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My new Taki’s Magazine column:
by Steve Sailer
March 21, 2023
But while looking up examples of just how many eons Biden has been around—he entered the United States Senate a half century ago in 1973, serving with six solons born in the 1800s, including Sam Ervin (1896–1985), the Foghorn Leghorn-like star of that year’s Watergate hearing—I got diverted by the question of how far back into history you could go with the fewest handshake links.
What are handshake chains?
Back around 1900, a popular vaudeville song was “Let Me Shake the Hand that Shook the Hand of John L. Sullivan,” the last heavyweight bareknuckle boxing champion. In those days, people were apparently fascinated by the thought of being linked to the famous via a series of handshakes. This likely helps explain why on New Year’s Day 1907, over 8,500 members of the public lined up and shook the hand of president Theodore Roosevelt (which is the most 1907 thing I can imagine: Picture a sped-up silent movie of Teddy vigorously pumping the hands of the citizenry).
This obsession may sound strange today, but it’s rather like how Americans in 2000 were into playing the parlor game Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon to find the shortest path connecting another actor with the Footloose star via mutual appearances. For example:
John Wilkes Booth appeared in an 1863 production of ‘Macbeth’ with Louisa Lane Drew.
Louisa Lane Drew appeared in an 1896 production of ‘The Rivals’ with her grandson Lionel Barrymore.
Lionel Barrymore –> ‘Right Cross’ (1950) –> Kenneth Tobey.
Kenneth Tobey –> ‘Hero at Large’ (1980) –> Kevin Bacon.
Read the whole thing there.
English
Arabic
Chinese (Simplified)
Dutch
French
German
Hebrew
Hindi
Italian
Japanese
Korean
Persian
Polish
Portuguese
Russian
Spanish
Swedish
Turkish
Vietnamese
I’ve shaken hands with Pat Buchanan, who shook hands with Nixon, who shook hands with everyone (Mao, JFK, Eisenhower, etc.).
My dad shook hands with Sen. Joe McCarthy. On his deathbed, he shook my friend’s hand and said, “You just shook the hand of a man who shook Joe McCarthy’s hand.”
I’ve received Holy Communion from Avery Cardinal Dulles, son of Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, sometime disciple of Fr. Leonard Feeney, and later made a cardinal by Pope St. John Paul II.
OT: I see that the space-alien-looking thing in the Chicago mayor’s office has been voted out. How could one of our great cities have ever voted it in, in the first place? I hope things will improve under the next mayor.
Ack! Ack!
https://i.imgflip.com/1cbjy6.jpg
Something here about aliens wiggling their way into political office. Ilhan Omar is a front and center example: just here to damage the place in service to a home planet far away.
I always thought it was interesting to play the musicians’ version of this game. Since a lot of musicians have played with each other, how far in all sorts of Oddball different directions you could go and how many links it would take. You could probably hook up the Beatles to Mozart this way within a few links.
U.S. Blues Lyrics
[Verse 1]
Red and white, blue suede shoes
I'm Uncle Sam, how do you do?
Give me five, I'm still alive
Ain't no luck, I learned to duck
Check my pulse, it don't change
Stay seventy-two come shine or rain
Wave the flag, pop the bag
Rock the boat, skin the goat
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Verse 2]
I'm Uncle Sam, that's who I am
Been hiding out in a rock and roll band
Shake the hand that shook the hand of P.T. Barnum and Charlie Chan
Shine your shoes, light your fuse
Can you use them old U.S. Blues?
I'll drink your health, share your wealth
Run your life, steal your wife
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Bridge]
Back to back chicken shack
Son of a gun, better change your act
We're all confused, what's to lose?
You can call this song the United States Blues
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
My my my oh my my my my
Summertime done, come and gone, myReplies: @Achmed E. Newman
Steve,
I don’t think that stage appearances count in the “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” game.
If they do, I have a Kevin Bacon number of 2, since I have performed on stage with John Goodman (John went to my high school), and John of course has a Kevin Bacon number of 1.
I do, however, have a legit Erdös number of 6.
Churchill’s grandaughter to Churchill to Gladstone.
My Lame Claim to Fame, I am the most boring person you’ll ever meet?
Me > Historian David Irving > Albert Speer > Adolf Hitler.
Okay, I understand this game now, but I still disapprove.
I guess you can go to the 1500s at least.
That great pioneer in medical bacteriology, Louis Pasteur, who was instrumental in proving the role of pathogenic bacteria in infection, made a point of politely declining handshakes when introduced to a stranger or on meeting a friend or acquaintance.
OT — Scientists confirm the air covering East Palestine (Pennsylvania) is toxic. Pete Buttigieg has announced an immediate Jamaican vacation.*
Experts from Texas A&M and Carnegie Mellon University have been conducting their own air quality tests using a mobile testing unit in East Palestine.
They said that if the chemicals persist at the current levels, it could cause long-term health issues for residents, the researchers warned.
The finding is in direct contrast to the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) ongoing assurance that the air quality in the area is safe.
https://archive.is/ZI76O
*This part isn’t true.
The inspector general’s office is currently investigating him for excessive use of private planes. There’s a budget for cabinet secretaries to rent private planes as needed. But Buttigeig is way over budget and it’s only FebruaryReplies: @Corpse Tooth, @Art Deco, @tyrone
It's pretty much impossible for the chemicals to persist at the current levels unless they keep pumping in fresh ones. Most of the symptoms that are being described are characteristic of panic induced by mass hysteria.
The spill should be cleaned up but it's clear that there are people who are trying to make political hay out of this tragedy.Replies: @Known Fact
I don’t understand this game. I would love to be able to say “I’m the guy that came up with X,” or “I gave Y the idea for X,” or even “I once had a substantive discussion with Y.” I don’t understand “Y and I were once in the same elevator for ten seconds.” This is the triumph of the wordcel over the meatspace talking climber. Online you can correspond with people whose hands you could never shake.
I had a film buff friend in college that would always make interesting Six Degrees chains because he could always come up with links that included obscure movies, obscure actors, or obscure, small roles by Bacon or some other famous actor.
