her unelected place beside her elected husband…A FREE black woman who has not only overcome again and again – no matter what new obstacles they place in her way…and still continues to – and on her own terms no less..
You hear the constant refrain that she is ‘ungrateful’…LOL..they mean that she’s not sufficiently beholden…and won’t genuflect and kiss the white supremacy ring – or a*rse…she refuses to coon or jig…you take her or leave her – completely on her own terms…she’ll have it no other way..
And even more worrisome for them…without even trying to – or needing it, she’s won the respect and admiration of many, and become an esteemed role model – to so many the world over…including those who previously cleaved to those same long-installed ideas and standards of supremacy and racial hierarchy they gleefully and authoritatively hawk …ideas and standards that have long infiltrated and colonized the minds and mindset of other countries..even peoples who aren’t white…ideas and standards that have forever ruled our larger world and societies – rules that automatically disqualify and denigrate blackness… rules and standards that define and purport to know what’s best, what’s smart, what’s hot, what’s beautiful, what’s right…what and who rates…what and who reigns supreme…
They fear her genuine and powerfully authentic and compelling presence and voice…
They fear that she knows who she is…that she unlike so many – even among the rich and powerful and celebrated…that she is indeed free …FREE…in the very best and in every sense of the word…they fear that she has and retains a core…that she in spite of their many attempts to access and destroy that core, that she and it remain not only intact, but even stronger and more determined and compelling than ever…
And when they think that like most ambitious folks who’ve tasted power, that she would be consumed by it…desperately crave it …and needing to be fed by it, be tempted to pursue it …place her self at their mercy to achieve it…especially in the most common way – via politics…she instead shows precisely why she’s like no other…she shuns it…preferring to have her husband back and finally enjoying and spending time alone with him – and reveling in their love and their often deferred life together…and parenting and modeling a deep and stable and committed love – a love that prioritizes each other…for their still young and impressionable daughters…
She will …they will together as a couple, do great…greater things post-presidency…important and enduring things that will most certainly exceed the presidency…and not in the way folks who at once fear her popularity and the persistent and ubiquitous calls for her to run for president (that they’ve tried to squelch) …and still contradictorily hate that she won’t …denying the naysayers and opportunistic haters alike, any direct or indirect access to her ever again – or the chance to try to contain and control her still…
They fear that try as they have variously…and in very public, stealth and insidious ways….they couldn’t psychologically break or destroy her…or tame her…or control her…they fear that they couldn’t permanently silence or destroy her, but more importantly, they couldn’t contain or cultivate or co-opt her for their own purposes…they fear that she never ceded her power and lived humanity and rights to exist and thrive…that she never needed or sought out their validation or approval…that she not only has a mind of her own, but has kept it and lived by and led with it…She wasn’t beholden …and so they could never get to own her…or force her to do their bidding – and especially not on their terms…
They fear this consistently unassuming, uncontrived and unaffected woman …a magnificent and delightful and appealing contradiction – embodying the best of modern and traditional…all while eschewing the need to mimic or be an imitation of anyone else… A refreshingly powerful woman who neither wants or craves power…and embodies an unusual greatness and incredible and still latent and yet untapped greatness and power…an unassuming greatness and latent power that cannot be squashed or contained…or co-opted…That even without her trying, she is powerful…and holds a powerful influence…Yet, unlike other influential and powerful people, she neither wields her power…or misuses her influence ….she especially does not wield power to manipulate, exploit, or to control others …or to self-servingly cultivate and amass a following…or to enrich or install and keep herself relevant or in power…She instead uses her power and influence to empower…to encourage…to boost…especially those who believe they have none…the forgotten, the oppressed and the voiceless especially in communities like those where she grew up…and she does it without being condescending…or needing them to cower or worship or be beholden to her in return…she levels the playing field…but she humbles herself to those she wants to bring up while doing it…and she leaves you at the end, not indentured…but just as free as she is…the only debt you owe her, is to do better…and to reach back and do the same for as many as possible..
They recognize that even as she effortlessly still shines – and inspite of the 10 years of endless and baseless attacks designed to dehumanize and destroy her …to preemptively discredit and break her…and even in spite of the fact that she was never protected – or supported in ways other First Ladies and high-profile women have always been supported and protected and rallied around.. she has survived – and only by the grace of God… and for the strong and impressively and uniquely superior human being she is… few would have survived what she has been subjected to …and without protection…she was perfectly and divinely made for this historic role…there’s no denying it…
…They realize that even as she has disproved the naysayers and not only brilliantly and deftly and effectively navigated this perilous experience and her historic position as an exquisite, proud, confident, dark-skinned woman…and in this her unelected position and supporting role to her elected husband…a role where she has mostly ceded her own dreams, aspirations, power and greatness…to fully and effectively support the husband she fiercely loves and believes in, in his historic position..
