Watching the Passing of Seconds, Minutes, Hours, Days, Weeks, Months, Years, Decades..............

Bob Dylan performs "Cry A While" here at the 2002 Grammys and on an audio clip from Stockholm in March 2009. Getting into the year-end Festivus groove....

President Obama, Political Climate and Health Care Reform

Despite some recent diminishing polling numbers for President Obama and his administration, today's Quinnipiac poll showed some interesting nuggets, hidden among all of the continued looming uncertainty on the economy and the complexity and doubt spiraling around the current health care reform initiative:

"But voters say 49 - 29 percent that Obama's policies will help the economy and voters trust him rather than Republicans in Congress 45 - 36 percent to handle the economy.

"In what might be his brightest point in an otherwise dark economic picture, more Americans believe President Obama's policies will help the economy, even if they don't believe those policies will help them personally," said Brown. "And they trust the President more than the Republicans to fix things."
From December 15 - 20, Quinnipiac University surveyed 1,616 registered voters nationwide with a margin of error of +/- 2.4 percentage points.

Nevertheless, a total of 91 percent of American voters describe the economy as "not so good" or "poor." Voters split 28 - 28 percent on whether it is getting better or worse with 43 percent seeing no change. The results on both questions are virtually identical to when Quinnipiac University asked them in July.

"On Wall Street, the stock market's performance has many people optimistic and economists may be telling us that the recession is over. But on Main Street, Americans think the economy is still in the toilet," Brown said.

Details here.

In a related topic, opposition to the Obama health care reform initiative comes from both left and right:

The GOP/Right: Opposes financial penalties for failure to buy health insurance. Opposes costs to business including increased taxes to support the plan. Opposes use of any public monies for performance of abortions. Opposes additional debt that will result from the health care overhaul, among other issues.

The left: Opposes absence of a public option in the health care plan (the bill provides for health care provided from a pool of corporate insurers). Absence of a
provision for public funding of abortions. Proposed bill will not permit purchase of pharmaceuticals from Canada.

Based on the previous Clinton administration's failure, concern that this will represent the last opportunity for health care reform, at a critical point where the future of the American economy depends on this reform to spur business and growth, highlights the likelihood that the administration will fashion a new approach to health care that, out of the box, will satisfy neither left nor right but will open the door for subsequent "reform of the reform" that may in fact offer economic relief and, hope and, yes, "change."

Dylan and Kubler-Ross: The 5 Stages of "Christmas in the Heart"

"Love and Theft" ? "Love and Death" ? Good grief!

Harold Lepidus's review in the Examiner.Com takes the long way around to enthusiastically appreciate Dylan's new holiday album "Christmas in the Heart." It may be too soon to tell if it will in fact assume Holiday Classsic Status. And, since the unusual Christmas (or Xmas) cover material, arrangements, and mix of musicians and singers may at first be off-putting to fans who have found new appreciation of Bob Dylan as he seemed to renew his relationship with "American roots" music in the past decade or so, Mr. Lepidus compares the shock 'n awe for fans of this new Dylan album to the 5 stages of grief assigned to dealing with death in Elizabeth Kubler-Ross's "On Death and Dying":

"Bob Dylan fans are familiar with these feelings. When he went electric. When he went country. When he put out Self Portrait. When he "found Jesus" and stopped singing his old songs. When he made Hearts Of Fire. When he asked Michael Bolton to collaborate on a song. If you were a Dylan fan during any of these endeavors, there's a good chance it was a shock to your system.

"Then the Kubler-Ross model kicks in. Denial - "This can't be happening." Anger - "It's not fair ! Who is to blame?" Bargaining - "If I can just go on long enough until he's onto something else." Depression - "I give up." Acceptance - "Dylan does it again. It took a while, but I love it ! " Who among us have not felt that way about something Dylan has done ?

"When Dylan sings on Christmas In The Heart, I listen to the lyrics just as I would any of his other albums. It's interesting to pay attention to the craft of songwriting that inhabits each and every song here. You can see why he chose these classics. To Dylan, the cliches are invisible. What's even more fascinating to me is that the lyrics are more Dylan-esque than one would ever imagine. Can't you just hear the lines, "The ox and lamb kept time," or "Jump in bed and cover your head" on Bringing It All Back Home ? How about " As we dream by the fire to face unafraid the plans that we made, " or "Some day soon we all will be together, if the Fates allow. Until then we'll have to muddle through somehow" on Time Out Of Mind ? "

The full text here

Let's see, perhaps the following epigraphs are suitable:

"I make shoes/for everyone, even you/But I still go barefoot" - "I & I " -Bob Dylan

"I did it for you/And all you gave me was a smile" - "Cry A While" - Bob Dylan

The 500 Words for Snow...