In fact a traveling researcher like Irving is more of a watershed. He’s talked to a ton of people related to his books, almost whoever was still alive in the 70s. It would be the evil version of adding, say, John Hersey or George Plimpton to your chain, and trumping the rest of the dinner party. (Physicist Dave’s point is similar because if you were a good student you could easily have had a teacher who was like a Feynman. In fact, Hugh Hewitt is both an academic and a radio host with consistently top guests, plus he served in governments and organizations with famous people. There are multipliers that throw the whole thing off.)
Okay, I understand this game now, but I still disapprove.
OT, but I strongly urge everyone to reaad this posting from last week by the Beijing Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:
Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.
It's basically China saying that they're done with taking US crap.
I have to say that while I have no love for China and would never want to live there, I'm very impressed with how they've played corporate America and our foreign elite rulers. Corporate America thought that they'd exploit China's workforce and environment while never letting them develop their own ability to manufacture. Instead, China stole their technology and know-how and created their own companies and economy.
Yes, there's massive corruption and shoddy quality control, but China is still a manufacturing powerhouse.
As to our foreign rulers, they assumed that China would be a repeat of 1990s Russia and generally what they do to every emerging market country, namely buy off the leaders, get the country into debt making them dependent on our banks for dollars and thus making Wall Street rich.
Instead, we went into debt to them. Granted, China is still dependent on the dollar, but they're pushing hard to break away. They must feel fairly confident that the dedollarization process is moving forward, or they'd never make that statement.
If the neocons had any level of self-awareness, they'd be extremely alarmed. But, of course, they don't.
What's even more alarming is that our intelligence services are bringing the expertise they developed in staging color revolutions in other countries to our domestic politics.
My dad shook hands with Sen. Joe McCarthy. On his deathbed, he shook my friend's hand and said, "You just shook the hand of a man who shook Joe McCarthy's hand."
I've received Holy Communion from Avery Cardinal Dulles, son of Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, sometime disciple of Fr. Leonard Feeney, and later made a cardinal by Pope St. John Paul II.Replies: @silviosilver
Technically, every Catholic and Orthodox Christian has received communion from someone who, from someone who… all the way back to someone who received communion from Jesus Christ himself.
I’m just impressed that Alger Hiss lived to 92. I assume he had a lot of stress in middle age, so he probably should have been studied.
Shaking hands is dirty and should be phased out in our post-Covid world.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_HRNMCDihs
Once I'm shilling I guess I should mention that, as much as I dislike internet communications, I started a substack yesterday.It is here.https://open.substack.com/pub/ydydy.....
My twitter is herehttps://twitter.com/@renderuntocaesa.......And my youtube is herehttps://youtube.com/@YDYDY
.......
Most importantly, I am on twitter mainly to fuck their shit up, on substack because it was the only way to unsubscribe to emails I had accidentally subscribed to, and on youtube because it's possibly something I actually am supposed to do.It goes without saying that I stand by nothing written, recorded, thought, said, or done by anyone with my social security number and fingerprints. Hence, my freedom to write, record, thinks, say and do as pleases me in the moment. And may God have mercy on my soul.
I don't think that stage appearances count in the "Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon" game.
If they do, I have a Kevin Bacon number of 2, since I have performed on stage with John Goodman (John went to my high school), and John of course has a Kevin Bacon number of 1.
I do, however, have a legit Erdös number of 6.Replies: @AndrewR
Well motion pictures didn’t exist in the 1860s so it’s not exactly fair to blame Wilkes Booth for not appearing in one. The second most famous thing about him (besides maybe his profession) is that he didn’t live very long after he did what he’s most famous for. Even today lots of great actors do “old-fashioned” theater, even if it’s not as popular as it once was.
It’s a lame claim to fame.
Somehow reminds me of “third generation holocaust survivor”.
In the early 80s I shook hands with a man who’d met Joe Orton (1933-1967) in Morocco in 1966. I probably should have washed it afterwards.
Around the same time I shook hands with John Peel (1939-2004), who connects to all kinds of figures in music and British media. In his autobiography he claimed to have shook hands with JFK in Dallas on November 22 1963.
This is the Tina Fey style low-key funniest and most quietly relevant reply to this thread.
Well, wait a minute, one of those people is dishonestly laying claim to money and power, and the other is just trying to be interesting.
In her concession speech she was quoted as saying:
Ack! Ack!
My father was born about the same time as the death of mother Jones, the famous labor activist, for whom the liberal magazine mother Jones was named.. mother Jones was born about the same time as the death of James Madison, the former president and the father of the Constitution, who was born before the United States was actually formed
Update: One of them died. https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/08/us/john-tyler-grandson-death-trnd/index.html
The strong law and order candidate, Vallas got almost twice number of votes as the mildly law and order candidate. About 135K to 75 K So there’s hope. But the Chicago and N Illinois jews are determined to destroy the city and suburbs using their black criminal storm troopers sooo Vallas could be defeated and the destruction of the city by black and brown criminals could continue.
That’s what happened in the recent Los Angeles mayoral election. White man Caruso pro police anti crime actually had a real job lost to the Jewish candidate black woman Karen Bass. Anti police anti White never had a real job in her life went off to Cuba to train with the communist Venceremos brigade right after high school.
The Los Angeles Jewish Journal advocated for Bass. Advocated equity policing aka arrest and convict as many Whites as blacks. As if there are enough Whites left in town to arrest and convict. Los Angeles Jews are behind Soros DA Gascon all the way. That obscenity Katzenberg poured last minute millions into Bass to ensure election of an anti White anti police pro black criminal trained in Cuba communist black woman.
There are enough “ naturally conservative family values hard working church going “ LOL Hispanics to have defeated the Jewish puppet Bass. But in America racism rules everything. Non Whites won’t vote for a White man. Neither will liberal and Jewish Whites unless the White man is gay.
Katzenberg and Jewish puppet Mayor Bass are currently advocating for continuation of Measure H. Measure H was approved 10 years ago and is due to expire this year. Jews liberals and blacks want to renew measure H.
Measure H provides 350 million a year to ponder the problem of homelessness Not to house the homeless but to pay grant grifters and con artist critters to sit in offices thinking about homelessness. 350 million a year for ten years is more than 3 billion dollars down into the sewer of non profit grifting
I’m sure measure H will pass. Mail in votes you know, same way that disaster Cuba trained Bass won all her elections.
