Glenn Ford - 1916-2006

I have always like Glenn Ford. His performances had qualities of sincerity and humanity. He seemed a likeable guy on screen and I felt he probably was the same off. I know he never abandoned his friends, Like Bill Holden in his alcoholic deliria or Rita Hayworth, who was labeled an alcoholic or druggie when she actually suffered from Alzheimer's.

He also was the man man who explained, to my satisfaction, Will Roger's most famous saying. Ford was a teen-age friend of Roger's who helped tend his polo ponies. He says that what Will really said was, "I never met a man I didn't like, -- who didn't like horses." That, now, makes sense to me.

Nevertheless, It is hard for me to think of Glenn Ford without hearing a little ditty created at the piano by Ronnie Graham one night. It went something like this:

Glenn Ford, you're adored,
Ever since you made the movie Gilda.

Glenn Ford, you're adored,
More than Lee J. Cobb or Brandon de Wilde.

Glenn Ford, you're adored
May your ship of success never sink.

Though many tributes come your way,
I am here to say.....

Glenn Ford, (piano run up the keys) you stink.

I never saw a bad performance by Glenn Ford, or heard a funnier tribute by a fellow entertainer.

Misplaced Placenta

I swear to god that when Donald Rumsfeld's mother gave birth they threw away the baby and kept the placenta. This soulless lump of toxic tissue is the obvious noxious heir to Joseph Goebbels. He is much more the Proganda Minister than Defense Secretary. Virtually everything out of his mouth is an ugly lie.

For the health and well being of Planet Earth, he should be immediately wrested from the equally infamous Bush/Cheney protectorate and rocketed to a personal toxic dump on one of those newly recognized, ice crystal, dwarf planets.

NASA, set the launch!

Lifestyles, The Sequel.

The New York TIMES has posted a streaming video version of its Nuns In Hollywood story.

Lifestyles

This article in the NYTIMES caught my eye and interest. Curious about the location of the monastery, I Googled it and discovered that it is situated at the corner of a short street that I turned on many times during the years I lived up the street leading to the Hollywood sign.



And I don't remember that I ever noticed it.

I imagine that soon the praying will end, and after the final Amen, a fresh new condo will rise in its place.

Rainbow Andy Young

"But you see those are the people who have been overcharging us — selling us stale bread, and bad meat and wilted vegetables. And they sold out and moved to Florida. I think they've ripped off our communities enough. First it was Jews, then it was Koreans and now it's Arabs, very few black people own these stores."

When Mel Gibson ran into a redneck Jew in Malibu speed trap recently he was definitely drunk and disorderly when he mouthed off against Jews. Andy Young, it happens, was giving an on-the-record interview to the Los Angeles Sentinel. A presumably sober, though not an orderly diatribe in defense of Big Box Wal-Mart, his employer and exploiter of the working emigre.

Mel was promptly pilloried and persistently criticized--even his apology was scorned by the press and mauled by the media.

But Andy Young, big city mayor, civil rights stalwart, U.N. Ambassador, statesman, pastor, businessman and humanitarian has so far been given a free ride for his vicious and calculated commentary on ethnic emporia and their products. Is this an example of the vaunted liberal media bias, or simply a display of fear to call a spade a spade when the death card is dealt by a person of that hue?

I see Andy Young as being very lucky right now that he is not rich, famous and White in America or he would do worse than lose his job as shill for Wal-Mart.

Wetlands Give UC Merced Growing Pains

As reported on today's LA TIMES:

"The year-old university has expansion plans but still lacks federal permission to build on 86 acres nearby that contain protected vernal pools.

With its first year tucked under its belt, the University of California Merced —
which cost more than $500 million and took nearly 20 years to plan —
still lacks federal permission to build on wetlands near the fledgling campus.
UC Merced is developing 105 acres as part of Phase I of the campus and
plans to build Phase II on 805 adjoining acres it purchased near Lake Yosemite.
But that second parcel includes 86 acres of federally protected wetlands.

Now, university officials are hoping for an environmental permit to destroy
the vernal pools on those wetlands and build, among other things,
institutes to study the environment and energy."

**********************************************
Apparently, The University of California believes it is better
to study the environment in books and buildings than in nature.

The Winner

When a real American hero dies, attention should be paid. So far, only the L.A. Times has lived up to its obligation.

Overstock

So we bought the house in Westchester in June and put our condo up for sale. Within three weeks, two other units in our ten-unit building were suddenly added to the market. This is an imitation that is not flattering.

Drunken Stupor

Mel Gibson's problem seems to me to be a persecution complex. His personal movie projects from the Man Without a Face, through Braveheart and The Passion of the Christ are all about good men who suffer from the cruelty of others.

And citing his inebriated diatribe at the time of his arrest seems irrelevant to either his driving or his career. The slogan in vino veritas is sheer nonsense. There is nothing about drunken behavior that speaks to the truth or the real character of the sober person. Who among us has not behaved badly when either stoned, angry or scared? And when we later realize what we did, the feeling of shame or remorse is sufficient proof that the things done under the influence of booze, anger or fear do not represent one's true nature.

Words are one thing, actions are something else again. Gibson, to my knowledge, has not supported the killing of innocent citizens in Iraq, Lebanon or Israel. I am holding my scorn for those Americans, Muslims and Israelites who soberly employ weapons of mass murder in their exercise of bigotry.

Yet, for all of them, their proclaimed excuse is self-defense. They all seem to share a persecution complex with another great warrior of the 20th Century, Adolph Hitler.

Which reminds me of the time I came upon a man crouched over a huddled woman in an alley, raining heavy blows to her head and bloodied face. As she cried and begged him to stop I heard him shout, "Stop it, Barbara! Don't do this to me!"

I got him off of her, but that's another story.