Inuit and other native peoples to the Far North ostensibly have a panoply of words to describe snow. I do admit right after the Thanksgiving holiday thoughts start to turn toward the holidays and the first snowflakes. Well, yesterday, we got 'em, wuff, and then some, with a vengeance.

We spent an hour or so shoveling the stairs and sidewalk around the house, and then another couple of hours attempting to get the cars free. (My Better Half is a NYC teacher at a school in East New York - Bushwick, and there is no easy public transportation access to her school.)

So, after a few hours with my son spending some "Quality Time" shoveling, pushing (with thanks to the considerate help of our neighbor as well), and sweating out the snow hassle, and generally freezing, I have already had it with snow for the Winter of 2009-2010. Dean Martin's "Winter Wonderland" and "Let It Snow," will not be on my play list for the foreseeable future..

Now, I, too, can think of -- if not hundreds--dozens of words to describe the snow, none of which are really printable here....

Well, still, it's good to be home for the holidays although Rome last year wasn't so bad, either.

Remembering Theater 2009: 'Himmelweg' at Teatro Circulo

Dramatic setting from "The Way to Heaven" (Himmelweg)at Teatro Circulo this past summer, a play by Juan Mayorga.

Got Physics? Toying with the Infinite for the Holidays

Above, Strange Magic over Norway, as reported by UK Daily Mail.


Above, Large Hadron Collider, Fired Up in Switzerland. Subatomic particle tracks from colliding protons on Sunday at the Large Hadron Collider.

According to the UK Daily Mail, Norwegians reported the above gorgeous yet bizarre sky show earlier this week. Barring a welcoming celebration for 44, currently in Norway accepting his Nobel Peace Prize, suspicions pointed to the failed test of a Russian missile, which may have released fuel, creating the spiral sky show with a flashing, emanating blue streak.

While that may be all well and good, the NY Times in today's paper reported that "With a Mighty Smash, Europe seizes the lead in Big Physics" with the successful test earlier this week of our good old pal, The Large Hadron Collider, at CERN labs in Switzerland. The LHC, as you may recall, has been cast in the role of possibly discovering the Higgs-Boson (aka "The G-d Particle.") C'mon, gang, there is no connection?

Colorful lightshows as the LHC toys with the Infinite. A great Bob Dylan Christmas album? Hey, anything's possible. Stay tuned, or better yet, Watch the Skies.

The Invention and Reinvention of Man Ray: "All New York Is Dada"

Above, Man Ray in a "Rayograph" Self Portrait. The current "Alias Man Ray" show at the Jewish Museum explores Man Ray's life, work, and the millieu in which he fabricated his identity as an artist and perenniel outsider.


Salvador Dali, left, and Ray in Paris in a photo by Carl Van Vechten, June 16, 1934.

Man Ray in a letter to Tristan Tzara: "Dada cannot live in New York. All New York is dada, and will not tolerate a rival.”

Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky) was an American born painter, sculptor, photographer and dadaist (August 27, 1890 – November 18, 1976). He spent most of his career in Paris, France. Perhaps best described simply as a modernist, he was a significant contributor to both the Dada and Surrealist movements, although his ties to each were informal. Best known in the art world for his avant-garde photography, Man Ray produced major works in a variety of media and considered himself a painter above all. He was also a renowned fashion and portrait photographer. He is noted for his photograms, which he renamed "rayographs" after himself.

While appreciation for Man Ray's work beyond his fashion and portrait photography was slow in coming during his lifetime, especially in his native United States, his reputation has grown steadily in the decades since.

The current "Alias Man Ray" show at the Jewish Museum explores Man Ray's life, work, and the millieu in which he fabricated his identity as an artist and perenniel outsider. In 1999, ARTnews magazine named him one of the 25 most influential artists of the 20th century, citing his groundbreaking photography as well as "his explorations of film, painting, sculpture, collage, assemblage, and prototypes of what would eventually be called performance art and conceptual art" and saying "Man Ray offered artists in all media an example of a creative intelligence that, in its 'pursuit of pleasure and liberty,'"—Man Ray's stated guiding principles—"unlocked every door it came to and walked freely where it would."[

From Wikipedia: From the time he began attracting attention as an artist until his death more than sixty years later, Man Ray allowed little of his early life or family background to be known to the public, even refusing to acknowledge that he ever had a name other than Man Ray.

