It’s Memorial Day weekend, and so my thoughts are 270 miles south of here, at the Kerrville Folk Festival. For the second year in a row, events are intervening to make it virtually impossible that I’ll get down there for even a day or two.
Such is the way life goes, sometimes. Dennise and I had actually both talked about going down this very weekend, and spending some days. But, we’ve been busy with other stuff.
Bill Nash texted to say that they’d do a circle at Nashbill in my honor. Can’t ask for much more than that….and hope that folks keep the reports flowing on the Kerrchat list.
Inquiring minds want to know.
Here’s what she’s posted to her website:
“I am sad to inform you that my sweet son Jared has passed. My Jared was
involved in an automobile accident that happened on May 18, 2008. He was
being driven by a friend who was under the influence and was killed
almost instantly. The boy who was driving is in jail and being charged
with manslaughter. He is just a kid and so I hope you keep his family
and ours in your prayers as both are grieving.”
Read the whole thing here.
I truly ache for her and her family. Jared was a good kid who tolerated his Mom’s hanging out with the Kerrville crowd. Debbie’s an old friend who sang on stage with me both at my CD release party, and at Uncle Calvin’s…once upon a time.
My heart aches and goes out to all of them.
Rev. Bill Crouch died about two weeks ago. Bill was a legend in the North Texas Conference, and was my “DS” at one point. He’s also the father of one of my good clergy friends, Mary Beth Crouch. (And, long, long ago, I was the hall director for one of his other daughters…)
You can read a fine obit here.
Bill was most known for being a minister. But he was also a musician. Bill played in a group that, best I can tell for what I’ve heard, had a sort of “Kingston Trio” sound.
Bill died of an aggressive form of cancer, and his memorial service was the Monday after Dennise’s surgery…so I just couldn’t get up there for it….but I heard it was great.
But one of the things I will now cherish is that apparently Bill’s last performance as a musician –singing and playing his acoustic– was with Connections during our Denton show back in February. Bill “sat in” on several of the Eagles tunes.
And we are honored to list him as “sitting in with the band” member of Connections, and honored by the memory of getting to play with him one last time.
Well, the brouhaha over Hillary Clinton’s comments the other night continues. Her supporters continue to suggest that anyone who was offended by it is over-reacting. So, we’ll see how it plays out.
Of even more interest to me is some analysis done on her claim that “many Primaries go into June.”
Well, that appears to be technically true. But it overlooks the fact that this year’s primary started earlier than any in history.
The NYT blog has done some interesting analysis on this.
“The 1992 Democratic campaign to defeat President George Bush started much later than this year’s campaign. Bill Clinton, then the governor of Arkansas, announced his candidacy on Oct. 3, 1991. Mrs. Clinton began her race last January, and her Democratic rival, Senator Barack Obama, entered the contest soon after.”
That means that Bill Clinton’s campaign –from “announcement” to June of the following year– was nine months. Hillary Clinton’s campaign, assuming she stays in until June, would be 17 months!
But wait, there’s more. Despite her many assertions that President Clinton didn’t have it wrapped up until June, there is ample evidence to the contrary among reports from the time. From the same NYT blog:
“Yet by March 20, 1992, the list of Democrats seeking the nomination had dwindled to the point where Phil Angelides, then the chairman of the California Democratic Party, said, “Today is really the day we start the general election campaign against George Bush.”Less than two weeks later, on April 8, after winning the New York primary, Mr. Clinton’s deputy campaign manager, George Stephanopoulos, declared the process complete.
“It’s mathematically impossible for Brown to get the nomination, and it would take Tsongas about 90 percent of the remaining delegates to win,” Mr. Stephanopoulos said, referring to Senator Paul E. Tsongas of Massachusetts, who had already suspended his campaign, and Jerry Brown, the former California governor. Though Mr. Brown competed until the Democratic convention, Mr. Clinton was the presumptive nominee.”
As for the other events Hillary Clinton mentioned –the timeline of Robert Kennedy’s run in 1968– this chronology shows how Kennedy didn’t even enter the race until March of 1968!! He was in it until his untimely death in June of that year, for a paltry total of 3 months!!! Fourteen less than Clinton will be in, should she stay through June.
So, yes, she is correct that several campaigns have technically gone into June previously. But none of them have been quite so lengthy as the one we’re in right now.
Changing the tone completely, may I say here that sometimes I really love the Onion.
Yes, that last one was funny. But, sometimes, truth is stranger than fiction. And while I love to write you all about all the great things to like about Texas, sometimes there’s this:
Man Uses Gun for Backscratcher, Shoots Himself
The reporter on this was Kimberly Durnan who, as Pegasus News noted, used considerable restraint in her reporting. And apparently she did such a good job that the DMN gave her the next story in the same…um…rich…um…genre:
Naked Mom Argues With Son, Accidentally Shoots Finger
Yep. That’s our state.
One final note: look for the Connections Band fall schedule very, very soon…perhaps as early as tomorrow. Some GREAT dates coming up…including the chance to see every show we’ve done so far, and our newest cover show, coming in September.
I promise…you won’t want to miss it.
More soon.
WhenEFTalks 