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WELCOME BACK......where have you been?
Unbelievable!
Pays monthly!
Spent all night hunting for it ARR!
Thanks!
Why don't you like Jews?
Show me a hero, and I’ll show you a bum.
—Maj Greg “Pappy” Boyington, WW II Marine Flying Ace
Have you read this...it's a hoot
THE GREATEST MAN IN THE WORLD
James Thurber, noted American humorist, cartoonist, and whimsical wit, was a prolific writer and commentator on our ways and our politics. He may be best remembered for his short story, The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, which was made into a movie. His gently acid humor was treasured for the decades he lived, and has survived his death in 1961.
As a young man, I recall reading a Thurber short story titled, The Greatest Man In The World. It was featured in his anthology, and I could never figure out his purpose in writing it. Let me describe the tale to you, and ponder just why it has remained in my memory for nearly fifty years.
In a parody of Lindbergh's solo flight across the Atlantic Ocean, Thurber wrote about Jack "Pal" Smurch, an unmarried loner, who in 1937 had just flown solo around the world. He was resting comfortably in New York City before official recognition of his fame by a ticker tape parade, coast-to-coast media acclaim, and public adoration. Reporters, the mayor and governor of New York, various dignitaries, and special representatives from the president, had gathered in an expensive 9th floor suite to interview Mr. Smurch, about whom almost nothing was publicly known. The president himself secretly showed up. There had been ugly rumors about the young pilot. He had once knifed his school principal and served time in a reformatory. Enterprising reporters had located his mother, a short- order cook in a small Iowa town. Of her son, she had said, "To hell with him. I hope he drowns."
Incredibly, Jack Smurch had flown unheeded and nearly unannounced, completing his nine-day flight in an old, rusty airplane by landing at Roosevelt Field to claim the large monetary stipend that had been offered to the first person to make the journey alone. Mr. Smurch began the meeting by breaking into a crooked smile, rubbing his hands together, and crowing, "Bring on the broads, booze, and bucks." Within two minutes he had convinced everyone present that he was a rascal, a rogue, utter scum in fact, a man completely unworthy of the fame soon to be given him.
The people in the room glanced at each other as Jack Smurch walked over to an open window and looked out expansively across the city. The president nodded quietly, and the mayor's secretary moved behind him, grabbed his shoulder and pants seat, and pushed him out. A quick-witted editor shouted, "My God, he's fallen." The president left. The head of the Associated Press took charge, outlined a story, and sent two of the men to announce it. America had been spared the spectacle of deifying and making an idol of a public embarrassment. John Donne had, of course, said it perceptively for humanity centuries ago, but for Jack Smurch not one citizen was concerned for whom the bell tolled. Not even his mother.
The mystification I felt on reading this intriguing story and wondering why it was written has bothered me to this day. It was only yesterday as I saw Mr. Clinton standing relaxed and confident with the Pope on a stage in St. Louis, that I realized Thurber's prescience. There are times a public embarrassment can achieve unjustifiable high position and notoriety. If I were the Pope, which most certainly is beyond both the realm of reason and God's plan, I would not share a stage with Mr. Clinton unless I were wearing a lightning rod protection harness with a one-inch diameter steel ground strap. Without the slightest qualm of guilt, the potentially lethal corpus of Mr. Clinton basked in the aura of holiness, truth, mercy, and goodness surrounding the Pope. Totally unconcerned about lightning bolts thrown by an angry Zeus, by Allah, or our Christian God Almighty, the president aided the feeble Pope to his chair, ignoring the Constitution's clearly required separation of church and state, as well as any sense of shame and humility.
Where is Thurber when we need him, and the mayor's silently anointed secretary to push barbarians out of skyscraper windows? The United States Senate is at best a pompous, politicized, and ineffectual substitute for the incisive justice and whimsical mind of the departed James Thurber.
Thanks buddy!
Great post!
The Pope was long after Jesus's time!
Yeah ...... you run them off! ASSHOLE!
Hell who does?
I think Atheism fits the definition of a Religion....your view? It has beliefs, meeting places , dogma. It's a religion.
My knowledge of Eastern Religions could fit in a thimble! Baby steps please.
Is it real?
Wall if their is reincarnation you will come back as Kudzu!
http://www.jjanthony.com/kudzu/images/kudzucabin-h.jpg
My wife too I remain skeptical but.......it is intriguing. My two wiener dogs must have been Saints in a prior life.....they are treated like royalty!
