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White House: Is that Doggy for Sale?

April 19, 2012 by

I guess this was inevitable.

On the bright side, eating dog meat should put to rest the rumors that President Obama is a Muslim!

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Comments

  1. Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says
    April 19, 2012 at 10:44 am

    Ah, that excellent scene with the inimitable Bruno Ganz as Hitler! It’s been used over and over, and it’s always incredibly funny. There’s one version that goes after Apple.
    As for Patti Page…If anybody resents rap, they should just remember what disgusting silliness used to be foisted on us by the media.

    • Carl Kraeff says
      April 19, 2012 at 11:05 am

      Your Grace, I am deeply hurt by the lumping together of rap and the silly ballads of the 1950s. Now, if you had contrasted doo wop to those ballads it would be an entirely different matter. For example, while Teen Angel is sentimental and somewhat light weight, How Much is That Doggie is plain silly. However, Teen Angel and How Much both represent an innocent, perhaps naive, outlook, most rap is evil crap. (I guess that tells you how much I dislike rap).

      • Geo Michalopulos says
        April 19, 2012 at 12:11 pm

        Interesting point, Carl. What slays me is how come the cultural elites have given Rap/Hip-Hop a pass while Rockabilly was condemned way back when.

        • Lola J. Lee Beno says
          April 19, 2012 at 3:51 pm

          In the beginning, rap/hip-hop was good, until they started dogging women.

          Sorry about the pun . . .

        • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says
          April 19, 2012 at 7:29 pm

          Who condemns rock-a-billy? Not this lefty (heh-heh)! I’ve never heard of ANYONE condemning rock-a-billy, except maybe in NYPD sitcoms. Condemned? I missed that entirely.
          Hip-hop is just poetry of the underclasses; therefore, it’s a favorite target of those who need to feel better than someone. I’m surprised that Carl likes the most commercial genres.

          • Carl Kraeff says
            April 20, 2012 at 3:37 pm

            My favorite genres are (with favorites):

            Classical (Dies irae, Verdi, Requiem, Claudio Abbado, Berlin Philharmonic, 2002)
            Opera (E lucivan le stelle, Puccini, Tosca, Luciano Pavarotti)
            A capella music (Bortniansky’s No. 7 by St Petersburg Chamber))
            Country (Down to the River to Pray, Alison Kraus)
            American Song Book (My Funny Valentine, Rodgers & Hart, Babes in Arms, Melinda Doolittle)
            Folk songs from various countries (Delio Haidutin, Bulgarian Folk Song, Nevena Tsoneva)

          • Geo Michalopulos says
            April 20, 2012 at 4:26 pm

            I was just speaking in general, Your Grace, not mentioning anybody in particular. In the interest of full disclosure, my elder son loves Hip-Hop. And in truth, I can feel the seductiveness of its musicality. I certainly don’t appreciate its lyrics for the most part but I do understand that it is fueled by masculine black rage at the feminization of black culture in America. Not just homosexualization but the rise of the black matriarchy and the economic impotence of the African American male.

            In that respect, I’d say it’s a legitimate art form, at least a necessary outlet for black rage. My overall problem with it however is that the white oligarchy views it as just another degrading form of music like the minstrel shows of old. They encourage it because it solidifies continued black obsequiousness, ultimately. Of course they won’t say it in these terms but their refusal to criticize its excesses (based on white guilt of course) is patronizing nonetheless.

            I know this is rather harsh, but my euraka! moment came back in 1994, when Bill Clinton tried to get money appropriated for Midnight Basketball. At first, I thought it was a sick, racist joke but when the Congress lined up behind it, I was flabbergasted. It wasn’t a joke. These idiots were for real. Think of it, there was no clamor for Midnight Squash for whites, or Midnight Mah-johng for Asians, or Midnight Cock-fighting for Mexicans, or Midnight Drag-racing for Southerners, or Midnight Poker for Greeks, or Midnight Stock-trading for Jews, or Midnight Interior Decorating for gays? Why the clamor for Midnight Basketball for blacks?

