An Early Christmas Present for Wayne, N.J.

(This is a blog that had gone unposted due to Christmas commitment congestion.)

Wayne, New Jersey, won a huge victory against sustainable community development when the town’s Board of Adjustment rejected AvalonBay’s application to build a 422-unit apartment complex in a former industrial complex on Dec. 21.

 

All our northwestern New Jersey suburbs are riddled with these future urban blight projects. They’ve led to increased traffic congestion, a loss of green spaces, and a decided upsurge in crimes, both in theft and drug use.

 

These sustainable development communities have been built for one of several of purposes: a) to bolster flagging strip mall businesses; b) to encourage use of non-existent mass transportation, in this case into New York City; c) to lure inner city types to enroll in new, community colleges, one just down the road from where I live, and from the new welfare office; and finally, d) to destroy the single-family home, and the single family that lives within it.

 

I talk as I shouldn’t, as I live in converted garden apartment condo. Hey, I’m single.  There’s no live-in man to mow the lawn, clean the gutters, or tinker with the water heater.  I don’t have the income (at the moment, I have virtually no income, save for the pittance I earn as a freelance photographer) to support a house.  I couldn’t afford the water bill, much less the taxes on a place like that.

 

This is America. There should be a home for everybody, whether they want to live in a high-rise tower, a garden apartment, a garden condo, a townhome with a garage, a modest, three-bedroom split-level like the one I grew up in, or a 4,000 square-foot McMansion.  Rent or own:  It’s up to you and your income.  Just don’t expect someone to pay your bills for you, to subsidize a home you know you can’t afford.  It’s not fair that you can only afford to rent in a blue-collar town; what’s not fair is expecting the government to subsidize your residence in a brand-new condo complete with all the amenities.

 

Except for air conditioning; I don’t care if you’re that welfare illegal alien mom ahead of me in line buying your week’s groceries with the WIC check. While Northern New Jersey’s weather is famously temperate, our summers are dreadfully humid.  I wouldn’t want to see some poor old man or woman have a heart attack just because they’re impoverished and can’t afford the A.C.

 

Still, I’m for sending the illegals back where they came from. Why everyone gets into such fits over sending them back is incomprehensible.  We’re not talking Nazi Germany here.  It’s as simple as processing the illegals already in the detainment camps, putting them on a train, bus or plane, and sending them back where they came from.

 

Instead, the American taxpayers are building brand new housing for them, better than the houses we live in ourselves. Just image:  all that money the taxpayers have spent, thanks to the Mount Laurel  (N.J.) Housing order, harboring these fugitives in these high-density, high-price luxury ghettos could have been spent on their tickets back home and on the fence Donald Trump wants to build.

 

That isn’t what we do in America, Obama and his minions declare. What we do presently isn’t working well, and Wayne, N.J., stands at the forefront of the battle against taxpayer-funded, mandatory, sustainable development, high-density communal residences.

 

According to The Record of Bergen County: “Before the vote — a unanimous 7-0 vote against — 16 residents spoke during the public comments portion of the meeting, all expressing disapproval of the project.

 

“AvalonBay had planned to build 336 apartments in a four-story building and 86 town houses in 13 buildings. The company had sought a use variance from the Board of Adjustment because most of the 31.8-acre property is zoned for industrial uses.

 

“AvalonBay was also seeking relief from the 50-foot height limit — the four-floor building would be 58 feet tall — and for permission to create a smaller buffer zone from other residences than the required 50 feet. A vacant 345,000-square-foot building once occupied by a defense equipment manufacturer sits on the property.

 

“In his closing argument, Robert Kasuba, the attorney for AvalonBay, said household sizes were shrinking, increasing the need for residences like AvalonBay’s. He said the apartment complex would be compatible with surrounding properties and meet the township’s need for affordable housing.

 

“But township residents raised a host of concerns during public comments, as they have since the application was first presented in June. They focused on the proposed development’s impact on municipal services, like firefighting and schools, and traffic.

 

“’This is too big, it’s too dense, it’s too tall and it’s in the wrong place,’ said Stuart Lieberman, the attorney for the New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club, which opposed the project.

 

“The township received AvalonBay’s application two days before a large blaze on Jan. 21 tore through the company’s Edgewater complex, displacing hundreds of residents and triggering calls from fire officials statewide to toughen the state Uniform Construction Code.

 

“AvalonBay’s senior vice president, Ronald Ladell, had said the Wayne apartment’s standards would surpass those set by the state code. Like projects in Princeton and Maplewood, AvalonBay would install sprinklers in attics and spaces between ceilings and floors, and use masonry firewalls, made of concrete block, instead of gypsum core board firewalls, Ladell said.

 

“AvalonBay could sue to overturn the board’s decision in Superior Court if it thinks the decision was arbitrary and capricious. AvalonBay’s representatives on Monday referred questions to Ladell, who wasn’t at the meeting.

 

AvalonBay in Bloomingdale is an eyesore, built on an unofficial dump which the state was able to declare an “urban blight zone.” Bloomingdale? An “urban” center, with its one – count them -one (1) – traffic light and no high school?

 

The monstrosity rises above the wooded Union Avenue almost to the height of the elementary school on the hill. Just as in Wayne, AvalonBay couldn’t get a variance to build higher than four stories, so they cleverly trucked into mountains of dirt and built an artificial hill to raise the “height” of the development.

 

Wayne, already grossly over-developed decided enough was enough. In Bloomingdale, the sustainable developers have the green-light to go full urban-blight zone.  In the next 20 to 30 years, the Federal Hill ridge (AvalonBay is built on the historic site where Revolutionary soldiers mutinied against not being paid or clothed; they were summarily executed on that spot) will be completely demolished, to make way for even more urban development.

 

The quiet, woodland town where my brothers and I hiked with our mom and our family dog, Brownie, will be gone. In its place will rise an infernal nightmare of congested traffic, welfare mothers cashing WIC checks, and a virtual babbling, Babylon of unassimilated illegal aliens and Muslim jihadists who will have burnt down Bloomingdale’s only remaining church.

 

Bloomingdale was once a rural community. With the addition of a second level on the George Washington Bridge and the prospect of low property taxes, Bloomingdale became a suburb, a “bedroom community.”  My mother, a former architectural reporter, advised perspective.  Eventually, Bloomingdale – and Pompton Lakes, Butler, Wanaque, Riverdale – would succumb to urbanization.

