FILE - In this file photo taken Friday, Sept. 27, 2013, Malala Yousafzai listens as Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust introduces her to reporters at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. Children’s rights activists Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan and Kailash Satyarthi of India and have won the Nobel Peace Prize. (Jessica Rinaldi, File/Associated Press)
Excerpt:"The founder of the Nobel Prizes, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, said the prize committee should give the prize to “the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”"
By Associated PressOctober 10, 2014
OSLO, Norway — Children’s rights activists Malala Yousafzai of Pakistan and Kailash Satyarthi of India were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize Friday.
The Norwegian Nobel Committee cited the two “for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.”
Yousafzai, now 17, is a schoolgirl and education campaigner in Pakistan who was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman two years ago.
Satyarthi, 60, has maintained the tradition of Mahatma Gandhi and headed various forms of peaceful protests, “focusing on the grave exploitation of children for financial gain,” the Nobel committee said.
The Nobel Committee said it “regards it as an important point for a Hindu and a Muslim, an Indian and a Pakistani, to join in a common struggle for education and against extremism.”
The founder of the Nobel Prizes, Swedish industrialist Alfred Nobel, said the prize committee should give the prize to “the person who shall have done the most or the best work for fraternity between nations, for the abolition or reduction of standing armies and for the holding and promotion of peace congresses.”
The committee has interpreted those instructions differently over time, widening the concept of peace work to include efforts to improve human rights, fight poverty and clean up the environment.
Copyright 2014 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Thursday evening stopped officials in Wisconsin from requiring voters there to provide photo identification before casting their ballots in the coming election.
Three of the court’s more conservative members dissented, saying they would have allowed officials to require identification.
Around the same time, a federal trial court in Texas struck down that state’s ID law, saying it put a disproportionate burden on minority voters.
The Wisconsin requirement, one of the strictest in the nation, is part of a state law enacted in 2011 but mostly blocked by various courts in the interim. A federal trial judge had blocked it, saying it would “deter or prevent a substantial number of the 300,000-plus registered voters who lack ID from voting” and would disproportionately affect black and Hispanic voters.
The law was provisionally reinstated last month by a unanimous three-judge panel of the federal appeals court in Chicago hours after it heard arguments. The full court was deadlocked, five to five, on a request for a new hearing.
“It is simply impossible, as a matter of common sense and of logistics, that hundreds of thousands of Wisconsin voters will both learn about the need for photo identification and obtain the requisite identification in the next 36 days,” the appeals court judges opposed to the requirement wrote.
The three-judge panel upheld the law on Monday, reasoning that it was similar to one from Indiana that the Supreme Court upheld in 2008.
The challengers to the Wisconsin law asked the Supreme Court to block the voter identification requirement for now, saying it would “virtually guarantee chaos at the polls.” Whatever the legality, they said, the state cannot issue enough IDs and train enough poll workers before the November election.
The law requires absentee voters to submit identification. But forms sent before the appeals court acted did not include that requirement. State officials had said they would not count ballots returned without copies of valid ID.
The officials argued that voters knew of the appeals court’s ruling and that blocking it would cause confusion. “Voters would get the pinball treatment,” they wrote. They told the justices that opponents “legitimately raise issues regarding absentee ballots,” but that local election officials were trying to inform voters that they might have to take more steps for their votes to be counted.
In dissent, Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., joined by Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas, said the timing of the state’s request made it difficult. “It is particularly troubling that absentee ballots have been sent out without any notation that proof of photo identification must be submitted,” he wrote.
But he added that it was not clear that the appeals court had “demonstrably erred” in reinstating the law, as required by Supreme Court precedent to block it.
The Supreme Court’s action was seen as a setback for Gov. Scott Walker, a Republican who, along with a Republican-controlled Legislature, approved the law in 2011. He faces a re-election challenge from Mary Burke, a Democrat.
Critics of voter ID laws say that they disproportionately burden poor, older and minority voters, and that cases of impersonation at the polls are very rare.A recent studyby the Government Accountability Office indicated that changes to such laws were behind decreased turnout in some states.
Recent Supreme Court orders have restored voting restrictions in Ohio and North Carolina that appeals courts had blocked. The Ohio case concerned early voting, and the North Carolina case involved same-day registration and votes cast in error at the wrong precinct.
Thursday’s ruling from Texas, issued after a two-week trial in Corpus Christi, found that the state’s voter ID law “creates an unconstitutional burden on the right to vote, has an impermissible discriminatory effect against Hispanics and African-Americans, and was imposed with an unconstitutional discriminatory purpose,” Judge Nelva Gonzales Ramos wrote.
A spokeswoman for the Texas attorney general’s office said it would immediately appeal “to avoid voter confusion in the upcoming election.”
Ryan P. Haygood, a lawyer at the NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, welcomed the decision. “The evidence in this case,” he said, “demonstrated that the law, like its poll-tax ancestor, imposes real costs and unjustified, disparate burdens on the voting rights of more than 600,000 registered Texas voters, a substantial percentage of whom are voters of color.”
All German universities are now free to Americans and all other international students. The last German state to charge tuition at its universities struck down the fees this week.
Why are they offering such a generous plan?
In explaining why Germany made this move, Dorothee Stapelfeldt, a Hamburg senator, called tuition fees "unjust" and added that "they discourage young people who do not have a traditional academic family background from taking up study. It is a core task of politics to ensure that young women and men can study with a high quality standard free of charge in Germany."
The perks don't end at free tuition:
Even before Germany abolished college tuition for all students, the price was a steal. Typically semester fees were around $630. What's more, German students receive many perks including discounts for food, clothing and events, as well as inexpensive or even free transportation.
Considering the average student loan debt in the U.S. is $29,400, a lot of U.S. high school students would do well to start learning German.
Russell Brand: ‘I can’t escape the Kenneth Williams, Frankie Howerd music hall campness of our country. I’m at ease with that.’ Russell Brand: ‘I want to address the alienation and despair'
Last year, Russell Brand caused another to-do. This time he wasn’t playing nasty jokes on Andrew Sachs, or boasting about the millions of people he’d slept with; he wasn’t calling George Bush a “retard”, or giving a Nazi salute at the GQ awards, or turning up to work dressed as Osama bin Laden (as he did the day after 9/11), or stripping naked to cover the May Day protest for MTV. No, this time he simply made a political statement.
Brand was asked to guest-edit the New Statesman, and chose revolution as his theme. He agreed “because it was a beautiful woman asking me”, associate editor Jemima Khan– not the most revolutionary reasoning. He then admitted he had never voted and encouraged others not to, in order to nobble the establishment. A few weeks later, he was grilled on Newsnight by Jeremy Paxman: who was he to advocate revolution, a here-today, gone-tomorrow comedian, an apathetic whinger who couldn’t even be arsed to exercise his democratic right, a “very trivial man” who believed in nothing?
One year on, Brand has got his answer. Now, his revolution isn’t just a throwaway comment. It’s a new book, a slogan on his necklace and, he believes, a real possibility. The book is a classic Brand potpourri: brilliant and infuriating, part travelogue, memoir, rant, riff, a call to arms and, ultimately, to love. It is not as readable or funny as his two Booky Wooks; more stream-of-consciousness tract. In short, he argues that the planet is being destroyed, the poor are being shafted, the rich are getting richer and he has had enough.
We meet in a pop-up cafe close to his Shoreditch home. Young trendies run it; even younger trendies sit at long tables sipping complicated coffees. When Brand arrives, he is starving and quiet. Intensely quiet. “I am bleak with hunger,” he says. I had always thought of him as seedy – a walking STD in skinny jeans – but he looks surprisingly wholesome: lovely olive skin, Malteser-brown eyes, well-washed, tactile (more knee patting than you’d get off Terry Wogan in his prime).
Dan, the manager, is making Brand an almond latte and avocado toastie. He says the coffee’s been made with love, gesturing with a knife. “What is the ingredient the rest of the time, you knife-wielding charlatan?” Brand asks. Like Adam Ant’s dandy highwayman, he’d have been in his element in the 17th century.
