Weekly Mail January 17, 2016

Editor's Note: Typed this up on January 16 and never posted it. Weekly Mail regrets missing deadline by two weeks. 

The night I was out at Donovan's with Ray, Karl and Auggie, the conversation of course came around to the 2016 Presidential race. Being the only Republican of the 4 of us, the guys were itching to know who I would be voting for when the primary came along.

I'll get into who I'm going to vote for as the vote gets closer, but I decided to start with who I wouldn't be supporting. And while they were a bit surprised at the fact that Donald Trump didn't top my "No way I'm voting for him" list, my choice for that title, Ted Cruz, was met with tacit approval.

And this is before that tool derided Trump for having "New York Values."

Now maybe I should give Terrible Ted some credit here. At least he had the balls to come out and say what the rest of these goobers running for the Republican nomination are thinking.."We have no use for New York." My father in law always says "I think they are all biased against NY" Usually when he says that, he is referring to sportscasters. (Joe Buck, Jon Miller and Joe Morgan are his usual suspects)  But it also applies to the Republicans.

And it's true that there are some social positions that my elected officials here support that don't necessarily jive with some of my beliefs.

But this is my hometown. And I'll be damned if some slimebag from Texas (by way of Canada) is going to smear my peeps. In addition to mocking NY values, he voted against the Zadroga Bill for 9/11 responders, and against funding for Hurricane Sandy victims, while also sticking his hand out for victims of Texas natural disasters. Not to mention that he's always looking to raise campaign cash here in NY.  I mean, how rich is that, ripping the city while your trying to shake it down for money?

I guess his attitude is that if he gets the nomination, he's not going to get NY's electoral votes, so he might as well rag on NY to garner more national favor. Well that's all well and good, but you have to play in the LCS before you get to the World Series,you clown. And there are people in NY who can vote to make that happen.

I happen to be one of those folks. It's only one vote, sure, but its one vote you a'int gettin. You Texas turd.



David Bowie (1947-2016)

      There has been so many tributes, written and spoken for one of the true pioneers of music, that anything I write is probably going to be redundant. But even though I wouldn't call myself a huge fan of his, this man was simply incredible.

      When he came on the scene in the late 60's/early 70's, it had to have been a shock to the system. The hair, the costumes, the make-up, was he gay, straight, androgynous?  In this day and age, they would make a reality show about him, 45 years ago? I'm sure people were ducking and covering.

      And then there was the music. Space Oddity I'm sure, blew everyone's mind. And it only went on from there. What I find amazing to this day, is that almost no 2 David Bowie songs sound alike. Not in music style, shoot not even in voice. It was like different people singing. That he could pull that off so smoothly spoke to the depth of his talent.

     And wasn't it just like David Bowie, who came into the biz in such a spectacle, went out as quiet and simple as someone not nearly as famous? By the end, he was just a simple transplanted Englishman, living in New York City, with his wife and teenage daughter,  minding his own business while not letting anyone in on his own...namely that he was dying of cancer. My first reaction when I woke up Monday morning was, "I had no idea he was sick" Well neither did anyone else apparently.

      Several years ago, there was a commercial for Sirius/XM, if my memory serves correctly. It featured Snoop Dogg, who was looking for his big diamond encrusted D necklace. He was stopping in all the studios, encountering, amongst others, Derek Jeter. The last person he asked was David Bowie, Bowie plead ignorance, then when Snoop left, pulled it out from under his shirt. I wondered if any of the people in the commercial realized just how big of a deal David Bowie was. I mean, you had one of baseball's best players and a huge rap star, but Bowie was such an innovator.

Bowie once referred to John Lennon as the last great original. Lennon was an original no doubt. But so was David Bowie. When they made him, they threw away the mold.


Alan Rickman (1946-2016)

"So it looks like this is like High Noon. Except this time John Wayne doesn't walk off into the sunset with Grace Kelly."

That was Gary Cooper, a$$hole.

That exchange between Hans Gruber, played by Alan Rickman, and John McClaine, played by Bruce Willis, is one of my favorite of all time. I never really saw any of the Harry Potter movies, so my points of reference are Die Hard and Robin Hood Prince of Thieves. In both of those movies, Rickman played the bad guy in such a way that part of me actually liked the bad guy. He delivered these performances with a sharp sense of humor to go along with the evil. And judging by the outpouring of love from his former cast mates, he approached his work much the same way. Like David Bowie, gone too sudden and too soon.

I'll try to start handicapping the primaries and caucuses before the Raucous Iowa Caucus on february 1st.

Have a Great Week.