The Funeral of Pfc. Justin Whitmire

At left: Pfc Justin Whitmire, age 20, upstate soldier killed on December 27th, only 19 days after arriving in Afghanistan.






I had planned on titling this post "Up close and personal with the Westboro Baptist Church"--but instead, I witnessed an amazing sight. I saw about 3000 members and associates of the Patriot Guard Riders stand in loose formation outside the Simpsonville Baptist Church. They stood quietly and respectfully during the funeral of Justin Whitmire. (No smoking or cell phones, conversation kept to whispers.) And then, as the honor guard departed, the bikers lined Main Street (Highway 14) in Simpsonville, holding American flags aloft. The phalanx on both sides of the road was impressive, as the Patriot Guard provided an escort for the funeral procession.

The line of people stretched for miles, all the way to the cemetery. It was astounding.

The infamous Fred Phelps and his equally infamous Westboro Baptist Church was nowhere to be seen, although they had threatened to picket Whitmire's funeral. There were copious rumors they had already arrived in the upstate, including (if you heard my radio show this morning) a local sighting at Walmart. I had heard of the Patriot Guard and knew they were attending, but I had no idea there would be so many of them. The rumble of thousands of Harley-Davidsons in downtown Simpsonville, echoing off the old buildings, sounded like the engines revving at Talladega. (Apparently, this is one way they drown out Westboro's noise, when they confront them.)

It is puzzling to me (to say the least) that WBC continues their evil deeds. Nobody likes them. Nobody agrees with them. Certainly, nobody appreciates their picketing of grieving veteran families. They are mostly a grim and disturbing sideshow, at this point. This morning on my radio show, we discussed at length why they continue these bizarre shenanigans... and it was during this conversation that one of my callers used the word ASSHOLE, the first cuss-word on my show to date (unless you count "dumb-asses"--and I don't). I'm just glad *I* wasn't the one to say it!

(Yes, it took Westboro Baptist Church to finally break the no-cussing rule on The Daisy Deadhead Show.)

Apparently, WBC makes money every time they open their whack-ass mouths. SOMEBODY must be buying what they are selling, since they continue to travel all over the country for these anti-veteran protests. In fact, they are majorly lawyered up, so one of their shakedowns is goading people into hitting or hurting them, and then suing them for damages and denial of their civil rights, etc.

The way the Patriot Guard stood so firmly and with such dignity, was heartening. Many of them were wearing Christian-oriented biker wear, and I realized, they feel responsible for confronting WBC as Christians. They will not let these people do this nasty stuff in the name of Christianity, at least not without their own Christian witness alongside them. I have a great deal of respect for that.

They were beautiful.

I am so happy that Justin's family had such dignified, dedicated escorts for their son. My thoughts and prayers are with them at this difficult time.

Photos below--as always, you can click to enlarge. My dastardly camera-battery ran down before the Highway 14 formation, but at least you get an idea of how many folks turned out.

The radical transformation of a moment of fear and hate, into a display of respect, solidarity and love, is a lesson we all can learn.

~*~

Friday links of interest

DEAD AIR presents Friday linkage for your perusal, on this eve of the first New Hampshire primary debate.

First up, Senator Rick Santorum, family man, is another morally-bankrupt fake. (Nah, go on! Say it isn't so!) Check out Politico's Santorum: Ultimate D.C. insider:

Rick Santorum received a troubling email in 2009, when he was working as a Fox News analyst — an aggrieved husband was accusing Sen. John Ensign, Santorum’s friend and former Republican colleague, of having an extramarital affair with the aide’s wife.

Santorum quickly tipped off Ensign that the man was threatening to go public with the scandal, a move that set in motion a chain of events that allowed Ensign to get ahead of the news by presenting his version of the story first.

For anyone who knows Santorum, his decision to protect Ensign was not surprising. During his 16 years on Capitol Hill, Santorum developed close personal ties with Republican lawmakers, became immersed in the inner workings of the Senate, climbed the ladder of leadership and embraced earmarks.

As Santorum tries to seize the tea party mantle and paint Mitt Romney as the ultimate establishment candidate, the reality is that Santorum became the ultimate Washington insider.

Interesting! Faithful, moral Catholic daddy of seven, makes sure to protect an adulterer from the ire of his constituents. How is this moral?