He is talking so quietly, I can barely hear him. He doesn’t just seem bleak with hunger; he’s bleak with bleakness. He explains how he decided on the interviews in his book, with Naomi Klein, anarchist David Graeber, economist Thomas Piketty: people who could help him make sense of his political vision. “I wanted to do it from a perspective that is accessible. I didn’t want to come across as pedagogical. Is that right, pedagogical?”
Blimey, Brand is checking a word with me. This is nothing like the motor-mouth on the telly, laughing in the face of everything. He says he has always been political, and refers me back to one of his first TV shows: a documentary in which he hung out with the head of the young BNP in Leeds, challenging him on his views. It’s interesting to return to that show – Brand looks so young, all puppy fat and pasty-faced, yet in many ways he was already fully formed: super-smart, self-adoring, brave, a brinksman on the verge of getting a kicking.
Brand at an anti-austerity protest in June.Photograph: Rex
“I was still a drug addict back then, on crack and smack.” Didn’t that make it hard to work? “God, no. If you use them in conjunction, they are the coffee and alcohol of the illicit world, providing enough animation to get things done, enough opiation to keep me relaxed.” Actually, he says, he’s being glib. “Crack makes you so fraught, it’s unbearable. It’s just amplifying the anxiety attack that was my modus operandi. Heroin is like a panacea for angst.” Even though he’s been clean for 11 years, Brand still often talks about drugs in the present tense. He is one of life’s natural addicts – not just drugs, but sex, work, success, avocado on toast. Politics, even.
If he hadn’t got waylaid by success, he would have been banging revolutionary drums long before now. “I always wanted to do something worthwhile, and more than the self-aggrandising pursuit of fame. There’s all sorts of opportunities if you’re an ambitious and narcissistic kid, and that’s the direction I ended up going down.” Fame – another addiction. “I came to realise it doesn’t do anything, has no value. It’s not going to be enough, like all the addictive behaviours I’ve pursued are never enough. They are, what’s the word? Sisyphean.”
Brand says it is a misconception that druggies have no drive. He was always driven. He was brought up by his mother in Grays, Essex. His father, a photographer, left when he was a baby. An only child, he adores his mother, who was diagnosed with uterine cancer when he was eight, then breast cancer a year later (she recovered, but was diagnosed again earlier this year). By 14, Brand was bulimic; at 16, he left home after falling out with his mother’s partner, then discovered drugs.
A lonely, insecure boy, he had grandiose ambitions. After appearing in a school production of Bugsy Malone, he didn’t simply assume he was destined for superstardom, he was already working out how he’d use his fame to change the world. “I narrativised my own impulse incredibly quickly, from doing a school play to thinking, ‘I want to be a movie star’, to thinking, ‘God, that will never be enough. I have to use this influence to talk about important issues that affect people.’”
At school, people found him funny, often for the wrong reasons. What would they laugh at? “My manner. I can’t escape the Kenneth Williams, Michael Crawford, Frankie Howerd music hall campness of our country. That’s in me. However much I try to channel Marc Bolan, I’m still a bit peculiar. I’m at ease with that now. I didn’t feel at ease growing up in Grays. You want to be good at football, good at fighting.” Was he good at fighting? “I’m a lunatic, so I’ve got a thing in me where I can go, oh well…” But no, he says, not really.
He went to the local arts college and won a place at the Italia Conti theatre school, where he was expelled for drug use and poor attendance. From then on, he relied on his own wits – acting, writing, gigging, presenting, agitating.
The first political rally Brand went on was in London for the striking Liverpool dockers in the late 90s. “There were police horses galloping up Charing Cross Road, people ripping up pavements. I didn’t think [he puts on a posh voice], ‘About time, too – the Liverpool dockers are finally being heard here.’ I thought, ‘Fuckin’ hell, this is brilliant.’” He related to it on a personal level. “The internal mayhem I’m feeling is spilling out everywhere. I loved it, and felt very connected to activism – particularly activism that feels loaded with potential. Not the oppositional activism that seems like there’s a stasis around it – earnestly sincere, but a monolith equal to the establishment.”
There has always been an element of mayhem to Brand’s career, his hunger for success at times trumped by his knack for sabotaging it. Hosting an MTV awards show in the US in 2008, before Obama had been elected, he said, “People say America will never elect a black president, but I know America is an advanced equal opportunities kind of country. After all, you’ve had that retarded cowboy in the White House for eight years. In my country, he wouldn’t be trusted with a pair of scissors.”
He returned to his hotel room to celebrate his brilliance. “Helium balloons were filling my room. I remember waking up next morning and Googling my name.” For 24 hours, his name was the fifth most Googled thing in America. “I was sitting in the room, reading all the negativity and death threats, and by now the helium balloons were half-full, hovering like jellyfish. My agent said, ‘Well, we wanted people to know who you were, and now everybody does, but not a lot of them like you.’”
Did he regard it as a triumph? “No, I felt a bit scared. It was like, ah, no, I misjudged that. The feeling’s hard to articulate, but it’s like a hunker-down mentality that happened with Sachsgate and a few other times.” Is he addicted to professional risk-taking? He sprinkles pink Himalayan salt over his avocado toast and bites into it. “Yes, I think so.” He shouts out to the manager. “Thank you, Dan, this is lovely. I’m excited and confused by the salt. What a ludicrous pursuit. Who’s going to the Himalayas and coming back with pink salt?”
In retrospect, he says, the early days were great. “The first flush of fame, the Big Brother type, was brilliant. Oh my God!” But then he’d want another level of celebrity, achieve it, and get more bored and disgusted. “It’s easy to start thinking, being on E4, doing Big Brother, is a bit shit. Maybe it would be good to get my own show? Maybe it’ll be better if I’m making movies. And each gradient achieved doesn’t nullify the sense that it’s pointless.”
When was it most pointless? “Hosting big award shows and making big movies. It’s like vacillating between a huge anxiety attack, hosting those shows, to the grinding tedium of being hunched in trailers and doing makeup tests.” He pauses. “Perhaps I’ve not made the right type of films.”
Brand wth his ex-wife Katy Perry.Photograph: Mark Ralston /Getty
What’s the worst film he’s made? “When I did Arthur, I did that with a certain intention. Looking back, I think, ‘Ugh, I probably shouldn’t have done that.’” What was that intention? “Doing a big film.” He shagged his way around Hollywood, married pop star Katy Perry and famously divorced her by text (he insists it wasn’t as simple as that), became addicted to transcendental meditation and began to question his old way of life. Did he get bored with all the sex? “When I got married, I was becoming a bit bewildered and exhausted.” Had sex become a commodity? “It is very easy to look for comfort in anything that takes you out of your head. I was transfixed by that avocado, I couldn’t think of anything else. I just fixate on something simple that’s got an orgasm at the end of it.”
On his return from America, he fell in love with Jemima Khan and found himself becoming more politicised. I read an early draft of Revolution and it feels like a love letter to Khan. When I tell him this, he looks surprised, even slightly put out. “Why’s that?” Well, because it is so adoring of her, as a muse and a mentor. Is she the main influence behind his politics? Now he looks positively disgruntled. “Like I said, these things were always in me. Politics is not something I’ve acquired through academia or influence, it’s something I’ve acquired through growing up in a single-parent family, being on the dole, then being a drug addict. There’s a lot of anarcho-collectivism in the fellowship around abstinence-based recovery. I didn’t read about politics, I felt it, then picked up a bit of jargon and lingo. Certainly this has been a huge learning curve the last couple of years, and I wouldn’t want to diminish the role of Jemima in that, but neither would I want to be so glib as to say it’s down to her.” Soon after our interview, it is reported that Khan has split with Brand; parts of the draft I read have since been substantially revised.
The Trews, Brand’s True News YouTube broadcasts.
For the past year Brand has been airing his views on the Trews (or the True News), a daily YouTube broadcast. In recent weeks, he has discussed democracy in Hong Kong, the importance of embracing real politics by ignoring Westminster, and whether Obama should give back his Nobel Peace prize. In the book, his conclusion is simple: capitalism is kaput, celebrity charity won’t plug holes, revolution is the only solution. Yet it also feels like a bit of a cop-out: he insists all this can be achieved through love, peace and understanding.
Would he ban private education? “Yes.” And private health? “Yes.” He would “cull corporations” after they have served their purpose. Does he really believe all this can be achieved without coercion? “Yes.” How? “By focusing on the important issues. We’re not even talking about moderately wealthy people – we’re talking about a society so unequal, so ludicrous, that 85 people have as much money as the 3.5 billion poorest in the world.”