 

The Millennial Generation is more receptive to that style of living. They’ve been conditioned to consider large families and private homes unnatural, almost criminal.  That’s the way it is in the Soviet Union and China.  The communist operatives have done their job of manipulating and brainwashing well over the last 50 years.

 

Hope is still alive in Wayne, N.J., however. Well done, citizens of Wayne!  And thank you, Santa Claus (who will have no chimneys to climb down if Sustainable Development is successful).

 

 

Star Wars Film Soars to Billions

Star Wars: The Force Awakens raked in over a billion dollars in its two Christmas holiday weekends.  Should we be surprised at this amount of money?

 

Considering the price of movie tickets today; considering the population increase since 1977; considering that this is a Star Wars sequel movie we’re talking about, not Robocop XIV – no, of course not.

 

People, especially kids, have only been thronging for the sequel-sequel since the last prequel came out about a decade ago. The animated series, Star Wars: Clone Wars ran for eight seasons and won an Emmy.  The films have only claimed technical and musical Oscars, by comparison.

 

Did director J.J. Abrams deliver? Well, he did and he didn’t.  He certainly delivered the whizz-bangs! And the boopity-boops.  And the laughs, at least throughout most of the film.  His success depended a great deal on secrecy and the deception of the trailers.

 

Who wouldn’t turn out to see Han Solo and his pal, Chewie, beaming from the good old Millennium Falcon again? Naturally, the film made billions.  The new stars are terrific.  They’re fine; no complaints there.  Handsome Oscar Isaac is sure to have teenie-girls drooling through the next two films.  Daisy Ridley delivers the girly-girl power, and John Bodega gives blacks a prominent, well-earned place in the Star Wars universe.  BB-8 is a cutie-pie, roly-poly droid; you just want to pick him up and pinch his little sensors.

 

It’s just too bad Abrams felt he had to jettison poor old Han Solo.

 

His excuse was that Han Solo wasn’t “moving the plot forward.” No?  Well, he sure moved the ticket sales forward.  Not bad for an old space pirate who grabbed all the laughs as soon as he and Chewie growled the way onto the screen.

 

Abrams claims he wasn’t moving the storyline forward. So why is it Han Solo is now scheduled to appear in the next movie, Star Wars VIII?  Either the next director (who mercifully is not Abrams) will either have to use The Force to magically resurrect Solo from the dead, or half the movie will have to be told in flashbacks.

 

Yes sir, that’s a great way to move the storyline forward, by going backwards.

 

The Harry Potter series killed off a number of popular characters: Sirius Black, Severus Snape, Albus Dumbledore, one of the Weasley twins, Dobbie the houself.  Even poor Hedwig, the snowy white owl was killed off.  But J.K. Rowlings didn’t kill off any one of the main trio:  Harry, Ron or Hermione.

 

The week the new film came out, the cable stations began running all the old Harrison Ford movies they could find in their archives. We were laughing at it:  someone should tell those networks that Han Solo died, not Harrison Ford!

 

From a production standpoint, you can understand why the producers needed to kill off Ford’s character early on. They never know when Ford will crash yet another experimental airplane.  Get the death scene over with, and flash back as much as you can in the event the actor kills himself off.

 

That would make sense. Claiming that Han Solo isn’t moving the plot forward is just absolute nonsense and shows a considerable lack of humility on the part of the director.  And I’d still like to hear a reason why Disney Studios and Abrams’ Bad Robot Productions didn’t make an appearance in the opening credits.

 

They’re bloated with gloat over their billions, earned through deception and not a little censorship, not to mention a bit of propaganda, citing only good reviews and squashing anyone who dares to dissent with the opinion that it was an entirely terrific movie.

 

What was terrific were the teasers, commercials, and product-tie in advertisements. Jeep’s commercial showing a couple enjoying the “peacefulness” of a star-filled sky through the vehicle’s moon roof is classic.

 

There are DVD players and apps coming out that will allow you to edit movies in the future. Once I can edit out the offensive scene, I’ll happily sing the Star Wars theme again.  The whole scene could just be cut out and no one would be the wiser.

 

Maybe I’ll even be able to cut out some of the noise so I can actually hear John Williams’ music.

 

 

Stealing Jesus

New Jersey has been hit by a rash of nativity-nappings.  Churches in North Arlington, Kearny, Lyndhurst and Newark have had their Baby Jesuses stolen from the manger scenes in front of their churches.

 

Tradition says that you’re not supposed to place the infant Jesus in His manger until Christmas morning; it’s part of the mystery, the say. The mystery in New Jersey is why thieves would steal Him, in the first place.

 

If you’ve ever priced a nativity scene, you’ll know why the thieves were so interested. Nativity scenes are an expensive deal.  The larger the statues, the more elaborate the scene, the more ornate and colorful the figures, the higher price.  A modest indoor set can go for anywhere from $50 to $100.  Better sets (that come with the stable) are priced from $150 upwards.

 

Statuary outdoor nativity scenes, with three-dimensional statuary start at $200 and climb upwards. The price for just Mary, Joseph and Jesus statuary is about $600.  Adding the Wise Men, the Shepherds, the sheep and other critters can run into the thousands.

 

If you figure Jesus is worth a little more in that $600 set, that’s $400 for Baby Jesus. The more expensive the set, the higher the price for the infant.  That’s not just kidnapping but highway robbery.

 

The average family couldn’t afford such a nativity scene. For the middle class family, there are inflatable, lighted nativity scenes, about $200 to $300.  For the poor, there are painted metal sets or silhouette nativity scenes.  I have a painted metal set, myself, which cost about $50.

 

Jesus, Mary and Joseph. Who else do you really need?  Of course, I have an indoor nativity.  But only guests in my home see the Baby Jesus there.  Outside, the whole complex – everyone, that is to say, who comes to dump their garbage or has made a wrong turn into our complex – can see this humble scene.

 

They were only “decorations” I had the time, energy or desire to set up this year.

 

What are the thieves going to do with the Baby Jesus? They might pray to Him for forgiveness (“Thou shalt not steal.”).  The churches from which they were stolen are high-crime areas.  Perhaps St. Nicholas, the patron saint of thieves (thieves “stole” Nicholas’ body from his crypt in Myra, Turkey, knowing that the Muslims were about to invade and Nicholas’ last wish was to not allow his body to be defiled by the invaders), can intercede on their behalf.

 

The scene-stealers really ought to consider returning the Baby Jesus to his caretakers, lest the real McCoy show up, demanding what is His – their souls.

