Live-TV tedious excitement over the naming of the House managers for the show trial in the Senate.

I'm overhearing Fox News (with, I'm assured, MSNBC getting recorded) and (as I'm trying to finish my post about Michael Moore's assertion that Elizabeth Warren stabbed Bernie Sanders in the back) I'm seeing the faux-drama in the New York Times...



Nancy Pelosi is about to do a big reveal. How much do you care and how much depends on who the hell the House managers are?

I find this a bit irritating, this political theater.

UPDATE: I watched the announcement, but all I remember is Nancy Pelosi going on about the Constitution and mentioning Abraham Lincoln, Paul Revere, and "These are the times that try men's souls." And somebody said that not only would Trump be on trial, but the Senate is on trial. And Nadler, looking disturbingly green, said Trump is on trial and also democracy is on trial. The frame of what's "on trial" is ever-expanding. What do you think is on trial? I'll just say it's trying my patience. And my patience pleads not guilty.

I'm adding some tags with this update, and I tried to add "Paul Revere," not that I wanted to create a new "Paul Revere" tag, but I'd add the tag if it already existed. Did it? Well... kind of...



AND: Is my use of the term "show trial" apt? It's not the normal show trial, where the predetermined outcome is that the accused will be found guilty and punished. From Wikipedia:

A show trial is a public trial in which the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal the presentation of both the accusation and the verdict to the public so they will serve as both an impressive example and a warning to other would-be dissidents or transgressors. Show trials tend to be retributive rather than corrective and they are also conducted for propagandistic purposes. The term was first recorded in 1928.

In the case of Trump's impeachment trial, the show is of hearing the accusations and the predetermined outcome is that the accused will be vindicated and nothing will happen to him. But there is a propagandistic purpose to it, and it's some kind of effort to warn other would-be transgressors. And yet, it's not very scary, is it? Indeed, in the future, the threat of impeachment may lose its power. It's just political nonsense.

Did you know John D. Loudermilk wrote all these songs... and do you, like me, know all these songs?

I'm reading the obituary of a man I'd never heard of, who died this week at the age of 82. I love the picture of him as a youngish man, pointing at his framed gold records. The songs are so varied, including things I heard on the radio when I wasn't even a teenager, like "A Rose and a Baby Ruth" (1956), "Sittin' in the Balcony" (Eddie Cochran!), "Abeline," "Then You Can Tell Me Goodbye," and the unforgettable "Norman" (ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh):



Bill invited me to a show but I said no, cannot go/There's a dress that I've got to sew and wear for Norman...

Loudermilk had 2 of the most striking of the politically conscious songs of the later era: "Tobacco Road," based on "his poverty-stricken childhood in Durham, N.C.," a hit in 1964 for the British group called The Nashville Teens...



... and "Indian Reservation," a tribute to the Cherokee people and a hit for Paul Revere and the Raiders:

Kicks just keep getting harder to find...

Goodbye to Paul Revere of Paul Revere and the Raiders, who died yesterday, at home in Idaho, at the age of 76. It was only half a century ago that I would come home from school and switch on "Where the Action Is," Dick Clark's afternoon rock 'n' roll show, which had Paul Revere and the Raiders as regulars. Paul Revere founded the group, and his name really was Paul Revere (Paul Revere Dick), but he was not the lead singer. So if you, like me, had a crush on the lead singer when you were 14, Paul Revere was not the one we had our crush on, and you may feel some relief knowing that Mark Lindsay lives on.

Here are Mark and Paul as they appeared on another Dick Clark show "Happening '68," in 1968, when everything was happening:



That's Mark in the Nehru jacket and love beads and Paul, looking slightly dubious.

Imagine if... women bought cars!

An ad from the May 5, 1967 issue of Life Magazine:



"You'll discover that even driving down to buy bread can be kicks. You'll find yourself saying 'I'll pick you up' even when it's Helen's turn to drive. Or Ed's.'"

I love the use of the word "kicks." It's almost as if our little lady is getting in some of those drugs we've been reading about as the Summer of Love rolls in.

The mid-calf skirt is suddenly a mini skirt, but it's only 1967, and if you're as old as I am, you know what that meant — your stocking tops and even your garters might show:



ADDED: The anti-drug song "Kicks" was a hit in 1966. If you ever worry that you don't know how to dance, I guarantee you that 20 seconds into this "Kicks" video you will be able to dance as well as Paul Revere & the Raiders.