Post a true but little-known fact about someone famous, living or dead -- (Part 2)

Post a line from a movie & see if anyone knows what movie it's from -- (Part 2)

No fair using Google!

Name a song with "Baby" in the title

Baby Talk - Jan & Dean

Today is Lightnin' Hopkins' birthday

Samuel John "Lightnin" Hopkins (March 15, 1912 - January 30, 1982) was an American country blues singer, songwriter, guitarist, and occasional pianist, from Centerville, Texas.

Hopkins developed a deep appreciation for the "blues" at the age of 8, when he met Blind Lemon Jefferson at a church picnic in Buffalo, Texas.
That day, Hopkins felt the blues was "in him."

Hopkins began accompanying Jefferson on guitar at informal church gatherings.
Jefferson reputedly never let anyone play with him except young Hopkins, and Hopkins learned much from Jefferson at these gatherings.

It has been estimated that he recorded between eight hundred and a thousand songs in his career.

By the mid to late 1950s, his prodigious output of high-quality recordings had gained him a following among African-Americans and blues aficionados.

In 1959, the blues researcher Robert "Mack" McCormick contacted Hopkins, hoping to bring him to the attention of a broader musical audience in the folk revival.
McCormick presented Hopkins to integrated audiences first in Houston, and then in California.

He made his debut at Carnegie Hall on October 14, 1960, alongside Joan Baez and Pete Seeger, performing the spiritual "Mary Don't You Weep"

In 1960, he signed with Tradition Records.
The recordings which followed included his song "Mojo Hand" in 1960.

In 1968, Hopkins recorded the album "Free Form Patterns,' backed by the rhythm section of the psychedelic band "13th Floor Elevators."

Hopkins was Houston's poet-in-residence for 35 years.

He recorded more albums than any other bluesman.

Hopkins died of esophageal cancer in Houston on January 30, 1982, at the age of 69.
His obituary in the New York Times described him as "one of the great country blues singers and perhaps the greatest single influence on rock guitar players."

Where Did Trump's Record Inauguration Spending Go? - "It's Inexplicable"

ProPublica.org
March 14, 2018


Last month, the committee that ran President Donald Trump's inaugural festivities released basic details about it's revenues and spending.
Trump raised $107 million, almost twice the previous record, and spent $104 million.
The committee's tax filing showed that $26 million of the spending went to an event planning firm started in December by a friend of the first lady.

It's not clear how the firm spent that money, or how most of the money raised for the inauguration was used.
The tax filing doesn't show spending by subcontractors, nor is it required to do so.

In this week's episode of "Trump, Inc." we dig into the inauguration.
We've found that even experienced inaugural planners are baffled by the Trump committee's massive fundraising and spending operation.
We also noticed that two members of the inaugural committee have been convicted of financial crimes, and a third - the committee's treasurer - was reportedly an unindicted
co-conspirator in an accounting fraud.

Greg Jenkins led former President George W. Bush's second inaugural committee in 2005, which raised and spent $42 million.
Asked about how Trump's team managed to spend so much more, Jenkins said:
"It;s inexplicable to me..I literally don't know."

More + podcast:
https://www.propublica.org/article/trump-inc-podcast-trump-record-inauguration-spending

Injured Nuclear Workers Finally Had Support. The Trump Administration Has Mothballed It.

Pro Publica
March 9, 2018

AN ADVISORY BOARD OF SCIENTISTS, DOCTORS AND WORKER ADVOCATES HELPED ENSURE THAT NUCLEAR WORKERS EXPOSED TO TOXINS RECEIVED PROPER COMPENSATION.
THE TERMS OF NEARLY ALL BOARD MEMBERS EXPIRED LAST MONTH - AND NO NEW MEMBERS HAVE BEEN APPOINTED


Nearly three years ago, President Barack Obama responded to long-standing concerns that workers exposed to toxic chemicals at the nation's nuclear weapons labs were not receiving proper compensation.

Obama created an advisory board to be composed of scientists, doctors and worker advocates.
Their recommendations have led to significant changes, including the repeal of a rule that made it more difficult for workers who'd been injured in the last two decades to get compensation.

President Donald Trump and his administration have taken a different approach.
His Labor Department has let nearly all of the board member's terms expire - and so far hasn't nominated new ones.

"For two years our board put a lot of brain power and cutting-edge expertise into developing recommendations," said Ken Silver, an occupational health professor at East Tennessee State University, who until last month was a board member.
"Without appointing another board, those recommendations may disappear into the ether."

More:
https://www.propublica.org/article/injured-nuclear-workers-finally-had-support-the-trump-administration-has-mothballed-it

The Trump Administration's Campaign to Weaken Civil Service Ramps Up at the VA

Pro Publica
March 12, 2018

FIRINGS SURGED AT THE VETERANS AFFAIRS DEPARTMENT LAST YEAR IN THE WAKE OF A NEW LAW - NOW THE PRESIDENT WANTS TO REPLICATE THAT LEGISLATION ACROSS THE GOVERNMENT.

