Headlines

Maybe Trump isn’t solely to blame for your angry Thanksgiving

‘They don’t know we’re here’: In Britain’s most pro-Brexit town, voters are still angry

Queen on the brink: Retirement plans could see King Charles in two years ...

Chick-Fil-A donates to extremist Southern Poverty Law Center

Trump signs Hong Kong bill denounced by Beijing

Hong Kong is the biggest geopolitical threat to markets, economist warns

Tucker [Carlson] serves turkey on Trump ... ‘A full-blown BS artist’ ...

Ousted Navy Secretary rips Trump over Navy SEAL case

British poll projects landslide for Boris Johnson

North Korea fires unidentified projectiles, South Korea military says

28 Iraqi protesters shot dead in 24 hours, violence spirals ...

NY to free 125K accused criminals, give them taxpayer-funded benefits

Headlines

Buttigieg has a serious Latino problem too

Stocks rise for a forth day in a row, hit record highs

Great getaway ... record 55 million travel for Thanksgiving

Politico: Obama ‘skeptical’ of Buttigieg and most other Dem candidates

Judge delays Flynn sentencing to wait for Russia IG report

Economy is growing better than economists had expected just a few weeks ago

GDP 2.1% ... But Fed pumps $108.95 billion more into markets ...

Mexico calls for meeting over Trump’s cartel terrorism designation

Poll: Biden remains atop Democrat field, as Warren slips

Bloomberg is crushing all 2020 Democrats with his ad spending in Super Tuesday states

Iran, Russia, China to hold joint war games in ‘message to world’ ...

Sen. Blumenthal: Lindsey Graham will ‘regret’ investigating Biden

Quotable Quote

“If we had listened to Ben Franklin and made the turkey our national bird, then we would be serving roasted bald eagles for Thanksgiving.” — Anon.

Thanksgiving

When we are gathered around the turkey and cranberry sauce soon, we all should give thanks:

- That Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has decided she doesn’t want to have any children

- For the cold winters in Boston that keeps this city from becoming another Los Angeles for those defecating homeless

- For those Hong Kong protesters who are teaching our American youth the meaning of freedom

- That a political consultant convinced Hillary that she didn’t have to campaign in Wisconsin

- For the Army Corps of Engineers who are building that beautiful Mexican wall

- For that Belgian shepard dog, Conan, which convinced Al-Baghdadi to blow himself up

- That Elizabeth Warren has called for Medicare for All and a wealth tax to pay for it

- That Beto O’Rourke and Bill De Blasio quickly hit the upper limits of their competence

- For President Trump’s internal fortitude

- For America’s crude oil fracking industry that has made us energy independent

Headlines

El Chapo allegedly bribed former Mexican president while in office

Brace for corporate defaults as Chinese firms with dollar debt are 'under increased pressure'

President says Chief of Staff 'will move on' ...

Democrats to investigate why Trump wants to include U.S. citizenship count on 2020 census

President blasts 'Little Adam Schitt' on Twitter

Survey: Wealthy investors say the bull market is coming to an end, but they don't blame politics

[PM] MAY: Getting rid of me won't help Brexit ...

Dems seek to allow religious head garb in Congress

Trump' Mexico-Canada deal hits trouble in Congress

The White House should challenge the Fed's rate hike rationale

Northeast coldest Thanksgiving on record ... 25 degrees below normal ...

Graham warns against Whitaker interfering with Mueller ...

Headlines

Judge orders White House to return press credentials to CNN's Acosta

Trimp's trade war with China could disrupt the traditional Thanksgiving [stock market] rally

Household debt record high

Globalists latest push: Amnesty for all illegal aliens

John Kelly makes final bid to save Kristjen Nielsen's job

CIA determines that Saudi's crown prince ordered the killing of Jamal Khashoggi

Facebook investors call on Zuckerberg to resign ...

Pence, Xi trade barbs at Pacific summit

Progressives back Pelosi for speaker -- in return for more power

The way to avoiid World War III: avoid delusions about China and U,S. leadership

President says he has answered Mueller questions

Poll: Half of Americans share Trump's nationalist worldview

Fractured Definition

Bumbershoot -- An NRA event held sometime in late November offering a prize fit for the Thanksgiving table.

Headlines

These headlines are real ... they have all been discovered on Internet news sites.

New EU 'travel tax' ...

