BREAD/CHEESE/BRICK

Let’s all ruminate upon the simple brick.

Clay and water. Fired.

Pavers of our streets. Mainstays of our walls. Enablers of our shithouses.

Fashion statement for student bookshelves.

Rioter’s friend.

What gets laid more?

But like everything that active, bricks need protection.

First, put your hands on a brick. Regular size (8" x 4" x 2 1/4", if you want stats) , nothing fancy. Red, if available.

Second; wrap-up said building supply in aluminum foil. (Why do we need the brick to be red? Ask a fireman wearing colorful suspenders.)

Easily at hand should be; frying pan (any), butter (real), bread (good), yellow cheese (sliced), yellow mustard (or mustardy mustard, Colonel ).

Now you’re getting the idea.

Fire up that spacious flat thing in your kitchen called the cooktop (burners). It’s usually right above your stove and powered by electricity or some sort of gas. (See chapter, Survival on Big Blue, if you’re having any trouble up to this point.)

Place frying pan on heat source, medium high heat.

Butter. If the butter is warm, like room temperature, spread this cow product on one side of two pieces of bread. Or to be more specific, spread butter on one side of each slice of bread. If butter is colder, cut off around 1/2 inch from stick (assumed) and toss into warming frying pan. Now how hard was that?

Spread some mustard on the unbuttered sides of bread, or on either side if bread previously unbuttered.

Next, grab a couple of slices of cheese and carefully place between two mustardy sides of bread. Remember: you want both the mustard and the cheese to be situated between the two slices of bread and the unbuttered/unmustarded or buttered/unmustarded sides to be on the outside.

By now the frying pan should be nice and hot and the butter in the pan, if butter is in the pan, should be making a little noise. Spread the butter around a bit with the bread/cheese/mustard concoction you’ve just made.

Place the bread/cheese/mustard in the frying pan.

Pick up your aluminum foil wrapped brick and gently place it on top of the bread in the pan. Press down a little. Not too much.

Wait a minute or two, depending upon the heat of the pan, until you start to smell burning bread.

Take off the brick, set on a different burner on your cooktop, and using a spatula or knife, lift up your sandwich and see if it toasted to a color which suits your appetite. (You won’t get this right for a bit, but you’ll eventually figure it all out.)

If it looks right to you, it is right.

Flip it over in the pan.

Put brick back on.

Wait a minute or two. Remove brick. Cheese should have melted some by this time.

Turn off burner.

Remove sandwich from pan.

Let cool a bit.

Eat.

You are now king in the land of the blind.


Additional uses for aluminum enshrouded brick when not being used as a gourmet aid; doorstop, hatholder, Stanley Kubrick tribute, paperweight, mail minder, action figure pedestal.
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NO SEX FOR DEMOCRATS

After nearly a year-and-a-half of Republicans taking control of the Democratic Party, it’s time for the referees to start calling fouls. After Barack Obama has shown he can hustle more private insurance policies than anyone could ever have imagined and peddle infinitely more patent medicine than any fever dreamed snake oil salesman, it is time to blow the whistle on the Obama brand of corporate Republicanism.

A quick reminder. Doubling the number of troops in Afghanistan under Obama. How many troops are in Iraq right now? (Comparing anyone to George W. Bush should be the definition of damning by faint praise.) Obama’s refusal to prosecute torturers. (A crime in itself.) Predator drone assassinations. Shoveling trillions to Wall Street. (Tax breaks for small business? What Republican in the past hundred years hasn’t campaigned on that canard?) Passing a Health Care Bill weaker than that introduced by Republican Bob Dole over sixteen years ago. How many times does Obama have to prove to us that he really is a corporate Republican?

Forget Obama. It’s time to go Lysistrata on the entire Democratic Party.

Now let’s not get all in a lin tizzy about this. We all know that politicians are a sexless bunch of power junkies who wouldn’t be at all phased by withdrawal of intimate human contact. Pols only care about one thing, votes. It’s time to pull out of the Democratic Party until they promise to come across with something worthy of our affections.