            Shouldn’t young black men be getting a good night’s sleep so they can go to a productive job or get educated? Nobody asked that question. Meanwile every other ethnic group was not catered to.

            Think about it.

            • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says
              April 20, 2012 at 9:33 pm

              Well, the old Marxists used to say, “Everything is politics.” I think this is supported here.
              And I still don’t know who’s knocking Rockabilly.

              I like blues, the blacker the better, but I also like old Joe Turner and always have. One image of his I can’t forget…he’s going through an empty wallet which only has a wrinkled picture of his mother in it and the only thing he has to eat is “wind puddin’ ”

              Opera is for everyone in Italy, but not in U.S.A. You have to sit through a whole lot, a whole lot of “filler” in order to get to one or two really outstanding arias. It makes for fat bottoms.

              Jace Everett’s a decent poet.

              In my previous incarnation, I really enjoyed line dancing and the music it was done to.
              During a stint at Fort Gordon in the 50s, I remember the occasional weekend afternoon when there’d be a whole bunch of guitar-playing GIs in a row sometimes on the stage at Service Club #3, all playing country & western stuff together. What a sight and what a sound!

              Anthony Newman and Virgil Fox could make a pipe organ just get right into your spine.

              Elizabeth Schwarzkopf and the Austrian Irmgaard Seefried and the Hungarian Sylvia Sass could do things with Lieder that were almost unbelievable, although Schwarzkopf was so vain about her voice that she’d do any kind of distortion of words to highlight her voice, including turning the words into worse than gibberish. She had the very best “Ihr habt nun Traurigkeit” (from Brahms’s “German Requiem”), though, until Kire Te Kanawa came along with just as good a voice and perfect diction. Of course, she was a Maori, while Schwarzkopt was “echt Deutsch.”
              Bobby Bland…
              What would we call
              Mozart’s “Dies irae” is way better than Verdi’s, but Verdi’s “Recordare” is unbeatable.
              Who was that boy from the Northeast who turned himself into a country-western type (remember “Dear One”, anybody?) and then went on to build a recording career in Sweden and Germany?
              I played bass fiddle in orchestra in high school and also outside school in a small swing band, in the 40s. Actually DOING any music is better than listening, IMHO. I’ve always sung in church choirs since I before my voice changed: in grade school, then, in churches (Lutheran and then Orthodox) and in college (Saint Olaf). Lately, I’ve been following an Iranian group called “Hypernova.” They’re immigrants, sing “post-punk rock”, and their lead singer, King Raam (pseudonym) has a unique bass voice..

              • Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says
                April 20, 2012 at 9:45 pm

                And here’s a very small bit by King Raam, singing a song his girl friend wrote, Called “Ma bishomarim” (We are numberless) which is very popular among the youth and the “Greens” of Iran at home and abroad:
                http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHTDqPAVQds&feature=related

              • Geo Michalopulos says
                April 20, 2012 at 9:59 pm

                I myself am torn between R&B (Kansas City Sound esp) and Mountain Music. If you had to pin me down though, I think Elvis Presley singing “That’s alright, Mama,” and/or “Heartbreak Hotel,” is one of the purest expressions of musical genius ever. I once was opening up a store in the early morning and there were maybe three of us there, someone put on the radio and it was Elvis singing HH. There was no other distraction. It was simply sublime.

                • Jane Rachel says
                  April 21, 2012 at 7:57 am

                  I often get goose bumps whenever anything beautiful goes beyond beyond, but that was my first case of getting goose bumps over the thought of Elvis singing “That’s All Right Mama.” Thanks, George. 🙂

  2. Anna Rowe says
    April 19, 2012 at 5:57 pm

    I like rap/hip hop and am intrigued by the art form. I DO NOT have any appreciation for the gangsta stuff. As for the silly songs….kind of liked them. Sometimes one needs a light moment and not everything has to mean something.