 

 

 

 

Merry Christmas, 2015

Merry Christmas, readers.

 

We can say that here. We should be saying it everywhere.  Jesus, the guy whose birth we’re celebrating (actually, tradition holds that he was born in the spring) said so.  We should be defying those who tell us to clam up about Jesus, even on Christmas.  You know what Jesus had to say about that:

 

Matthew 10:33: “Whosoever shall deny me before men him will I also deny before my father in heaven.”

 

We’ve been given a gift whose only condition is to spread the good news to others. What is the good news?  Evangelium “Good messenger.”  That we are free from our slavery in sin.  But at a very high cost, one which most people are too ashamed to admit their own humiliation and stop their ears up at the mention of the name of Jesus Christ.  The more His name is banished, the farther we slip into that pit.  But He said he would march to the very gates of Hell to free us.  That was the news a little over 2,000 years ago.

 

Luke 2: “And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flocks by night. And lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them:  and they were sore afraid.  And the angel said to them, ‘Fear not:  for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.  And this shall be a sign unto you; ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.’  And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of heavenly host praising God, and saying, ‘Glory to God in the highest, and on Earth peace, good will towards men.’”

 

Did Jesus give something to men that they didn’t want? They’ve certainly spent the last 2,000 years or so trying to give the gift of peace back, or regifting it as the secular Peace Movement.  Some people, usually young people, try to take up the message and state solemnly, “I wish for peace on Earth.”

 

A wish is not a prayer. Peace doesn’t happen by magic or wishful thinking.  Love isn’t a Mercedes Benz wrapped up in an enormous red Christmas bow.  That sort of Christmas is for children and rich people.

 

What do you get the older, wealthier brother who has everything, including a late-model Cadillac (which he bought new)? A fifty-cent refrigerator magnet that reads:  “Proud servant of my corporate master.”  It made him laugh.  Laughter is worth more than all the beribboned Cadillacs parked end-to-end from the South Pole to the North.

 

The Jehovah’s Witnesses consider Christmas to be a pagan holiday. They are highly critical of Constantine, who stopped the persecution of Christians, having been raised by a Christian mother (St. Helena).  He allowed the pagans to transform their pagan idols into Christian symbols.

I don’t know. I don’t have a problem with that, personally.  Jesus, the humble son of God probably wouldn’t approve of our celebrating His birth on any day on the calendar.  I have more of a problem with ornate churches being built over the sites of his birth and crucifixion.  Why weren’t these places left in their original state?  That would have been more of a tribute to the babe born in a manger.

 

The Witnesses did answer one question that had always puzzled me (actually, they’ve enlightened me on a number of enigmas). Why did Jesus wash his disciples’ feet?  I know the traditional answer is that before you can serve, you must be a servant.  That was the answer of Jesus himself.

 

No, but wait. That wasn’t what I wanted to know.  Why wash the feet?  What was the symbolism in the feet?

 

Jehovah Witness G. is also a gardener of sorts. “Well, you know,” she said, “it’s like when you repot a plant.  You remove it out of the planter.  You throw away the old soil and replace it with new soil.  Then you wash the roots thoroughly and replant it in the new soil, and it blooms all beautiful, like it was new.”

 

No, I didn’t know. I vaguely recall my mother, years ago, explaining about washing the roots of the plant before repotting it.  But I hadn’t made the biblical connection.  Jesus is coming to repot us in fresh soil.  We have to wash all the old contaminants off our roots and store up fresh soil for the replanting.

 

We’re going to be transplanted into God’s garden, if our roots haven’t all rotted away. I remember my mother rescuing some pretty far-gone plants and restoring them to health and vigor.

 

Maybe Jesus wasn’t born on December 25. But even if it was originally a pagan holiday, like everything else, the day was transformed.  The third day past the longest day of the year, hope is reborn and we’re traveling back towards the light.

 

We hang lights on our Christmas trees symbolically, replacing bulbs that burn out. This is one light that will never burn out.  The gifts have been purchased and now opened.  The dinner has been made (best sweet potatoes yet), the dishes washed, and the cat fed.  The Christmas blog is written and about to be posted.  What a novelty, having dinner at 3 instead of 6.  Now I can go rest my back.

 

Merry Christmas.

 

 

Christmas Eve, 2015 (Baby, It’s Warm Outside)

Some wag at MRC (Media Research Center) went to a college campus to recruit students to petition all radio stations to ban the song “White Christmas.”

 

Most of the students bobbled their collective heads in agreement, signing the bogus petition. Didn’t their parents ever warn them not to sign a petition if they weren’t sure of its authenticity?

 

You can hear Bing singing the song in the attached clip from the 1954 film, “White Christmas.” He originally introduced the song in the 1942 film, “Holiday Inn”. He sang it again in the 1946 film, “Blue Skies.” Legend has that Der Bingle didn’t like the song.  Go figure.

 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OIVI4cE9PPo&feature=player_embedded

 

Still, he did his duty. The stories about his dislike of the song only came out later.  He was smart enough not to kill the goose that laid the golden egg.  He recorded the song numerous times.  He sang it and he sang it and he sang it.  And then he sang it some more.  Crosby was the consummate professional.  Whatever his personal feelings were about a song, he gave the audience what it wanted, no matter how many times it wanted it (Harrison Ford, take note).

 

Interestingly, none of the actresses who appear with him in the White Christmas numbers (in “Holiday Inn” and “White Christmas”) actually sing the number. On the soundtrack for “White Christmas” singer Rosemary Clooney is replaced by Peggy Lee, due to a contractual conflict.  In “Holiday Inn,” Marjorie Reynolds was dubbed by Martha Mears, the Marni Nixon of her time.

 

Another interesting thing about “White Christmas” is that the plot was about a warm spell in Vermont, which nearly dooms the owner of the ski inn, the departing general at the beginning of the movie, before Crosby and pals rescue him.

 

Conflating the word “white” as in snow with the racial term “white” is such a feat of linguistic legerdemain that one wonders if such people need a tow truck to pull them out of this racial snowdrift into which they’ve plowed.

 

The War on Christmas has been raging since the Seventies. Liberals have succeeded in changing Christmas concerts to holiday concerts, Christmas trees to holiday trees, and Christmas parties to holiday parties.  Not that the change in terms mattered to the San Bernardino jihadists.  They weren’t fooled.