This year, if your Democratic senator, congressman, governor, dog catcher, whatever does not support Medicare for All Americans, and does not pledge to help introduce legislation to that effect, cross your legs, withdraw your essence, and let them know your vote is going elsewhere. Vote Green if you want. Write in if you feel like it. (The correct spelling of my name should be at the top of this article.) Stop supporting the corporate Democratic/Republican party. And make sure you let them know why they’ve lost your support. It is time to act. There is a national election coming up in a few months. Obama and his Democrats have proven that they would rather sell private insurance company policies than campaign for universal health care. Now is the time to pull out of the Democrat Party until they come across.

REFUSE TO VOTE FOR ANY DEMOCRAT WHO ISN’T 110% BEHIND MEDICARE FOR ALL AMERICANS.

MAKE SURE YOU LET THEM KNOW WHY AND WHERE YOUR VOTE IS GOING

It’s game time. How many more American will die because corporations are allowed to run health care?
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The Lethal Downside To The Health Reform Bill

By not attempting to pass any form of universal health care, President Obama has helped condemn 23,000 Americans a year to unnecessary deaths.

How did this lethal equation come into being?

Why was Single Payer never pushed by the White House?

Why was the Public Option given the most meager of lip service by Obama?

Who decided 23,000 deaths a year was acceptable collateral damage?

Did anyone ever actually say, “Mr. President, if you don’t push for universal coverage, we can get this through and you won’t expend any of your political capital. Only 23,000 Americans will die every year, but that’s OK with us.”

Why aren’t more people discussing the deals made by the White House with the pharmaceutical companies and the hospitals? Did these deals have anything to do with the White House not campaigning for Single Payer or universal health care? Have these deals ever been published on the Web or anywhere else? Or were these the ultimate backroom arrangements which will leave 23,000 Americans a year to die?

Transparency in this White House? I think not.

The argument used is that this pitiful health care reform bill was the best they could do. I’m not going to get into why that is a laughable defense, but we all know, you can’t win if you don’t try. The White House didn’t try. Never once did Obama use his bully pulpit to demand that 23,000 Americans not die each year.

23,000 living Americans are just a bit more important than “bending the cost curve.”

Today 23,000 Americans a year will be allowed to die unnecessary deaths. That’s less than it would have been without this present bill but it is the least that could have been done. It is a meager achievement at best and a massive sales job by the insurance companies at worst.

Today 23,000 Americans a year might have been saved if President Obama had raised his voice in righteous indignation and demanded that the right to health care be enforced in this country.

But instead Obama did nothing to save them.

Obama and all those in government who did not use the power of their positions to demand universal health care, have chosen to allow 23,000 Americans a year to die unnecessarily.

For someone known for his oratory, President Obama kept surprisingly silent as 23,000 Americans a year were left to die.

Congratulations on passing your bill.
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Greed Needs A Sin Tax

It doesn’t matter if the wealthiest 5% of the people in this country control 70, 80, or 90% of this country’s wealth. It doesn’t matter if they pay more taxes at a slightly higher rate. What matters is how you define greed.

Sin taxes are governmental levies on perceived evil substances such as tobacco and alcohol. People feel comfortable hitting those products with extra taxes because, hey, we all know booze and tobacco are bad for you. We’re just helping you out by making these products more expensive to buy. It’s called negative reinforcement. If you smoke or drink, it’s going to hurt you in the pocketbook when you buy them.
Not only do tobacco and alcohol hurt you, they also harm those who come into contact with smokers and boozers.

Isn’t greed something society should help its citizens overcome? Not only is greed bad for the individual, but greed harms society as well.

Greed is one of the seven deadly sins.

Ask any good Bible reading Christian. Greed is bad. Greed is a sin.
Let’s tax greed. If we don’t tax greed, we might as well not tax tobacco and liquor. Smoking and drinking don’t even make it onto the top seven sin list. Greed is not good.

Back in the glory days of the 50s and even during the mythic days of the Gipper, the top tax rate on income was something close to twice what it is today. Somehow the rich stayed rich but surprisingly, the poor did not get poorer. The gap between the rich and the rest of the citizenry was a whole lot less than it is today. There was still greed, but it wasn’t as rewarded as it is today. Greed was taxed, seriously. And somehow this country and its people prospered.

The more you tax high incomes, the more trivial high incomes become.

It’s time to bring back the 70% top federal tax bracket. This would do wonders for the federal budget and, besides, it’s the Christian thing to do. Helping our fellow man avoid the sin of greed is probably a spiritual work of mercy.