Strong 1-Gerald Ford when President, Margaret Mead, Oscar Robertson, Charles Koch,Robert Nozick,Thomas Szasz, Red Rodney , McCoy Tyner,Mark Murphy(scatted my name at concert), Tommy Emanuel, Everett Vokes, Jerome Corsi during Swift boat deal,George Will, John Stossel,Al McGuire, Ben Felson, Jerome Wiot, Roger Moore,Mario Lemieux. Don Donoher,Martha Di
Laurentis,Mike Singleterry , cousin of Maz who partied with him night of home run, close cousin of Joe Montana,Lou Holtz, son of Deeds Carillon dude in Dayton, Eleftherios Mamounas, William Brand, Lawrence Einhorn,Alan Lichter,David Hedison, Dennis Rodman, Charles Smith(Knicks), Howie Long, Eddie Sutton,Neil Armstrong, Milton Friedman,Marilyn vos Savant and husband Robert Jarvik, Noble Fowler, Henry Heimlich of maneuver, Alex Fraser, Joel Spring, David Osterfeld,Ellen and Jeff Paul, Murray Rothbard,Eric Milne,PJ Oroark, Olajuwon and Karl Malone, Scott Wentworth, Mr T, Frank Gorshin, John von Ohlen, Guido di Leone, Orrin Keepnews, Livingston Taylor,Andrew Klavan, Joe Lovano, George Sledge, James Brown football host, Dick Gallagher(recruited Jim Brown for Paul Brown), Pete Elliot, Ara Parseghian
Weaker1-saw Rex Harrison in rerun ofMy Fair Lady, saw Willie Mays make silly error,
saw Pete Rose play as rookie , saw Frank Robinson and Vada Pinson and Juan Marichal play,saw original Globes(not Wilt) play , saw Steve Allen and Ray Charles play 2 weeks before they died .saw Albert Sabin and Norman Mailer lecture, saw Newt Gingrich at a party, passed MJ in hall when at Ortho for broken foot, saw Bird play Moncrief in college, saw Magic playWalton in San Diego, saw Crosby play in Stanley cup finals, attended rallies for McGovern, Bush 2, Trump, saw Darrin McGavin forget line in small play, seen Lionel Hampton and Modern Jazz Quartet and Jimmy mcGriff and Bobby Hutcherson and Nat Adderly and Joey di Francesco and other jazz people in small venues, David Morse , Oprah(twice), Gene Siskel , Dick Vermeil, was at 50 greatest NBA player All Star game(West and Shaq no shows as was Maravich(dead)) as well as ceremony at Football HOF when 100 living players attended( Jim Brown was no Show)
Missed 1~was invited to party at Charles Finley (A’s)house but didn’t go, regret it now
Solid 2( not counting from above)Bo Schembechler,Joe Paterno, Warren Bennis, Scott Glenn, Mies van der Rohe, Tommy Glavine, Gretzky
Not bad for a kid from a small town in Ohio
Experts from Texas A&M and Carnegie Mellon University have been conducting their own air quality tests using a mobile testing unit in East Palestine.
They said that if the chemicals persist at the current levels, it could cause long-term health issues for residents, the researchers warned.
The finding is in direct contrast to the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) ongoing assurance that the air quality in the area is safe.
https://archive.is/ZI76O
*This part isn't true.Replies: @Alden, @Jack D
Buttigeig is busy being a devoted mommy to his baby. There are 2 kinds of government departments. Glamorous and practical. Streets sewers sanitation building maintenance agriculture and transportation are all practical. Need to be headed by some one promoted from the ranks. How can a person whose experience is gay activism and small town mayor know anything about transportation in a huge country like this?
The inspector general’s office is currently investigating him for excessive use of private planes. There’s a budget for cabinet secretaries to rent private planes as needed. But Buttigeig is way over budget and it’s only February
Half of the answer can be found in your question. The other half is thus: Buttigieg began his life as a cipher serving as an intelligence officer in the USNR. It would not be surprising if Buttigieg spent time as a fuck-puppet in the Antinous cult within the USN and USMC that is comprised of captains and flag officers. The Antinous cult networks with similar circles in military and civilian intelligence. After his stint as a Rhodes Scholar (pipeline for Anglo-American managerial elite) at Oxford (MI6), Buttigieg signed on as a consultant at McKinsey & Company (CIA). From there he took the media route to a gig in municipal politics to hone his act. During this time he undoubtedly became a fuck-puppet for the homosexual big-money donors to the Democratic Party.
Pete Buttigieg's homosexuality and shadow state status makes him an ideal political operative for Rainbow Flag America.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.Replies: @J.Ross, @bomag, @SafeNow, @Citizen of a Silly Country, @Harry Baldwin
I don’t want to see the world Tonghized but I totally agree that American unipolarity has been a complete disaster, including to the United States. We were like a bad child with enough inheritance money to start and extricate himself from trouble. This is the fitting response to our neocon destroyer elite.
Around the same time I shook hands with John Peel (1939-2004), who connects to all kinds of figures in music and British media. In his autobiography he claimed to have shook hands with JFK in Dallas on November 22 1963.Replies: @J.Ross
Imagine being born Ravenscroft, wanting to be famous, and concluding that your name should be Peel.
https://faroutmagazine.co.uk/john-peel-met-john-f-kennedy/
Can we get LA on that program?
Something here about aliens wiggling their way into political office. Ilhan Omar is a front and center example: just here to damage the place in service to a home planet far away.
I treated the musician Prince for a broken hand, so we shook hands after a fashion. He doubtless shook hands with countless artists and performers. I went to high school with Robert F Kennedy’s daughter Kathleen and my high school girlfriend was the niece of NYC mayor John Lindsay. I’m not certain how deep that takes me, but likely pretty far.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.Replies: @J.Ross, @bomag, @SafeNow, @Citizen of a Silly Country, @Harry Baldwin
Well, yes, but no one can survive scrutiny today.
Behind every US action was a Zelensky et al desperately pleading for such action.
As you note, China is no great shakes (heh), mainly using economics to weasel around the world; and China is arguably the largest beneficiary from the world order set up and maintained by the US post WWII.
The late queen[‘s] all-purpose greeting was: “Busy as ever?”
