USA Network: In Plain Sight- Something About Mary McCormack

Source:In Plain Sight Wiki- There's a lot of something about Mary McCormack. 

Source:The Action Blog 

"Sundays, 10/9c beginning June 1st.  In Plain Sight is an hour-long drama that revolves around Mary Shannon (Mary McCormack), a tough, sexy US Marshal who works for the Federal Witness Protection Program. While many of the witnesses under her care are high-maintenance career criminals, some are just innocent people who had the misfortune of witnessing a crime or falling victim to one." 

Source:USA Network- a lot of something about Mary McCormack.

From USA Network

 

Source:IMDB- Mary McCormack, as U.S. Marshal  Mary Shannon 

Did In Plain Sight make actress Mary McCormack a star? I personally knew about her from watching her on ABC's Murder One from back in 1995-96 where she played one of the lawyers at the firm there. And liked her back then both physically, but as an actress as well. And then about ten years later where she played the National Security Advisor on NBC's The West Wing. The West Wing, goes off the air in 2006 and she gets In Plain Sight from USA a couple years later. She's been around for a while and has been very successful for a while, but perhaps In Plain Sight made her a household name.

What In Plain Sight did for ( there's a lot of something about ) Mary McCormack, is not just make her the star of that hit show from USA, but the main reason if not only reason to watch that show. She plays U.S. Deputy Marshal Mary McCormack, who is a badass Federal law enforcement officer who has a no bullshit ( to be frank ) attitude and doesn't take anything from anyone, including her family. Who operates in a world where everyone around her is dependent on her and wants something from her.

Her no bullshit attitude operates in a world of bullshitters where both her mother and adult sister not just live with her, but are dependent on Mary for their economic survival. And she feels used and perhaps abused even by her own family and then she's hard-ass U.S. Marshal who works for the U.S. Witness Protection Bureau and deals with professional bullshit artists for a living which just compounds all of her issues for her. And operates in a world where the only people she really trusts are the people she works with including her partner and supervisor.

Similar to Mariska Hargitay from Law & Order SVU who also plays a badass female cop, as tough as attitude and first impression is, she's just too cute, beautiful, and feminine to completely fool people with her attitude.

Mary McCormack, as well as her character U.S. Marshal Mary Shannon, is a tall, gorgeous, sexy, very cute, sexy blonde who wears tight outfits on her show a lot and unless you're gay or something, perhaps blind as well it would be very hard if not impossible to at least notice her, if not be attracted to her.

On the outside she's a very feminine and attractive woman, but with the attitude of an Army Drill Sergeant, where you would have to be a complete idiot to want to mess with her. And plays this role perfectly and makes a good show very entertaining all by herself.

Lew Rockwell: Bionic Mosquito: 'Liberalism and Christianity: Liberal Christianity'

Source:Disqus- Christian-Conservatives vs. Christian Liberals. 

Source:The New Democrat

“Leftism: From de Sade and Marx to Hitler and Marcuse, by Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn

Erik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn (EvKL) examines what he calls “Real Liberalism” in chapter 13 of this book. I think it is worthwhile to capture his understanding of this political and economic philosophy.

Let us look at the verbal meaning. The root is liber (“free”). The term liberalis (and liberalitas) implies generosity in intellectual and material matters.” 

From Lew Rockwell

Liberalism and Christianity implies at least that they're two different things when the fact is there's a fundamentalist and even theocratic version of Christianity way over on the Right, the Christian-Right in America represents that movement. There's a social democratic version of Christianity way over on the Left, that has been lead by people like Reverend Martin L. King, Reverend Jesse and many other left-wing preachers. And there is a liberal version of Christianity that is less government centric than the social democratic version and even the fundamentalist version. That is more about treating people the way you would want to be treated. About respect and earning the respect of others by how you treat people. 

As someone who is not a Christian of any sect or a member of any other religious sect, but who is also not an Atheist, but an Agnostic I actually agree with some of the Ten Commandments.

Thou shalt not kill: meaning we shouldn't take innocent lives.

Thou shalt not steal: any moral person can agree that theft and burglary are wrong and immoral.

The Golden Rule is not a Ten Commandment, but it's a great rule and gets back to one of my points about Liberal Christianity having to deal with respect which is do unto others as you would have done to you. Treat people the way you want them to treat you. Don't live life thinking you're superior to everyone else and that it should be someone else's honor just to be in your presence. And therefor you can get away with being a jerk ( to be generous ) around other people simply because you're better than them and they don't want to lose you.

Live and let live: here's a moral value that Liberals and Libertarians at least can fall in love with. Also goes to Economics Professor Walter Williams broader definition of property rights which also goes to the liberal value of free choice. Which is free people should be aloud to live freely and don't need big government trying to manage their personal affairs for them and telling them how they should live. Short of hurting innocent people with our personal freedom and choices.

Goes back to two of the Ten Commandments that I mentioned earlier which are thou shalt not kill and thou shalt not steal. Add thou shalt not abuse others either physically or verbally. Thou shalt not rape would be another good example of this. Thou shalt not hurt innocent people with what they're doing especially children and women. The second one some might believe is sexist, but so what.

I'm not a Christian of any sect, but someone with my liberal values could get into a liberal version of Christianity instead of Christians trying to use government to manage people's lives for them and punish people simply because of how they communicate or what they do with their personal times and lives because they see those choices as immoral. Or the Christian-Left, trying to turn government into some national charity and perhaps even replacing charity with some national welfare or charity state using it to take care of the poor by taxing the rich, instead of using government to empower the less-fortunate to be able to take care of themselves. If there was a Liberal-Christian sect like I mentioned, I could become a Christian myself.

Graham Brown: Life Is About Choices- We Are What We Choose To Be

Source:Success Magazine- Great Graham Brown quote 

Source:The Daily Review

"Maxime Lacoste-Lebuis and Maude Plante-Husaruk ((Husaruk), both filmmakers, were researching their upcoming trip to Central Asia when they first heard a man named Raïmberdi talk about plants. “We stumbled upon a French TV program about [Tajikistan] where Raïmberdi had briefly appeared, and we immediately thought he was a very interesting man and that there was definitely more to his story,” Lacoste-Lebuis told The Atlantic."