 

Fortunately, the “petition” was only a gag; it would be a shame if the song, especially in its 1954 film/video version. “White Christmas” 1942 was so popular during World War II, that it made Bing Crosby the most popular performer by the armed forces and inspired the producers of the 1954 version to film the scene against a World War II backdrop (Monte Cassino, to be exact, southeast of Rome, a place where my father could very well have been fighting).

 

The scene is so touching that it just blows you (and any other versions, including the romantic 1942 film version) away. Sometimes that’s all it takes – one extraordinary singer and a music box – and our guys in our uniform.  Notice the general’s expression when Bing sings about “children.”  That’s just about how old those World War II soldiers were – about 19.

 

Of course, they’re only actors in the movie. But they give a great performance, all the same.

You’d have to be pretty cold-hearted to hold the racist view of “white” while watching this scene. The political police have succeeded in taking not just “Christ” but the entire concept of “Christmas” out of Christmas.

 

Are the climate changers planning to ban the “winter” song, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” too, just because today (on the Eastern Seaboard), baby, it’s warm outside? And gray, not white?  Might as well stop putting marshmallows on your hot chocolate, while you’re at it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A Green Christmas for New Jersey

There have been White Christmases. Even Blue Christmases.  But for New Jersey this year, and surrounding areas, Christmas 2015 is going to be Green.  As in we got bucket-loads of rain today.  On Christmas Eve morning, we’re due for some morning thunderstorms that will lower the temperature 10 degrees from 73 degrees to 63 degrees.

 

The record temperature for Newark (the state’s official weather capital), was 69 degrees in 1964. The record high for Christmas Eve in Newark was 64 degrees in 1990.  Seven years earlier, the temperature, in 1983, was 3 degrees in Newark (and a whole lot colder in the northwest suburbs!).

 

What do all the climate changers have to say about that? The latest “rumor” is that climate change is caused by carbon dioxides that come not from cows but from vegetables.  Not only shouldn’t we drink milk, eat meat, but now we shouldn’t even eat our veggies.  You can just hear the kiddies cheering.

 

The news comes one day after the official winter solstice, the longest day of the year. The record-breaking Eastern temperatures are like a gift from Santy Claus to Climate Changes.  What fun they’re going to have postulating on the extreme warmth of this Christmas, not to mention the Christmas Eve asteroid that’s going to race by Earth.

 

Then again, we’re also due for a rare full moon on Christmas. Rudolf can take this Christmas Eve off.  There’s a huge, unexpected solar flare coming out from the Sun.  It was so strong, that it blacked out short-wave radios in the Southern Hemisphere.

 

None of the Christmas Eve asteroids are coming that close to the Earth. The asteroid passing us by tomorrow will come within 1.4 LDs (Lunar Distance) of the Earth, about 6:15 Universal Time.  It’s not a very big asteroid.  It’s come a lot closer to Earth than this.

 

No one around here, or any other Northern clime, unless they’re kids or ski buffs are complaining about the extremely mild temperatures or care why it’s happening. If Easterners will be strutting around on Christmas Eve in shorts and tee shirts, that’s just fine with them.

 

The only thing I find disappointing is that I won’t be able to wear either of my ex-sister-in-law’s beautiful Christmas sweaters. Christmas sweaters, on the whole are mocked, but she had a tendency towards good taste in clothes and these sweaters are quite beautiful.

 

Climate change is like a bus. If this Christmas Eve disappoints, just wait – another cold Christmas will come around within the next 15 years.  Not that I’m dreaming of a cold, snowy Christmas.  I remember them.  Plenty of them.  They were fun when we kids in the Sixties.  Not so much when we struggled to get from our cars to whatever auditorium in which we were playing with our musical equipment.

 

You don’t need snow for sleigh bells. You can get them at Musician’s Friend or any number of other musical websites for about $35 dollars.  Being a bell player, I even bought a small, sleigh bell Christmas tree as a decoration about 15 years ago (when I was working).

 

We’re having a Warm Christmas? Don’t sweat it!  Just of all the green you’ll be saving on heating bills this month.

 

The First Order Versus the New World Order

I must apologize to my readers for a few things.   First, for posting a blog without a Star Wars spoiler alert.  Second, for getting the name of the “Supreme Leader” wrong in my review of Star Wars: The Force Awakens:  the name is “Snoke”  not “Snopes.”  Personally, I think it’s a stupid name, either way.  I also incorrectly referred to the new Star Wars regime as the “New Order”; it’s the “First Order.”

 

I may have been confusing the Star Wars galaxy with our own “New World Order” which I think is an understandable mistake.

 

By the time we left the theater, it was close to 8 p.m. The advantage of going to a 5:30 p.m. showing is that you stand a better chance of getting in if the movie is a popular blockbuster.  Parents don’t bring their kids to a showing during the dinner hour.

 

We were now hungry, so we stopped at a nearby McDonald’s to get some food. This was a new, 21^st Century, state-of-the-art McDonalds.  No plastic kiddie seats, no goofy characters, no primary colors.  The restaurant even had television.

 

This was Saturday night, the night of the Democrat debate. My companion wondered who would want to watch a Democrat debate.  I replied, “Nobody’s going to be watching it, not even the Democrats; not around here, at least – they’re all back there at the theater, waiting in line for the Star Wars movie.”

 

Supreme Leader Hillary was holding forth on the screen. No complaint of Bernie Sanders that the Democrat Party had favored the S.L. in distributing data of some kind and cheated his campaign out of it.  The Supreme Leader deflected the charges as haughtily and as easily a Sith Lord fending off a mere blaster shot.

 

We weren’t sure what was going on. But it seems as though the Democrat Party is jealous of all the attention the Republican Party is getting with its huge list of candidates, angry voters, and candidates falling all over themselves to prove how “Conservative” they are.

 

We have Donald Trump. We know it isn’t fair, Democrats.  We’re having all the fun.  But you’re welcome to some of our other candidates.  Frankly, we don’t really know why some of them are even on the Republican primary ticket.

 

Lindsay Graham just threw in the towel. Since you have a dearth of candidates, you’re welcome to him.  He has all the proper Liberal bona fides.  He couldn’t do any worse than that third-place, two-percent loser at the bottom of your short ticket, Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley.

 

We’ll also throw in John Kasich. He’s so Liberal, he’s probably to the Left of Hillary.  You can also have Ben Carson.  He’s definitely good material for the Democrats:  he wrote a tract criticizing the Vietnam War, stating that Communism is actually good for some countries.