When Lord Palmerston (1784 – 1865) was campaigning for election he would greet people he felt he had met before with “How is the old complaint?”
(Why m’Lord was campaigning for a seat in the House of Commons is left as an exercise for the reader.)
I once talked to a German girl on a pupil exchange. She mentioned that her father worked in a university library, and that he had shaken hands with the German President when he opened their new building. “Ah” says I “then your Dad had shaken a hand that had doubtless shaken hands with the Queen and so a short chain of handshakes must cover people by the millions.” Whereupon she and I solemnly shook hands.
I’m not a great shaker of hands but in my twenties I knew a bloke who went on to be Prime Minister. If he and I ever did shake hands that’s a pretty short route to Her Majesty. And I’ve certainly shaken hands with lots of people who will certainly have shaken hands with the late Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, late husband of Her Majesty. I did have an old friend who once shook hands with Senator JFK when my pal was a visiting fellow at MIT. That’s as close as I get to American royalty I expect.
So there's another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We'd have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.Replies: @slumber_j, @The Germ Theory of Disease, @yaqub the mad scientist, @Graham
When Lord Palmerston (1784 – 1865) was campaigning for election he would greet people he felt he had met before with "How is the old complaint?"
(Why m'Lord was campaigning for a seat in the House of Commons is left as an exercise for the reader.)
I once talked to a German girl on a pupil exchange. She mentioned that her father worked in a university library, and that he had shaken hands with the German President when he opened their new building. "Ah" says I "then your Dad had shaken a hand that had doubtless shaken hands with the Queen and so a short chain of handshakes must cover people by the millions." Whereupon she and I solemnly shook hands.
I'm not a great shaker of hands but in my twenties I knew a bloke who went on to be Prime Minister. If he and I ever did shake hands that's a pretty short route to Her Majesty. And I've certainly shaken hands with lots of people who will certainly have shaken hands with the late Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, late husband of Her Majesty. I did have an old friend who once shook hands with Senator JFK when my pal was a visiting fellow at MIT. That's as close as I get to American royalty I expect.Replies: @dearieme
An ancestor was a great friend of The Sage of Chelsea, Thomas Carlyle (1795 –1881). Which is how I come to own Tom’s smoking cap.
So there’s another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We’d have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.
I hope and expect that the young man survived the war, because the book wound up in a used bookshop in Texas, and not in the mud and blood of the Somme.
Balgarnie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Henry_Balgarnie) was the inspiration for Mr Chips in the book Goodbye, Mr. Chips.
I bought it from my local second-hand bookshop and googled the name on the flyleaf.
For me, games like this or Six Degrees are only fun if you have one or two random links in the chain. For example, the story that Physicist Freeman Dyson can connect himself to Napoleon through some random neighbor lady is mildly interesting, but it wouldn’t be much at all if the “old lady” he shook hands with had been someone like the Queen or Thatcher.
I had a film buff friend in college that would always make interesting Six Degrees chains because he could always come up with links that included obscure movies, obscure actors, or obscure, small roles by Bacon or some other famous actor.
My father shook hands with Groucho Marx, my brother with Ronald Reagan, and I with Senator William Proxmire. I have an ancestry line making Joseph of Arimathea my 54th great grandfather. Joseph and Nicodemus took the body of Jesus Christ down from the cross and placed it in the tomb Joseph had built for himself.
In the same way, every bullfighter has been made a bullfighter (ha tomado la alternativa) by a bullfighter who was made a bullfighter by…all the way back to the first modern bullfighter Pedro Romero. (Who had his portrait painted by Goya.)
Steve Sailer is right about Paul McCartney in my case: my late friend Bob Freeman was for many years the Beatles’ official photographer, so I’m one handshake away from that lovable mop top.
My very Concord, MA father-in-law’s great uncle Edward used to like to say he’d sat in the lap of a man who sat in the lap of George Washington. In both cases when they were boys, I’m pretty sure…
Let’s see, Timothy Leary and Bill Brock, Republican senator from Tennessee. That ought to cast a wide net! I also briefly met Ed Sullivan in 1969 and got his autograph, and I don’t think I shook his hand, but it’s possible. Sullivan was very nice to a bunch of annoying American teenagers overseas.
So there's another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We'd have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.Replies: @slumber_j, @The Germ Theory of Disease, @yaqub the mad scientist, @Graham
Mine is easily a first edition of Joyce’s Ulysses, bought at the time of its publication and somehow smuggled into the US (where it was then illegal because obscene) by my paternal grandmother’s first husband, a consumptive literary critic and WWI-era US Navy veteran named Schuyler Ashley. (I also have his Navy sidearm, a Smith & Wesson .32 Model 1 1/2, which is a pretty weird revolver and really cool in its own right.)
That Lord Palmerston quote is fantastic by the way. Thanks!
A message from the future!
Incidentally, on March 21, 2003, we unleashed “shock and awe” on Baghdad.
“Shock and awe” was supposed to be the opening salvo of “Operation Iraqi Freedom” but the timetable was disrupted by a strike against a “target of opportunity” (a bunker where Saddam was supposedly spending the night) just before dawn on the 20th (Iraqi time). American troops began swarming into the country a few hours later. By the time we got around to bombing the crap out of Baghdad, the invasion was well under way.
Those were heady days for the neocons.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.Replies: @J.Ross, @bomag, @SafeNow, @Citizen of a Silly Country, @Harry Baldwin
At the height of their popularity in 1959, there were more than two dozen “cowboy” programs on each week. At least six of them were directly or indirectly connected with Wyatt Earp! The cowboy culture – – – and let’s be even more specific – – The Gunfight at the OK Corral (all 31 seconds of it), had a profound influence upon American culture. It is not crazy to speculate that this 31-second event accounted for the fighting ethos of the U.S. Wait I’m not done. Troll me, LOL me, but if Ukraine causes Armageddon, it might be the case that The OK Corral resulted in the end of the world.
Harvey Weinstein to some hot actresses… and a potted plant.
My doctor as a baby was also W. C. Fields’ doctor, or had been. You figure it out…
I used to work with an Englishman whose dad was a personal friend of Winston Churchill. As it was our habit to shake hands all around after a gig wrapped, I can march back in time two or three handshakes from Winnie and beyond.