It’s time to seriously tax the extemely rich. Greed isn’t good for any of us.
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So Tax Me for Living

If you live and breathe in the United States you are about to be taxed. Not your income. Not your property. You are about to be taxed simply for living. And breathing. You are about to be charged a fee for your right to life in the United States of America. Welcome to the Breath Tax.

(Disclaimer: Opening up Medicare for all Americans is the only moral and efficient way to deal with the present healthcare situation. Imagine how much money would be saved by putting the private insurance pencil pushers out to pasture.)

Think about it for a second. Forcing every American, under penalty of law, who is not covered by public insurance to be covered by private insurance is possibly the most egregious tax ever levied upon the citizens of these United States. This unprecedented transfer of private funds into the coffers of corporations is the harbinger of the coming of a corporate state.

What Obama’s Democrats are proposing is the equivalent of a tax for living. Never before has any American been taxed simply for breathing. And to add insult to injury, the money will not be going into Federal coffers, it will end up in the pockets of insurance companies, enabling them to finance even more campaigns aimed at extorting even greater sums from Americans.

You breathe, you pay a private insurance company, unless you’re already under Federal protection. Your money or your life. I wouldn’t feel so bad about all of this if at least there were a public option where my money would not be used by private companies who would rather see me die than take away money from their shareholders. At least the Federal government isn’t bound to increase earnings for stock holders. It’s bad enough being taxed to breathe, but to pay the money to corporations, who by law do not have your best interests at heart, well, that’s a little hard to take.

The Breath Tax, certainly has a ring to it doesn’t it? Unless you are over 65, disabled, a veteran, a child, you are going to be forced to pay money to private insurance companies, either indirectly, through your employer, or out of your own pocket.

I hate to bring this up, but Obama’s Breath Tax is a poll tax.

Remember the old poll taxes? Poll taxes were used to keep minorities from voting. Obama’s breath tax isn’t exactly that.

A poll tax is a capitation tax. Poll used to mean “head.” What we’re talking about here is counting heads which is what happens when you go to the polls and vote. No doubt this is a bit confusing but there you have it. The trick is that the US doesn’t use poll taxes. Hasn’t in quite some time. A poll tax is a regressive tax if there ever were one. In other words, Bill Gates and anybody pulling in 40 grand a year are subject to the same minimum tariff. The same minimum tariff to be paid to some insurance company represented by Joe Lieberman.
So there you have some information. The Breath Tax demands you pay money to corporate insurers. Obama’s Breath Tax puts tax money directly into private hands. Today’s Democrats are presenting no other option.
There’s only one way to avoid the Obama Breath Tax.
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Obama, Slavery, and Health Care

President Obama - The Member from South Carolina will be recognized.

Congressman Blowhard - Thank-you, Mr. President. As has been previously discussed, the report from the Congressional Budget Office clearly indicates that freeing any of the Slaves currently held in bondage within these United States will result in ongoing deficits for at least the next decade. I think we can all agree on this.

Vice-President Biden - We have to reduce the cost curve.

Senator Lame - The people of the United States have clearly indicated their preference. They don’t want any change to the current law. They know that freeing any of the current slaves into the work force will reduce their wages.

President Obama - Now I think we have more areas of agreement here than disagreement. That’s why I’m currently proposing that instead of freeing all of the slaves at this point in time, we come to an agreement that current slave holders should be allowed to purchase as many slaves as possible for the next four years and that all current slaves should at some time in the future be allowed the right to purchase their own freedom through federal exchanges which will negotiate a better price than that which individual slaves would be capable of negotiating themselves.

Congressman Blowhard - What we need are state exchanges which will negotiate under current existing law.

Vice-President Biden - What we all agree upon here is that these slaves are a commodity. I think we can all agree that human life is a commodity? Can we not?

President Obama - Joe, you’re exactly right there. After all, what is human life and well being other than a commodity which at the moment is way out of whack with what this country needs right now. We’re here to figure out how to keep the cost of this commodity to a minimum.

Senator Lame - What we don’t want here is the Federal Government setting the price for our slaves. Individual States know what’s best for their own people. I agree we have to keep the price of this commodity down, but Federal interference is nowhere in the Constitution.

President Obama - I think we can all agree that human beings are a commodity and the price curve should be brought down. Let’s talk some more.
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Should Obama Resign Today?

Today?

Yesterday?