Answer: it isn't. Santorum is Mr Morality when it suits him, but not when it doesn't.

Radio show host (and former Fox News talking head) Alan Colmes got in considerable trouble for criticizing the behavior of the Santorums, after Karen Santorum had a miscarriage: They brought the fetus home to show the kids.

No, I could never make that up:

Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum has evoked squeamishness and ridicule for retelling the story of the death of his son, Gabriel, at 20 weeks gestation and the family's unconventional response -- taking the body home from the hospital and allowing their other children to cuddle the corpse and say goodbye.

The Internet lit up with comments this week after Santorum's meteoric rise to second-place in the Iowa caucuses, nearly tying him with presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Some described Santorum's story as "weird" or "horrifying."

Gabriel was the couple's eighth pregnancy and he survived only two hours. In her book, Karen Santorum wrote about bringing the body home to their other children.

''Elizabeth and Johnny held you with so much love and tenderness," she wrote. "Elizabeth proudly announced to everyone as she cuddled you, 'This is my baby brother, Gabriel; he is an angel.'''

But some mental health experts believe the Santorums may have been ahead of their time by ritualizing their son's death in order to exorcize their grief, though they say taking a body home is unusual and not recommended.

In the context of the times -- the year was 1996 when the family buried Gabriel -- their behavior was understandable, according to Dr. David Diamond, a psychologist and co-author of the 2005 book "Unsung Lullabies."

Helen Coons, a clinical psychologist and president of Women's Mental Health Associates in Philadelphia, said couples are not encouraged to bring a deceased fetus home.

"If a couple chooses to do a burial or memorial service for a third-trimester loss, funeral homes will assist in a caring manner," she said.

Everyone jumped on Colmes for his insensitivity, but I think he simply verbalized (accurately) what the rest of us were thinking.

And Santorum is running for the highest office in the land, Saints preserve us.

~*~

More stuff:

FBI Changes definition of rape (Mother Jones)

Illinois Lottery Checks Bounce For 85 Winners (Huffington Post)

Doggie survives avalanche! (UPI)

David Bowie turns 65! (UK Guardian)

Employees of big companies fill Ohio's Medicaid, food stamp rolls, report says (Dayton Daily News)

Twelve Things You Were Not Taught in School About Creative Thinking (Psychology Today)

~*~

And I profusely apologize to everyone for not writing a much more fascinating blog post... but I confess I have spent my whole day babbling ON THIS INTERMINABLE THREAD instead.

And don't forget to TUNE IN TOMORROW! 9am EST, 1600AM and 94.9FM in upstate South Carolina!

Bachmann Bails

At left: Cover of The Madness of Michele Bachmann by Ken Avidor, Karl Bremer and Eva Young.


Michele Bachmann's presidential campaign is history. Those of us who planned elaborately-amusing blog posts making fun of her husband's pray-away-the-gay therapy are profoundly disappointed. I was looking forward to at least a few more weeks of the Michele-and-Marcus follies. Gone after the Iowa caucus? She can't even make it to New Hampshire? Lightweight!

Bachmann placed sixth in Iowa. How Michele Bachmann went bust is explained by Chris Cillizza of the Washington Post:

What happened in the 144 days between those two dates was a mix of bad luck, bad strategy and a candidate who opted for a national rather than Iowa-focused campaign, according to a series of conversations with former strategists and advisers to the Minnesota Republican. That series of factors created a potent concoction that left Bachmann out of money and options less than 24 hours after the first vote of the 2012 presidential primary.

“At the end of the day, voters liked her but didn’t see her as the party nominee or their president,” said Ed Rollins, Bachmann’s one-time campaign manager. “She didn’t make the sale.”

What's next for Michele Bachmann? asks Alex Pareene of Salon:

Michele Bachmann, a deeply deluded and irresponsible religious fanatic who until this week was apparently seriously running for president of the United States, has slunk back home to her oddly shaped Minnesota congressional district to brood on her future.

Politico declares her a “lock” for reelection, but that depends on whether or not she runs. She effectively promised not to, but that promise may have been predicated on her remaining a legitimate presidential candidate. (Minnesota law prohibits running for two federal offices at once.)

Bachmann is not a lock because she’s particularly beloved in her district — as longtime Bachmann critics have been at pains to point out to the national media, she never wins Stillwater, her district’s largest city, and she has tended to win tight races with help from third-party spoilers — but because she is hugely popular outside her district, with a nearly endless supply of Christian right cash.