..That even as we have been witness to the nonstop attacks …the trials and tribulations, and her victorious and unassuming greatness – right along with those who perpetrated the attacks…and have tried to deny her greatness and her…some of whom now reluctantly concede it …even as they still try to find fault and reasons to pooh-pooh and scuttle her greatness…we know that her best and greatest days – and her zenith of greatness are not in the past, but still ahead…still in the future…her greatness zenith, whether the naysayers know it or not…whether they like it or not…is only just unfolding…
May we all live long to bear witness to that fully unfolded greatness….but also too, may her enemies …known and unknown…who mercilessly attacked and dehumanized and did their darnedest to try to break and destroy her…and all those who tried her, and tried to trip her up…and those who begrudged her her destiny…and all those who tried to preemptively destroy her…may they also live long to witness the greatness zenith in the future, of this brilliant but unassuming great woman …the proud and unapologetic and truest, living, breathing legacy of the ancestors who paid the price so that black folks would not just succeed, but would never have to coon or jig to do so…or in order to take their equal and rightful place in this country….this proud descendant and living, breathing legacy of slaves …the slaves who paid the price so that she could live her beautiful and authentic life unapologetically –standing tall and living her best life to the fullest….with integrity, dignity, honor, brilliance, principle, self-respect, fearlessness and some fun if and when she felt like it…and fearlessly modeling for those who come behind her… the new and better and more authentic way to be and live and achieve…as a black woman, wife, mother, daughter, historic First Lady, professional, citizen…wholly worthy and accomplished – and deserving of every respect and honor and yes, chivalry…not only in these United States, but the world over…
May she and her beloved family live long and strong…
LOL…
Our phenomenal First Lady…
The can’t touch her…they can’t break her…they’all never …
She is EVERYTHING…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=J7s83-0JtPM
The Ease of Dylann Roof
As a white man living in America, Dylann Roof was confident he would be safe and protected throughout his trial, a protection that black people are routinely denied.
posted on Dec. 17, 2016, at 8:30 a.m.
Bim Adewunmi
Dylann Roof possessed, alongside his racist and murderous inclinations, ease. There was no forced entry into the AME church that night. Dylann Roof walked in, aware and confident that he would find no real resistance. He sat with congregants, and then, later that evening, he murdered them. Their deaths were unexpected if not exactly shocking — sudden, vicious terror unleashed on black bodies is a very old story — but what lingers for me, the hard kernel at the core of Dylann Roof’s behavior, both at the scene of the massacre and in every official glimpse we have been given of him since, is that ease.
At no point in the aftermath of killing nine black people in a church did it look like Dylann Roof was in fear for his life.
Several hours after Dylann Roof opened fire at Emanuel AME Church and killed those nine people, he was apprehended. Police officers from Shelby, North Carolina, found and detained him while he was driving down the highway. Upon arrival at the Shelby Police Department, he was deposited in “the library”: a sort of conference/interrogation room. In the taped conversation with two FBI agents that was played in court, Dylann Roof confessed that he was the killer. “I’m guilty,” he said, laughing. “We all know I’m guilty.” In the video, still wearing the clothes he had on while emptying a clip of 11 bullets into Susie Jackson, an 87-year-old woman who walked with a cane, Roof was at ease. He seemed, in the words of FBI agent Michael Stansbury, “eager to explain” his actions. In the two-hour video, Roof shifts in his seat a few times, leaning forward to elucidate a point, or leaning back in quieter moments. He talks with his hands; he chuckles. He is, to put it in internet parlance, chill as fuck.
…
I carried out a thought experiment as I sat in Courtroom VI at the Charleston County Courthouse, and allowed myself to imagine a slightly different scenario. I imagined a 21-year-old black man, perhaps named Darnell Roof. In this situation, the fictional and darker-skinned Roof was sitting in that room with two FBI agents, calmly detailing how he had exited a church and drove off in his car after killing nine white people (including the pastor of that church, who was a former state senator, just as Reverend Clementa Pinckney had been) in their church. I imagined Darnell saying, “I went to that church in Charleston, and, you know, I did it,” just as Dylann Roof said to the investigators in the recording. I imagined him saying that and surviving his interview. Then I took it even further: I thought of members of the Shelby Police Department pulling Roof over, as they had done hours earlier, then pushing his handcuffed body into the back of a squad car. I thought about him concluding both the traffic stop and the subsequent ride to the station (the officer driving the car said that Roof was “just looking out the window” for the duration of the trip) with his physical body intact and unbruised. Can you imagine, I asked myself, and a bitter laugh rose in my throat, right there in that courtroom.
…
Even under the severe circumstances, it was striking to see what white privilege could afford him.