 

George Pataki is another Liberal Republican, in the style of Nelson Rockefeller. He helped destroy the Conservative movement in the Republican Party in 1964.  Just think what a Rockefeller Republican could do for you.

 

We’d tell you to take Jeb Bush, and probably Marco Rubio, too, except that the GOP is so panic-stricken at the notion that the Conservatives might take over that they’ll never let these two go. If they can “liberalize” the Republican Party, why couldn’t they “conserve” the Democrats?  Tit for tat, you know.

 

This trade-off would balance the scales enormously. Some of our lower tier candidates aren’t even of any use to us, much less to you.  Republican Party voters would be appeased.  They could stop taking Pepto Bismol every time a Liberal Republican supports the Dream Act or signs on to huge budget increases.  Bush talks tough on defense.  But Trump and Christie are tougher.  They’re naturals at it, where Bush is a poser.

 

That would leave us with four or five really strong candidates: Christie, Cruz, Huckabee, Santorum and Trump.  They would have more time to discuss the issues.  You Democrats would get freedom of choice.  What choice do you have right now?  An old socialist hippie and a Supreme Leader facing criminal charges?

 

Oh, but wait, I forgot. Essentially, you’re socialist communists.  You don’t believe in freedom of choice.  In fact, you don’t believe in freedom of anything.  All that bilge about being for “The People” is just bilge water.  You’re no more for “The People” than Supreme Leader Snoke.

 

As long as you get yours, which you believe, in your supreme estimation of yourselves and your intelligence, you deserve, the common people are just cogs in the machine, meant to work for the greater good, not their own. They don’t realize that, of course.  Where Communism has conquered freedom, the first of those freedoms to be banished is freedom of speech, and with it, the truth about Communism.  The second thing to be squashed is ownership of weapons, and third, education.  Or rather, “re-education.”

 

In Russia, “The People” were squashed into communal apartments, and very small apartments at that, where they must share a common bathroom with other floor residents. The Chinese haven’t fared much better.  They lived in what America used to call “factory towns.”  One of them just got washed away in a mudslide in southern China.

 

The Democrats have the same plan for America. You almost managed to co-opt the Republican Party.  But voters are fighting back.  The Tea Party has succeeded in getting its main message out.  We’ve never been about politics; our goal is freedom.  Limited, accountable government, lower taxes, and unlimited liberty.

 

Two interesting complaints about the Star Wars movies, that I have on good authority from friends with teenagers is that 1) one of the reasons they hated the prequels, of which I had been ignorant, was the planet Coruscant, the city-planet. Absolutely hated the great, indoors, the polish, the cleanliness, and the focus on high-level politics and 2) that the Star Wars movies always seem to involve desert planets.

Climate change message? I don’t think so.  That’s where we’re all going to wind up, either in massive, planet-wide cities or in deserts, where we can’t interfere anymore with Mother Nature.  Shang-Hai, China, is the model (I believe) for Coruscant of the prequels.

 

Shang-Hai used to be a dirty, poverty-stricken heck-hole. Then along came the Olympic Games and the city was remade.  Now it’s a city of high-rise residential and business towers, stream-lined roadways and high-price luxury stores.  Not exactly the place to raise children, which the Chinese Communist government discourages.

 

But Shang-Hai is great for the Arrested Adolescent who wants to do nothing more than work on computers and come home at night, have a few drinks in some posh bar, and go home and play more video games (or watch pirated Western movies). Children?  They’re just an expensive nuisance as far as your Chinese cousins are concerned, American Millennials.

 

Homes with yards? Property ownership was banned back in the ancient history of Communism in the early 20^th Century.  No one owns homes.  Besides, they’re high-maintenance.  You have to mow lawns, rake leaves, and clean out gutters.  Life’s a lot easier in modern Shang-Hai.

 

Back during my Public Affairs days, I once stayed in an Atlantic City hotel. Across the way was another high-rise hotel with a neon display which took up the entire face of the building.  At first, it was interesting.  However, this thing flickered all night long through the chinks in my hotel curtains.  I cut my assignment short that next day, and even though it was the middle of the night, I hurried back up the Garden State to my comfy condo and the comparatively mild annoyance of giant light in the laundromat parking lot next door.

 

The television screen on the McDonald’s wall was set up on high, so it would be visible. The effect was that when Hillary came on the screen, she was looking down her nose upon the McDonald’s audience.  She reminded one very much of the old posters of Lenin, holding his giant hand out to the people.

 

The last two Harry Potter films replicated this image of the Minister of Magic, now a tyrant (in the Deathly Hallows) towering over the citizens of Magical London.

 

Just imagine if she’s elected, the electronic images of a giant Hillary towering above you, flickering in an endless, insomniac vision as you, Lenin’s useful idiot, try to get some sleep in your cramped, high-rise condo, never again to feel the earth beneath your feet; only the rock hard concrete of Communism.

 

Welcome to the New World Order. You voted for it.

 

 

Star Wars: The Force Awakens – A Review (Complete with Spoilers)

Okay. I saw Star Wars: The Force Awakens, so now I can authoritatively comment on the film – and I don’t hold back on spoilers.  You’ve got to know the truth sooner or later and it’s also hard to discuss the plot of any movie without discussing the details (!).

First off, yes, Han Solo dies, just as I had noted in previous blogs. His death is unnecessarily sadistic.  The villain – his son, Ben Solo, aka Kylo Ren – murders him in cold blood when Han confronts him on a bridge on the Star Killer.  The murder goes on just a little too long, with Han crying in agony before falling into the abyss below.  Just before he goes down, though, Han makes a gesture that only a loving parent can make.

No one in the audience cried, being composed mostly of teenage boys. One woman gasped as Han falls off the bridge.  Han (and Leia; it’s their son) suffer the fate of parents everywhere with a child gone psychopathically wrong.  Some of those parents have been murdered by their mentally-ill offspring.  At any rate, Han is gone.  I was waiting for my friend to come back from the Men’s Room after the movie.  The next audience was waiting in line, and a teenage dude said  sadly to a buddy, “No, don’t tell them; let them enjoy the movie and find out for themselves.”

Other than this enormous black hole in the film, which comes mercifully late – we get plenty of Han Soloisms and wisecracks before The End – it’s a darned good movie, full of the old-fashioned Star Wars “Yahoos!” and “Yippees.” BB-8 is the adorable, new little droid, owned by Poe Dameron, the new, hotshot pilot who always manages to come to the rescue.