Obama and Merkel: Globalization is here to stay

Axelrod tells transition critics to chill ...

Thanksgiving meal much cheaper: Turkey prices drop ...

DNA breakthrough could 'fix broken genes in brain, delay aging' ...

Paris Hilton: 'I voted for Trump'

London's Muslim Mayor urges anti-Trump migrants to flock to UK

War on Christmas: Saudis ban international schools from observing non-Islamic holidays

Department of Education wasting money at an incredible rate ...

Switzerland considers banning Koran distributions

Obama sets new record for regulations, 527 pages in just one day

Apple may produce IPhones in USA ...

Thanksgiving

I have just watched the customary pre-Thanksgiving round of television personalities citing the things that they are most thankful for ... good health, family and friends. Of course, I am also very thankful for these gifts ... but, musing further on my life ... one thing that I am also appreciative of is that those peevish complainers who always seem to come out of the woodwork to destroy with sinister pleasure every tradition that gives our lives comfort ... have not yet sunk Thanksgiving with their nihilistic blitzkriegs.

As I Remember It

This actually happened … to the best of my recollection.

I think it was Thanksgiving vacation in 1958 or 1959. My mother and I were visiting my sister and her family in Nashville, TN. As it turned out I also had a college fraternity brother who lived in Nashville and he agreed to fix me up with a friend of his girlfriend. We planned a raucous night  ... starting out by buying a bottle of Southern Comfort at a local package store  ... which we all swigged on throughout the night. I don’t remember any of the details of what we did that night until such time as my fraternity brother, feeling no pain, was driving along a country road … at far too fast a pace.

I didn’t tell him to slow down … but, overcome with a premonition, I turned to my date and said, “Excuse me,” and crouched down on the backseat floor. It couldn’t have been five seconds later when our car went out of control and crashed into a tree … after which all hell ensued. My date was screaming. (I told her to keep quiet … she wasn’t helping.) My fraternity brother yelled, “She’s not breathing … she’s dead!”… so I popped out of the car to see what was wrong. His date was face down in a drainage ditch and so I said, “Or course she’s not breathing, her head is under water!” Being sensitive to possible spinal injuries, standing in the cold water, I gently rolled her onto the ditch bank and pushed a number of times on her chest.

She then choked, spit out some water and came back to life. Both girls were full of cuts and broken bones, the details of which I have long since forgotten. But I did grab the liquor bottle and throw it as far as I could into the woods. Some passer-by must have alerted the authorities for it was not too much later that an ambulance and the police arrived. Our dates went off in the ambulance and my fraternity brother and I in the police car … I think to the hospital. When we arrived, I tried to get out of the police car and discovered that both my ankles were severely sprained and swollen.

I spent the rest of Thanksgiving both on my sister’s couch or on crutches ... thanking my premonition for not suffering worse consequences.. My fraternity brother was never charged with anything.

Both girls survived their injuries with a bit of plastic surgery and I received I think two free trips back to Nashville to be deposed and then testify in the resulting damages suit. But it was settled before the trial started.

Pie in the Sky

First lady Michelle Obama apparently likes things over the top.  So it was with pies on Thanksgiving.  This past Thursday there were nine pie types on the White House’s groaning larder-board … pumpkin (of course), pecan, sweet potato, peach, apple, coconut cream, chocolate cream, banana cream, and huckleberry.  (What, no lemon meringue?!) And for the rest of her turkey-day feast menu see … NY Times Story.

Last Christmas Michelle splashed 54 gaily-decorated Christmas trees around the White House … a place where the first family wouldn’t even be on the day that these trees memorialized … see: Oh Oh Tannenbaums.  Somehow, Michelle’s penchant for overdoing things with her fabulous fetes and glittery galas brings to mind that famous French first lady ... the one who favored cake.

Over the River ...

I have another blog that features my short prose efforts ... usually with an unexpected twist at the end ... both fictional and semi-autobiographical ... see: Purple Prose.  Here is an entry I wrote some years ago dealing with a fictional Thanksgiving:

The five of us arrived at Grandmother’s house after a long, chilly drive in Uncle Bill’s old Packard. His over-sized gray sedan smelled of damp mohair and the allspice, mace, and cinnamon that infused the steam seeping in from the pie basket in the trunk. In this hamper were three plump pumpkin pies, a cardamom-mince pie, and two zesty lemon pies with their alpine-high meringues dotted with caramelized sugar drops, all packed in among four dozen yeasty, poppy-seed dinner rolls. We also carried bouquets of the last of the brilliant fall asters and multi-colored maple leaves. Greeting us at the door were most of rest of Grandma’s and Grandpa’s issue and a few neighbors; 22 in all, beaming and chatting with growling stomachs.