Source:The Atlantic- The Botanist

From The Atlantic

Anyone who says that they have no regrets or have never made any mistakes, either is bullshitting you to your face and perhaps thinks you're an idiot as well, or perhaps hasn't really lived at all. Perhaps spent their entire life in an institution where everything was done for them and was always told what to do. Maybe they spend their entire time in their house and don't even ever cross the street for fear of falling or getting hit by a car. For someone like this they have to be so cautious and so conservative in the sense that they never take any risks, because they're always afraid of making mistakes and screwing up.

As Graham Brown says here, "life is about choices. Some we regret, some we're proud of. Some will haunt forever. The message: we are what we choose to be." Being human is about making choices and then living with the consequences of them for good and bad. Enjoying the rewards from the good decisions that we make, but dealing with the consequences for our bad choices. Anyone says they've never made a mistake in life and has no regrets, is either bullshitting you and thinks you're an idiot, or hasn't lived a life outside of an institution where they're always told what to do and everything is done for them. Perhaps spent their entire life in a coma. Which is I guess one way to honestly live without regrets. But who the hell wants to live in a coma simply to avoid having regrets and making mistakes?

It's not about whether we make mistakes in life and life with regrets, but the question is what do we do about it. Do we bitch about life being unfair and too hard, we can't go on and simply give up not just on life, but ourselves as well, or do we use our regrets and mistakes as learning opportunities. And look at them as opportunities to improve ourselves and look at where we failed and how not to do what we were trying to do there and learn how to do it right the next time so we don't make the same mistakes again. We all screw up, we're all wronged at some point in our lives, many times life is unfair and hits us si hard that it almost knocks us out. But as long as we're alive we're never knocked out and always have the wheels and power to move forward and to get better. As Graham Brown said we are what we choose to be base on the decisions that we make in life for good and bad.

Law & Order SVU: Kelli Kiddish- As NYPD Detective Amanda Rollins

Source:NBC- Kelli Giddish, on Law & Order SVU. 

Source:The Action Blog

"Actress Kelli Giddish on the set of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit"

Source:Mike Lenskikh- A look at Kelli Giddish, on the set of NBC's Law & Order.

From  Mike Lenskikh

From Wikipedia

Source:Fan Pop- Kelli Giddish, on Law & Order SVU.

"It was announced on June 27, 2011 that Giddish would join the cast of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit for its thirteenth season along with Cold Case's Danny Pino coinciding with Christopher Meloni's departure from the series.[7] Giddish told TV Guide during summer filming; "Everybody on the set is really excited and energized. They've lost a family member with Chris Meloni leaving, but they've been very accepting of us. Amanda is thrilled to be here working with these people, and so am I."[8]

Giddish made her debut as Detective Amanda Rollins in the 13th-season premiere, "Scorched Earth", in which the character first works alongside Detective Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay). In an interview with TV Guide, Giddish said about her character, "My character is in complete awe of Olivia, Amanda's really eager to get in there because she knows her stuff and really eager to learn. She has come from Atlanta and there was a ceiling there, so she's come up to New York."

From first appearance at least, Kelli Giddish looks like she would be one of the last people playing a hard-nosed ( to use a term from the 1950s ) big city police detective who is dedicated to her job as a police detective and always wants to get the bad guy or girl and protect the innocent. Especially people who prey on the innocent. Law & Order SVU, is a drama about NYPD detectives who handle sexual assault cases. Everything from child abuse rape and everything in between or even worst than those cases. So this NYPD unit deals with rapists, as well as people who sexually abuse innocent people, as well as murder them. They deal with some of the worst criminals you can possibly imagine, as well as some people who are mentally unhealthy, who commit horrible crimes.

I say Kelli Giddish and the character that she plays ( NYPD Detective Amanda Rollins ) because physically she comes off as so adorable and sweet and simply as someone who is not tough enough to deal with these cases. On the surface at least, Kelli Giddish looks like someone who would be better suited playing a heiress, or someone who works for a fashion magazine, model, perhaps one of those people who are simply famous for being famous like a heiress who spends most of their time spending away the trust fund that their rich father gave them, as well as getting into trouble. But that just goes to show you how terrific an actress that Kelli Giddish is who is someone who has such an adorable the American sweetheart next door demeanor and yet she plays a very tough NYC cop, who not only takes on the bad guys and girls, but who also kicks a lot of ass on the show.

Law & Order SVU, is a modern cop show about detectives who do a lot of leg work, as well as undercover work and are always on the move and not just investigating bad people, but taking them down. And taking down people to arrest them who don't want to be caught. So you see physical altercations on this show on a regular basis and because of this you see beautiful, sexy women like Kelli and Mariska Hargitay ( who plays Detective Lieutenant Olivia Benson ) on the show looking beautiful and very sexy, dressing pretty casually. A lot of skin-tight jeans, boots, tight tops. A lot of times on the show Kelli looks like a Western cowgirl cop wearing a Western jacket with her skin-tight jeans and cowgirl boots. Instead of wearing a suit jacket or leather jacket that would be more common with big city cops in America.

The modern TV cop show now has a lot of women playing the top cops on the show and doing a lot of the dangerous work as detectives, sergeants, or lieutenants. Whether it's Elisabeth Shue and Jorga Fox on CSI Las Vegas, Mariska Hargitay and Kelli Giddish on Law & Order SVU. Which is why you not only see very attractive women on shows  like this today, when 20 years ago they would be working in offices and even managing companies, but not doing physical dangerous work like working as vice detectives that they do today and doing other law enforcement jobs. Kelli Giddish, is the perfect example of what the modern TV cop looks like today. Beautiful, sexy, and even adorable on the outside at least, but very tough physically and personally and not someone you want to mess with.