Poe, played by Oscar Isaac, looks an awful lot like Luke Skywalker with dark hair. In fact, my companion kept asking me when Isaac was onscreen, “Well, isn’t that Luke Skywalker?  What do you mean, ‘no’?  How can you be sure?”  Um, because Mark Hamill is 63?

Daisy Ridley as “Rey” and John Boyega as “Finn” do a marvelous job with their roles. Ridley holds her own in the beginning as the female lead, complaining to Finn to stop holding her hand as he tries to help her out of trouble.  Eventually, she succumbs to squeaks and wails.

She’s very taken with the old owner of the Millennium Falcon which, since being stolen, has gone through some five owners before winding up on a junk heap on the desert planet of Jakku, where the film begins. And Han Solo is taken with her.  There’s been speculation that she’s Luke Skywalker’s daughter.  But three particular scenes, two subtle, and one not-so indicate she’s Han and Leia’s daughter – and Kylo Ren’s sister.

Han picks Rey and Finn up after they’ve escaped from The New Order forces. He asks them what planet they’ve come from.  They tell him, “Jakku.”  He repeats the name twice, his face brightening, the same way it did after Leia tells him Luke is her brother (not his rival) in Return of the Jedi.

Then there’s the scene in the film after the climactic space battle.   Rey is the last one off the ship.  As everyone else clears off for the celebration, Leia comes forward, a rather knowing look in her eye seeing Rey.  Rey’s mouth drops off, in apparent recognition.  Understand that the two characters have not yet met – not in this film, anyway.  Yet Rey unhestitatingly hugs her and Leia gives her what can only be described as an understanding, maternal embrace.  There’s no bowing, no exclamation from Rey, “You’re – You’re General Organa.”  Or Princess Leia.  Or even Aunt Leia.  The unspoken implication is that this is Mom.

But the ultimate confirmation, as if meeting Mom and Dad aren’t enough, is her battle with Kylo Ren. At first, Rey is terrified.  As the Force grows within her (without any apparent training), she fends off his Sith mind probes, eventually, and in a way only a sister can who realizes her “brother” is a humbug.

xShe whoops him pretty handily in the climactic lightsaber duel. After the mind probe scene, he goes squealing to the First Order leader Snope.  Kylo whines that she’s too strong for him, the way any kid would run to Mom or Dad complaining that Sis hit him back and that it’s just not fair (!).  Trust me on this; you have to be the little sister of a big brother to get it (I beat mine at chess).  You just know that they’re brother and sister.

The fabled first four words of the film are from a quasi-Jedi master, played by Max Von Sydow, who says of the map our hotshot pilot is holding, “This will change everything.” The map, or rather partial map, pinpoints the location of the long-missing Luke Skywalker.  He’s been gone so long that for the younger generation, he’s passed into the category of “Legend.”  But maybe not so long as all that.

However, our “Legend” has gone into hiding over a failure to keep a padawan – who turns out to be his nephew – from going over to the Dark Side. One can’t help mentioning this item that would ordinarily be kept out of a review in order not to spoil the film because it does call Luke’s self-banishment into question, as in a question of judgment.  His retreat clearly made things worse.

Where are Yoda or Obi-Wan when you need them to chide Luke for running off too soon?

Han and Leia don’t blame Luke for their son’s failure. In a recurring franchise line ala Yoda and Obi-Wan Kenobi, Han says in disgust that there was nothing anyone could do because “he [Ben/Kylo Ren] has too much of Vader in him.”

The scrawl in the beginning of the film tells us that Luke has vanished, that the successor to the Evil Empire, the New Order, has arisen and that now-General Organa, if you please, need Luke’s help.

Boyega (before Harrison Ford shows up) is an AWOL, flesh-and-blood Stormtrooper who decides he needs a career change after witnessing (but not participating) in a massacre of Jakku villagers. With Poe’s help – the more or less help one another – he gets away.  But then they are forced to return to retrieve BB-8 and the information he carries, who is now in the custody of Rey, a young woman living alone in poverty after being abandoned by on the planet by her family.

Once back on the planet, Poe disappears when their stolen Tie-fighter crashes. Finn runs into Rey, who is being roughed up by some locals.  He goes to her aid but soon discovers she can take care of herself.  When the nearest ship is blown, up they head for a ship that hasn’t run in years – the Millennium Falcon.  Strike up one of John Williams’ wonderful fanfares.

Once out in space, after a hair-raising chase through a downed Imperial Battle Cruiser, they’re hauled up by a cargo ship captained by none other than Han Solo himself and his partner, Chewie.

From that point on, Harrison Ford just chews up the scenery until he’s chewed up by his on-screen son. He takes an instant liking to Finn and a grudging, paternal liking to Rey, promising to hire her on.  On their quest to find Luke, Han takes them to a New Order Jedi by the name of Maz Kanata (yes, she tells the group she’s a Jedi).  She’s not Yoda, but that’s not such a bad thing.

In her cantina, Rey finds Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber. Immediately, she has Jedi-style visions of Luke with R2D2 and her abandonment as a child and drops the thing like it’s on fire.  Kanata tells her to take it but Rey refuses, saying she doesn’t want anything to do with it.  Finn, on the other hand, gladly takes it when he’s in need of a weapon as the First Order discovers their whereabouts.

Reluctantly, Han catches up with Princess/General Leia. (Carrie Fisher’s voice is much huskier than when she was young).  There we get more of the backstory of Ben/Kylo Ren, their son, Luke’s failed attempt to train him as a Jedi, and their parental despair at ever winning him back.  If there’s a flaw in the film, this is it.

Not that the scene is objectionable. Like Han’s death scene, it paints a poignant picture of parental despair, disappointment and heartbreak at the inability to prevent a child’s downfall.  The objection is that the downfall needs more explanation.  In fact, it probably requires three entire films all on its own.

Adam Driver as Kylo is not the most convincing of villains. He reveres his grandfather, Darth Vader (rather than Anakin, the man), vowing to finish what Vader started.  Finish what?  Killing Luke?  Didn’t he listen to any of the family history, that Luke saved his grandfather?   He tells the leader of the New Order, “Snopes,” that he’s trying to resist being seduced by the “Light Side” – a reversal of “The Dark Side.”