As for student-teacher chains, the most enduring has to be the unbroken link of Catholic bishops back to the original Apostles and thus The Big Guy himself.
Surely Winnie visited Oz at some point...
Mine goes: Wally Shirra > Werner von Braun > Adolf Hitler.
Interesting exercise, but it sounds like one of those things that don’t need to be too many degrees of separation before you have netted everyone on Earth.
Talking to some big shot about one’s idea could be a better claim to fame were the guy to actually take take one’s advice. I shook Ron Paul’s hand at a gathering during the campaign for my State’s GOP primary in early ’12. This was not supposed to be anything but goodbye greetings after his good speech.
However, I told Ron Paul “If you want to win [REDACTED], you’ve got to talk about illegal immigration.” All around heard it, so Dr. Paul felt obligated to say something which was about “I’m all for law and order at the border”, etc. He’s not a liar, mind you, but he wasn’t as cognizant of the real problems of the invasion as he is now, a decade later.
Imagine if he’d taken that to heart! This was 2012, mind you, 3 years before Trump came down the escalator.
Coulda’ been a great shake. Instead, I settle for a chocolate malt occasionally.
Old-school Libertarians are pro-open border. They argue that it would not be such a problem if we didn't have a welfare state. That's wrong for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it would be far easier to close our borders than to dismantle our welfare state.
So there's another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We'd have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.Replies: @slumber_j, @The Germ Theory of Disease, @yaqub the mad scientist, @Graham
A very interesting and touching (though not historically important) thing which I used to own but later gave away to someone joining the Marines, was a small pocket-size leather-bound volume of Thomas Carlyle’s book of lectures on heroes and the heroic. On the inside leaf was an inscription dedicated 1915 in beautiful script, from a father giving the book to his son who was clearly about to ship off to fight in the Great War, eloquently exhorting him to be brave in the face of danger.
I hope and expect that the young man survived the war, because the book wound up in a used bookshop in Texas, and not in the mud and blood of the Somme.
Forgot a pretty good one: made out with a girl who at least kissed Paul Newman
Vallas has a rep for being ineffective. His great crimefighting plan includes “after school activities.”
The other guy is a leftist negro nut. He claims that he’s spent ” millions” on violence prevention.🙄
Hitler>Ludendorff> Kaiser Wilhelm>Queen Victoria>some Saxe Coburg nobility> G.Frederic Handel> …
I guess you can go to the 1500s at least.
These chains are getting broken by these fist-bumpers we’ve got now. Whenever anyone tries that, I’ll just get them to shake hands and tell ’em “you’ll be all right.”
This is a great one. I didn’t ask for these feels.
Mine’s pretty unimpressive: Barry Melrose- Wayne Gretzky- Gordie Howe…
“ Shake the hand
That shook the hand
Of PT Barnum
And Charlie Chan…”
The greatest shakes are malts from Whitey’s in the quad cities.
The least great shakes are from drug/alcohol withdrawal.
Should the date in the byline be March 1?
One of Star Trek’s finest episodes was the weirdly impressionist alien restaging of the OK Corral, leading to one of my favorite all-time lines, “Well then, we’re just not going to be at the OK Corral at 5 o’clock.” See how that worked out. So the aliens apparently shared your belief that this incident was somehow critical.
I had a high school teacher who argued that the western films made at any point in time distilled our national mood at that time — for one essay he let me use the 1968 Trek episode to make some points about the Vietnam era. (F Troop might have been a stretch). Westerns have pretty much vanished so what does that say about our national mood? I guess there’s Deadwood, and the ill-fated flick Alec Baldwin was trying to make.
So there's another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We'd have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.Replies: @slumber_j, @The Germ Theory of Disease, @yaqub the mad scientist, @Graham
My gg grandfather’s diary from the Civil War- he discusses various battles and getting wounded and captured.
Wow, I think all I’ve got is Jeannine Pirro — where does that get me?
The standard for being the strong law and order candidate right now is not hating the police and wanting blacks prosecuted when they commit violent crime.
As for student-teacher chains, the most enduring has to be the unbroken link of Catholic bishops back to the original Apostles and thus The Big Guy himself.Replies: @Stan Adams
Certain tribes in Australia shake penises instead of hands.
Surely Winnie visited Oz at some point…
Experts from Texas A&M and Carnegie Mellon University have been conducting their own air quality tests using a mobile testing unit in East Palestine.
They said that if the chemicals persist at the current levels, it could cause long-term health issues for residents, the researchers warned.
The finding is in direct contrast to the US Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) ongoing assurance that the air quality in the area is safe.
https://archive.is/ZI76O
*This part isn't true.Replies: @Alden, @Jack D
The temperature in my area fell by 10 degrees last night. If this trend persists, we’ll reach absolute zero by year end.
It’s pretty much impossible for the chemicals to persist at the current levels unless they keep pumping in fresh ones. Most of the symptoms that are being described are characteristic of panic induced by mass hysteria.
The spill should be cleaned up but it’s clear that there are people who are trying to make political hay out of this tragedy.
My brother used to bowl with Nixon’s niece and got invited to the white house where he briefly met Menachem Begin. I shook hands with Nixon’s brother and had dinner with them. So whether you count Nixon’s brother or mine as starting point I’ve got some interesting degrees of separation from politics.
Entertainment I am one degree of separation from Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris through different people. Athletics my grandfather played pro baseball so one or two degrees from some famous athletes.
https://twitter.com/nypost/status/1630211015664123906?t=frhhdRRAS006qXkfJz871Q&s=19Replies: @TWS, @George o' da Jungle
Just another reason to never eat food in China.
Anon[229] writes:
The Grateful Dead noted that handshake link in U.S. Blues. They mentioned P.T. Barnum and Charlie Chan and would probably get canceled for that in San Francisco these days.
U.S. Blues Lyrics
[Verse 1]
Red and white, blue suede shoes
I’m Uncle Sam, how do you do?
Give me five, I’m still alive
Ain’t no luck, I learned to duck
Check my pulse, it don’t change
Stay seventy-two come shine or rain
Wave the flag, pop the bag
Rock the boat, skin the goat
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Verse 2]
I’m Uncle Sam, that’s who I am
Been hiding out in a rock and roll band
Shake the hand that shook the hand of P.T. Barnum and Charlie Chan
Shine your shoes, light your fuse
Can you use them old U.S. Blues?
