Free Period: Friday Random/Genius Ten

If you are so inclined, Labor Day weekend is preferably celebrated with equal parts barbecue, beer and the beach. Since I’m an honest-to-goodness Southerner and a recovering jock, I might add football into that delectable mix.

But Labor Day isn’t all about fun in the sun and the symbolic end of the summer. In fact, the holiday’s origins have nothing to do with fun if my old history teachers and wikipedia weren’t just shitting me.

So rather than encouraging people to sit this one out, the good people of PostBourgie have offered up some songs about putting in serious work in this week's Friday Random/Genius Ten. Because, like it or not, in our newly socialist wasteland, we’ve got a lot of work ahead of us.

Consider it a labor of love.

My submissions for this week's list were: "Workin' Day and Night" by Michael Jackson and a bonus offering, "Work to Do" by The Isley Brothers. G.D.'s choice of "Thought at Work" by The Roots was sublime.

Had there been more spots available, I probably would have gone with "Work It" by Missy Elliott, "Doin' My Job" by T.I. (produced by Kanye, FTW), "I Get the Job Done" by Big Daddy Kane and "I Go to Work" by Kool Moe Dee.

Of course, a video is very necessary.

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Memory Lane

Weird but true: Mase's debut album "Harlem World" is one of my favorites. The whole CD reminds me of heading back to Houston on I-45, splashing on the Hilfiger cologne (which I still have, same container), slipping on some Polo boots and scoping out the ladies at The Roxy.

It's funny the things that trigger your memories, you know?



Also, Traci Bingham and the Mowry twins. Continue Reading »

What he meant by change

via


Also, he's just like O.J. Continue Reading »

Just like him

You know who else spoke to schoolchildren? Hitler!

I am not going to compare President Obama to Hitler.

Until the next sentence.

However, we can learn a lot from the spread of propaganda in Europe that led to Hitler's power. A key ingredient in that spread of propaganda was through the youth," wrote a blogger at the AmericanElephant.com blog, where the subject of the day was a national "Keep-Your-Child-at-Home-Day."

"Totalitarian regimes around the world have sought to spread their propaganda and entrench their power by brainwashing the children. I guess it's easier to indoctrinate a six-year-old instead of fighting a 26-year-old or being challenged by a 46-year-old in the voting booth," the blogger wrote.

But as Pat Buchanan has taught us, Hitler was not all that bad. He was just misunderstood. So, don't force Obama to kill you and everything will be ok.

h/t here and here.

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Inside the mind of Hitler

Who better to go there than Pat Buchanan?:

Now one may despise what was done, but how did this partition of Czechoslovakia manifest a Hitlerian drive for world conquest?

Comes the reply: If Britain had not given the war guarantee and gone to war, after Czechoslovakia would have come Poland’s turn, then Russia’s, then France’s, then Britain’s, then the United States.

We would all be speaking German now.

But if Hitler was out to conquer the world — Britain, Africa, the Middle East, the United States, Canada, South America, India, Asia, Australia — why did he spend three years building that hugely expensive Siegfried Line to protect Germany from France? Why did he start the war with no surface fleet, no troop transports and only 29 oceangoing submarines? How do you conquer the world with a navy that can’t get out of the Baltic Sea?

If Hitler wanted the world, why did he not build strategic bombers, instead of two engine Dorniers and Heinkels that could not even reach Britain from Germany?Why did he let the British army go at Dunkirk?

Why did he offer the British peace, twice, after Poland fell, and again after France fell?

Why, when Paris fell, did Hitler not demand the French fleet, as the Allies demanded and got the Kaiser’s fleet? Why did he not demand bases in French-controlled Syria to attack Suez? Why did he beg Benito Mussolini not to attack Greece?

Because Hitler wanted to end the war in 1940, almost two years before the trains began to roll to the camps.

Matt Yglesias has a thoughtful response here. Also, Mein Kempf.

I suppose that I'm just unfamiliar with the ways of the Beltway because I really didn't know being a Hitler apologist was acceptable in polite company anymore. But I'm sure Fox News could find a spot for Uncle Pat somewhere on their airwaves.

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Free Period: Your Monday Random-Ass Roundup

Four years after Hurricane Katrina carved a path of destruction from Texas to Alabama, we still can't know what sor of future awaits those devastated areas along the Gulf Coast. What we do know is that there is a lot of work left to be done. If you're interested, Leigh at Poverty in America is keeping track of some of the recovery efforts:

Late as usual, we've posted Your Monday Random-Ass Roundup over at PostBourgie. Some of the items for this week: more about Katrina, more about the fallen Liberal Lion of the Senate, more about health care, Moscow's problem with black and African people, our national bias against the overweight, OutKast is No. 1 and some classic MJ.

Hope you all enjoy. I was playing hurt this week.

Weird side note: I finally defriended someone on Facebook, saving myself from needless political aggravation when I go trolling through my friend's profiles and pictures. It was sort of liberating. I might even do it again.

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