Man Ray was born Emmanuel Radnitzky in South Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1890, the eldest child of recent Russian-Jewish immigrants. The family would eventually include another son and two daughters, the youngest born shortly after they settled in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, New York, in 1897. In early 1912, the Radnitzky family changed their surname to Ray, a name selected by Man Ray's brother, in reaction to the ethnic discrimination and anti-Semitism prevalent at that time. Emmanuel, who was called "Manny" as a nickname, changed his first name to Man at this time, and gradually began to use Man Ray as his combined single name.

Man Ray's father was a garment factory worker who also ran a small tailoring business out of the family home, enlisting his children from an early age. Man Ray's mother enjoyed making the family's clothes from her own designs and inventing patchwork items from scraps of fabric.Despite Man Ray's desire to disassociate himself from his family background, this experience left an enduring mark on his art. Tailor's dummies, flat irons, sewing machines, needles, pins, threads, swatches of fabric, and other items related to clothing and sewing appear at every stage of his work and in almost every medium. Art historians have also noted similarity in his collage and painting techniques to those used in making clothing.

More on Man Ray here.

The excellent exhibit at the Jewish Museum here.

Zero Hour: Brochu Shines as Painter/Actor/Comic Zero Mostel

Jim Brochu as Sam "Zero" ("Zee" to his friends) Mostel

"Zero Hour" at the Theater at Saint Clements

With the recent hegemony of Mel Brooks' film-to-Broadway comedy classics, it is ironic and perhaps unfortunate that the role for which Zero Mostel is most remembered by many, "Max Bialystock" in Brooks' 1968 film, The Producers, was a role that he hated. This and many other stories emerge from the fascinating life of Sam "Zero" Mostel ("Zee" to his friends) as brilliantly portrayed by Jim Brochu in his passionate and very funny play, "Zero Hour."

Initially living in the Brownsville section of Brooklyn, the family moved to Moodus, Connecticut, where they bought a farm, later returning to the Lower East Side. As a child,Mostel's mother would dress him in a velvet suit,sending him to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to copy masterpieces. Zero had a favorite painting, John White Alexander’s Study for Woman in Black and Green, which he copied every day, to the delight of the gallery crowds. One afternoon, while a crowd was watching over his velvet-clad shoulder, he solemnly copied the whole painting upside down, delighting his audience. Later, studying art, he began to lecture -- often humorously -- about art, which later turned into a nightclub, theater and film career.

Jim Brochu's play, directed by Piper Laurie, brings the joys, passions and often withering, sarcastic wit of Mostel alive. Although Mostel clearly loved to perform, as he did in works as diverse as Tevye in "Fiddler on the Roof," "Ulysses in Nighttown," "Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum," Ionesco's "Rhinoceros," and in numerous films, including "The Hot Rock" ("Afghanistan, Banana Stand!") filmed in Brooklyn, and his lamented appearance in "The Producers" he was at heart, as the play depicts, a dedicated and serious painter, who periodically needed to seclude himself in his studio on West 28th street (the setting for the play) and get paint on his hands.

Still, Mostel's many triumphs and high profile in the performing arts, brought him, as it did many other artists and writers, including many of his friends, to the attention of Senator Joseph McCarthy and the House Un-American Activities Committee, as they scrutinized the youthful radicalism of some of America's most talented people, destroying many careers--and lives--in the process. The HUAC hearings are receding in history, but with the expiration of the Patriot Act later this year, it is a reminder, that even in times of national crisis, as the Cold War represented, and as the threat of terror suggests today, eternal vigilance is required to protect civil liberties. However, Mostel, as depicted here with great power and comic effect by Mr. Brochu, stood up to the Committee, refusing to name names for the sake of his career, and even sparring with and challenging the committee with great humor. Some excerpts from Mostel's actual appearance before HUAC will give you a flavor. Mr. Brochu, in "Zero Hour" explores this part of Mostel's life in depth.

In the course of an interview with an unseen NY Times reporter, Jim Brochu explores this and many other stories from his life, in the process celebrating "Zero," sometimes tenderly, sometimes ferociously, but always with great warmth, humor and charm.

Through January 31, 2010. Information here.

"Complaint-Free Wednesday" Before Thanksgiving: Highs, Lows and Somewhere In-Between

Well, clearly Giving Thanks on the last Thursday in November may not be enough. A Congressman has proposed legislation making the Wednesday before Thanksgiving a complaint free day, noting that chronic complaining impacts health, wealth, career advancement and, I would add, the "Pursuit of Happiness." See the link with full story here.