It’s stifling in the cafe. My phone rings and I take the call. Brand seems worried that he’s losing my attention. “It’s really hot in here, it’s unnatural,” he says. And before I know it, we’re heading out. It’s obvious we won’t get much peace outside, but Dan has an idea: “I’ll half pull down the shutter.” There is a gap between the window and shutter, and we sit on the ledge. Brand’s head is hidden from public view, but his voice and legs are not.
With Jemima Khan last year: ‘An early draft of the book feels like a love letter to Jemima Khan, I say. He looks surprised, even slightly put out.’Photograph: Richard Young/Rex
The move outside transforms him. He gulps in the air and starts speaking twice as fast and 10 times louder. “Yeah, and what I think is, the book’s just the start of a conversation. I don’t know what you do about private education or private fuckin’ anything – I’m not a bloody politician. I want to address the alienation and sense of despair that you see all around us. Everyone’s fucked off, everyone’s had enough, so it don’t matter to me how much people have a go at me, because I live in the world and walk around, and people are going, ‘Well done, Russell, well done, son.’ I’m ready, I’m ready, I’m ready to die for this.” He finally takes a breath. “Yeah, I’m ready to die for it.”
Wow, I say, it’s amazing what a bit of fresh air does for you. He grins like a shark. “Yeah, I love it out here. This is where I belong. When I look at them Eton-educated people that govern us, I ain’t afraid of those people. I am excited. I’m going to enjoy this like nothing else, because for once I’m on the right side of the argument. And this is the right time. I feel it. I feel it. The means exist.”
I ask if he normally talks so fast. “Yes. Yes. So now, why I’m excited and why I endorse not voting, is because the farther politics drifts to the right, the better it is. Good. Antagonise people. Let’s get to the point where people are no longer just satisfied with iPods, iPads, iWatches. To the point where people go, ‘I’ve had enough.’” Is he advocating rioting? “It doesn’t have to be through rioting. It can be through total disobedience, non-payment of taxes, non-payment of mortgages.”
Caring capitalism was a blip, from 1945 to the end of the 70s, he says: a one-off created by the second world war and the founding of the welfare state. “Capitalism is going to continue to increase inequality. And people are preparing now for what follows capitalism. If people are informed and activated, it will be something that’s more liberal and fair; if they’re not, it will be draconian and terrifying. I think people in power are preparing for the latter. That’s why $4.2bn worth of military equipment has been transferred to local police authorities in America over the last 15 years. Why London authorities are buying water cannons and why Thomas Piketty’s book is causing such a stir.”
Even though only his legs are visible, there is no disguising him. Roll up, roll up, for the Russell Brand revolutionary show. And they do. Within seconds, people, largely young men, are approaching, giving the thumbs up, screaming their approval or joining us under the shutter. Nobody wants to talk about his gigs or acting; there is only one thing on their mind: the Trews and politics.
“People support the Trews,” a well-spoken young man says. “He’s having an impact on the psyche and the spirit and the global consciousness.”
“Say it again, because this man’s interviewing me for the Guardian and you’re making me look good,” Brand says.
“This gentleman here is a proponent of the truth,” the young man continues. “His only agenda in life is to disseminate unadulterated facts in a hopefully unbiased way.”
Another man approaches: “Got any spare cash?”
He hasn’t, because he’s celebrity royalty. “I ain’t got a penny, mate. You got any money, Simon?”
Brilliant, I say, digging into my pocket. I’m interviewing you about the revolution and you’ve not got a couple of quid to give to this fella.
As Brand talks to the homeless man, the posh boy says Brand has got a touch of Marx, Che Guevara and Jesus. “But really, parallels shouldn’t be drawn because he’s in a league of his own.”
Another young man joins us. He says he didn’t realise how intelligent Brand was until recently. Did he like him before? “To be honest, I judged him a bit on the way he dresses. I always thought he was a bit of a…” He comes to a stop. Cock? I suggest. “Not cock. A rich boy, a mummy’s boy. But I’ve heard him talking on YouTube recently and he comes out with some great points.” He looks at Brand. “He used to train in the same kickboxing gym as me.” Who’s better? “Nah, no chance. I’ve done competitions. He’s a bit green, to be honest, but I’d let him win every day of the week. He’s a top bloke. I love his political views.”
Jeremy Paxman interviewing Brand on Newsnight
It’s funny, I say to Brand, that everyone wants to talk about the politics. “Well, that’s what I was saying. I don’t feel I’m looking for approval. I’m not doing it for any other reason than I believe in it.”
Are we seeing the rebranding of Russell Brand? “No, I don’t think that. I think after a while you think, ‘Oh, I’m from a suburban, low-aspirational, low-expectation community, I became famous, I thought it was going to be brilliant. It wasn’t.’ Fortunately, I had somewhere else to go.”
That somewhere isn’t simply revolutionary politics, he says; it’s politics mixed with faith. He mentions a recent interview I did with Gordon Brown, in which I said Brown had disappointed me as a prime minister. Brand talks dismissively about my “stout leftism”: if I really believed in revolution, I should be prepared to change. “I had to become someone who isn’t a drug addict any more. I had to change my beliefs. Then I had to stop being a person who was enamoured of the glistening spectacle. If you’re motivated by sufficient pain, you will change. We’re approaching a point where a significant number of people want to change.” Brand is hardly an ascetic, but he is learning about self-denial.
He received a six-figure advance for Revolution, but insists he won’t be keeping it. “I’m going to get a property in east London and set up a coffee and juice bar to be run by people in recovery from addiction.” So he’s going to give away his money? “No. I’m no longer interested in making money. And the money I get, I’m going to use for good. We need systemic change, not charity. I won’t be in charge. They’ll vote for how they want to run it.”
Is he loaded? “Yeah!” How much is he worth? “I don’t know, but I could probably never be poor again. When I see stuff in the paper like, ‘Oh, he’s worth £20m quid’, I ain’t worth that much. I don’t know what I’ve done with my money. I’ve sorted my parents out, but all the money now, I’m going to use it for social enterprises. My intention is to dedicate myself to this.” He stops. He doesn’t want to sound pious, he says: “I’m still going to do dumb stuff like The Big Fat Quiz Of The Year with Noel Fielding.” He asks if I’ve seen the film Punch-Drunk Love, starring Adam Sandler and Philip Seymour Hoffman. “Sandler is victimised by Hoffman, and there’s a bit where he eventually confronts him and he’s frightened, and he finally stands up to him and goes, ‘Look, I am a nice man’, and that’s all he says. I am a nice man. And I just think that’s enough, isn’t it? Just be a nice man.”
I tell him the posh bloke thought he was a mix of Che Guevara, Jesus and Marx. “Well, that’s very flattering,” he says, newly humble. What does he think? “Well, I’d say Karl Marx designed one of the most powerful and influential economic and social philosophies of recent history, and I don’t know whether I’ve done anything quite at that level yet. Che Guevara was a brilliant militarian. I don’t think I’d survive in guerrilla warfare. And Jesus Christ, we don’t know about him – it seems as if he may have just been a Jewish radical, so if I had to pick one… heheheheh!” He cackles like a crazy.
Does he worry about what he may unleash? People might look to you for leadership, I say; they might want you to stand for parliament? “I’m not frightened of that, but there is no room or requirement for compromise, Simon.” His repeated use of my first name is both endearing and mildly mocking. “Regardless of what I do, madness is coming. And I’ll be happy to participate in whatever way I can. But I don’t think it will be by joining an already antiquated and defunct system.” But surely he’d walk it, standing as a revolutionary independent. “Well, my ambitions go way, way, way beyond that. I’m not asking for an invitation to the party – I’m saying the party’s over.”
“On with your revolution, mate!” a passing woman shouts. He stops to stare at her. “Thank you, thank you,” he says, then dictates into my tape recorder: “‘You’re a fuckin’ star,’ she says walking by, an attractive young woman in burgundy jeans.”
Is there a danger that he’ll lead the masses up the hill, then toddle off to Hollywood and give up on the revolution? “No. I’d rather die. I’d rather die than go back to the dark.”