And following the murders, he was still in possession of that ease. That’s why he could sit in the interrogation room and laugh as he mentioned the murder weapon, his Glock .45. It’s why, when the agents told him he had in fact killed nine people, not the “four or five” he had initially reported, he replied with a joking incredulity, “Are you guys lying to me?” It’s why, when the FBI agent sought consent so they could search his vehicle, Roof asked if he had to give it (in the end, he declined to sign the consent form). It’s why, when the agents said they were going to take a photo of him, Roof mussed up his hair self-consciously and said, “I don’t look too good right now,” and moments later added, “I sure wish I could take a shower.” He was not afraid. He had not been worried, while walking into that church or while walking out after firing 77 shots. He had not been bothered, driving down back roads until he was out of state, moseying down the highway, idly wondering about heading to Nashville since he’d never been there before. He had not been especially worried he might die while in police custody.
…
On television in my hotel room after the Dylann Roof guilty verdicts, I watched footage of two men, one black, one white, in a loose hug in a courtroom in Fayetteville, North Carolina. The white man was John McGraw, a 79-year-old who had punched the black man, Rakeem Jones, at a North Carolina Trump rally back in March 2016. McGraw was jubilant on camera at the time of the assault: “The next time we see him, we might have to kill him.” Months later, with his candidate elected as the next president of the United States, McGraw pleaded no contest and was fined $180 plus court costs. “You and me have to heal our country,” McGraw said, before the men shook hands and embraced. That is to say: A man who punched another man, unprovoked, was advising on healing.
Navigating white people is a lesson that keeps on being learned.
https://www.buzzfeed.com/bimadewunmi/the-ease-of-dylann-roof?utm_term=.ipG9DAeLa#.qs724dnEx
Isn’t that the truth…
so sweet
https://mobile.twitter.com/AFarray/status/810230160184197123
uh huh
https://mobile.twitter.com/fieldnegro/status/810254197476233216
No comment.
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HA! They shut down that HIGH-PRICED CALL GIRL OPERATION.
For now…and only for ‘auctions’…doesn’t mean they are done with the sitting in on ‘meetings’ and other such transparently superficial ‘inducements’ utilized by her father to get his way from those who he believes will fall prey to his daughters surgically-aided ‘charm’…
ROBERT REICH: THE FOUR STAGES OF TRUMP GRIEF
BY ROBERT REICH ON 12/16/16 AT 10:49 AM
As the era of Donald Trump approaches, some of you are succumbing to the follow four syndromes:
1. Normalizer Syndrome
You want to believe Trump will be just another president—more conservative and pompous than most, but one who will make rational decisions once in office.
You are under a grave delusion. Trump has a serious personality disorder and will pose a clear and present danger to America and the world.
2. Outrage Numbness Syndrome
You are no longer outraged by what Trump says or what he does—his incessant lies, his cabinet picks, his bullying, his hatefulness—because you’ve gone numb. You can’t conceive that someone like this is becoming president of the United States, so you’ve shut down emotionally. Maybe you’ve even stopped reading the news.
You need to get back in touch with your emotions and re-engage with what’s happening.
3. Cynical Syndrome
You’ve become so cynical about the whole system—the Democrats who gave up on the working class and thereby opened the way for Trump, the Republicans who suppressed votes around the country, the media that gave Trump all the free time he wanted, the establishment that rigged the system—that you say, the hell with it. Let Trump do his worst. How much worse can it get?
You need to wake up. It can get a lot worse.
4. Helpless Syndrome
You aren’t in denial. You know that nothing about this is normal; you haven’t become numb or stopped reading the news; you haven’t succumbed to cynicism. You desperately want to do something to prevent what’s about to occur.
But you don’t know what to do. You feel utterly powerless and immobilized.
Millions of others feel equally powerless. But taking action—demonstrating, resisting, objecting, demanding, speaking truth, joining with others, making a ruckus and never ceasing to fight Trump’s pending tyranny—will empower you. And with that power you will not only to minimize the damage that is about to occur, but also get this nation and the world back on the course it must be on.
If you find yourself falling into one or more of these syndromes, that’s understandable. Normalizing, numbing, becoming cynical and feeling powerless are natural human responses to the gross absurdity and genuine peril posed by Trump.
But I urge you to pull yourself out. We need you in the peaceful resistance army, starting January 20.
http://www.newsweek.com/robert-reich-four-stages-trump-grief-532716
Crispy bacon, eggs, grits, biscuits, jelly and coffee. Mmmmm hunnie!
Delicious 😁😁😁😁
For now…and only for ‘auctions’…doesn’t mean they are done with the sitting in on ‘meetings’ and other such transparently superficial ‘inducements’ utilized by her father to get his way from those who he believes will fall prey to his daughters surgically-helped ‘charms’…
Sorry, wrong comment fell in the wrong place..
https://twitter.com/NPRKelly/status/809880215488962565
Morning, Everyone😐😐😐
Good morning RIKYRAH & everyone!
Good Afternoon, Everyone. Guess who slept in on this sunny, snow-filled Satruday?