The Atlantic: David Frum: President Trump's Attorney General: 'A Flaw in American Democracy'

Source:The Atlantic Magazine- The Atlantic's editor David Frum. 

Source:The New Democrat

What President Donald Trump, doesn't seem to understand, unaware of, or could simply care less ( and that might be putting it lightly ) is that even though he's the most powerful and ranking officer in his latest business investment and new company that the rest of us call the United States Government, he doesn't own it.

Source:ABC News- President Trump's temporarily acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker 

President Trump, is accountable to not only the voters, but Congress and the Judiciary as well. If he were still the President of the Trump Organization and he wanted to appoint a lackey because he was worried about current and incoming government investigations of his company and he didn't want to turn over key company documents to the government and he wanted a Trump loyalist to be his General Counsel of the company, he could do that because the TO doesn't have Board of Directors ( known as the U.S. Senate at the Federal level ) and no one would probably even say anything about that.

Source:VOX- President Donald Trump and company 

If President Trump, wants a Trump loyalist to be his Attorney General or even acting AG who has never worked in the Trump Administration before, he could do that, but for that person to take that job he would have to be approved by the Board of Directors also known as the U.S. Senate. He has a Republican Senate now and in January he'll have a Republican Senate again in the next Congress with perhaps two more seats than they have right now. And they could approve Matt Whitaker or Chris Kovach or anyone else to be the new Attorney General, because they're in the majority and Senate Democrats wouldn't be able to block the appointment just by themselves.

I'm not a lawyer and I've never even played one either on TV or played the part in some play let alone on some talk show or movie and I'm not going to pretend to a lawyer constitutional or otherwise here, but the law and Constitution regarding the appointment process here is very clear. If the President wants to appoint someone on an acting basis even to be full a cabinet level position who has never served in his administration before, like Attorney General which also just happens to be one of the 3-5 most important and most powerful jobs not just in the U.S, Government, but perhaps anywhere in America as well, the President needs to send that confirmation up to the Senate for their advice and consent. If the Senate approves the nominee, the President gets that nominee for that position. If the Senate votes that person down, it's back to the drawing board.

Donald Trump, either as President or as a one-reality show about his own narcissism ( also known 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue at The White House ) is an example of how bad a shape that social studies is in America and Americans lack of knowledge about how their own government works. And a great example of why Americans are viewed as dumb to the rest of the West and developed world. President Trump has this wild idea that he can basically do whatever the hell he wants regardless of what the law and Constitution says, just as long as his defenders in Congress and the Judiciary backs him up. And American government is just not supposed to work that way.
Source:The Atlantic

The Atlantic: Thomas P. McBee: 'Men Are Socialized To Act Inhumanely'

Source:The Atlantic- The American man. 

Source:The Daily Review

"A lot of people contend that American men are in crisis. But which men? And what is the nature of that crisis? 

American men are in crisis, the conventional wisdom goes. And, according to some experts, they have been for a while. For a few decades, perhaps. Maybe for more than a century.

But in a discussion about this “crisis” on Tuesday at the Aspen Ideas Festival, which is co-hosted by the Aspen Institute and The Atlantic, panelists had varying notions of what that crisis entails, if it exists at all. For Michael Kimmel, an author and professor at SUNY Stony Brook, where he founded the Center for the Study of Men and Masculinities, the crisis involves one type of man—heterosexual, white ones—who feel like their power “is slipping.” Tristan Bridges, an assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, agreed with Kimmel, adding that the crisis affects men who are now contending with “unchallenged entitlement.” For the writer Thomas Page McBee, the crisis involves men who are hurting in the face of society’s stereotyped expectations that they should be more inhumane than humane, more violent than empathic. For Joseph Derrick Nelson, a senior research fellow with the Center for the Study of Boys’ and Girls’ Lives, the crisis is hitting black boys who need support and the kind of unconditional love necessary to help them break free of certain damaging norms...

From The Atlantic

When I first saw the title of this video for this piece, I was expecting to hear some Far-Left radical feminist view about what's wrong with men, especially straight men and even more so straight Caucasian men. What the Far-Left just calls White boys or White males. They don't even have enough decency to refer to this group of Americans as men. But I was pleasantly surprise to hear Thomas McBee's point and what he was arguing about really was the extremes of straight men in America regarding their behavior when it comes to female relations especially in the workplace.

American boys regardless of their race or ethnicity, especially if they come from a straight two-parent family with a mother and father who are in love with each other, are raised to be men. Now, once a boy reaches puberty and starts thinking sexually it might turn out that boy is not straight and gay and there might be signs of that early on with the boy having a more feminine take on life and not interested in at least traditionally boy activities growing up like sports and other activities like that. But for most of us regardless of race or ethnicity especially if we come a starlight two-parent home we're raised to be men, meaning straight men.

American males are expected to be manly. Meaning we're expected to speak with strong voices, be sure about ourselves, at least look like we can handle ourselves physically and not to be picked on physically. Be able to handle criticism and humor about us because we're not overly sensitive, ( not including the current President of the United States ) we're expected to be into sports, interested and knowledgeable about cars, not just interested, or like women, but love women and think about them constantly and love talking to them and being around them, checking them out and everything else. We're expected to be the man of the house and lay down and enforce the rules for how our kids are supposed to behave, as well as handle the security and the home improvements of the house.

Some might argue that I'm just throwing out a lot of stereotypes out there like QB throws out a lot of balls in a two-minute drill, ( another male stereotype being that men use a lot of sports references to make their points ) but the thing about stereotypes is that there's always some truth in them or it wouldn't become a stereotype that's used over and over again by intelligent people even. As far as the gay movement has come now in America with gays even getting the right to marry each other in America, 90-95% of whether you just include outed gay men or closeted gay men, are not only straight, but we still tend to be masculine in America. There are gay men even who aren't queens and you wouldn't know right away after meeting them that they're gay.