I’ll drink your health, share your wealth
Run your life, steal your wife
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Bridge]
Back to back chicken shack
Son of a gun, better change your act
We’re all confused, what’s to lose?
You can call this song the United States Blues
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
My my my oh my my my my
Summertime done, come and gone, my
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eViobWoVLJoReplies: @Name Withheld
That’s what Ann Coulter said when I insisted upon shaking her hand after recognizing her distinctive voice from acrossnthe rook in the Met. She was incognito in hat, glasses, etc, but the moment I hear her voice I – still across the room facing the other way announced – “ANN COULTER!” before spinning around to tell her that I was an admirer if not exactly a fawning fan.
I subsequently explained to her that her anti-handshake view likely had something to do with the fact that she was expected to shake many many hands, and MUCH to do with the fact that she was a woman, and handshaking is primarily a male activity.
Once I’m shilling I guess I should mention that, as much as I dislike internet communications, I started a substack yesterday.
It is here.
https://open.substack.com/pub/ydydy
…..
My twitter is here
https://twitter.com/@renderuntocaesa
…….
And my youtube is here
https://youtube.com/
…….
Most importantly, I am on twitter mainly to fuck their shit up, on substack because it was the only way to unsubscribe to emails I had accidentally subscribed to, and on youtube because it’s possibly something I actually am supposed to do.
It goes without saying that I stand by nothing written, recorded, thought, said, or done by anyone with my social security number and fingerprints. Hence, my freedom to write, record, thinks, say and do as pleases me in the moment. And may God have mercy on my soul.
This life only?
A previous life, I was crucified next to Jesus Christ. No handshake obviously, but he gave me a friendly nod.
Whatever “improvements” take place will probably be cosmetic, though hope springs eternal.
My Chicago Alderman Leon Depres came into the family business once in the 1970s; he knew Trotsky, Rivera and Kahlo!
Had a elementary school substitute teacher in the 1960s that said Al Capone gave her a ride as a child.
Saw University of Chicago physicist Robert J. Moon with an acquaintance who actually talked to him in the 1980s. He said he met and talked to Winston Churchill. Moon was one of the people who signed off on the letter to the President urging him not to drop the A-bomb.
https://www.atomicarchive.com/resources/documents/manhattan-project/szilard-petition.html#:~:text=In%20view%20of%20the%20foregoing,at%20the%20Chicago%20Metallurgical%20Laboratory.
Justice Holmes, mentioned in your article, makes possible some really short connections to the distant past. His last law clerk was a speaker at some sort of cruise, possibly National Review, somewhere around 2015. One shake with him connects to a man whose father (Holmes Sr.) was connected to everyone important in New England in the 1840’s. Justice Holmes as a boy knew men who had fought in the Revolution. Probably knew Melville and Emerson and Hawthorne too.
That date can't be right. Justice Holmes left the Supreme Court in early 1932. His last law clerk must have been born no later than about 1910. I can't imagine a 105-year old giving a speech on a cruise.
It's pretty much impossible for the chemicals to persist at the current levels unless they keep pumping in fresh ones. Most of the symptoms that are being described are characteristic of panic induced by mass hysteria.
The spill should be cleaned up but it's clear that there are people who are trying to make political hay out of this tragedy.Replies: @Known Fact
What goes up must come down. Dioxin breaks down extremely slowly and collects in the food chain. And if your home was suddenly worth $0.00 you might understandably want to make some “political hay” out of it
The inspector general’s office is currently investigating him for excessive use of private planes. There’s a budget for cabinet secretaries to rent private planes as needed. But Buttigeig is way over budget and it’s only FebruaryReplies: @Corpse Tooth, @Art Deco, @tyrone
“How can a person whose experience is gay activism …”
Half of the answer can be found in your question. The other half is thus: Buttigieg began his life as a cipher serving as an intelligence officer in the USNR. It would not be surprising if Buttigieg spent time as a fuck-puppet in the Antinous cult within the USN and USMC that is comprised of captains and flag officers. The Antinous cult networks with similar circles in military and civilian intelligence. After his stint as a Rhodes Scholar (pipeline for Anglo-American managerial elite) at Oxford (MI6), Buttigieg signed on as a consultant at McKinsey & Company (CIA). From there he took the media route to a gig in municipal politics to hone his act. During this time he undoubtedly became a fuck-puppet for the homosexual big-money donors to the Democratic Party.
Pete Buttigieg’s homosexuality and shadow state status makes him an ideal political operative for Rainbow Flag America.
A previous life, I was crucified next to Jesus Christ. No handshake obviously, but he gave me a friendly nod.Replies: @Corpse Tooth, @njguy73
Yeah, I remember you. I was the Roman soldier with the spear.
The inspector general’s office is currently investigating him for excessive use of private planes. There’s a budget for cabinet secretaries to rent private planes as needed. But Buttigeig is way over budget and it’s only FebruaryReplies: @Corpse Tooth, @Art Deco, @tyrone
About 100,000 people live in South Bend. It’s not a small town. (He was a meh mayor and the homicide rate went up on his watch). Buttigieg has used homosexuality for marketing; he was never active in any gay organizations and didn’t make a public point of his homosexuality until he had been in office for several years. (He dated women in his early 20s).
He definitely is the beneficiary of organizational activism even if he was not himself an activist.
I shook hands with William F Buckley once. I’m sure that shortens my “handshake chains” quite a bit…
When I was Private Bankstering I shook hands with two Heads of State and around ten senior politicians. A number of billionaires at least one of whom had well documented (and very generous) interactions with Jeffrey Epstein- God knows where that one leads.
Do hugs count? Alger Hiss is my third cousin on my mom’s side. In addition to working for Holmes, he also attended the Yalta Conference with lots of glad handing all around I imagine. Along with FDR and Churchill, there was Stalin with close connections to Lenin and Trotsky. Does sleeping with Frida Kahlo count?
I am one handshake away from Brian Wilson of the Beach Boys and many other rock figures including Chuck Berry. As a lad I shook the hands of three Illinois governor’s (Ogalvie, Walker and Thompson). So there to presidents.