Ren is convincing enough as a villain with his mask down, a ridiculous prop that looks like it came straight out of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King property room.  Only fans who bought the Special Edition DVD of the LOTR film saw the scene where Frodo wears that mask as he and Samwise are making their way across the plains of Mordor in disguise as little orcs.

Once he doffs the mask, he’s basically a loser. Without it, he reminds one of a young Severus Snape (from the Harry Potter series). He has formidable Force skills, can read minds (excuse me, but just the way the Jedi did in the first three films), choke victims, and displays a new skill, freezing victims in place.  But mostly he’s an overgrown, spoiled brat, given to ridiculous temper tantrums.  Darth Vader did all that and more.  He had brief fits of temper with Padme (and went postal in the third film) but at least he kept it all together, even if he was an insane psychopath.

Comparing Kylo Ren to Darth Vader is difficult, especially without more backstory. Darth Vader was a full generation older than the Star Wars trio (Luke, Leia and Han), so he seemed more mature (in an evil way, naturally).  Even in the despised sequels, Anakin is handsome, likeable enough, and even somewhat sympathetic, at least initially.  His grandson, roughly the same age as he was in SW: The Attack of the Clones, is just a greasy-haired wanna-be.

We know what happens to Han Solo already. Finn is left injured and unconscious.  Rey takes over the Millennium Falcon, with a rather pleased Chewbacca at her side (he seems to have a Wookiee crush on her or maybe he suspects she’s Han’s daughter) and with Poe along for the ride.  They finally discover Luke’s whereabouts on a deserted island on a planet far, far away, to which we now know he has repaired out of guilt.

The last scene is of Rey handing an older and sadder Luke Skywalker his lightsaber. Will he take it (if you’ll recall, he tossed it away at the end Return of the Jedi)?  Han tells us that Luke walked away from it all after his failure with young Ben (too bad Anakin Skywalker didn’t do the same thing and become a mechanic instead).  Will Luke finally finish what he started?  Does he know the nephew he failed to train killed his brother-in-law?  Is Rey his daughter or his niece?  No, wait; there’s no mystery there; she’s his niece.  Absolutely.

We have to wait until May 2017 to find out for certain, of course.

Was this the best Star Wars ever? Um, no.  It certainly wasn’t the worst.  But this film’s gaping black hole made it too much of a downer to be the equal of the optimistic original.  The movie and its cast try hard and succeed in humor, fantastic creatures, and seat-of-the-pants space battles before the death scene drops it all in the dumper.  On the other hand, it does rank well with The Empire Strikes Back, the darker sequel to A New Hope.

The franchise will have to travel a long, long way to find a scene-stealing actor the caliber of Harrison Ford (who I still think won’t survive to see the last installment of this trilogy). But what can you do?  Ford ran his race as Han Solo and ran it well.  Who knows?  He may show up again in flashback in Episode 8 or 9.

The galaxy isn’t going to be the same without Han Solo. But it will just have to do the best it can.

 

 

Paul Ryan: The Wolfman in Republican Sheep Clothing

Oh, the treachery of it all.

No, not J.J. Abrams wrapping up the new Star Wars film in a great, big cheerful commercial package with pictures of Han Solo and Chewbacca celebrating their homecoming on the Millennium Falcon; a cute, new droid named BB-8 rolling around a familiar desert landscape; and a winsome but resourceful new heroine who doesn’t need any hero’s help, thank you very much, and putting a huge Christmas bow on it.

Then, luring people into the theater only to find out that their favorite space smuggler is not even just killed in action but murdered in cold blood, the villain putting the old Sith chokehold on him, and staring our hero in the eye as he slowly drives his lightsaber through the hapless you-know-who’s heart and slowly draws it out again (if accounts are correct).

Has anyone, other than Entertainment Weekly (thank you, EW!), warned parents of young kids about this?  Who are these stone-hearted teenagers cheering about this movie?  Is sadism the new normal?  HS is light-sabered right through the heart – but otherwise it’s a GREAT movie!  Can’t wait for the sequel!

You really need to wake up, Americans.  It’s definitely not 1977, anymore.  If only.  The heck with this spoiler censorship nonsense.  Think more along the lines of “if you see something, say something,” for God’s sake.

No, this treacherous betrayal, if not as gory (and painful), is just as villainous. J.J. Abrams and Harrison Ford are hyping up the gun control hyperbole with this gruesome scene smack-dab in the middle of a film we’re supposed to believe is just like the original Star Wars.  House Speaker Paul Ryan, who’s supposed to be a Conservative, is giving Obama the entire Santa Claus bag for Christmas, Islamic jihadists, phoney-crony-credits and all.  Stabbings on the screen and in the theater at the same time.  Talk about interactive movies.

A Conservative House Speaker inking an omnibus spending bill. Who saw that coming?  Conservative America is shocked, shocked.  This Conservative blogger?  Eh, not so much.  Lying, cheating and spending are apparently the new, old normal in Congress.  But it’s not news; not if you’ve been paying attention.

Back in 2012, in one of the most anti-Constitutional votes ever, Rep. Paul Ryan (R., 1-Wisc) voted in favor of reducing the U.S. Senate’s power to confirm presidential appointments to key government positions, including federal judges and key positions of federal departments. Another 90 or so Republicans, including some Conservatives voted “Yea” with him.

Happily, New Jersey’s Scott Garrett was not among them, Nor was Lance Leonard.  That this news wasn’t made more public was absolutely appalling, especially given Ryan’s espoused “conservative” views.  If this was a “Conservative,” then the Conservatives didn’t need any enemies.

The bill (at the time, now a law) was entitled S. 679 (112th) Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act of 2011. Family Research Council’s Senior Vice President Thomas McClusky at the time, noted the dangers of giving this kind of power to the president, saying:

“The United States Constitution does not bestow kingly powers on the President to appoint the senior officers of the government with no process.”

Now Ryan has given Obama everything he wants in the way of fiscal powers. As the new Speaker of the House and sporting a beard that makes him look like a refugee from some Hollywood werewolf movie, Ryan passed a $1.1 trillion, 2,000-plus page omnibus bill that funds Obama’s ‘fundamental transformation of America.’

 

According to Breitbart, among other things, Ryan’s omnibus fully funds the Dream Action or DACA (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals), grating work permits to 70,000 illegal aliens along with tax credits and access to federal entitlement programs. The bill also funds sanctuary cities, all refugee programs, and all of the Middle East Immigrant programs.  Call it “The Terrorist Express.”