To Thomas McBee's point about what it means to be a man and to be masculine, I agree with him. There's nothing unmanly about guys who care about other people and not just people who are related to them or are their friends or associates. There's nothing unmanly about guys hugging each other and I'm not just talking about hugging our father, grandfather, brother, uncle, cousin, etc, but guys who hug their male friends, because they love their male friends. The strong handshake plus one-arm hug that's popular now with straight men, I do that with my good buddies as well especially if I haven't seem them in a while. I have two brothers who live on the West Coast and live 3000 miles from me. Every time we see each other which isn't very often we give each other big hugs. Nothing unmanly about guys showing physical affection for each other.

At risk of sounding politically incorrect here, but I'll qualify what I'm going to say here and not just because this will probably be politically incorrect and again as a Liberal who believes in free choice and personal freedom there' nothing wrong with homosexuality and nothing immoral about it. I believe Americans have a right to be themselves and even a responsibility to be themselves regardless of who they are short of hurting innocent people with what they're doing, but being unmanly is not manly. ( To state the obvious ) Again, all Americans should be exactly who they are, but men who speak with high voices and they tend to be gay, or feel the need to use their hands move their cheeks and eyes, necks when talking, talk like valley girls, but have feminine interests and mannerisms and I'm not talking about being interested in women, but interested in what women tend to be interested in, to me at least queens aren't manly otherwise they wouldn't be queens. Not that there's anything wrong with that, if that's who you are. ( To use a Seinfeld line )

Again at risk of stating the obvious, you can be a straight man even and still be human. My only advice there would be to take things meaning life as they come and not to overact. Use proper analysis about what's going on and how it affects you and not to overreact to. Don't have a teen age girl moment ( again, to sound politically incorrect ) and act as if your life is over because you didn't get the job that you wanted or someone said something awful about you. I hate the term man up, so I would say be a man about life and take it for what it is which comes with a lot of highs and lows. Enjoy the highs because those are the pleasures of life, but don't view yourself as invulnerable because now you're on top. And use your lows as learning experiences and opportunities to improve. Instead of thunking your life is now over screwed up and suffered some disappointment and you'll get a lot more out of life and enjoy it a lot more. That to me is what being a man is about which is taking life for what it is and acting accordingly

Sophia Bush: Detective Erin Lindsay On Chicago P.D.

Source:Spoiler TV- Sophia Bush, with a bloody mess on Chicago P.D.-

Source:The Action Blog

"Welcome back, everyone! The darned heat is gone, leaves are changing, pumpkin flavor is overtaking the world, and TV is back. Chicago PD kicked off this week with a solid season three start.

We pick up this season roughly three weeks after the second season finale. Lindsay has fallen into her pre-cop ways, Olinsky has a newly-discovered, delinquent teenage daughter, and Burgess and Ruzek are happily engaged (for now)." 

From Spoiler TV

"Earlier this week, “Extra’s” Mario Lopez spoke to Sophia Bush at Universal Studios Hollywood, where she opened up about her decision to walk away from her hit show “Chicago P.D.”

Bush said, “I woke up one day and realized I hadn’t had a day off in 15 years.”

She added, “I went straight from junior year of college to ‘One Tree Hill’ and suddenly you realize your life is going by and you’re working 100 hours a week.”

After taking a much needed break, Sophia is “excited” to be back to work, promoting her new film “The Incredibles 2.”

“The Incredibles 2” hits theaters June 15."

Source:Extra TV- Mario Lopez interviewing Sophia Bush.

From Extra

To be completely honest with you, I only got into Chicago P.D. the last few years at all because I saw a few reruns and noticed that Sophia Bush whose name I never even heard of before, but then got to thinking that was very familiar and then I looked up the show and her online because she looked like one of the actresses from the teen soap opera One Tree Hill from ten years earlier. A show I watched on Soap Net about six years ago and she played one of the main characters on that show. But that she was much better looking now especially sexier while still remming just as adorable as she was back 2004-05, 06, etc. 

And like One Tree Hill which was sort of like for Millennial's which I'm not what Beverly Hills 90210 ( the original ) was for my Generation X. The main if not first soap opera about that generation and it wasn't as good as Beverly Hills and not as successful, but still a good show about that generation and I would argue very accurate as well, but how One Tree Hill is with Beverly Hills Chicago P.D. is not as good as Law & Order especially the original Law & Order from the 1990s or even Law & Order SYU. Not that Chicago isn't a good show or even a great show, but that it's not as good as the show that probably inspired it. 

Teen soap operas regardless of the generation that they were about became popular in the 1990s. Cop shows became popular in the 1990s as well because of shows like Law & Order and the CSI Las Vegas in the 2000s. To the point that thanks to NBC with their Law & Order franchise and CBS with their CSI franchise, cop and law enforcement shows are perhaps the most popular shows on network TV right now, because of all of these great cop shows and the great casts and characters that they put together. Chicago P.D., which is a police detective show where a lot of the characters are either detectives or sergeants, but based of course in Chicago unlike Law & Order in New York.

One thing that I like about the Detective Erin Lindsay character on Chicago P.D. ( played by Sophia Bush ) if that she fits the old cliches don't let appearances fool you, or don't judge a book by it's cover, or I would add don't let the baby face fool, because she'a lot tougher than she looks. She plays this beautiful, but baby face as cute as a little girl Chicago P.D. detective and yet she handles herself with the best of them and kicks as about as well as any guy on that show. The last part might be going pretty far, because you have big strong men who are also detectives on that show, but similar to the Elisabeth Shue character on CSI Las Vegas, she's mote than capable of handling herself and even pressing the issue when she's interrogating witnesses and suspects and making arrests.

The modern cop action/drama show has a lot of attractive, sexy women on it who kick ass on the show and do that wearing very tight, sexy outfits. Sophia's main outfit on that show are tight t-shirts, skin-tight jeans, and heeled boots with a beautiful body as well. She plays a vice detective so of course she's going to very casually dressed, but that's what people want to see with their cop shows today which are strong, tough, but very sexy women and Sophia Bush was one of the best at playing that strong, tough, sexy women on that show.