I once shook hands with Chuck D of Public Enemy, that one must lead to some oddball Marcus Garvey/civil rights linkages. Also Fred Schneider of the B-52s; Lawd knows where else that hand has been.
If their house is really worth zero then they should sue the railroad for damages. Printing alarmist stories in the tabloids is sure not helping their property values.
Former president John Tyler was born in 1790. He had a son when he was fairly old. His son married a young woman when he was pretty old and had a son 1920s-1930s. This grandson, I think, was alive in the 1990s maybe 2000s. So three generations spanned three centuries.
I was probably too young for handshakes at the time, but I remember meeting a relative who was born before the Civil War, and I’m not even all that old. The past isn’t as far back as many think.
https://twitter.com/nypost/status/1630211015664123906?t=frhhdRRAS006qXkfJz871Q&s=19Replies: @TWS, @George o' da Jungle
This reminds me of this guy https://www.nytimes.com/2020/10/07/us/lyon-gardiner-tyler-jr-dead.html
I don’t think of myself as that old but my father married later on life, as did his father. Even though I was born in the 60’s, my grandfather was born in 1884. Many of my friends that are my age have grandparents that were born around the same year as my dad. My grandmother was born in Norway in 1894 and as a child sang in a school choir to King Haakon VII of Norway.
Yes, fine by all means sue the railroad. But hold your breath in the meantime, and maybe this isn’t the best time to get pregnant around there either
So there's another game: what historically interesting things do you own by passing down through the family? We'd have to exclude plutocrats, aristocrats, and royalty from the game if it is to be interesting.Replies: @slumber_j, @The Germ Theory of Disease, @yaqub the mad scientist, @Graham
I have William H Balgarnie’s copy of The Clouds of Aristophanes [ΑΡΙΣΤΟΦΑΝΟΥΣ ΝΕΦΕΛΑΙ], ed. C E Graves, Cambridge University Press, 1898, stamped in red ‘With Thacker, Spink and Co.’s Compliments’ and in purple ‘SPECIMEN COPY’.
Balgarnie (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Henry_Balgarnie) was the inspiration for Mr Chips in the book Goodbye, Mr. Chips.
I bought it from my local second-hand bookshop and googled the name on the flyleaf.
The inspector general’s office is currently investigating him for excessive use of private planes. There’s a budget for cabinet secretaries to rent private planes as needed. But Buttigeig is way over budget and it’s only FebruaryReplies: @Corpse Tooth, @Art Deco, @tyrone
Butt-plug has played every crisis about as poorly as could be played ……..of course this means the demoncrats will want him for higher office.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.Replies: @J.Ross, @bomag, @SafeNow, @Citizen of a Silly Country, @Harry Baldwin
I saw that too. It’s a remarkable document. Outside of a declaration of war, I’ve never seen a statement so explicit, especially coming out of the East which isn’t known for being straight-forward.
It’s basically China saying that they’re done with taking US crap.
I have to say that while I have no love for China and would never want to live there, I’m very impressed with how they’ve played corporate America and our foreign elite rulers. Corporate America thought that they’d exploit China’s workforce and environment while never letting them develop their own ability to manufacture. Instead, China stole their technology and know-how and created their own companies and economy.
Yes, there’s massive corruption and shoddy quality control, but China is still a manufacturing powerhouse.
As to our foreign rulers, they assumed that China would be a repeat of 1990s Russia and generally what they do to every emerging market country, namely buy off the leaders, get the country into debt making them dependent on our banks for dollars and thus making Wall Street rich.
Instead, we went into debt to them. Granted, China is still dependent on the dollar, but they’re pushing hard to break away. They must feel fairly confident that the dedollarization process is moving forward, or they’d never make that statement.
If the neocons had any level of self-awareness, they’d be extremely alarmed. But, of course, they don’t.
I remember, well, sitting on my father’s knee; I have a picture of him at the knee of the nephew of R.E. Lee; Gen’l Lee’s father, Harry, whom he barely knew, knew and hated Thomas Jefferson, the feeling being mutual; Tom knew a lot of people.
Maybe it would be more impressive to say Harry Lee paid a debt to George Washington with a check that bounced.
It’s the best I can do. I wish I knew some ballplayers or somebody.
Gee whiz no one has mentioned any athletic chains. But maybe because they wouldn’t be very hard. Like getting back to Walter Camp.
In a pick-up game in Berkeley in 1997, when I was a deadeye shooter, I passed up all my shots to feed this 6’10” Aussie who I thought would dominate the game and keep us on the court for a long time. But he missed every single shot he took, and we lost. He sheepishly apologized, I told him he owed me one, and he nodded. So when I heard he’d hooked up with a billionaire and become GM of the Nets, I called in the chip. You can probably guess the rest. Not only did Prokhorov shake my hand, he promised to pass on my advice that nobody would care if SF got nuked.
Justice Holmes, mentioned in your article, makes possible some really short connections to the distant past. His last law clerk was a speaker at some sort of cruise, possibly National Review, somewhere around 2015.
That date can’t be right. Justice Holmes left the Supreme Court in early 1932. His last law clerk must have been born no later than about 1910. I can’t imagine a 105-year old giving a speech on a cruise.
Well, I once shook the hand of Dave Butz at a waterfowl hunting event (we were hunting geese). Dude had huge hands. Dave Butz was a defensive lineman for the (then St. Louis) Cardinals and the Washington Redskins (I refuse to refer to them as the “Commanders”). He played from 1973 to 1988, and won 2 Super Bowl rings (he showed me the one he was wearing from the 1982 Super Bowl win, the famous Redskins-Dolphins game where John Riggins ran off left tackle, broke through Miami CB Don McNeal’s attempted tackle at the line of scrimmage and rumbled 43 yards for the game clinching touchdown).
Since Dave Butz was an All-Pro DT during his career and played 15 years, then I have plus 1 shook the hands of many famous NFL players and coaches of that era (and probably plus 2 of many from the prior era).
A previous life, I was crucified next to Jesus Christ. No handshake obviously, but he gave me a friendly nod.Replies: @Corpse Tooth, @njguy73
What a way to spend your Easter vacation.
