Blue Monday, Buddy Guy edition

With Jack Bruce and Buddy Miles.  "Happy" Memorial Day.

Alabama Shakes

Blue Monday, Cream edition

Because there is no YouTube footage of Robert Johnson.

Carlos Fuentes

RIP.

10

Sen. Cornyn declares that Obama is "dividing the country"

Similarly, LBJ was dividing the country with passage of the Civil Rights Act.

Donald "Duck" Dunn

RIP.

Blue Monday, The Beatles edition

Not really blue, but...amazing:

Romney's conformity problem

Daniel Luzer notes that Romney's bullying behavior back in boarding school matters, not just because he's an asshole and always has been, but because of what it says about Romeny's world view.

But Mitt Romney’s bullying matters. It’s not that he’s was making fun of the (apparently) gay student for being kind of wimpy. This, unfortunately, is a fairly common behavior among high school students (Romney apparently did that also, mocking one effeminate student with “atta girl,” whenever he spoke up in class). No, this is troublesome because of the reason why Romney assaulted the student. According to the Post article:

John Lauber, a soft-spoken new student one year behind Romney, was perpetually teased for his nonconformity and presumed homosexuality. Now he was walking around the all-boys school with bleached-blond hair that draped over one eye, and Romney wasn’t having it.

“He can’t look like that. That’s wrong. Just look at him!” an incensed Romney told Matthew Friedemann, his close friend in the Stevens Hall dorm, according to Friedemann’s recollection. Mitt, the teenage son of Michigan Gov. George Romney, kept complaining about Lauber’s look, Friedemann recalled.

A few days later, Friedemann entered Stevens Hall off the school’s collegiate quad to find Romney marching out of his own room ahead of a prep school posse shouting about their plan to cut Lauber’s hair. Friedemann followed them to a nearby room where they came upon Lauber, tackled him and pinned him to the ground. As Lauber, his eyes filling with tears, screamed for help, Romney repeatedly clipped his hair with a pair of scissors.

Right, around the same time college students were burning draft cards and taking LSD, when young people began to experiment with marijuana and premarital sex, Romney was worried about unconventional hair.

Conform! young Mitt demands. I will not have that creative, alternative hair in my line of sight. Obey the rules and be normal.

Indeed, conformity is what drives Romney's entire "Fight for the America We Love" campaign.  He can't articulate a coherent foreign policy, his economic arguments make no sense, and he can't really say why he wants to be president.  But he never tires of returning America to some hazy past, before men wore their hair over their eyes and before someone named "Obama" could be president.

"People have died for the Voting Rights Act"

Thin mints and the Catholic Bishops

First they reprimanded the largest group of U.S. nuns, who by the way, tend to be way more popular than either priests or nuns among American Catholics. 

Now, it's the Girls Scouts who have come under the inquisition investigation by the U.S. Bishops.

The new inquiry will be conducted by the bishops' Committee on Laity, Marriage, Family Life and Youth. It will look into the Scouts' "possible problematic relationships with other organizations" and various "problematic" program materials, according to a letter sent by the committee chairman, Bishop Kevin Rhoades of Fort Wayne, Ind., to his fellow bishops.

The bishops' conference provided a copy of the letter to The Associated Press, but otherwise declined comment.

Girl Scout leaders hope the bishops' apprehensions will be eased once they gather information. But there's frustration within the iconic youth organization — known for its inclusiveness and cookie sales — that it has become such an ideological target, with the girls sometimes caught in the political crossfire.

"I know we're a big part of the culture wars," said the Girl Scouts' spokeswoman, Michelle Tompkins. "People use our good name to advance their own agenda."

"For us, there's an overarching sadness to it," Tompkins added. "We're just trying to further girls' leadership."

With the bishops now getting involved, the stakes are high. The Girl Scouts estimate that one-fourth of their 2.3 million youth members are Catholic, and any significant exodus would be a blow given that membership already is down from a peak of more than 3 million several decades ago.

The inquiry coincides with a broader effort by the bishops to analyze church ties with outside groups. Rhoades' committee plans to consult with Girl Scouts leaders and with the National Federation for Catholic Youth Ministry, which has been liaising with the Scouts for two years about various complaints.

 It's amazing that one of the world's great criminal enterprises could comprise such idiots.

But, of course, dear Readers, you'd be expecting this:

 

Credit where credit is due -- AP edition

I'm beginning to think that the "false equivalence" meme is having its effect.  To wit:

GOP blocks Senate debate on Dem student loan bill

 Go, AP, go.

Blue Monday, Sonny Boy Williamson II edition

Things for which you don't even need to follow the link to

Obviously.

Brusnsetter later claimed that while she did use the word “Caucasian” she couldn’t say why and that it was not a racial issue.

Romney administration: no openly gay need apply

If you're an "independent," or a moderate Republican who figured that now that the primaries are over, Romney will be able to move to the center on social issues, your view has  nowprobably changed.

What we know now is that Romney is helpless in the face of such pressure. In office, he will be a tool of the furthest right in his party. In fact, he has much, much less space to maneuver in than any president since George H. W. Bush. Because the base doesn't trust him, he has to be super-right-wing on issues like homosexual equality, climate change, more tax cuts, more defense spending, abortion, and birth control.

 And Romney's silence on this is deafening.

Richard Grenell, an openly gay and longtime Republican foreign policy spokesman hired last month by Mitt Romney’s campaign, abruptly resigned on Tuesday after antigay elements in the party criticized his appointment and some Republican advisers said Mr. Grenell had been sidelined by the campaign during a busy foreign policy week.

The Romney campaign issued a statement saying that it had sought to keep Mr. Grenell from quitting. And according to some Republicans, while Mr. Grenell’s sexual orientation was not an issue for the campaign, the Romney team had cut Mr. Grenell out of the loop on some issues after feeling a surprising pressure from some social conservatives. 

Krugman defends Diocletian economic policies!

Paul vs. Krugman.  Hilarity ensues.