Doug Berch

"The spectacle is not a collection of images, but a social relation among people, mediated by images."

- Guy Debord - "Society of The Spectacle" (1967).

YouTube video by Ronan Pinc Stéphane Grappelli - Honeysuckle Rose - vers 1959

I have long loved Stephane Grappelli's tone and the fluidity of his playing.
❤

Perhaps the Andrew formerly known as Prince could buy US citizenship as offered for sale by the Trump administration. The Republicans would consider him worthy of a cabinet appointment at the least, and all future crimes would be pardoned.

Say cheese!

YouTube video by aural archipelago Wisisi - Iniki One - Lani String Band Music from Highland Papua

"Wisisi (also called iniki one) is a musical tradition of the Lani and Dani people of the Papuan highlands. Though it takes its instrumentation from the Melanesian string band tradition, wisisi's brilliance is in its radical deconstruction of this form."

YouTube video by aural archipelago Selober: Mouth Harp Music of Lombok

This is wonderful. ♥️

Mike Johnson Just Tried To Correct The Pope On The Bible. Seriously. The House speaker’s attempted use of scripture to defend Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown drew backlash online.

Is the Pope Catholic?

Does Mike Johnson shit in the woods?

"The work of art of the future will be the construction of a passionate life."

- Raoul Vaneigem

Alert: ICE is drawing weapons on legal observers in Minneapolis.

Punxsutawney Phil Sees His Shadow And Predicts Three More Years Of Fascism

YouTube video by Huppelplopp1848 Chumbawamba - Give the anarchist a cigarette

The healing power of music.

"Nothing ever burns down by itself; every fire needs a little bit of help."

YouTube video by Tommy McCook - Topic Zazuka

The healing power of music.

Zazuka · Tommy McCook & The Supersonics

Public Service Announcement For Republican Men:

While sitting through multiple showings of "Melania," make sure to keep a coat or a briefcase on your lap.

What happened to Pee-wee Herman could happen to you.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

After Donations, Trump Administration Revoked Rule Requiring More Nursing Home Staff

The pious family values party just threw the disabled and the elderly under a bus in exchange for a bribe.

"You cannot bargain with the State. The State recognizes no coinage but power, and it issues the coins itself."

Ursula K. Le Guin - "The Dispossessed"

Things are getting worse.

ICE is abducting people and forcing them to attend screenings of "Melania."

Only joking.

Or am I?

When this horror is over, "I never supported Trump" will be the MAGA version of "I had a lot of Jewish friends before the war."

Museum showcases Anatolia’s coffee culture Tucked in the southern province of Adana's Seyhan district, the Kahve Evi Müzesi has emerged as a quiet powerhouse for cultural preservation — welcoming almost 50,000 visitors in two years to explore ...

Tucked in the southern province of Adana's Seyhan district, the Kahve Evi Müzesi has emerged as a quiet powerhouse for cultural preservation — welcoming almost 50,000 visitors in two years to explore the storied world of Anatolian coffee.

www.hurriyetdailynews.com/museum-showc...

"Happiness is the absence of striving for happiness."

- Chuang Tzu

I've long noticed that when people create God in their own image, their God usually turns out to be an asshole. Funny how that works.

official auction photo, quarter turn side profile facing left on white background “Paul Manship is most known for his highly stylized Greek mythological figures. His small-scale animal sculptures, such as the present work, were modeled with the same spirit of animation and dynamism as his mythological human forms. “In Manship’s work nature is neither tamely imitated nor distorted. It is simplified and organized by the artist for a specific symbolic and sculptural purpose,” explains scholar Edwin Murtha (Edwin Murtha, Paul Manship, New York, 1957, p. 16). The artist’s bird sculptures are celebrated for their individuality. Despite their small stature, they possess a remarkable degree of detail, right down to their foundry marks which reside along the narrow edge of their respective bronze bases. Manship’s birds were cast in Munich at the German foundry of Priessmann Bauer & Co. in 1932. Although the exact edition size is not known, each bird was cast in a small run. Other casts of King Penguin, Flamingo, and King Pelican reside in the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s permanent collection.”

For #PenguinAwarenessDay 🐧:
Paul Manship (USA, 1885-1966)
King #Penguin, 1932
Bronze, 10¾ in. (27.3 cm) high on a 1¼ in. (3.2 cm) lapis lazuli veneered base
www.sothebys.com/en/buy/aucti...
#BirdsInArt

What saddens me more than this ill criminal spreading evil, lies and chaos is the fact that so many people in the United States still support him. They are either wealthy and profiting from this, racists, pridefully ignorant, Christian Nationalists, or just plain stupid.

Owl carving from the medieval chancel stalls of St. Mary's Church at Higham Ferrers in Northamptonshire. 📸 My own. #Woodensday #HighamFerrers #Northamptonshire

YouTube video by BristolRon Bert Jansch ' The Curragh Of Kildare ' VRC0292

♥️

YouTube video by clarebannerman Melodeon Music

Two reels beautifully played on a one row melodeon.

A noir-style illustrated poster titled “The Case of the Disappearing Copyright.” The Lockette—a cartoon character whose body is an open yellow padlock—cautiously steps out of an open vault marked with a copyright symbol. A strong beam of light shines from outside the frame, casting a large copyright symbol onto the floor. Floating eyes and a magnifying glass with a question mark evoke a detective mystery. Red footprints lead toward the open vault door. Text reads: “Public Domain Day 2026” and “Jan 21st @10am PT: Virtual.” Illustrated by Freya Morgan. Text to the right reads "Tomorrow! Online Celebration! Watch Worldwide!"

🕵️ TOMORROW! Crack open the case as newly liberated books, films & music enter the #publicdomain.

From Betty Boop & Pluto’s debut to “Georgia on My Mind," join us for clips & conversation with artists, librarians & scholars.

📅 Weds Jan 21
🕙 10:00 AM PT
📍VIRTUAL
🎟️ www.eventbrite.com/e/the-case-o...

From Senator Chris McDaniel: “Lately, some folks have taken to calling ICE “the Gestapo.” It sounds fierce. It feels righteous. But it isn’t true, and it isn’t harmless. The Gestapo was a secret police force. No warrants. No courts. No lawyers. And no appeals. People vanished in the night, not because they broke the law, but because the law no longer meant anything. The knock on the door was the sentence. ICE isn’t that. Not even close. ICE is a public agency enforcing laws passed by elected officials. Its agents file reports. They seek warrants. They lose cases. Judges stop them. Lawyers challenge them. Some detainees go home. That’s not tyranny. That’s bureaucracy, for better and worse. You can hate immigration policy. You can argue enforcement is too harsh, too sloppy, or too broad. You can work to have the law changed if you wish. That’s a republic doing what it’s supposed to do. But when you call ordinary law enforcement “the Gestapo,” you cheapen real evil. You turn history into a slogan and suffering into a metaphor. And once every badge is tyranny, no tyranny is left to recognize. In Mississippi, I was raised to believe words should earn their weight. This one hasn't yet. It throws around the language of dictatorship while living under a system where courts still rule, lawyers still argue, and the government still loses. That difference matters. Because the day enforcement becomes secret, unchecked, and answerable to no one, we won’t need to borrow names from history. We’ll know exactly what we’re dealing with. And we’ll wish we’d kept our words honest.”

“ICE isn’t the Gestapo. The Gestapo was…” (proceeds to describe qualities that apply to what ICE is currently doing)

Federal agents are pulling over off duty cops based on the color of their skin.

This is not a serious operation to enforce immigration law. It’s a performative show of force and it’s gotten way out of hand.