Tomorrow?

You can mark me down as being in the Tomorrow column. Yesterday or Today are a bit too unreasonable for me.

I know Obama being in office for another twenty-four hours means another one hundred and twenty-three people have died unnecessarily because they lack health insurance, but I think the gentleman from Chicago should be given the time to neatly pack his belongings and leave. Having him rush out of town as if an angry mob were after him is not justified. Resigning by tomorrow will be fine with me.

What did we expect? Barack Obama had the least pertinent experience of any elected President in the past hundred years. (If you want to say W was even worse that’s fine. Just remember you’re the one comparing Obama to Bush. I pray Obama is incompetent rather than corrupt.)

Everyone was enamored by the young, good looking, intelligent legislator from the Land of Lincoln . Barack was so much better than George.

Get over it.

Obama is a horrible president. Almost as bad as Bush.

It’s time for Obama to resign.

He’s unfit for the job.


(Abetting torture by not prosecuting torturers. Doubling troops in Afghanistan. Predator drone assassinations. Useless on Health Care Reform., etc.)
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22,500 Democratic Deaths. And Counting

If 45,000 Americans die each year because they are uninsured, how many of these deaths are now the responsibility of the Democratic Party? Since gaining control of the legislative and executive branches fourteen months ago, the Democrats under Obama have accomplished nothing in stopping these unnecessary deaths. Even giving them eight months to get their act together (Obama’s August 2009 target date), they now have six months of responsibility for uninsured deaths on their hands. That’s 22,500 preventable deaths. And counting.

In a similar vein.

Artists die young.

Why?

Let’s face it, the way this country rewards or punishes behaviors is through the tax code and other financial programs. You can get thousands back from your government if you purchase a certain type of gas guzzler. You can write off from your taxes what you spend on sporting events. (If you are properly incorporated.) You get reimbursed for not growing crops. You can receive reimbursement for college tuition if you’re willing to be employed as a gunman/woman for a few years.

When I read this eulogy, I remembered my friend, Helen. Helen died because she couldn’t figure out how to be an artist and maintain proper health care. She was presented with the choice, work as an artist or stop being the artist she was and waste her energy on jobs where she worked only to be able to afford health insurance. She chose to be an artist. She carried useless health insurance. And so she died.

Shows you how much this country values human life and original thought.

That would be not at all.

And now the responsibility lies in the hands of the Democratic Party. 22,500 so far.

Hey, Olberman! You’ve been harping on the number of days since Bush declared victory in Iraq for years now. I’m not saying you should stop. But lets add a number to your daily routine. March 1, 2010 will be six full months since August 2009.

Number of Preventable Deaths since President Obama said we should have a Health Care reform bill passed.

22,500

And then add 123 more each and every day until Obama’s Democratic Party acts humanely.

22,623

22,746

22,869

22,992

etc.

etc.
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Your Money or Your Life, Mr. Lime

One of my all time favorite movies is The Third Man, directed by Carol Reed. When Graham Greene adapted his novella into a screenplay, perhaps the world was a more understandable place. The post World War II period never seemed simple to me. Somehow I doubt life was any less complicated back then, but that’s nostalgia for you.

Poor Holly Martins (Joseph Cotton) arrives in multi-occupied Vienna after being offered work by his friend, Harry Lime (Orson Welles). Martins soon discovers that Lime has been run over by the proverbial bus (lorry) and will not soon be delivering on any promised employment.

Moving right along, Martins discovers that Harry Lime was a black marketeer of the most nefarious type. Lime stole a shipment of penicillin and, after watering it down, sold it back to the medical community. Unfortunately the diluted penicillin is possibly worse than worthless and numerous children have allegedly either died or been crippled by Lime’s product.

Harry Lime is portrayed as the most despicable of human beings. A cretinous bug. But this was all back in the 1950s when things were simpler. Back then a scumbag was a scumbag, even if you couldn’t use the word scumbag in polite society.

Harry Lime, the lowest of the low, profiteer and thief.

But let’s hold on a second. That was how hateful Harry was perceived sixty years ago. Let’s have another look at Harry from today’s enlightened corporate perspective.

Was Harry ever convicted of a crime? Absolutely not. Allegations he had stolen penicillin were never proven. Innocent until proven guilty.

Did Harry Lime steal the drugs he was accused of reselling? Again, how Harry came into possession of his product has never been adjudicated.