It’s fun (“fun”) for political observers to imagine her going up against Sen. Amy Klobuchar, but that would be nuts even for Bachmann. If she couldn’t beat Ron Paul in Iowa among Republican voters, she’s not going to win a statewide election in more-liberal Minnesota against a popular incumbent.

What I wanna know is, how did we ever get stuck with this person on the national stage? People like this are usually consigned to the outback, aren't they? How could anyone take her seriously as a presidential candidate?

Pareene mentions that:

It has been honestly disturbing to watch as a woman who was a local joke when I left Minnesota years ago rose to become not just a larger joke but then suddenly a national figure of some influence and seriousness, and that her rise was abetted by precisely the qualities that made her a joke in the first place — her vicious small-mindedness and bigotry and self-evident idiocy — is what makes people deeply cynical about the intelligence and decency of Other Americans not like themselves, to the detriment of our politics. So to see her roundly rejected is cause for some small celebration, even as hateful troll Rick Santorum rides his resentment-fueled momentum into the next contests.

So, honestly, who cares what Bachmann will do next? The future Bachmann deserves is one of total obscurity. It would almost be appropriate if this avowed “non-politician” remained an uninfluential absentee House of Representatives backbencher. Though it’d be much more satisfying if, say, Minnesota legalized gay marriage and Marcus divorced her to marry Ted Haggard at a wedding officiated by Keith Ellison.

Bachmann may not be making any detailed plans for the future, considering that she believes she’ll be raptured away any day now, which both I and her apocalyptic death cult would likely agree would be a good thing for all involved.

We could never get that lucky... although I think she'd be great on a reality TV show: Praying Away The Gay with Michele and Marcus.

Oxygen network? Lifetime?

Ohio Players album covers

... were amazing, proudly artsy and pretty dirty, too. (I'm so glad Tipper Gore and the fabled PMRC wasn't around to police us in the 70s.) Did the powers-that-be know about these album covers?

Although pioneering-funk band The Ohio Players (whom I was wildly fortunate to have seen live in 75, rocking the proverbial house!) had #1 hits, these eye-popping album covers seemed to stay under the radar. I remember seeing one of them in a very conservative, old-school Midwestern drug store, another at a truck stop that sold lots of coffee mugs with Bible verses on them. You just had to wonder.

At left, the cover of PAIN, which when opened up, looked like THIS. Coupled with PAIN was, of course, PLEASURE. Finally (and what did you expect?) there was both ECSTACY and ORGASM. That last one, with the metal (is it metal?) dildo popping out of the guy's back, blew my little mind.

Enjoy the linkage-gallery of nostalgic, nasty images; beware questionable taste, probably NSFW.

~*~

And now we go to the video!

Although we are given to believe "skin tight" refers to a woman's jeans, I don't think it does... or rather, I don't think that is the only thing he is talking about. Just a lucky guess!

I remember an interminable ride on the Interstate, primarily saved by these fabulous jams. For this reason, I prefer the long version of this funk masterpiece, which I play in heavy traffic or late at night. Therefore I insist on foisting the original long-ass version on all of you. This is what funk is supposed to sound like! (Yes, you really should listen to all eight-and-a-half minutes for the full 70s experience.)

PS: The guy making this video can't resist showing us the album cover, LOL.

Ohio Players - Skin Tight



Gone, gone, gone with your bad self.

Almost curtains for Newt? We can only hope

You can click to enlarge. (Thanks again to Yellowdog Granny!)

And for those of you who believe we jest, here is Jonah Goldberg's National Review column (you've been warned!) quoting and further analyzing Newt's statements about putting poor kids to work, scrubbing toilets.

Apparently Newt is unaware that lots of us have already had those jobs, and now they go to the undocumented immigrants he wants to keep here in the country working on the cheap. (Does he understand that this is a fundamental contradiction, like most of what he says?)

If I can figure this much out, maybe *I* should be the one running for president.

The Iowa Caucus (not primary, as I incorrectly stated previously) is tomorrow, and hopefully, Newtie will go away after that. However, there is a monster-sized NEWT GINGRICH FOR PRESIDENT sign down near the mall, so I expect him to do fairly well here in the Palmetto State.

Stay tuned, sports fans!