We doffed of scarves and greatcoats and were given hot mulled wine or a Bourbon Old Fashion, according to our taste. Scattered around the den and kitchen were the hors d’oeuvres: butter-tender Schmaltz herring in a sweet-sour-cream sauce sprinkled with lots of chopped fresh dill; oysters Rockefeller (saucer-sized and nestling a bed of chopped spinach and a drop of Pernod with a bubbling crust of bread crumbs and grated Parmesan cheese); mounds and mounds of tender Jumbo shrimp with a sharp horseradish and chili-sauce dressing, crisp celery and carrot sticks with a dip made from butter and blue cheese mashed together and thinned with a vintage port wine; colossal Pimento-stuffed olives; miniature sweet Gherkins; and an assortment of odoriferous cheeses (a runny Brie, a ripe Gorgonzola, a well-aged Gouda, a nutty Emmenthaler, and a creamy Double Gloucester) with lots of crusty French country bread.

After over-sampling this largess and re-acquainting ourselves with each other, we were led into the candle-lit dining room for a family prayer and the object of our sojourn. There on the groaning board were ten chilled bottles of this year’s best Nouveau Beaujolais (fruity almost to the point of a fine Spanish Sangria); a huge cob-smoked ham with a orange-honey-clove glaze over a copious coat of toasty fat; two boned legs of grilled baby lamb basted with its garlic, rosemary, and lemon au jus; a 32-pound roasted capon turkey, cooked to a juicy perfection with its chestnut and sage dressing; and three gravy boats filled with a glistening minced-giblet gravy (made with the turkey pan drippings, arrowroot, and the water in which the giblets had simmered all morning along with celery tops, some carrots and crushed shallots). 

Filling in the voids on this massive table were the poppy-seed rolls, a large chaffing dish of whole cranberry sauce augmented with toothpick-thin candied orange-rind strips and Grand Marnier; Greek string beans (made from haricots vert, an oregano-laced marinara sauce topped with bread crumbs and grated Romano cheese and baked to a nutty crust); golden carrots Vichey (dime sized carrot slices and tiny pearl onions blanched into tenderness and then sauced with a roux made with flour, grated onion, a soupcon of nutmeg, and fresh cream); two casseroles filled with steaming sauerkraut, laced with caraway seeds and nestling fresh baked kielbasa; a watercress, Belgian endive, and avocado salad with its mustardy vinaigrette in a yeoman-sized wooden bowl; and a surfeit of fluffy, butter-and-parsley-topped garlic mashed potatoes.

For dessert, out came all the pies we had brought; a chocolate and vanilla-iced Daffodil cake, a browned and steaming rice pudding studded with currents, candied citron, and dried cherries; a rainbow fruit compote (cantaloupe, watermelon, and honeydew balls with strawberries, blueberries, Valencia orange slices, and soused with Marsalla and champagne); and steaming pots of Costa Rican coffee and Earl Gray tea. For dessert’s dessert we had pitted prunes that had soaked to a divine softness in Armagnac; the remainder of the pre-dinner cheeses, now surrounded with ripe Anjou pears, Macoun apples, and fresh figs; and, finally, minted chocolate twigs.

We all sleepily threw ourselves into the washing up and, when it was over and done with all the crockery dried and put away; we settled around the roaring fire in the living room with a glass of hard cider or warming cognac. After many war stories, seasonal songs, and familial antidotes, we pulled on our weather clothes and re-entered the old Packard. Following lots of thank-you’s and echoed good-byes, Uncle Bill pulled from the curb with a short toot of the oogle horn. On the way home we all fell into a deep, high-blood-sugar and L-tryptophan induced sleep. Unfortunately, this also included Uncle Bill ... who consequently drove off of the road at over 60 MPH ... directly into a bridge abutment. Contented ... and with full bellies of Butterball ... we all instantly perished in a Thanksgiving fireball.