Yep
No more fun of any kind
Dean Wormer Animal House
Thanks we don't bite here....my wife believes in reincarnation and past lives....makes sense...... Energy can not be made or destroyed....
Many Christians would be very surprised that there are a tremendous number of references to reincarnation in the Bible. The most compelling references in the Bible can be found within the teachings of Jesus concerning John the Baptist as the reincarnation of Elijah the prophet. Here are the major verses: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], and [10]. More information concerning the history of reincarnation in Christianity can be found on my Christian NDEs and Reincarnation page.
Bad guys here are not the people on this board...rather the Bankers that created the housing bubble sent it all over the world in nice packages....then shorted the shit out of it. Us little guys got hosed.
This is the only fun Politics Board on IHUB ...you and PM take a bow!
Lol I thought you would post about the Peasant......some watery tart distributing swords is basis for a government!
Not argue and bicker over who killed who.....your beheading....come on Wall!
Here you go I'm the King
She will be ...you are starting to sound Christian......where is Love?
He got beheaded....quit whining!
Lol I'm 44 my stepdaughter is 42......I got an odd family.
You are in good company
King James Bible (Cambridge Ed.)
He said, I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord, as said the prophet Esaias.
Ooh deep, disturbing but true! Dont do that again!
Bringing my step daughter home Friday...I knew they wouldn't keep her....assholes!
Got a chance to add 200 bucks a month from a divvy stock...what do you think?
This pays monthly right?
Knew this would take off!
Good point and very true....hence faith... I dont personally believe in the Christian Heaven but hey you never know.
Whats he doing there?
Very Christian of you.
Just found this stock it looks great!
Blog on Food-Stamps
By Alan Bjerga - Apr 26, 2012 12:00 AM ET
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Food-stamp use has been increasing even as unemployment declines, a break with historic patterns as more eligible recipients such as those stuck in part-time jobs take advantage of the program.
The BGOV Barometer shows that food-stamp enrollment rose to an all-time high in 2011 while the number of Americans on jobless rolls dropped to 13.1 million at the end of last year from a peak of 15.4 million in October 2009.
Chart: BGOV Barometer
Food-stamp enrollment has risen and fallen in tandem with unemployment most of the time since the Food Stamp Act of 1964 created the modern program. Changes in qualification rules and efforts to reach more eligible people drove an increase that started under President George W. Bush and accelerated under President Barack Obama, said Parke E. Wilde, an associate professor at Tufts University in Boston who studies food-stamp policy.
“The main reason caseloads are rising is increased participation among eligible people, and a higher fraction of the population that is eligible,” Wilde said.
Spending for food stamps has more than doubled in four years to a record $75.7 billion in the fiscal year ended Sept. 30, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s biggest expenditure. Funding over the next 10 years would be cut by more than $33 billion, about 4 percent, under a plan approved by the House Agriculture Committee on April 18. The Senate Agriculture Committee is preparing to take up a farm bill including more modest cuts in food stamps.
Participation Increases
From 2002 to 2009, the most recent year of available data, participation rose to 72 percent of eligible recipients from 54 percent, according to the USDA. About 46.45 million people received the aid in January this year -- almost one in every seven Americans -- down from a record 46.51 million in December and only the second drop since 2008, the USDA said earlier this month.
Joblessness peaked at 10 percent in October 2009 and was at 8.2 percent in March, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The drop in unemployment doesn’t reflect 7.7 million Americans who are working part-time for economic reasons, such as a lack of full-time work, Labor Department statistics show.
Enrollment in the program is still likely to decline as the jobless rate improves, said Kevin Concannon, the USDA undersecretary who oversees food stamps.
Congress may need to take further steps to rein in food- stamp spending, possibly through tapering benefits for recipients at higher incomes or experimenting with less- expensive block-grant initiatives in several states, said Ron Haskins, co-director of the Center on Children and Families at the Brookings Institution in Washington.
“It’s an important program,” said Haskins, formerly a senior adviser to the George W. Bush administration on welfare policy. “There is money to be saved.”
To contact the reporter on this story: Alan Bjerga in Washington at abjerga@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net
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I posted the Black Community has to fix themselves...where am I wrong?