A few days later, Brand turns up at a drop-in for destitute asylum seekers that I am involved with. He arrives, chauffeur-driven in a black Mercedes with tinted windows, poses for any number of photos, flirts with everybody from the age of eight to 80, and listens intently to what they have to say.
Of course there are many people who will call Brand a hypocrite and say it is all very well preaching equality when he has a driver, his millions and expensive designer jeans. “Give me a chance to grow,” he pleads. “I’ll continue to improve. But I don’t care what other people think. Simon, I’m sure you’re playing devil’s advocate, but let me tell you this – the devil has enough advocates.” And now he’s screaming into the tape recorder, all passions blazing. “Be cynical. I’ve got a fantastic bicycle, I’ve got all sorts of stuff, but just give me a chance. Who cares what jeans I’m wearing? And if you want change… unless you just want to carry on doing your journalism for the Guardian and moaning about Gordon Brown, get on board when somebody’s prepared to die for something.”
• Revolution, by Russell Brand, is published on 23 October by Cornerstone at £20. To order a copy for £13.50, go to theguardian.com/bookshop.
***
Russell Brand to The View: Fox Condemns Immigrants to Distract from Real Problem: Rupert Murdoch by Andrew Kirell | October 13th, 2014video369
Discussing his new book (titled Revolution) Monday on The View, Brand took swipes at big media, largely blaming major outlets for helping advance what he believes are the insidious agendas of their corporate owners. When Rosie O’Donnell asked him to discuss his online news show, almost begging for a Fox or MSNBC reference, he delivered:
I do a true news channel, called “The Trews.” It’s true news, news that you can trust, where we report on how the news should be told and when on Fox News they’re telling you to condemn Mexican people, or immigrants, or people of different sexual identity to you, that’s to distract you from the people that really have the power, people like Rupert Murdoch that owns Fox News.
Young Jewish men argue with Pro-Palestinian supporters beside a giant banner calling for a recognized Palestinian State, in Parliament Square, central London on Oct. 13, 2014.
By Associated Press
British lawmakers vote in favor of recognizing Palestine as a state
UK lawmakers say their motion in favor of recognizing Palestine as a state could kick-start the peace process
Despite the U.N. recognizing a state of Palestine, the U.S. and many European countries have not followed suit
British lawmakers voted Monday in favor of recognizing Palestine as a state, a symbolic move intended to increase pressure for a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Legislators in the House of Commons voted 274 to 12 to support a motion calling on the British government to “recognize the state of Palestine alongside the state of Israel.” Prime Minister David Cameron and other government leaders abstained, and more than half of the 650 Commons members did not participate in the vote.
But Western politicians have expressed frustration with Israel's continued settlement-building on West Bank land the Palestinians want for a future state.
Earlier this month Sweden's new Prime Minister Stefan Lofven said his government would recognize the state of Palestine, an announcement that drew praise from Palestinian officials and criticism from Israel.
Excerpt:“I think this is an attempt to stop propagandizing and acting as if the only good things ever done are done within faithful traditional Catholic marriages. When you do that, no one believes you,” she said.
In an unprecedented shift, Catholic bishops meeting at the Vatican to discuss family issues say gays should be accepted and that there are “positive aspects” to a couple living together without being married. (AP)
A top Vatican panel assisting Pope Francis went further than the Church has gone before in affirming non-traditional relationships, saying Monday that the Church must “turn respectfully” to couples such as those who live together unmarried or are of the same-gender and “appreciate the positive values” those unions may have.
The comments blew away some longtime Vatican experts because they put the Catholic Church – the world’s largest – squarely in the middle of the mainstream public discussion about sexuality and marriage, rather than in one corner focused mostly on unchanging doctrine. What changes to doctrine or practice might follow from the suggestions, if any, weren’t at all clear.
The comments came in a document a small handful of clergy — including DC’s Archbishop Donald Wuerl — prepared to summarize what has happened during the first half of a two-week long “synod” Francis called in order to confront the Church’s most contentious issues. The document was the first real information the Vatican has released on what’s gone on in the rare high-level meeting of 190 top clergy, who are launching a deeper look at church teaching and practice around family issues. It’s meant to guide further talks for this week and in coming months.
The document reaffirmed that traditional teachings are the “ideal” but was remarkable to some in its openness and lack of emphasis on condemnation of untraditional relationships.
The Rev. James Martin, a Catholic writer with the Jesuit magazine America, wrote that the document was “stunning.”
“The Synod said that gay people have ‘gifts and talents to offer the Christian community.’ This is something that even a few years ago would have been unthinkable, from even the most open-minded of prelates–that is, a statement of outright praise for the contribution of gays and lesbians, with no caveat and no reflexive mention of sin,” Martin wrote. “That any church document would praise same-sex ‘partners’ in any way (and even use the word ‘partners’) is astonishing.”
On that, the document said “Without denying the moral problems connected to homosexual unions it has to be noted that there are cases in which mutual aid to the point of sacrifice constitutes a precious support in the life of the partners.”
Patrick Hornbeck, chair of the theology department at Fordham, a Catholic university, said the document’s power was in its perspective.
“Some questions were asked here that have never been asked publicly by bishops: What good can we find in same-sex unions? In many ways for the first time in a long time the Catholic Church is saying it wants to ask really hard questions about how people truly live their lives,” he said. “But the fact that the question is being asked doesn’t mean the answer will be what progressive and liberal Catholics want it to be..it would be a mistake to see this document as in any way definitive or significantly revolutionary.”
Nonjudgmental language was used when discussing everything from living together to divorce. In a section entitled “the relevance of emotional life,” the clergy wrote that in a society with economic challenges and changing norms “a greater need is encountered among individuals to take care of themselves, to know their inner being, and to live in greater harmony with their emotions and sentiments, seeking a relational quality in emotional life. In the same way, it is possible to encounter a widespread desire for family accompanied by the search for oneself. But how can this attention to the care for oneself be cultivated and maintained, alongside this desire for family? This is a great challenge for the Church too. The danger of individualism and the risk of living selfishly are significant.”
What concrete changes – if any — could come of this language wasn’t clear, and many lines in the document were phrased as questions. Many Catholics who have left the church cite teachings that ultimately condemn being gay or using contraception. Some leading clergy involved in the meeting immediately challenged the document and pushed for more edits and detail. Some wanted there to be a clarification that Catholicism teaches that “some unions are disordered.” Some challenged the idea that, when you’re talking about core issues like marriage, holiness and truth can be found outside the church.
The document is a kind of jumping-off point for discussion. It will be rewritten again when the synod closes this weekend and is meant to launch a year of conversations and reflections among Catholics. In the fall of 2015, Pope Francis has planned a second synod at which actual pastoral changes could be proposed.
Voice of the Family, a global coalition of traditional Catholic groups, released a statement calling the document a betrayal. “Why not give Communion to polygamists if we give it to divorced and remarried?” the group asked.
As many things related to Pope Francis, the document drew the attention of groups outside the Catholic Church.
Russell Moore, the policy leader for the Southern Baptist Convention – the country’s largest Protestant denomination — suggested the document was dangerously emphasizing grace over “truth.”
“Should we patiently love and offer the gospel to those who are refusing to repent of immortality.. Yes. Should we baptize and admit those into membership who refuse to walk away from such things? No,” Moore wrote.
Fred Sainz, a spokesman for the major GLBT advocacy group Human Rights Campaign, said the language was significant – particularly during a year that has seen a rise in gay and lesbian Catholics being fired as teachers or leaders from U.S. Catholic schools and parishes.
“It may very well be that we are never in full agreement with the Catholic Church in terms of [marriage] but today was certainly a step in the right direction towards a recognition of our lived experience,” said Sainz, who said he left Catholicism himself over this issue. “There has been so much hurt and ridicule. I have to believe many will see this as a hopeful beginning to a very long road. But it will be a very, very long road.”
In releasing the document at a news conference at the Vatican, Luis Antonio Tagle, a top cardinal from the Philippines, noted that debate was just beginning: “The drama continues.”
On people who marry outside the church or create families without marriage, the document wrote: A “new dimension of today’s family pastoral consists of accepting the reality of civil marriage and also cohabitation….” and “In such unions, it is possible to grasp authentic family values or at least the wish for them. Pastoral accompaniment should always start from these positive aspects.”