© Copyright, George W. Potts

Thank You

Coming up on the day called “Thanksgiving” the subject of this reflection manifests itself. This therefore is a paean to all that makes my life good. But first let me explain what I mean by the“you” in “thank you.” Being a secular humanist I don’t necessarily mean God … but then again I don’t really want closely to identify myself with secular humanists. Too many of these people unfortunately want to take away some of the things that help make my life good. What are really wrong with church bells on a Sunday morning anyway? Secular humanist are laden with babinzoes who are too full of bile to recognize that these bells are calling to assembly a bunch of neighbors who wish me no harm. Rather, by “you” I mean everyone who has preceded me who has contributed to the state of near grace in which I find myself.

I say “near grace” for I am not kidding myself into believing that I have lived a life of transcendental enlightenment. I am not so inclined. Rather I take what snippets of grace that come my way with a kind of innocent joy (like this morning at 3:30AM when our 3-year-old granddaughter climbed into bed with us). And I herein recognize that these moments of grace are often constructs of uncountable efforts of unnamed predecessors over innumerable eons. So exactly what are these constructions for which I am indebted?

- A country in which I fear not a barrage of rockets.

- A home that keeps out the rain and keeps in the warmth.

- A wife and family that allow me to contribute and return the favor.

- A society that provides for my needs and allows me some wants.

- Friends and neighbors who forgive me my quirkiness.

- Forefathers who constructed a form of government that often seems to work.

- The legions of defenders of our freedoms who have died or been maimed in the process.

- A medical system that has kept me alive long past my due.

- My remembered father, mother, sister, friends, mentors and educators.

- The joy of watching youth blossom into understanding.

- A leftover turkey sandwich with sage stuffing, cranberry sauce and mayonnaise.

Thank you.

Rash Prediction

Before Thanksgiving of this year, the price for a share of the Facebook (FB) stock will have fallen below $10 (IPO price was $38/share).

Parade Rest

With my grandchildren romping about me this morn, I turned on the TV to see the preparations for the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.  Suddenly I was transported back in time 35 years or so to when I used to take my children to vintage versions of this same procession.  We were living in Stuyvesant Town on the lower east side of Manhattan and, after breakfast, we would bundle our children up and I would walk them over to Broadway in the low twenties to get a front row spot for watching this extravaganza.

The parade always consisted of many marching bands, floats, and huge helium balloons held down by phalanxes of Macy employees dressed to match the theme of their balloon.  The balloons I remember most were Underdog, the Sesame Street characters, and Rocky and Bullwinkle.  Usually there were also lots of clowns and unicyclists handing out candy and trinkets to the children.  It was all right out of Miracle on Thirty-Fourth Street ... but without Margaret O'Brien.

And I remember that it was almost always bitingly cold ... so getting the kids to stay for the finale was generally a bit dicey.  But we usually did and when Santa Claus went by waving and Ho Ho Ho-ing we knew that we could then trudge back home and thaw out.  Entering our apartment, we were greeted with the wondrous smells of pumpkin pies cooling and the Thanksgiving  turkey cooking in the oven.  I would then generally have a cup of hot coffee and settle in to TV-watch some college football with Christmas music wafting out of the stereo.  What bliss it was!

Giving Thanks

This Thursday's trenchermen (trencherpersons?) would never sit still at our Thanksgiving table for me to enumerate all the things I am thankful for at this difficult time in our history ... so I will burden you, poor reader, with my list:

- a populous awakening in this country to many of the things that seem seriously awry ... as demonstrated by the Tea Party and, yes, even in their perversity, by the Occupiers

- all my beautiful grandchildren ... and the hope that I have for their bright and healthy futures (much of which I will probably never witness)

- all my children and their spouses who have produced these wonderful grandchildren and who are so carefully molding their lives within a creative and moral  template

- my wife, Jeanette, who has been such a great mother, grandmother, and life partner.  She has tirelessly toiled to create for me a wonderful home and make me a better person than I otherwise would have been

- the legacy that previous generations of Americans have left to us (in particular those who have given their lives) so that we can experience our national uniqueness and the best standard of living in history

- those (very) few politicians who had put their country ahead of their personal interests ... Ronald Reagan and Harry Truman, in particular, come to mind

- a leftover turkey sandwich bulging with stuffing, cranberry sauce, and lots of Hellmann's mayonnaise

Who's the bigger turkey?

 

Angelina Jolie thinks Thanksgiving is disgusting. See: Gawker