What was Harry Lime's crime? Multiple jurisdictions, no conviction.

What crime? Harry Lime simply maximized profit with the product he had at hand.

Penicillin was a desirable commodity at that time in Vienna. Lime was in possession of a source for the drug and doctors and hospitals were willing to purchase this commodity at venues considered illegal. Certainly the medical community didn’t have to make these questionable purchases. These medical professionals chose to buy black market drugs. How could they imagine these illegal drugs would be of the same quality and potency as those obtained through legitimate channels? These medicines should have been tested for quality before they were used on unsuspecting children. Obviously, the medical profession was negligent.

So there you have it. Harry Lime wasn’t guilty of anything. All he did was profit on the ill health of those who could afford to pay for his watered down pharmaceuticals.

Today Harry Lime, profiteer and murderer, could easily become an executive for any of numerous American health care providers or drug companies. The Third Man certainly knew how to turn the ill health of innocents into a commodity. Isn’t that what it’s all about?

Harry Lime, corporate medicine at its finest!
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Moveon, there's nothing happening here, just Moveon

Today I found in my overflowing inbox another email from Moveon.org. I guess I've been on their mailing list for a long time now.

Moveon began with simple goals. Stop talking about your neighbor's sex life. Stop the war in Iraq, get Bush out of office, etc. In general it's a fine organization meant to appeal to the best in us. Stop unnecessary killing and all torture. Things like that.

Moveon helped organize tens of thousands, at least, of young people to get the Democrats in control of the government.

But today's missive was something else again.

Today I was informed that Moveon was now involved with regulating Wall Street. Perhaps they have been doing this for some time. Maybe I previously had just failed to notice. Today I was told that I should send money to Moveon so they could deal with all the criminals involved in the AIG shell game.

Wow! Somebody has discovered there are a bunch of thieves involved in the financial markets!

Now I certainly applaud anyone who has figured out how to deal with the infinite machinations included within our present financial system. And after I introduce you to them, I have a small bridge I can sell to you in Breukelyn. Moveon has just joined the most disreputable of all social beings, the economic pundits. To say this is a comedown is putting it mildly.

Listen! All of you liberal rabble rousers out there, stick with what you know. I seriously do not want Amnesty International telling me how to clean up the environment. I don’t want Greenpeace asking me for money to campaign for more libraries. Stick with what you are Moveon.org. Do not pretend to be the financial police. And most certainly don’t ask me for money to do something you really shouldn’t be doing. Isn’t that what got AIG into trouble in the first place?
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Why the health insurance companies love Obama

Let’s face it, Obama’s heart was never with health care reform. He has invested approximately zero of his political capital in creating a new health care insurance system. Zero. Nada. Zilch. For the past year, platitudes have been the only words to escape his lips while he vocally supports not a single specific program.

Democratic Presidents, ex-officio leaders of the Democratic Party, are meant to push specific programs. When Obama was first elected he had tremendous political capital and grassroots support. Over the last year he has frittered away all that momentum. Who can get behind the health care bill of President Platitude? There is no bill. Over the past week Obama has mentioned his health care program on numerous occasions. But there is no such program. He stands for nothing. Obama can speak endlessly about generalities. Perhaps he missed his calling. Perhaps he should be penning greeting cards. “Hope!”

Now who benefits from all this? Obama’s opponent in the Democratic primary was Hillary Clinton. If anyone scared the health insurance industry more than Senator Clinton, please let me know. What the health insurance industry needed was a Democratic candidate who could mouth all the right platitudes but who had no particular desire to upset the health insurance industry as it exists today.

All I know is, that after a year, President Platitude has accomplished nothing as far as reforming the health insurance industry is concerned. The insurance companies couldn’t have asked for anything more.
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From the Circus History Message Board

CIRCUS RIDER

a novel history of the first American circus

and a great American portrait

now available in the United States

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(for Breschard/Ricketts Gilbert Stuart posts, click the "Gilbert Stuart's Circus Rider" link on the upper right hand corner of this page)

27 Jan 2010 - Among the earliest of photographic portraits of circus people are several images of animal presenter Jacob Driesbach. A long-time collector that owned one of them saw fit to bestow an identification of Isaac A. Van Amburgh upon it, having no knowledge of the actual sitter other than his general notoriety. There is no evidence at hand to confirm that Van Amburgh ever sat for a photographer.