Longtime Vatican reporter John Allen wrote that the document could offer a perspective on family and sex akin to the one that the landmark Second Vatican Council did on ecumenism – or the Catholic Church’s relations with other parts of Christianity. While before Vatican II, many Catholics hesitated to even walk into a Protestant church, after such “taboos were gone,” Allen wrote Monday. “Without overdramatizing things, something similar may be going at the 2014 Synod of Bishops on the family vis-à-vis people living in what the church considers “irregular” situations.
Hornbeck said the document is part of Francis’ effort to shift the contemporary dialogue about what plagues healthy families.
“He’s not so quick to assign liberalism or secularism as the cause. He wants to engage in a much more broad discernment, that economic, cultural, political and social changes are challenging not just the traditional model but how people actually live their lives,” he said.
The document didn’t alarm all traditional Catholics. Writer Eve Tushnet, a lesbian Catholic who advocates for celibacy, said she was struck by the document’s acknowledgment of the “mutual aid” same-sex couples provide one another.
“I think this is an attempt to stop propagandizing and acting as if the only good things ever done are done within faithful traditional Catholic marriages. When you do that, no one believes you,” she said.
Michelle Boorstein is the Post’s religion reporter, where she reports on the busy marketplace of American religion.
CNN speaks with Fareed Zakaria about reports over new advances by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. This is an edited version of the transcript.
There is reportedly one base remaining in Anbar Province under Iraqi control. Talking to a general, he said it isn't so significant. You disagree. It's very significant. It’s not significant militarily, because Baghdad will hold for reasons we can talk about. What's significant here is that it tells you that the Iraqi army has collapsed, that there’s no real Iraqi army. Because those bases where people are giving up, surrendering, these are all Sunnis who don't want to fight ISIS, Sunnis who don't want to fight fellow Sunnis.
What you're seeing is that if you scratch the surface of the Iraqi army, it's a bunch of sectarian militias, and the Sunnis will not fight against ISIS because they don't like the Baghdad government.
They don't have that regard for a nation. It's like a sect nation. They think at this point the Iraqi government is being run by Shia. And so they in a sense don't like ISIS, but they like the Shia government in Baghdad less. So what we have to come to grips with is, this army that doesn't really exist.
Billions of dollar poured into this army… Billions of dollar poured into it, because it was based on the idea that there was an Iraq, that there was a nation that there would be a national army for. Maybe we need a different strategy, which is to stand up sectarian militias, Shia militias, Sunni militias. They already exist. And the Kurds have their Peshmerga, that model. Send them into fight in their areas, not in other areas where they would be regarded as a foreign army.
That's giving up on a lot, but if you look at events on the ground, that's what reality is telling us.
The reality with regard to Turkey – many are wondering what their role would be moving forward. We now know. We watched the parliamentary vote, that Turkey is now saying to the U.S. OK, you can use our country as this launch pad to bring your troops in and to fire rockets and whatnot. How significant is that move? Do you think that could be the next step toward maybe some ground troops from Turkey? Turkey is absolutely crucial, because they're the one serious army in the region that borders the ISIS forces that has the capacity and that has the determination and that has the interests at stake. Turkey has put its head in the sand for so long, trying to believe they don't need to get involved, and they have allowed again their petty issues to overwhelm them.
Is this them pulling their head out of the sand just a little bit? I think they're beginning to pull their head out of the sand. What they have been worried about…so the people in Kobani are Kurds. They don't want Kurdish forces to get stronger, which then might produce Kurdish separatism, which Turkey worries about because Turkey has lots of Kurds. They are trying to sort of limit the degree to which the Kurds, the ethnics Kurds in the area...
And they can't put all that aside and just fight the terrorists, bottom line? And they can't put that aside because they don't feel that they're threatened. They feel that ISIS will stop at their border. And they're probably wrong. And so what you're seeing is everybody wants the United States to sweep in like a knight in shining armor.
And fix it. Fix it for them so they can all free-ride on the United States. And I think one of the things we have to recognize is if the United States stays back and forces some of these governments in, they're going to get involved. They are threatened. This is their region.
We're 6,000 miles away. But, of course, they would much rather the United States come in and we have got all the firepower and Washington has all the firepower. Who wants to fight if the largest military in the history of the world is willing to do it for you?
Final question, Baghdad – how vulnerable? Do you worry about that? I don't worry about it a lot, because the truth is that because Baghdad is now the Shia capital of Iraq, there are lots of Shia militias. The army is Shia, they will fight until the end. And, remember, the Iraqi army, even in its currently reduced state, it is several hundred thousand. ISIS may have 10,000 or 15,000 people. They are outnumbered 10 or 15 to one. The weapons that the Iraqi army has are much better. And these guys have the will to fight because they want to preserve Shia control of Baghdad.
Alan: Colbert is unusually hard on Deresiewicz... and correspondingly funny.
In this instance I wish Stephen had reserved his wit for one of the garden variety jerks he interviews.
Deresiewicz has not only revealed a national "secret" but in his own life has exhibited the courage of conviction.
In sum...
Do not trust careerists (and other "climbers"), especially those who have been mis-educated at elite schools.
We can learn from careerists, and -- in limited ways -- even benefit from their ministration.
But, ultimately, do not trust them. Certainly not for vision, nor for charting one's own course.
Rather, find your own vocation, your unique calling -- true and "God/Universe given" -- and pursue it at all cost. (This includes the cost of poverty.)
The ancient Romans believed -- at least of "free men" -- that everyone is endowed with a genius.
And unless that genius is realized "in the world," it will rattle around inside seeking escape until it is manifest, or, until it breaks something, often irreparably.
Alan: It is -- specifically -- mercy that American conservatives oppose.
These rigid, brittle people want vindictiveness, retaliation and punishment.
They want "the undeserving poor" to suffer and they want it "with a vengeance."
In the main, American conservatives oppose mercy, compassion and forgiveness.
These "conservative""Christians" would be much more at home in The Old Testament than The New, and have precious little in common with the way Yeshua lived his life.
The Hard, Central Truth Of Contemporary Conservatism
The hard, central "fact" of contemporary "conservatism" is its insistence on a socio-economic threshold above which people deserve government assistance, and below which people deserve to die.
The sooner the better.
Unless conservatives are showing n'er-do-wells The Door of Doom, they just don't "feel right."
Almost "to a man," contemporary "conservatives" have apotheosized themselves and now -- sitting on God's usurped throne -- are rabid to pass Final Judgment.
Self-proclaimed Christians, eager to thrust "the undeserving" through The Gates of Hell, are the very people most likely to cross its threshold.
Remarkably, none of them are tempted to believe this.
Frog Hospital Publisher, Fred Owens in Madrid's Plaza Mayor
Dear Fred,
Thanks for Frog Hospital.
Your Plaza Mayor photo is splendid.
Glad to hear all is well with you.
My scientist friends - including a Stanford hydrology professor - tell me that hot, dry climate changes now taking place in the American southwest are likely to extend as far north as The Bay Area.
At the moment, I am still in Rochester where local television (I have not had TV for 19 years) runs an advertisement for a Christian "mingling" service:'Sometimes God takes the initiative. And sometimes God expects you to take the initiative.' The advertisement concludes with this exhortation: "Now, it is your turn."
A couple months ago I realized how easily we humans confuse statistical "outliers" with "Divine Providence."
For example...
I once contracted with a "drive-away" car company in San Francisco to deliver a pristeen Datsun 280Z to Colonel Mark Fish at the Fort Sheridan Ramada Inn a little north of Chicago.
I arrived in pre-dawn light and asked the receptionist to ring the Colonel with the news that his car was in the parking lot.
Unexpectedly, the clerk, a surprised look on his face, handed me the phone. No sooner had I said "Colonel Fish?" than I got this stentorian reply : "I don't know who the hell you are or what kind of joke you think you're playing! But I DO NOT APPRECIATE being wakened by nonsensical strangers at 5 a.m.!"
Slam!
