It Takes A Village
I waylaid Kari Costello this AM, digging for dope on the future of her and hubby Bob’s Village Deli, which came thisclose to being destroyed by fire this past Sunday afternoon.
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The Bloomington institution’s hind end was devastated by flames during the Sunday breakfast/brunch rush. Nobody was injured even as thick black smoke and leaping flames forced the packed house to be evacuated in a hurry.
Anyway, K. Costello says she and Bob have entertained a couple of insurance co. appraisers in the three days since the conflagration. They still don’t know anything about when the restaurant will re-open nor how much actual repair work needs to be done.
The Front’s Cool
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Of equal importance to is the plight of the V.D.’s staff. “A lot of them are college kids,” Kari says. “This was their only source of income. How are they going to pay their rent? We’ve got to do something for them, and quick.”
Some V.D. staffers will work temporarily at the Laughing Planet, also part of the Costello empire along with Soma Coffee. As for further info on the Deli’s re-opening, Kari says, “When we know something, you’ll know something.”
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Moving On
And then who should drop by Table No. 1 at Soma but Alycin Bektesh, newly-emeritus news director at WFHB. She took a powder, unexpectedly and surprisingly, from the community radio station earlier this month. Her second in command, ass’t news director Joe Crawford, has been elevated to her chair and Alycin’s sticking around to help with the transition and finding a lieutenant for him.
Alycin Bektesh, Election Night 2014
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I’ll tell you this: Alycin looks great these days. Her face is free of the stress of working virtually every day of the week, being on call from morning until night, and spending holidays, birthdays, and sunny summer days in the on-air studio.
Alycin doesn’t know precisely what the future holds in store for her but, natch, level-headed kid she is, she won’t be panhandling on Kirkwood Avenue any time soon.
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All The News That Fits
Whoever controls the media, the images, controls the culture.
— Allen Ginsberg
Gov. Mike Pence: Indiana’s Editor-In-Chief
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Yeah, I’m as harrumphed as anyone in light of the news that Indiana Gov. Mike Pence has started his own state-run news service. It’s called Just IN. Cute, huh? Y’know, taking the old TV newsman’s intro to a bulletin — “This just in…” — and doubling it down to to connote news and info just from the Hoosier State. Just for you. Just, I guess, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth as the Guv sees it.
How, peeps are asking, can a supposed small-gov’t conservative justify using taxpayer dough to run a propaganda operation? What would the Founding Daddy-o’s, whom the Right never fails to cite when trying to win an argument, say about that?
Well, history tells us the likes of Benjamin Franklin, who ran the Colonies’ first non-Crown post office, wanted low-cost and easy delivery of mail in large part so he and his cohorts could spread news about their Revolution. The current USPS (then called the U.S. Post Office Department)) was created in 1792 thanks to legislation sponsored by George Washington and James Madison. Its paramount raison d’être was to facilitate the dissemination of gov’t news.
So it can be said the post office has always been a propaganda machine. And the Founding Fathers wanted the taxpayers to foot most of its bills.
Just as Mike Pence does for his little venture.
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Martin’s Music
Digital DJ extraordinaire Hondo Thompson passes along this news from Steve Martin’s Twitter account:
Starting now to record a new album with Edie Brickell. Peter Asher (CBE!) producing.
Just wondering: Is there a cooler guy in America than Steve Martin?
Steve Martin
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BTW: While trying to find a nice image of himself, I came upon Martin’s speaker’s appearance agency. Apparently, he gets a cool $200,000 for each speaking engagement. Yow! My speaker’s fee is negotiable, in case you’re interested. I’ll be happy with $20. If that’s too much for your blood, I’ll take a White Castle gift certificate. Or bus fare. Your choice.
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Nuh uh, Sez Michelle
Anything that’s a spit in the eye of a tyrannical theocracy (I apologize for being redundant) is good by me.
Click Image For Full Story
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Word Police
Benedict Cumberbatch, whom millions of females find alluring for some reason or another, consigned himself to the fires of hell by using the term “coloured” to describe black and brown people, ironically in a interview having to do with racism in both Great Britain and this holy land. Cumberbatch expressed dismay that his homeland is seemingly more racist than the US. He also decried the lack of opportunity for dark-skinned folk in theater, movies, and TV.
None of that means anything, though, to people who dig finding insults under every bed.
Just to recap: White man (who, physically, could be mistaken for a mobile home owner from Bedford, Indiana) places himself four-square on the side of the angels in terms of race relations in the Anglo-American world but, unfortunately, chooses to use a forbidden term to describe the oppressed group so he’s immediately cast as a racist on the order of a Grand Dragon .
Cumberbatch
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So, I put it to my pal, a reasonably well-known African-American artist. This Cumberbunch dude, I said, used the term “coloured.” What’s your take?
After a few shrugs and a question or two about exactly who Cummerbund is, my pal finally responded, “Who cares?”
Bingo. Here’s the sham that passes for race relations in these United States today: Canary-in-a-coalmine sensitivities are elevated to moral imperatives even as real atrocities are committed day in and day out against America’s dark-skinned brethren and sisteren. It’s a trade-off everybody’s a party to — we whites promise not to drop N-bombs or other slurs and dark-skinned folks promise not to rise up en masse and kick the crap out of us for hundreds of years of slavery, Jim Crow, coded political catch phrases, institutionalized second-clss citizenship, and too many policemen using them for target practice.
Hypocrisy — as American as sweet potato pie.
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well said white man.