 

The omnibus also funds illegal alien resettlement in a neighborhood near you as well as the release of criminal illegal aliens. It quadruples H-2B Foreign Worker Visas (that’s 250,000 unskilled guest workers).  The bill also locks in huge spending increase on both defense and non-defense spending next year by $25 billion.

 

The one thing the Ryan Express does not fund is the 700-mile double-layer border fence that Congress promised the American people.

 

“What may prove most discouraging of all to Americans,” Breitbart states, “is that recent reports reveal that conservatives is the so-called House Freedom Caucus are praising Ryan even as he permanently locks in these irreversible and anti-American immigration policies. According to Politico, the House Freedom Caucus will ‘give Ryan a pass’ even as funds disastrous policies that prioritize the interests of foreign nationals and global corporatists above the needs of the American people whom lawmakers are supposed to represent.”

 

Well, if J.J. Abrams can throw away the original concept for Star Wars (old Forties films where the good guys in white hats saved the day), it’s possible for a Republican poser to deceive the people who voted for him and send the American economy down the drain while granting amnesty to Islamic Jihadists who supposedly, just this afternoon, called in a bomb threat to a theater in Freehold which is showing the new Stars Wars flick.

 

I have a bad feeling about this…

 

 

J.J. Abrams’ Lump of Coal for Star Wars Fans (Spoiler Alert)

Disney Studios originally wanted Star Wars: The Force Awakens to be released in May 2017, the traditional month when Star Wars movies have been released in the past.  But director J.J. Abrams was adamant that the movie be released before Christmas – just before Christmas, mind you – in 2016.

 

The movie had its world premiere Monday night. No actor, actress or other film industry insider was about to denounce Abrams’ film – not if they want to work in some Abrams’ film in the future.  In any case, as more than one film critic has noted,  they don’t dare give away any of the movie’s secrets because Disney Studios has light-saber bearing attorneys watching every word they say.

 

Fortunately, the UK Guardian, as I figured, has no scruples about announcing spoilers.  Actually, they don’t want to ruin a movie for audiences.  But they don’t want to see them sucker-punched, either.  That’s what was happening with the trailers and advertisements leading up to the film’s release.

 

Have you seen any, lately? No.  There’s a good reason for that, as well as a good reason why Disney wanted the film released in May of next year, not December of this year, just before Christmas.  Despite the glowing reviews from newspaper all over America, there are hints that something is amiss.  Critics report “crying like a baby” and feeling “gut-punched” after seeing the movie.

 

That doesn’t sound like a very happy ending and it’s not. I knew what was in store for the ending held, and so did Disney Studios.  Harrison Ford himself stated in an early interview, or George Lucas related the conversation, what had to happen to his character in order for him to return to the franchise.

 

All right. Okay, so Ford is getting old.  Who wants to see Han Solo rolling around the galaxy in a wheelchair?  If my calculations are correct, Ford won’t live to see the release of third film.  However, why just before Christmas?  What was director J.J. Abrams thinking?

 

Abrams is the new, anti-imperialist, anti-colonialist Hollywood. His reboot of Star Trek was okay, even good, thanks to Chris Pine’s performance as a young Captain Kirk and Zachary Quinto’s uncanny resemblance to Leonard Nimoy (the pitch of his voice is too high but otherwise, Quinto’s a spot-on Spock).  The follow-up to the new reboot, Into Darkness, stank of retribution for perceived social injustices and microagressions against “minorities.”

 

In The Force Awakens, Abrams get a two-fer, killing off a major, beloved Star Wars character (and white guy into the bargain) just before Christmas.  Merry Christmas, you white, racist, Christian Star Wars fans.  Note that no one minds the introduction of black actor John Boyega as an AWOL Stormtrooper or that he may have a romance with the white female lead.  It could be worse:  Daisy Rey could fall in love with Chewie.

 

From a production standpoint, killing off Harrison Ford makes sense. The actor is a reckless adventurer and at 73, that makes him a liability to any franchise movie-maker.  What if he doesn’t survive the next plane crash?  What would Disney and Abrams do then?  They’re already into production for the eighth movie.  If Ford was still involved, the writers would have to twist themselves into pretzels trying to write him out again.  Better to grant Ford his wish and get him out of the way, as quickly as possible.

 

Still, it’s a cruel thing to do to the audience. Worse still, Abrams drew audiences in and created buzz for the film with teasers about Han Solo’s happy reunion with Chewie and the Millennium Falcon.  Ford’s an incredibly popular actor and Solo is a favorite character in Star Wars galaxy.  He’s not Liam Neeson’s Qui-Gong or even Obi-Wan Kenobi, who (in the guise of Alec Guinness), at the start of the original Star Wars, we barely knew.

 

The audience has a history and a quasi-relationship with Solo.

 

So there it is, spoiler or not. Audiences (in my lowly opinion) have a right to know.  The critics shouldn’t have been charged with silence (and lawsuits) in this regard.  Audiences had a right to decide whether they wanted the movie experience spoiled, or their Christmas.

 

Back in 1982, rumors were wild that Spock was going to meet an untimely death in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan.  While no one would confirm the rumors, at least the rumors were allowed to be spread about.  A joke is made early in the movie that escapes modern audiences now, when Admiral Kirk asks Spock, “Aren’t you dead?”

 

Back then audiences tittered. Young Star Trek fans today are probably puzzled by the line.

 

I deliberately sought out of every scrap of information I could about The Force Awakens as soon as I read the George Lucas interview.  I watched every single trailer, even those aired in other countries, and pretty well figured things out ahead of time.  Needless to say, I wrote on Star Wars websites that Abrams was out of his mind.

 

Now I don’t think he’s out of his mind, but that he’s a sadistic jerk. Disney Studios was right:  Christmas is not the time to kill off a popular character.

 

For my part, and my companion’s, we’re going to wait until after the holidays to see the movie. Death comes all too suddenly around the holidays in real life.  Our next door neighbor’s son just died, her daughter is said to be moribund and will be lucky to survive through Christmas, and the woman herself is now all alone in a nursing home thousands of miles away with no family left (her husband died 20 or so years ago of a brain tumor).

 

My own mother is 91 and while she’s not suffering, she’s in failing health. Even my cat is 17 years old.  I don’t need to make the holiday even gloomier by seeing a movie that has been falsely advertised by critics as upbeat and fun.  Bah humbug.

 

Maybe I’ll buy the original Star Wars and watch that for Christmas, instead.