    • Lola J. Lee Beno says
      April 20, 2012 at 5:52 am

      Remember “Wild, Wild West”? That was a good one.

      • Jane Rachel says
        April 20, 2012 at 12:49 pm

        Can’t resist… can’t resist…. I liked the wittiness of “Wild, Wild West” but “The Avengers” was my fave.

  3. Bishop Tikhon (Fitzgerald) says
    April 19, 2012 at 7:57 pm

    Has Helga been busted or what?

  4. JBL says
    April 20, 2012 at 9:27 am

    What rock-a-billy has become:

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bp2UHWuf7UY

    • jacksson says
      April 20, 2012 at 7:29 pm

      My second cousin, Slim Rhodes (1913–March 10, 1966), born Ethmer Cletus Rhodes, was an American country music and rockabilly guitarist and vocalist popular during the 1940s and 50s with his band, Slim Rhodes and His Mountaineers more or less got the rockabilly movement going. At one point, early on, he had a recording entitled ‘Rockabilly’. I can’t find it any more. One of their first popular songs was: Take and Give – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2JabUBLz0w. Another popular hit was Gonna Romp and Stomp – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-9I2AAjawA. The whole Rhodes family in all branches were fabulous string players, banjos, fiddles (violins), bass, etc and even continued until I came along with my mother being the last violinist of my branch.

      Wikipedia reports: “Rhodes, the son of James K. Rhodes and Amanda Montgomery, was born in Pocahontas, Arkansas. In 1932, he formed a band with brothers Gilbert and Hilburn and sister Bea while they were in high school. The group, the Log Cabin Mountaineers, played at local venues including country fairs; after hearing a performance, an Arkansas state senator dubbed the brothers Slim (E.C.), Dusty (Hilburn) and Speck (Gilbert). Dusty played fiddle; Speck played bass fiddle and did comedy (and in 1960 joined Porter Wagoner’s band). The Rhodes family toured from Missouri to California and back, playing in theaters. From 1938–41, the group was heard on KWOC-AM in Poplar Bluff, Missouri and often performed at the Mid-South Fair. Other members at the time were Buddy Simmons and Tiny Little.

      Starting in 1939, “Slim Rhodes & The Mother’s Best Mountaineers” were heard daily on WMC-AM in Memphis, Tennessee at 11:30 a.m. on the South Central Quality Network, sponsored by Mother’s Best Flour. The group also had a weekly Saturday show over WMCT-AM in Memphis from 12–12:30 p.m. By 1953, they also had a 30-minute live show on KATV-TV in Pine Bluff, Arkansas every Tuesday. Other members included Brad “Pee Wee” Suggs (electric guitar), who recorded on Meteor Records and later for Phillips International on his own; and Danny Holloway (steel guitar).

      In 1950, Rhodes was signed by Gilt-Edge. Sun Records in Memphis signed the group from 1955–58, recording a mix of country and rockabilly. Rhodes acquired an Elvis Presley sound-alike vocalist, Sandy Brooke; releasing the rockabilly “Do What I Do” and “Take and Give”. Between 1955–57, Rhodes was a frequent part of Sun tours through the southern U.S. In 1966, he released the album, The Rhodes Show on the Road on the Cotton Town Jubilee label.”

      Bea, the last of the siblings, is still alive at age about 94 in Arkansas. http://www.areawidenews.com/story/1670759.html

      • jacksson says
        April 20, 2012 at 7:30 pm

        My second cousin, Slim Rhodes (1913–March 10, 1966), born Ethmer Cletus Rhodes, was an American country music and rockabilly guitarist and vocalist popular during the 1940s and 50s with his band, Slim Rhodes and His Mountaineers more or less got the rockabilly movement going. At one point, early on, he had a recording entitled ‘Rockabilly’. I can’t find it any more. One of their first popular songs was: Take and Give – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H2JabUBLz0w. Another popular hit was Gonna Romp and Stomp – http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n-9I2AAjawA. The whole Rhodes family in all branches were fabulous string players, banjos, fiddles (violins), bass, etc and even continued until I came along with my mother being the last violinist of my branch.