U.S. Blues Lyrics
[Verse 1]
Red and white, blue suede shoes
I'm Uncle Sam, how do you do?
Give me five, I'm still alive
Ain't no luck, I learned to duck
Check my pulse, it don't change
Stay seventy-two come shine or rain
Wave the flag, pop the bag
Rock the boat, skin the goat
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Verse 2]
I'm Uncle Sam, that's who I am
Been hiding out in a rock and roll band
Shake the hand that shook the hand of P.T. Barnum and Charlie Chan
Shine your shoes, light your fuse
Can you use them old U.S. Blues?
I'll drink your health, share your wealth
Run your life, steal your wife
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
[Bridge]
Back to back chicken shack
Son of a gun, better change your act
We're all confused, what's to lose?
You can call this song the United States Blues
[Chorus]
Wave that flag, wave it wide and high
Summertime done, come and gone, my, oh, my
My my my oh my my my my
Summertime done, come and gone, myReplies: @Achmed E. Newman
Song doesn’t start till 01:20:
Some interesting photos on the inside cover of the old album I have ......
I shook hands with someone who shook hands with Paul Mokeski.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eViobWoVLJoReplies: @Name Withheld
A good version I have not heard before. I think the best version is on Steal Your Face – 1976.
Some interesting photos on the inside cover of the old album I have ……
Football coaches have coaching trees.
Most important is how many handshakes to link to the leader of Wakanda!
If he was straight he would not be transportation secretary.
He definitely is the beneficiary of organizational activism even if he was not himself an activist.
A lot of those people have farms and nobody is going to want food which grew in that soil.
Interestingly, the character of Foghorn Leghorn was based on that of a fictional Southern senator, Senator Claghorn of the Fred Allen show.
When you reach 50 or 60 years of age, you realize that historical events that seemed quite remote earlier in your life no longer seem so. For example, I am now in my 70s and while I don’t think of my life as having been terribly long, only three such life spans would bring us to the earliest days of this nation. I suppose that’s the point of this handshake game, which I otherwise don’t find interesting.
I told Ron Paul “If you want to win [REDACTED], you’ve got to talk about illegal immigration.
Old-school Libertarians are pro-open border. They argue that it would not be such a problem if we didn’t have a welfare state. That’s wrong for a number of reasons, not the least of which is that it would be far easier to close our borders than to dismantle our welfare state.
As of 2017, President John Tyler, born in the 18th century, still had two living grandsons: https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2017-02-20/president-john-tyler-born-in-1790-still-has-2-living-grandsons
Update: One of them died. https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/08/us/john-tyler-grandson-death-trnd/index.html
My most famous handshake was not with a historical figure, but from the world of sports: the late, great Bobby Bowden (for non-sports fans, the longtime coach of Florida State football). Staying within the sports world, that undoubtedly links me to the four players in the Pro Football Hall of Fame (and every other player) he recruited and coached. In football, the counterpart to academic genealogy is called a “coaching tree,” and while I have not researched it, that links him to his mentors and pupils on that score, as well as every coach he gave the customary post-game handshake. (Coaches are promiscuous hand-shakers.)
It is also customary for champions of major professional and college sports to be invited to the White House, so while I have not researched to confirm this, if Coach Bowden had visited after either or both of his titles during the Clinton presidency, that would be my link to the stream of historical figures, and as far as my sensibilities will allow me to speculate as to whom Bill Clinton has touched.
Especially anyone who has any doubt as to which side Beijing is on in the conflict between the American Hegemon and the Eastern Allies in the war to liberate the Donbass.
The tl;dr excerpt:Uh, yeah. And they cite numerous, very specific examples.
The essay largely quotes Western sources: it is pretty hard to find many serious errors.
The Beijing regime is hardly without blemishes, and there are parts of the essay with which I myself disagree (for example, I am always glad when the US drops out of some UN-related scam!).
However, read it, and see how much of it you can really deny.
And see how true it rings to people around the world.Replies: @J.Ross, @bomag, @SafeNow, @Citizen of a Silly Country, @Harry Baldwin
The United States has developed a hegemonic playbook to stage “color revolutions”
What’s even more alarming is that our intelligence services are bringing the expertise they developed in staging color revolutions in other countries to our domestic politics.
Looks like our host already scooped me while I was typing!
I play a similar mindgame with major events, TV shows, fashions and so on from my teens. Stuff like Watergate is now, lets say, 52 years old but seems very much like part of our modern life. But go back another 52 years and you’re in WWI, the Spanish Flu and whatnot — 1918 seems so absolutely distant and archaic. We are as close to Green Acres or The Twilight Zone as they are to Archduke Ferdinand or Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle
In the town where I grew up, one of the graves in the cemetery was the doctor who pronounced Bonnie and Clyde dead. It ain’t quite like shaking George Washington’s hand, but I’ll take what I can get.
If I had crops or livestock in Central PA I’d be worried as well. Wonder if PA and NY are doing any testing
I didn’t shake hands with him, but I bought borscht and piroshki from Nick on University Ave in St Paul. Nick’s brother Pete sold a guitar to George Harrison in the other half of the duplex.
Here’s Pete with George and with Keith
Both Ronald Reagan and I made Walter Mondale laugh.
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_MCiIPA-cpGk/RpVOJrQietI/AAAAAAAAAZ0/Ihye9621R3c/s400/IMG_5349.JPGhttps://www.tcdailyplanet.net/wp-content/uploads/files/2014/March/img_0551_0.jpgHere's Pete with George and with KeithBoth Ronald Reagan and I made Walter Mondale laugh.Replies: @Reg Cæsar
Yes, those links got reversed.
Did you know that the wives who cheated on Harrison and Mick Fleetwood with their best friends were sisters? “She’s a must to a-Boyd…”
If we had a government, it would bring in hemp. Massively subsidize hemp farming. Not pot. Hemp cleans the soil. A generation of subsidized hemp farming and then you can return to potatoes.
I am a descendant of the Algonquin Indian chief Terramuggas and his daughter Rebecca (a convert to Christianity) who married a New England Puritan. The Puritan connection links me to a number of famous relatives because the Puritans and their descendants were ambitious, thinking that is what God wanted of them.
lll
That is pretty cool. He’s an interesting guy.