It had been my plan to transact the transfer and then hitchhike to Ann Arbor to spend a few days with Michael John Morgan who was doing his poly sci doctorate at UM. I retreated to a bank of pay phones on the far wall and called Michael, suggesting he bring his Super 8 camera gear to film what was about to unfold now that I had delivered a $50,000.00 sports car (with Hawaiaan plates) and the owner not only refused to take possession of the vehicle but was furious at my supposed prank.
While talking with Michael, the PA system bellowed: "Mr. Archibald. Mr. Alan Archibald. Please come to the reception desk."
I told Micheal I'd get back to him, hung up, and proceeded to Check In.
"I am so sorry Mr. Archibald!" the Ramada agent began. "As it happens we have two Colonel Mark Fish's staying with us this evening."
Divine Providence?
Or ... Outlandish Coincidence?
I suspect the latter... although I understand how easily analagous circumstances might persuade people -- even myself! -- of the former.
I still believe in sub-omnipotent "providence" but encourage you to contemplate the striking congruence between "one in a trillion" events and homo sapiens' widespread belief that such anomalies "must" have been intended by the intervening "hand of God."
Global warming?
Now, it's our turn.
Or... Do we expect God to "take out the trash" forever?
Not exactly the sort of "personal responsibility" we've come to expect from this generation's Pharisees.
Pax tecum
Alan
PS I am glad you pointed out that the conquering Moors did not require Christians to convert to Islam. I would have been even happier had you noted Isabella y Ferdinando's ultimatum to Islamics: "Convert or emigrate." In this regard, the following history is essential:
"1492: Caliph Bayezid II Offers A Home To All Jews and Islamics Expelled From Spain"
I was fortunate to get a plane ticket to Madrid for ten days, in the company of my daughter who works for Boeing.
My daughter left from Seattle and I left from Los Angeles. We arranged to meet in Madrid at the B & B at 5 Calle Los Estudios, only a few blocks from the La Latina subway station.
I took the subway from the airport, rather than a cab. A cab would have been 25 to 30 Euros. The subway was only 5 Euros.
I navigated successfully, making two changes, finally getting on the Green Line to La Latina, which is a sort of Left Bank neighborhood, site of the famed La Rastra flea market.
I greeted my daughter, entered the B & B, cleaned up from the journey, and then we headed to the street for a coffee, café con leche.
I enjoyed being in Spain. I spoke Spanish to everyone. They were glad to hear me say it. I was very glad to understand them. There is something about the Castilian dialect that is music to my ears.
La Latina is a densely crowded district. There was a constant stream of local people walking in every direction past the café. Walking and talking.
I observed the man sitting in the lottery booth, hardly bigger than an old phone booth. It is the world’s dullest job, I thought.
I introduced myself by name to waiter, which is not the custom, but it is my custom, and we struck up a conversation. He was a handsome young man and muy agradable.
He welcomed us to Madrid and we felt relaxed and grateful to be there.
More about Madrid
I have so much more to say about my journey, but pressing financial obligations require my presence at work this week, so I will have to postpone this composition.
I can add this small piece about the Iberian people -----
Local Iberian shaman hosts American visitor at the Plaza Mayor in Madrid.
A bit of history. It was the Phoenicians and ancient Greeks who discovered and settled Iberia many centuries before the time of Christ. Ready to greet these visitors when they came ashore were the Neolithic Iberian tribes with their druids and masks.
Later the Romans came to conquer, to build roads and viaducts and cities, to unify this vast province, and to impose the Latin language on the local people.
Over time the Iberians became assimilated to Roman culture, and the Latin language developed a local dialect which became the precursor to Spanish.
The Roman Empire crumbled and the Visigoths invaded and took over and founded a Christian kingdom which ruled Iberia for some centuries.
In the 700s, the Arab/Moslems crossed over from Africa and swept the Visigothic rulers aside, ruling Iberia, or parts of it, for 700 years. They did not enforce a conversion to Islam, but it helped you get ahead in the world, if you crossed over from being Christian.
Then Isabella and Ferdinand drove the Moslems out of Spain and back to Africa. Many people found it convenient to convert back to Jesus -- "convenient" in quotes.
Then these monarchs, our beloved Isabella and Ferdinand, funded the expeditions of Christopher Columbus to the New World.
No matter what you think of the Admiral and his voyages, it is good to place him in a historical context. It is good to remember that the Iberian people have always lived in Spain, having been invaded and conquered more than once.
But this old fool still dances in the Plaza.
More News.
I am back in Santa Barbara. The punishing drought continues and the garden is suffering. We pray and hope for rain.
Reading Dickens.
I am reading Bleak House. I am halfway through this masterpiece, but the plot is eluding my understanding. I must stop the reading and consult an Internet source, some sort of Wikipedia cheat sheet on the story. Normally I let Dickens write as he pleases, but this time I need a crutch.
All is Well
All is well on the home front. Good health, good family, good friends. We’re beginning to make Thanksgiving and Christmas plans.
1. Everyone In Rochester Eats Garbage And Loves It
Source: Flickr user Eugene Peretz
The finest of Rochester delicacies is, without a doubt, the Garbage Plate. Take a moment and think of every cheat food you can think of. Now pile them on a platter and add Rochester hot sauce. That’s the height of comfort food that is the garbage plate.
2. In Rochester Abbott’s Custard = Summertime
Source: Abbott’s Frozen Custard via Facebook
Just started juicing? Going full vegan? Paleo diet? Here comes Abbott’s to ruin all of that for you right now. Rochester loves Abbott’s not simply because of their delicious custard, but because when that open sign turns on, it means winter is finally over (probably)!
3. To Folks In Rochester Wegman’s Isn’t Simply A Grocery Store, It’s A Way Of Life
Source: buzzfeed.com
What can be said about Wegman’s that hasn’t already been shouted from the mountaintops? It’s unlikely that there’s a grocery store anywhere with as strong a following. If you moved away from Rochester, it’s the first thing you miss most about the city.
4. In Rochester “The Boss” Isn’t Springsteen, It’s A Tasty Sauce That Goes On Everything
The commercial says it all—Boss Sauce goes on everything. You know it’s popular if it comes in a giant glass jug like the one at 0:25. Country Sweet is an alternative, just not an acceptable one.
5. Top Three Words That Prove You’re From Out Of Town: “Soda,” “Freeway,” and “Hamburger”
Source: Imgflip
Here’s the quick rundown, to try and fit in with the rest of the crowd in Rochester: A: “Soda” is what you cook with. “Pop” is what you drink. B: “Freeway” is some kind of West Coast atrocity. You drive on the “Expressway” C: You might think you’re eating “Hamburger” but everyone knows its just “Ground Steak.”
6. Your Best Friend's Name Is Now Genny And She's A Beer
Source: Genesee Brewery via Facebook
If you walk into any bar in Rochester and order a Bud, Keystone or Miller, you’re making a mistake. Genesee, founded and brewed right there in Ra Cha Cha makes a light beer called Genny that is every bit as good, if not way, way better than the industry big dogs.
7. Two Feet Of Snow? 45 Degrees? Hooray, It’s Rochester Shorts Weather!
Source: Flickr user Nazareth College
The fact that Rochestarians actually take to the icy streets wearing essentially beach gear actually makes sense when you consider people in Milwaukee and Chicago were doing the same thing right after the Polar Vortex passed. But that was just one year. Rochester pulls this stunt every winter—now that’s hardy.
8. Let’s Be Real, You Were Probably Wearing The Shorts Underneath Your Winter Coat
Source: Quickmeme
Rochestarians also know to be ready for anything, weather-wise. Sure, it looks like it’s going to be a balmy 70 degrees today, but when you’ve lived here long enough you know that you’ll want to pack a some snow pants and a parka, just in case.
9. What’s The Best Pie Filling? Cherries, No. Peaches, No. Grapes—Can We Have Seconds?
Source: Flickr user K. B. R.
Fall means pumpkin spice to the rest of the country, but here in upstate New York, just a stone’s throw from Naples where the Greatest Grape Pie in the World is judged annually, the sweet smell of sugary Concord grapes is what really gets folks Instagrammin’.
10. The Phrase “White Hot” Makes Folks In Rochester Drool
Source: Wikimedia Commons
The white hot is the premier sausage of Upstate New York, and it got its start in Rochester. Made from quality cut meats, it’s rare for a Rochesterian to have a white hot with just a bun—they prefer them on their garbage plates.