Along with the report on the recently unveiled "Optimism" Metrocard in today's NY Times,the work of artist Reid Seifer, it may in fact be the time to hitch up one's britches, and those who can do, and if you got 'em, smoke 'em (herbal of course) and move forward with optimism, vision and, to borrow a former Presidential slogan, "Hope." OK, Wall Street screwed up, we made some bad judgements, economically speaking, what we thought was beneficial under President Bush, in terms of cheap money and low interest rates, may have in fact not been so groovy. And our best creditors, the Chinese, are now looking at us a bit crookedly, as my late Dad would say. Are we now like Robert DeNiro as "Johnny Boy" in Mean Streets, telling Michael the loan shark (Richard Romanus) that he only goes to him to borrow because nobody else in the neighborhood will loan him money, and he knows that he can keep borrowing without having the loan called in? Of course, in Mean Streets, there is an unhappy ending. One hopes, that America pulls itself out of this economic maelstrom, despite Nouriel Roubini's predictions of continued downturn vis-a-vis continued unemployment. Perhaps Harvard Business guru Michael Porter's prescription on "Why America Needs an Economic Strategy" has some profound insights to offer.

But for the time being, maybe a bit of optimism, hope, pragmatic and visionary thinking, as opposed to glooming and dooming, couldn't hurt, and may even help.

But of course, right on the heels of "Complaint-Free Wednesday" and "Thanksgiving Thursday," comes the ill-named Black Friday, with its holiday-shopping lunacy, stampedes for flat-screen TVs, and Xbox360s, etc. So, while, sadly, consumption and shopping are what this country needs in the long run, for the short term, when it comes to the day after Thanksgiving or using the old charge card, better be careful out there...

Sorry to end the week on a queasy note. In the words of the late Allen Ginsberg:

It occurs to me that I am America./
I am talking to myself again.
--from "America" by Allen Ginsberg
from America by Allen Ginsberg or quick reference here.

Windy Day on the Brooklyn Bridge

Photo by TN

New York Yankees XXVII World Series Title

Election 2009

Let's guesstimate $90,000,000 spent on the campaign divided by 557,059 votes won. $161a vote. Guess Mayor Mike got off cheap.
Local election results via NY Post

GOP sweeps in NJ and Va via Drudge and Yahoo

Washington Post Profile of Brooklyn's Patrick Gaspard, WH Political Director

The Washington Post did a profile yesterday of Brooklyn's Patrick Gaspard, currently White House Political Director for the host of heavy hitters like Rahm Emmanuel, David Axelrod and others who surround the Decision-Maker in Chief, President Obama.

The article notes that Mr. Gaspard, a writer of poetry and reader of Russian literature, is persevering in an impossible role based on his ability to maintain "an even temper and dry wit that have earned him the admiration of peers in Obama's inner circle."

Rather than follow the wide-reaching model of some of his predecessors -- Ken Mehlman, who would go on to chair the Republican National Committee, had the job early in the Bush administration, running the administration's politics alongside Karl Rove -- Gaspard has gone the opposite route, rarely giving media interviews, looking for substantive policy openings where the political office can be helpful and closely coordinating with the rest of the in-house experts.

"The political director, I think, really focuses as a coordinator for all these strong personalities," said [Jim] MessinaRather than follow the wide-reaching model of some of his predecessors -- Ken Mehlman, who would go on to chair the Republican National Committee, had the job early in the Bush administration, running the administration's politics alongside Karl Rove -- Gaspard has gone the opposite route, rarely giving media interviews, looking for substantive policy openings where the political office can be helpful and closely coordinating with the rest of the in-house experts.

"The political director, I think, really focuses as a coordinator for all these strong personalities," said [Jim] Messina, (Deputy WH Chief of Staff) who is inarguably one of those strong personalities. "Patrick has a personality that is such that everyone likes him and respects him. He's one of the most grounded people I've ever met."

An interesting article on the structure and politics of 44's inner circle. By the way, don't forget to vote.

Washington Post article here

Burning Daylight

Missing being witness to the end of night and
first glimpse of sunlight on the horizon.
With the changing hour this weekend,
now moving directly into day;
At this hour, morning darkness no longer drifts away
into indigo, azure and deep purples, with the crevice of night filling with a fine gold filigree. Just the crash of daylight and
a sense of already running behind.
Too early for darkness, and if I have to get up any earlier,
Too damn early for poetry
--Brooklyn Beat