Sargon of Akkad: Interviewing Steve Bannon- Bannonism: The Revolt of The Little Guy

Source:Sargon of Akkad- The Steve Bannon interview. 

Source:The New Democrat

This is a good way to talk about Nationalists and nationalism, because they're Nationalists and then are Nationalists. Similar to there are Socialists and then are Socialists. Not all Nationalists are Nazis and not all Socialists are Communists. As someone who is not a Socialist or Communist and strongly dislikes both, I would tell you Steve Bannon is a Nationalist, but in the best sense. As someone who loves his country ( in this case America ) and believes his number job is to look out for America and stand up for America regardless of what the rest of the world thinks or does about that.

Source:Sargon of Akkad- Steve Bannon 

Steve Bannon, comes from a small town, blue-collar mindset which is now a solid percentage of the Republican Party now with most big city and big metro Americans either Democrats, Independents, or right of center Republicans especially on economic and foreign policy, but want nothing to do the Nationalists and Christian-Right when it comes to social policy.

Source:Sargon of Akkad- Interviewing Steve Bannon 

And Nationalists in the Bannon sense not the Nazi or right-wing Socialist sense, view people that they see as the elite who went to the top Northeast schools in America and come from money and probably inherited a good deal of money, who've worked in and out of government and when they're not doing that they're working for think tanks or professors at elite colleges, Bannon Nationalists view people of this background as the problem with America.

Bannon Nationalists, view elitists as people who looked down on people who physically work hard for a living, work hard just to pay their bills and mortgages, who don't live in or outside of a big city like Washington, New York, Boston, San Francisco, etc, people who frankly wanted Hillary Clinton for President who Hillary represents.

The 2016 presidential election between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, was essentially blue-collar Nationalists represented by Trump. And white-collar elitists represented by Clinton. A big reason why Trump defeated Clinton, is because the Clinton elitist wing of the country was in charge for America for a very long time. And the Trump blue-collar folks felt left behind and believed they were losing their America. Some would argue that part of that had to do with cultural, racial, and ethnic reasons and I would agree with that as well.

To say this is not your father's Republican Party anymore, would be like saying that if you jumped in a lake there is a high percentage that you'll get wet in the water. It would be one of the worst cases of stating the obvious since it was announced that water is wet. The country club Republican Party that were Conservatives and in some cases Progressives even that were primarily interested in economic and foreign policy, is still around, but on life support in the Republican Party. Today's Republican Party is based in the South and small town Midwest and rural America in general. And that's what the Steve Bannon's of the world represent in American politics.
Source:Sargon of Akkad

The Atlantic: Rebecca Traister- 'Can Women's Anger Save America?'

Source:The Atlantic- From author Rebecca Traister. 

Source:The Daily Review 

“In America today, women are angry. But this isn’t a modern phenomenon, argues the author Rebecca Traister. In her new book, “Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women’s Anger,” Traister details how female rage has long been the country’s political fuel. She expounded on this idea at Aspen Ideas Festival in June, where, in a video interview, she discussed how the fury of American women—from the suffragists to the abolitionists to Rosa Parks—has catalyzed major political movements. Read a review of Traister’s book on:The Atlantic." 

From The Atlantic

I'm cool with anger not that I enjoy being angry or seeing angry people ( especially with me ) but I'm fine with justifiable anger just as long as it's used to bring about positive change and used in a constructive sense.

Anyone can be angry with some or something, but unless they use that anger and express how they feel to make things better and express while they're angry with someone or about something, maybe you believe someone screwed you at work or you were turned down for a promotion and it went to someone who is less qualified, you're boyfriend or girlfriend is cheating on you, whatever the case is and whoever you believe wronged you unless you express you're feelings and do something about it to improve your situation, anger is nothing more than wasted emotion and energy. Emotion and energy that could've been used to to make things better for you.

Not to get too political but by message for Democrats and Independents who don't like President Donald Trump and the Republican Congress you can be as angry as you want to with the Republican Party especially in Washington right now, but if you don't bother to vote for candidates who oppose what they're doing, you're wasting your time and the country's time as well. Bottled up emotion is as useful and makes as much sense as trying to swim up stream with one arm and leg going into a 20 mile and hour and wind.

Anger is only a useful emotion when it's used to make things better even for yourself or people you care about. The same thing with screwing up and making mistakes if you don't learn from them, you'll make the exact same mistakes again and you'll be nothing more than a screwup who is perhaps learning impaired as well. Whether it's women who care about the me too movement or just hate Donald Trump and his treatment of women today and in the past, unless you use your anger to bring about positive change, all you're doing is trying to swim upstream with one arm and one leg in a 20 mile hour wind and your anger is nothing more than wasted energy and emotion. 

TV Guide: 'TV's Sexiest Crime Fighters- Women'

Source:TV Guide- Detective Catherine Chandler (played by Kristin Kreuk) on The Beauty and The Beast.

Source:The Action Blog 

"Detective Catherine Chandler (Kristin Kreuk), Beauty and the Beast The NYPD detective is stunningly gorgeous as is, but have you seen her dress up? Whether it's rocking a gown or a masquerade costume, it's no wonder Vincent and Gabe fought over her."

From TV Guide

There has been a trend in Hollywood going back 10-15 years and perhaps because of the success of CSI Las Vegas and Law & Order SVU of not just crime fighting shows or cop shows, but shows like that which are very sexy and where the cast is very sexy. Very attractive with a lot of beautiful sexy women on it playing the roles of lead detectives and doing a lot of the hard dangerous work on the cases.

Source: TV Wise- The original cast of True Justice, including Meghan Ory and Sarah Lind 

And when you look at their detective units where these people work at the office, there's no such thing as Casual Friday, but instead they have Casual Everyday. Where the dressiest outfit for women there would be a pantsuit, but with boots instead of dress or business shoes. You'll still see male detectives, sergeants, and lieutenants wearing business suits, but not so much with the women on these shows.