11. If Your Buddy Just Drove Through The Can Of Worms, Get ‘Em A Stiff Drink
Source: Wikimedia Commons
If you’ve ever seen an aerial view alone of the Can of Worms (i.e. the highway connection between 490 and 590), you have massive pity for anyone unlucky enough to regularly commute through it. It was definitely not anything you’d send a student driver down.
12. You’d Have To Be Looney Not To Have A Few Canadian Bucks On Hand
Source: Flickr user Jamie McCaffrey
Rochester’s proximity to the Great White North means that it’s easy to take a trip to Toronto if you like (it’s almost equidistant to NYC, and in some people’s opinion, better). And if you ever want to go to Niagara Falls, you’ll want to have a little Canadian change rattling around in your jeans.
13. People In Rochester Wish That Halloween Happened In July So It Wouldn’t Get Snowed Out
Source: Flickr user Tobin
Sure they can have their primary “sexy” costume set to go, but folks in Rochester know they always need a winter-friendly “Plan B” costume ready, too. May we suggest a space heater or a polar bear, should Mother Nature have her way.
14. Calling In For Work Or Skipping Because Of 18 Inches Of Snow Will Get You Laughed Out Of Rochester
Source: Flickr user Onno Kluyt
After a snowstorm, anywhere else, kids would be rallying around the radio to see if school will be cancelled, but in Rochester they grit their teeth and bring out the heavy-duty shovel. It’s a familiar scene you’ll see all the way down the block.
15. Red Wings Hockey? You Must Not Be From Around Here
Source: Flickr user Thomas Belknap
As far as fans of the local minor league team are concerned, the Detroit Red Wings are the inferior sports team (more about hockey later). Y’all remember Cal Ripken, Jr.? He totally played for them before going up to the Orioles.
16. No, Rochester Doesn’t Have An Accent—Pennsylvania Has An Accent
Source: Youtube user JennaMarbles
If you think that the vowel shift on words like “aunt,” “pajamas,” and, fittingly, “accent” sound word when a true Rochester native says it sounds weird, you’ve never heard someone from PA say “yinz.”
17. If Your Neighbors Mention Vinnie And Angelo, They’re Talking About These Clowns
Source: Youtube user logoman57
Back in the ’90s, anytime you plopped yourself in front of the tube, you were sure to catch Vinnie and Angelo harassing some old woman in a bid to get you to buy a new Dodge. Their car dealership was almost as famous as their commercials—a sampling of their whimsical hijinks is included here for reference and nostalgia purposes. Trust me, if your immediate friends don’t know about them, they’re probably transplants like you.
18. Ra-Cha-Cha Is A Perfectly Acceptable Thing To Call Your City
Source: Flickr user Ryan Hyde
Lilac City, Kodak City, even the occasional Rochiggity come out, but Ra Cha Cha is definitely the most fun you can have while referencing the Lost Borough.
19. If You Visit NYC, People Won’t Have Any Idea Where Your Accent Is From
Source: Giphy.com
NYC may as well be its own universe as far as Rochestarians are concerned. If you ever make a trip downstate, get ready for 20 questions about where you’re from—you’d think the folks on Manhattan had never made the trip upstate. Oh wait, that’s probably true.
20. If You’re Waking Up With The Wease, You Aren’t Heading To Weggies For Cough Drops
Source: The Wease Show on 95.1 The Brew via Facebook
Brother Wease has been a local staple for the past 20 years of Rochester’s 95.1 The Brew. It’s not morning in Rochester without him.
21. Wait, You’re Telling Us Your Version Of Hot Sauce Doesn’t Have Meat In It?
Source: Imgflip
Keep your Frank’s and Tabasco—Rochester knows how to step it up in the tastiest way possible. It doesn’t get much more Rochester than being the go-to topping for garbage plates, burgers from Bill Gray’s, and that get bottled and sold at Wegman’s.
22. If You’re Heading Downhill On Lake Road—You’re Accelerating
Source: Giphy.com
This will probably take a few tries before it makes sense, but if you’re heading downhill on Lake Road, it doesn’t make sense to brake—let gravity save you a little gas. You’ll be cresting the next hill if you build up enough momentum. Consider this a tip from the locals.
23. Getting A Whole Christmas Tree Isn’t Necessary In Rochester—Just Put The Lights On A Pole
Source: Youtube user RocPic.Com
Maybe it all started as an environmental effort—there were just too few evergreens to go around—but the Liberty Pole at the center of town gets strung up with a web of pretty lights, just as if they were hung from the branches of some giant tree elsewhere. In many ways it’s better—it’s just part of what makes Rochester the city it is.
24. You’ll Agree—Rochester Has The Best Cheeseburger
Source: Bill Gray’s via Facebook
Bill Gray’s can put a garbage plate on a bun, but it still doesn’t compare to their cheeseburger. Started out of a little suburb of the city, Bill Gray’s now has spots to pick up your favorite ground steak burger all over western New York.
25. Folks In Rochester Aren't American, They’re Amerks
Source: Flickr user Lets Go Amerks!
The people of Rochester pledge allegiance to the local hockey team the Americans… aka The Amerks.
26. The Very Best Thing About Being A Kid In Rochester Is Going To The Strong Museum
Source: Strong National Museum of Play via Facebook
The Strong Museum is widely held to be one of the best children’s museums in the whole darn world. What makes it so great? The nation’s best self-described museum of play has a Lego exhibit, a butterfly sanctuary the world’s largest collection of electronic games. We really want to go.
27. Folks In Rochester Can’t Imagine Living Anywhere Else
Source: Flickr user Patrick Ashley
If you grew up in this beautiful city, eating garbage plates and Bill Ray’s, going to The Strong Museum and rooting for some of the finest minor league sports in the land, you’d want to come back, too. And everyone knows that if you grow up in Rochester, even if you want to leave sometimes, you always know you’ll be coming back. What have you had to explain to out-of-towners about Rochester? Tell us in the comments below!
Who is Movoto Real Estate, you might ask? Movoto is an online real estate brokerage based in San Mateo, CA. Our blog has been recognized for its unique approach to city-based research by major news organizations around the world such as Forbes and CBS News.
Midterm elections are all about turning out base constituencies. Over the last few decades, there have been few more reliable voters for Republicans than white evangelical Protestants. This year, however, GOP candidates may be getting less help from this group—not because white evangelical Protestants are becoming less supportive or less motivated, but simply because they are declining as a proportion of the population, even in Southern states.
White evangelical Protestants have remained a steadfast Republican constituency in both presidential and midterm congressional elections ever since the Reagan presidency, which marked what political scientists Merle and Earl Black dubbed “the great white switch.” In 2008 and 2012, roughly three-quarters of white born-again Christians supported GOP nominees John McCain (73 percent) and Mitt Romney (78 percent). In the 2010 midterm election, similar numbers of white born-again Christians (77 percent) supported the GOP House candidate in their districts.
During the heady days of evangelical prominence in the 1980s and 1990s, white evangelical Protestant leaders frequently noted the decline of their more liberal mainline Protestant cousins, but now white evangelicals are seeing their own populations shrink. In recent years, for example, the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest evangelical denomination in the country, has reported steady declines in membership and new baptisms. Since 2007, the number of white evangelical Protestants nationwide has slipped from 22 percent in 2007 to 18 percent today.
A look at generational differences demonstrates that this is only the beginnings of a major shift away from a robust white evangelical presence and influence in the country. While white evangelical Protestants constitute roughly three in 10 (29 percent) seniors (age 65 and older), they account for only one in 10 (10 percent) members of the Millennial generation (age 18-29). In the last few national elections, however, because of high levels of voter turnout, white evangelical Protestants have managed to maintain an outsized presence at the ballot box according to national exit polls, representing roughly one-quarter of voters.
But the fact that there are currently five Southern states—Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, and North Carolina— where polling shows that the Senate race margins are less than five percentage points indicates that 2014 may be the year that the underlying demographic trends finally exert enough force to make themselves felt. These changes are evident in analysis based on the American Values Atlas, a massive interactive online map of demographic and religious diversity in America based on 45,000 interviews conducted throughout 2013, created by the Public Religion Research Institute in partnership with Social Science Research Solutions.