        Wikipedia reports: “Cletus (Slim) Rhodes, the son of James K. Rhodes and Amanda Montgomery, was born in Pocahontas, Arkansas. In 1932, he formed a band with brothers Gilbert and Hilburn and sister Bea while they were in high school. The group, the Log Cabin Mountaineers, played at local venues including country fairs; after hearing a performance, an Arkansas state senator dubbed the brothers Slim (E.C.), Dusty (Hilburn) and Speck (Gilbert). Dusty played fiddle; Speck played bass fiddle and did comedy (and in 1960 joined Porter Wagoner’s band). The Rhodes family toured from Missouri to California and back, playing in theaters. From 1938–41, the group was heard on KWOC-AM in Poplar Bluff, Missouri and often performed at the Mid-South Fair. Other members at the time were Buddy Simmons and Tiny Little.

        Starting in 1939, “Slim Rhodes & The Mother’s Best Mountaineers” were heard daily on WMC-AM in Memphis, Tennessee at 11:30 a.m. on the South Central Quality Network, sponsored by Mother’s Best Flour. The group also had a weekly Saturday show over WMCT-AM in Memphis from 12–12:30 p.m. By 1953, they also had a 30-minute live show on KATV-TV in Pine Bluff, Arkansas every Tuesday. Other members included Brad “Pee Wee” Suggs (electric guitar), who recorded on Meteor Records and later for Phillips International on his own; and Danny Holloway (steel guitar).

        In 1950, Rhodes was signed by Gilt-Edge. Sun Records in Memphis signed the group from 1955–58, recording a mix of country and rockabilly. Rhodes acquired an Elvis Presley sound-alike vocalist, Sandy Brooke; releasing the rockabilly “Do What I Do” and “Take and Give”. Between 1955–57, Rhodes was a frequent part of Sun tours through the southern U.S. In 1966, he released the album, The Rhodes Show on the Road on the Cotton Town Jubilee label.”

        Bea, the last of the siblings, is still alive at age about 94 in Arkansas. http://www.areawidenews.com/story/1670759.html

      • Anna Rowe says
        April 20, 2012 at 7:45 pm

        jacksson,
        Take and GIve is sweet!. Thanks for sharing.

        • jacksson says
          April 20, 2012 at 8:02 pm

          You are right Anna, I should have posted a Take and Give link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMLudTDz0hg&feature=related. Also for Do What I Do: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kqb7gKpKm0Y.

          When you listen to these recordings, you discover what great string work these Missouri/Arkansas/Tennessee artists performed. This particular group, the James K. Rhodes family, toured all over the south during the great depression earning a living on street corners and the occasional appearance in various halls and stages. This was before the sons of the family started their band. To show the caliber of their string work, Hilburn (Dusty) Rhodes won a national guitar playing contest at age 14 over many grown men. Gilbert (Speck) spend 28 years on the Porter Wagner Show at bass and comedy.

          • Anna Rowe says
            April 21, 2012 at 5:59 am

            Jacksson, wicked sweet guitar and addicting. I can imagine the sensation caused by a 14 year old. Good stuff.

            • jacksson says
              April 21, 2012 at 10:53 pm

              I still remember the Rhodes get togethers, the instruments would come out, the jamming would start and could those people play. My mother used to tell me the story about her grandfather who lived with her family (until he died in Hillsboro, Oregon at 104) being tasked with teaching her to play the violin. They would be on the back porch and he would start off by having her make a note over and over. Then the next one. Then he would hit two or three notes and end up ‘fiddling’. He would be gone, gone, gone and she would tiptoe off to play with her dolls or such.

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