Source: XP Autographs- SVU's Kelli Giddish 

A common outfit for female detectives especially when they're on the road and either questioning witnesses, suspects, or catching suspects will be a t-shirt sometimes long sleeve, but a lot of times short sleeve, with skin-tight denim jeans, maybe kaki jeans or cargo pants, with boots. Looking beautiful, sexy, and kicking ass as cops. Shows like CSI with Marg Helgenberger, Elisabeth Shue. Law & Order SVU with Mariska Hargitay and Kelli Giddish. True Justice with Meghan Ory and Sarah Lind. Saving Grace with Holly Hunter from ten years ago. The Mentalist with Robin Tunney and Amanda Righetti. Chicago PD with Sophia Bush and many other shows like that from this era.

Source: Chicago PD- Sophia Bush on Chicago PD 

A big part of this obviously has to do with style with boots and jeans being so popular now with women, along with staying in shape with women wanting to show their bodies off in a stylish professional way, but also because this look is so versatile and practical and women can wear boots and jeans to the office without looking too casual now. And because they're playing not just cops, but detectives who are in a lot of dangerous situations where they have to not only catch suspects, but catch people who don't want to get caught and have to physically confront suspects.

Beautiful both men and women in America like seeing women kick ass on TV and do it in a sexy way. The common female TV cop now is beautiful, sexy, and fairly young. Who is more than capable of defending herself who wears a lot of tight outfits which is what people want to see from their TV cops now both men and women. Gone are the days where TV cops were almost always guys and generally middle age guys who are always wearing business suits. Now the common TV detective both male and female are younger, very attractive, well-built, and sexy, because that is what the viewers want to see.

Ron Paul Liberty Report: 'Republicans Responsibility For Socialism's Comeback'

Source:Ron Paul Liberty Report- U.S, Representative Dr. Ron Paul (Libertarian, Texas) 

Source:The New Democrat 

"According to a recent Reuters/Ipsos survey, 70 percent of Americans, including about 50 percent of Republicans, support Medicare for all, the latest incarnation of single-payer health care. Republican support for a health plan labeled “Medicare for all” is not surprising considering that Republican politicians support Medicare and that one of their attacks on Obamacare was that it would harm the program. Furthermore, the biggest expansion of Medicare since its creation — the Part D prescription drug program — occurred under a conservative president working with a conservative Congress." 

From the Ron Paul Liberty Report

I think the way I would look at this would be to go back to George W. Bush's Administration. where Republicans with help from Congressional Democrats expanded the Federal role in public education in 2002. And then instead of reforming Medicare in 2003 a Republican Congress with some help from Senate Democrats and no help from House Democrats, expanded Medicare in 2003 with the prescription drug benefit in Medicare.

I'm not calling President George W. Bush a Socialist, but to argue that he was a Conservative doesn't sound right either. He expanded the Federal Government almost across the board except when it came to the regulatory state where his administration almost had an hands off approach when it came to government regulations of the economy. And you could argue that Ayn Rand approach to government regulations contributed to the 2008 financial crisis that lead to the Great Recession, with the Bush Administration being asleep at the wheel while American banks and investors were making irresponsible investments on Wall Street that they couldn't cover the losses for.

I believe the real reasons why socialism is making a comeback in America, has to do with President George W. Bush and his handling of the economy that you could at least argue is at least partially responsible for the Great Recession of 2008-09 and young Americans getting stuck with the bill for that economic collapse and finding themselves either with college diplomas, but are unable to find jobs that makes them financially independent or having to work multiple jobs just to pay their bills. Along with have college loans that they can't pay back that are eating away at their income.

And then you have people like Senate Bernie Sanders ( the only self-described Socialist member of Congress ) come along and make all sorts of promises of government being able to do this and that for the people and all of these new government services and expansion of current government services are going to be free and young naive people thinking that sounds cool ( or awesome ) to them and they get behind someone like a Senator Sanders and back his message of socialism.

The Daily Beast: Libby Torres: 'SVU's Detective Olivia Benson Is The Mother of The Me Too Movement'

Source:Notey- The current cast of Law & Order SVU.

Source:The Action Blog

To say that NBC's Law & Order SVU is ahead of it's time, would be like saying that it gets hot in Texas especially in the summer or it rains in Seattle, well at any point during the year or it snows in Minnesota in January and hopefully you get the idea by now. ( God help if you don't ) They were talking about issues back in 1999-2000 ( the first season of SVU ) 17-18 years before the so-called Me Too movement emerged in 2017. They were dealing cases as a detective squad about women being raped and sexually abused in other ways. As well as little girls and boys who are sexually abused by their parents and other adults in their lives.

Source: Daily Mail- Mariska Hargitay and Brooke Shields, being very cute for a little boy on the set of SVU

The original Law & Order which I still get to watch every week ( thanks to Sundance and TNT ) is still favorite now just show from this franchise, but one of my favorite shows ever, especially from the 1990s and 2000s, but SVU is right up there as one of the best cop dramas on TV. Perhaps the best cop drama on TV right now, but I'm guessing fans of CSI Las Vegas would probably dispute that. Maybe they can get together on TV ( fans of both shows ) and debate on live national TV. I'm sure Bravo would be happy to broadcast that and it would be ultimate and perhaps even real reality TV show.

But on a less substantive note but still important the Olivia Benson character ( played by Mariska Hargitay ) is one of the first sexy female police detectives on TV. There've been beautiful, sexy, younger female law enforcement officers on TV before. Angie Dickinson was the original with Police Woman from the 1970s, Heather Thomas from The Fall Guy in the 1980s, Kelly Hu from Nash Bridges from the late 1990s and perhaps there are more.

But Mariska is the first from a trend that started in the mid 2000s or so where you would have beautiful, sexy women playing tough cops who kick ass on a regular basis and even kick male ass. They're no longer playing secretary's, receptionists or desk sergeants that just take calls and pass on information to the real detectives and their superiors, but working cases and getting into conflict and having to physically take on strong male suspects who could severely hurt them if not kill them if the female officer is not up to the task.