White Evangelical Protestant Decline in Five Key Southern States (2007-2013) Differences marked with an asterisk are not statistically significant at the 90 percent level of confidence. (PRRI/SSRS, American Values Atlas, 2013; Pew Research Center, Religious Landscape Survey, 2007) Compared to 2007, just after the 2006 midterm elections, the five southern states where there are tight Senate races have one thing in common: the proportion of white evangelical Protestants has dropped significantly.
In Arkansas, where Republican and freshman Representative Tom Cotton is locked in a tight race with two-term Democratic Senator Mark Pryor, the white evangelical Protestant proportion of the population has dropped from 43 percent to 36 percent.
In Georgia, where Democratic candidate Michelle Nunn is battling Republican candidate David Perdue for retiring Senator Saxby Chambliss’s seat, white evangelical Protestants made up 30 percent of the population in 2007 but that number is currently down to 24 percent.
The proportion of white evangelicals in Kentucky has plunged 11 points, from 43 percent to 32 percent; here Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell faces the Democratic Alison Grimes, the secretary of state.
In Louisiana, where Republican Representative Bill Cassidy is up against three-term Democrat Mary Landrieu, white evangelicals have slipped from being 24 percent of the population to 19 percent.
Arkansas and Georgia have also witnessed significant declines in the numbers of white mainline Protestants, who also lean toward supporting Republican candidates in the South.
Two forces account for the declining proportions of white evangelical and mainline Protestants: the growth of non-black ethnic minorities and, perhaps surprisingly, the growth of the religiously unaffiliated across the South. Notably, each of these growing constituencies leans decidedly toward Democratic candidates. For example, in 2007, the religiously unaffiliated constituted 12 percent each of the populations of Kentucky and North Carolina. By 2013, the percentage of unaffiliated Kentuckians had jumped nine points to 21 percent, and the percentage of unaffiliated North Carolinians had jumped to 17 percent. While increases in the proportions of the religiously unaffiliated in Arkansas, Georgia, and Louisiana fall short of statistical significance, the patterns all point in the same direction.
So what does this mean for the 2014 elections? Certainly, events on the ground are still paramount; the campaign machines and peculiarities of candidates matter. And in low-turnout elections such as the midterms, the real weight of these demographic and religious shifts will not yet be fully felt at the ballot box. White evangelical Protestants have a strong turnout record, while non-black ethnic minorities and particularly the religiously unaffiliated are much less likely to vote. PRRI’s pre-election American Values Survey found that while two-thirds (65 percent) of white evangelical Protestants report that they were absolutely certain to vote in the November elections, less than half (45 percent) of the religiously unaffiliated report this kind of certainty. But the underlying trends indicate that at least one reason why there are a number of close elections across the South is the declining dominance of white evangelical Protestants, the most stalwart of GOP supporters.
In the main, liberalals believe things will work out.
In the main, conservatives believe calamity is "just around the corner," that humans are incapable of incarnating widespread goodness and that everyone is well-advised to look out for themselves, to sequester as much wealth as possible and to anticipate end-time conflagration at the end of humankind's one-way dead end street.
We become what we perceive.
Or, as Henry Ford put it: "Whether you believe you can -- or can't -- you're right.
"I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Creator, By fighting off the Jews, I am doing The Lord's work... Was there any excrement, any shamelessness in any form, above all in cultural life, in which at least one Jew would not have been involved" As soon as one cuts into such an abscess, one finds, like maggots in a decaying body,often blinded by the sudden light, a kike."
Democrat U.S. Senate candidate Michelle Nunn participates in planting a garden and reading to students at Burghard Elementary School in Macon, Georgia, Friday, October 17, 2014.
By Dana MilbankOpinion writerOctober 21 at 5:15 PM
David Perdue took the cheap and easy route.
The Republican Senate candidate in Georgia, like Republican candidates in most other competitive races, calculated that the surest road to victory was to tie his opponent, in this case Democrat Michelle Nunn, to President Obama.
Dana Milbank writes about political theater in the nation’s capital. He joined the Post as a political reporter in 2000.View Archive
“The president himself said, ‘make no mistake, these policies are on the ballot,’” Perdue said in a TV ad last week. As a photo of Obama with Nunn filled the screen, Perdue continued: “That’s why he wants her in the Senate.”
It was typical of Perdue’s campaign strategy of trying to run against Obama. What was not typical was Nunn’s response: She ran a spot of her own, featuring the same photo of herself with Obama.
“Have you seen this picture?” she asks viewers. “It’s the one David Perdue has used to try and attack me in this campaign.” As the image shifts to a photo of George H.W. Bush with his hand on her shoulder, Nunn goes on: “But what he doesn’t tell you is that it was taken at an event honoring President Bush, who I worked for as CEO of his Points of Light Foundation. Throughout my career I’ve been able to work with Republicans and Democrats, and that’s the same approach I’ll bring to the U.S. Senate.”
Nunn, daughter of the legendary Senate Democratic centrist Sam Nunn, may yet lose the race. But she is doing far better than expected in her run despite the hostile year and terrain for Democrats. A big reason for this: She’s showing authenticity and courage at a time when both are in short supply among Democratic candidates.
Nunn’s comfort in her own skin is in sharp contrast to other Democrats on the ballot, who are making awkward maneuvers to distance themselves from Obama and much of the Democratic Party.
In Kentucky, Democratic Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes ran an ad declaring “I’m not Barack Obama.” In Louisiana, an ad from Democratic Sen. Mary Landrieu showed her saying “the administration’s policies are simply wrong on oil and gas production.”
Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska) boasted in an ad that he“took on Obama”on Arctic oil production and “voted against President Obama’s trillion-dollar tax increase.” (Actually, the vote was a Republican stunt.) Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) bragged ofopposing gun restrictionsObama favored, proclaiming, “No one from New York or Washington tells me what to do.”
And then there’s Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) who skipped an Obama visit to his state and made the absurd claim that, at the White House, “the last person they want to see coming is me.”
But running from Obama is dumb, both because it doesn’t fool anybody and because it makes the candidate look shifty. Certainly, Obama is unpopular in the states that form this year’s battlefield. But voters are savvy enough to know that Democratic lawmakers tend to support a Democratic president. And Obama seems to have a suicidal wish to remind Americans of this, telling liberal radio host Al Sharpton Monday that “these are all folks who vote with me.”
The attempt to run from Obama only makes the runner look calculating at a time when voters are disgusted with anything that smells political. That helps to explain the Elizabeth Warren phenomenon. The Democratic senator from Massachusetts, a raging populist, is far more liberal than Obama. Yet she’s in demand as a surrogate for Democrats even in places such as Kentucky and West Virginia.
As The Post’s Paul Kane noted, she’s campaigning for Senate candidates in Minnesota, Iowa and Colorado this week, and candidates are clearly not afraid to stand with her as she delivers her fist-pumping jeremiad against Republicans and wealthy interests.
Contrast that with Kentucky’s Grimes, who had a promising start but has turned into a feckless candidate. She repeatedly refused to say whether she even voted for Obama, actually claiming during a debate last week that she wouldn’t “compromise a constitutional right” by revealing this secret.
The day after that preposterous dodge, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee said it was stopping advertising in Kentucky — essentially an acknowledgment that Grimes would lose — and was buying advertising time in support of Nunn in Georgia.
Republicans tried to play the same game with Nunn, but she didn’t make Grimes’s mistake. “I did vote for the president,” she told The Post’s Ed O’Keefe.
Of course she did. She’s a Democrat, and she’s not going to insult voters’ intelligence by pretending otherwise. If that causes her to lose in Georgia, she at least will have kept her dignity.
BARTLETT: Obama is a Republican. His foreign policy has been hawkish. He's more fiscally conservative than most Republicans (especially his predecessor). Obamacare is "is virtually textbook Republican health policy." What's not to like?The American Conservative.
Gov. John Kasich (R-Ohio) supports repealing Obamacare -- but wants to protect the Medicaid expansion. The problem is that the president's health care law provides $792 billion in funding for the expansion in savings from other programs. If the law is repealed, where will the money come from? In other words, Kasich is the kind of governor that takes apart the Oreo and eats only the frosting -- which will increasingly be a temptation for Republicans considering a presidential run in 2016. Jason Millman inThe Washington Post.