(This story was co-published with Politico)

Last June, President Donald Trump fulfilled a campaign promise by signing a bipartisan bill to make it easier to fire employees of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
The law, a rare rollback of the federal government's strict civil-service job protections, was intended as a much-needed fix for an organization widely perceived as broken.
"VA accountability is essential to making sure that our veterans are treated with the respect they have so richly earned through their blood, sweat and tears," Trump said that day.
"Those entrusted with the sacred duty of serving our veterans will be held accountable for the care they provide."

At the time, proponents of the bill repeatedly emphasized that it would hold everyone - especially top officials - accountable: "senior executives," stressed Veterans Committee chair Johnny Isakson; "medical directors," specified Trump; anyone who "undermined trust" in the VA, according to Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin.
Shulkin advocated for the measure, called the VA Accountability and Whistleblower Protection Act, by highlighting a case in which the agency had to wait 30 days to fire a worker caught watching porn with a patient.

"I do not see this as a tool that's going to lead to mass firings," Shulkin said last June.
"I would never support that as secretary. I see this as a tool that's going to be used on a small number of people, who clearly have deviated from accepted practices and norms."

The law's effect was nearly instantaneous: Firings rose 60 percent during the second half of 2017, after the law took effect, compared to the first half of 2017.
Since June, the VA has removed 1,704 of it's 370,000 employees.

More:
https://www.propublica.org/article/veterans-affairs-the-trump-administration-campaign-to-weaken-civil-service-ramps-up

In Totally Unhinged Speech, Trump Slobbers Over Foreign Despots, America's Free Press

Daily Kos
March 10, 2018

The President of the United States left Washington, D.C. this Saturday, but didn't head south to his luxury Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach as usual.
Instead Donald Trump went up to Pennsylvania to deliver a campaign speech on behalf of Rick Saccone, who is at risk of losing to Democrat Connor Lamb next Tuesday in a district that Trump won by twenty points.
The rally was reminiscent of Trump's aimless campaign speeches in 2016 where he pontificated like a mad evangelist for an hour or more.

In keeping with his practice of shrieking sermonizing, Trump made a point of attacking what he considers the scourge of his existence: the media.
He rattled off the sort of derogatory slander that would ordinarily be reserved for bitter enemies of all that is righteous.
It was a storm of damnation, both personal and broadly general.

For instance, Trump lashed out at NBC's Meet the Press calling it "A show now headed by sleepy eyes Chuck Todd. He's a sleeping son of a bitch, I tell ya."
Remember, this speech was at a daytime rally with children present.
He also went after an unnamed "certain anchor on CNN" who he said was:
"fake as hell. CNN. So fake. Fake news."

More + video:
https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/3/11/1748182/-In-Totally-Unhinged-Speech-Trump-Slobbers-Over-Foreign-Despots-While-Attacking-America-

"Why the Hell Are We Standing Down?" The Secret Story of Obama's Response to Putin's Attack

THE SECRET STORY OF OBAMA'S RESPONSE TO PUTIN'S ATTACK ON THE 2016 ELECTION

Mother Jones Magazine
March 9, 2018


This is the second of two excerpts from:
"Russian Roulette: The Inside Story of Putin's War on America and the Election of Donald Trump"
By Michael Isikoff, chief investigative corespondent for Yahoo News,
and David Corn, Washington Bureau Chief for Mother Jones.
The book will be released March 13.

CIA Director John Brennan was angry.
On August 4, 2016, he was on the phone with Alexander Bortnikov, the head of Russia's FSB, the security service that succeeded the KGB.
It was one of the regularly scheduled calls between the two men, with the main subject once more the horrific war in Syria.
By this point, Brennan had had it with the Russian spy chief.
For the past few years, Brennan's pleas for help in diffusing the Syrian crisis had gone nowhere.
And after they finished discussing Syria - again with no progress - Brennan addressed tow other issues, not on the official agenda.

First Brennan raised Russia's harassment of U.S. diplomats - an especially sensitive matter at Langley after an undercover CIA officer had been beaten outside the U.S. Embassy in Moscow two months earlier.
The continuing mistreatment of U.S. diplomats, Brennan told Bortnikov, was "irresponsible, reckless, intolerable and needed to stop."
And, he pointedly noted, it was Bortnikov's own FSB "that has been most responsible for this outrageous behavior."

Then Brennan turned to an even more sensitive issue: Russia's interference in the American election.
Brennan now was aware that at least a year earlier Russian hackers had begun their cyberattack on the Democratic National Committee.
"We know you're doing this," Brennan said to the Russian.
He pointed out that Americans would be enraged to find out Moscow was seeking to subvert the election and that such an operation could backfire.
Brennan warned Bortnikov that if Russia continued this information warfare, there would be a price to pay.
He did not specify the consequences.

More:
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/03/why-the-hell-are-we-standing-down/

Do you have a favorite "It Was So Cold" joke?

It was so cold, I saw a dog sticking to a fire hydrant.

It was so cold, hitchhikers were showing pictures of their thumb.

It was so cold when we milked the cows we got ice cream!"

It was so cold, Donald Trump's hair froze in place.

It's so cold, you're thankful for hot flashes.

It was so cold, Republican lawmakers had their hands in their own pockets.

It's so cold, you don't mind when strangers rub up against you on the subway.