Mariska, is the first female TV law enforcement officer to where tight jeans and boots on the show on a regular basis while she's working and not at home or having a rare day off, but working her cases in beautiful black leather jacket, black denims, and boots. She was doing that back in 2007-08 if not earlier and now every cop show has at least one if not multiple female lead officers who are beautiful, sexy, physically able to take care of themselves who work their cases in boots and jeans on a regular basis. Just watch CSI Las Vegas with Elisabeth Shue, or watch Criminal Minds with the attractive detectives there, Chicago PD with Sophia Bush, NCIS LA with Daniela Ruah and I could go on.

Mariska Hargiatay ( who plays now Detective Lieutenant Olivia Benson ) is not the first beautiful, sexy, sharp, witty, great cop on TV, she's just the best cop with those qualities and that includes Angie Dickinson who I love as well and they're now in their 20th season with apparently no plans to ever wind the show down and plan for a final season and not just because of how popular the show is and that it's lead to over great cop shows like Chicago PD, but also because of how great the show is. How great the cast, storylines and everything else that makes cop shows great.

Reason Magazine: Nick Gillespie- Interviewing Ken White: 'Free Speech Is In Just As Much Danger From Right-Wingers'

Source:Reason Magazine- Attacks on free speech. 

Source:The New Democrat

I guess where I would disagree is with the title of the Reason piece where they say, "free speech is in just as much danger from Conservatives." Implying that free speech is in just as much danger from Conservatives, that it is from Liberals. I argue that free speech is not in danger from either of the center's of American politics the Center-Right and Center Left, Conservatives and Liberals, but that's in danger from the fringes of American politics.

Nationalist-Tribalist- Christian-Nationalists on the Far-Right, who are offended by American culture and would like to see big government come in and restrict what we can see on TV and in pop culture generally. And anyone who opposes Donald Trump and his supporters are traitors ( from their perspective ) and therefor not serving of the same free speech rights as people who support Donald Trump and come from the Christian-Right Nationalist wing in and outside of the Republican Party.

And Socialists in some cases democratic but when you look at groups like ANTIFA and other self-described Communists in America, people who believe that right-wingers don't have free speech rights in America because what they say is offensive and they simply don't like what the Right ( especially Far-Right ) has to say and therefor should be shut down and silenced whenever they speak. Whenever one of these right-wingers especially Far-Rightist's like Ann Coulter tries to give a speech, you'll see Far-Left groups show up and protest her or someone else on the Far-Right and try to shut her down and shut her up. When one of these people writes a book, they'll protest bookstores and try to boycott them so the author can't sell their book.

As an actual Liberal, not a Libertarian, or Civil Libertarian or Conservative-Libertarian, but as an actual real-life Liberal who doesn't want big government trying to manage our personal and economic affairs for us including what we say to each other and doesn't want a national babysitter or nanny state, but a real Liberal in the real sense as someone who believe in liberal values like liberal democracy and the individual rights that Liberals actually support, I believe in free speech period. Whether it comes to pornography and other forms of adult entertainment that the Christian-Right claims to hate and use to view ( pre-Donald Trump ) as a national threat to our security and morality. Or critical or even offensive speech towards minority groups or anyone else in America that the Far-Right hates.

If you believe in free speech, you believe in free speech. Which is sort of like saying if someone believes in God, they believe in God, but my point is that if you believe in free speech you believe in free speech for everyone and not just people that you tend to agree with. Like that Michael Douglas line from The American President, that America is hard and you have to want it bad because it's going to come after you. Because it's a society where you have the right to say and believe whatever you want and those rights will be defended to the hilt. But that people who tend disagree with you have the exact same constitutional First Amendment free speech rights as you do. And free speech is better and America is better when we fight for the free speech rights as others the same way that we fight for our own and the people who we tend to agree with.
Source:Reason Magazine

The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson- Burt Reynolds (8/02/1978)

Source: Richard Binckley- Burt Reynolds, on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson in 1978.

Source:The Daily Review

Burt Reynolds, the master of action/comedy who was a basically a comedian himself who didn't do standup ( except when he was sitting down being interviewed ) being interviewed by the master of the late show the King of Late Night Johnny Carson. What could possibly be funny about two masters of the wisecrack and improv who play off each other perfectly because they have similar sense of humors? And then throw they were both somewhat immature when it came to comedy as far as not afraid of looking silly when they do their comedy.

I didn't get much out of this interview other than Burt's wisecracks about Hollywood parties and his trip to Florida for his summer vacation and how commercial the towns that he went through have become. But with Carson and Reynolds you didn't need a script for these two guys to have a funny interview, because they played so well off each other. Sort of like Whose Line is it Anyway, Saturday Night Live, any Cary Grant movie where the director trusted his cast and let them do their things and be themselves as performers, because they director knew it would work out.
Richard Binckley: The Tonight Show With Johnny Carson- Burt Reynolds: 8/02/1978

Aaron Ross Powell & Trevor Burrus: Rob Schenck: The Moral Collapse of Evangelical America

Source:Libertarianism.Org- The perfect title for this piece.

Source:The New Democrat

If there is a moral collapse of Evangelical America, it can be summed up in two words, which are Donald Trump. I'm talking about the political wing of the Christian-Right in America who are dominated by Evangelicals who base their political on their interpretations of the Bible, not the U.S. Constitution. And they see Donald Trump who just a few years ago was an Atheist or at best an Agnostic where religion had little if no impact on his life until he became a Presbyterian a few years ago, the Christian-Right sees Donald Trump and his presidency as their ticket to accomplish a lot of things that they couldn't do with really any other Republican President ever.

The Christian-Right, has made a bargain with devil ( so to speak ) with Donald Trump and have calculated that they're willing to tolerate anything that Donald Trump does all his bad personal behavior, maturity, temper, hate for any dissent against him, lack of experience and knowledge about the issues that he talks so much about and has to deal with as President, his bigotry towards people who don't support him and have decided to sum up all of President Trump's bad behavior into, "he's not a typical politician and does things differently."

And the Christian-Right have just swallowed President Trump's talking points when it comes to negative news about him into saying, "well, we don't know these things are true." Or "well, these Republicans even who don't like Donald Trump are just saying these bad things about him, because they're part of the establishment and are simply trying to defend that." Just as long as President Trump delivers on what he promised the Christian-Right. And appoints judges and justices that will one day will rule that abortion, and same-sex marriage are illegal, and there's no constitutional right to privacy even under the 4th Amendment. Which would be mean big government could then come into Americans personal lives and decide who Americans can sleep with and do with their personal time.

The Christian-Right-Wing of the Republican Party, that back in the 1990s saw pornography, same-sex marriage, and adultery, as threats to national security and morality and therefor must be outlawed in America, are now saying that they don't care about those things at least when it comes to the people they support politically. Adulterous affairs and pornography that their Republicans might have been involved with are none of the government's business, because these Republicans are their people and on their side. And because of this have lost all of their credibility when it comes to speaking about the personal lives and personal behavior of Americans including politicians, because they back and defend politicians who've lived similar lives and have done similar things. Whether it;'s adultery, pornography, or whatever it may be.
Source:Libertarianism.Org

Ederik Schneider: 'Fixing Big Government is Not Conservative'

Source:The Daily Beast- it's the job of Socialists and Nationalists to fix Big Government. Not anyone else.

“Go West, young man,” New York Tribune editor Horace Greeley famously urged soldiers coming home from the Civil War and wondering what to do with the rest of their lives. In that spirit, here’s my politically corrected advice to millennials who want to change the world: “Go local, young gender-unspecified person.”

Don’t look to Washington to remake American society from the top down.  And don’t assume that real political change can only come through massive expansions of federal power." 

From The Daily Beast 

"The past few years have put the size and role of government at center stage of our national politics. But the raging debates about how much Washington is doing and spending have involved almost exclusively yes-or-no questions about the left's vision of government. The right has been very clear about what government should not be doing, or should be doing much less of, but it has not had nearly enough to say about just what government should do." 

From National Affairs 

Originally the title: "Fixing Big Government is Not Conservative" came from a YouTube video that I saw about 10 years ago, but since no one else seems to want to claim that title now, I will. 

It's not the job of Conservatives, to conserve big government or fix big government. (At least not Conservative in a constitutional or political sense) Its the job of Conservatives to conserve the U.S. Constitution, the American way of life for all Americans, regardless of their race, ethnicity, religion, culture, lifestyle, etc. It's the job of Conservatives to conserve our individual rights which grants every American the right to be themself and be individuals. 

It's the job of Conservatives, to fix government, when government is too big, or even too small and not doing the things that we need it to do. Conservatives shouldn't say: "Big Government is not working and this is how we should fix it." What they should say instead is: "Of course big government doesn't work and this why. Which is why we shouldn't have Big Government in the first place. And this is the type of government that we should have instead."

Let Socialists, Nationalists, Theocrats, Monarchs, worry about fixing something that can't be fix, which is big government. Because the reason why big government never works, because it's too big. Once you take power away from individuals and give it an organization that doesn't even know the people whose lives you've given it the to power to manage, of course it's going to fail. Which is as predictable as getting wet in the rain, or glass breaking when it hits a concrete floor. 

LeAnn Rimes: Life Goes On

Source: LeAnn Rimes Official- LeAnn Rimes's Life Goes On 

Source: The New Democrat

Source LeAnn Rimes

"You sucked me in and played my mind

Just like a toy

You would crank and wind

Baby, I would give you to what you want

You left me lying in a pool of doubt

If you're still thinking your the daddy mack

Ya shouldn't known better

But ya didn't

And I can't go back

Oh life goes on

And it's only gonna make me strong

It's a fact

Once you get on board

Say good-bye

'Cause you can't go back

Oh it's a fight

And I really want to get it right

Where I'm at

It's my life before me

Got this feeling

That I can't go back

Wish I knew then what I know now

You held all the cards

And sold me out

Baby, shame on you if you fool me once

Shame on me if you fool me twice

You've been a pretty hard case to crack

Should've of known better

But I didn't

And I can't go back."

Source: Fun For Funny- LeAnn Rimes's Life Goes On 

I believe this is one my favorite songs now and certainly one of my favorite LeAnn Rimes song. Her music from the Coyote Ugly days and album is really what I love about her music. Can't Fight The Moonlight, How do I live. Not a country music fan even though I like country girls, which is really a different subject, but I like this song which isn't a country song. LeAnn, is from the pop country school of country music that came out in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Where country is mixed in with pop. Shania Twain, graduated from that school and in the mid 2000s Gretchen Wilson and Miranda Lambert took that a step further and address classic rock and even blues to their country music. With their music really being about country or rural life, but with a harder rock edge to it. One of the reasons why I like Life Goes On is because it's not a country song.

About the song itself, what LeAnn is saying here is that what won't kill her will just make her stronger. Which is sort of cliche now but it's right on point. This song is about a relationship that went south and she's saying that it's time to move on and that life goes on for her without this man in her life that I guess did her wrong. Reminds me a lot of Tina Turner's I Don't Wanna Fight from 1993. And the point of the song is so spot on and so honest about what life is really about which is that we all start off life with a steep learning curve and the only way to really live life is buy learning about it. Which includes making mistakes, not intentionally at least for most us but learning by doing learning from experience including making mistakes and even bad mistakes. And using those mistakes to improve ourselves and make us into better people.

And that is what this song is about that she went through a rough relationship with a guy and suffered from it because she trusted someone who hurt her over and over and guess finally woke up and decided it's time to move on and that life really goes on for her and that has to be without him. The whole line about which sounds corny but is very true that, "shame on you if you fool me once, shame on me if you fool me twice" is a perfect example of that and she finally got it that this guy is playing her and can't be trusted and it's time for her to dump him. That she should've known better but didn't and she can't go back because life goes on. Great song with a great message to it.
Source:LeAnn Rimes