The late Stuart Thayer had descriptions of both Driesbach and Van Amburgh. He even found a newspaper reference for the session when and where Driesbach was photographed. Thayer advanced a strong case for his Driesbach identification. Despite overwhelming evidence, others interested in photographic materials refused to accept his findings for fear of alienating the collector.

Thus, the earliest prominent portrait of an American circus owner, as well as some of the earliest photographic portraits of a circus performer are both challenged in their identification. Even with a sound argument at hand, it is often impossible to alter an entrenched mentality until a generational change takes place. Truth falls victim to allegiance, for a variety of reasons, especially in the public eye. Good luck with your establishment of the Breschard identity for the Gilbert Stuart portrait. Fred Dahlinger 

http://www.circushistory.org/Query.htm#3227

Fred Dahlinger is an extremely well respected circus historian.

Generational change does not necessarily need move at a glacial pace.

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Obama Resigns

AP 01-21-10 10:35 PM

In a fit of rampant bi-partisanship, Barack Obama announced today that, "I intend to become the first President (not about to be impeached), the first Black President, the first Hawaiian President, of these United States, to resign from office."

Realizing, at long last, that after one year in the White House his only remaining supporters were paid employees of the war/medical/pharmaceutical/insurance/money laundering machines, today President Obama finally made a proposal upon which both sides of the aisle could agree.

"I mean, seriously folks, why on earth did you ever expect someone with as little experience with the top levels of government to be anything other than a poster boy for military industrial complex? They’ve been at this for a long, long time. I was in the Senate for what, a couple of weekends? Truly, I am sorry. The accommodations were wonderful and Michelle and the girls had a great time, but we are so out of here. To tell the truth, I’d rather be on the beaches of the great state of Hawaii."

News of Obama’s resignation was greeted with relief. "Joe Biden’s no great shakes but at least he isn’t going to listen to anything the Republicans have to say." said a senior Senator. This seemed to be the general consensus of most Democrats on hearing the news.

From the other side of the aisle, former Presidential candidate John McCain wished his one time opponent well and "Thank God Barack is doing this. He scared the hell out of us. I mean, was he sleepwalking or what?"

Reached for comment the President presumptive, Vice-President Joe Biden, mentioned something about trains not being available for the additional commute.
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Inscriptions on Breschard, the Circus Rider, not by Gilbert Stuart

There  appears to be a good deal of confusion about the two inscriptions at the bottom corners of this painting. As has been shown by the National Gallery of Art, these two inscriptions were placed on the canvas years after the work was completed. The guesses as to what the names may be are both many and confusing. They were not added by Gilbert Stuart but by someone unknown which is what is meant by "later hand". The names are neither Ricketts nor Breschard. Not even the NGA uses these signatures to indicate who the actual sitter is.

http://www.nga.gov/fcgi-bin/tinfo_f?object=3160&detail=ins

from the NGA

Inscription

in a later hand, lower left: Portrait of / Mr Rickarts / Horse Equestraine [sic] / Friend of the artist / Gilbert Stuart; in a later hand, lower right: Portrait of Rickarts / Horse Equestrian / An Intimate Friend of / Gilbert Stuarts

These indecipherable inscriptions, added long after the painting was completed by someone other than Gilbert Stuart, are useless in deciding who was the sitter for this portrait.
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Non-Comic Strips, Almond Division

Many things in life are like lifting a heavy weight. This recipe is one of them. There are two truisms that come to mind whenever I know I’m about to strain every muscle in my body and possibly sustain minor to more than minor injury. Three things actually. One: Avoid injury. Two: lift with your legs. (If you learn anything from all of this, lift with your legs is as good a lesson as any.) But this recipe has nothing to do with these first two thoughts. Mostly. Number three is what concerns us here. Number three, as we all should have learned a long time ago, reads: Before you lift something heavy, know where you’re going to put it after you have it in hand. You really don’t want to be walking around going, “Where shall I place this awfully heavy object which is causing me such pain as I walk around with it in my hands looking for a place to unload the damn thing other than from where I just picked it up? Ouch.”

We are here to avoid that pain. Know what you are going to do with these almondy wonders before you launch into this recipe. Know that you are going to send a dozen to the neighbors. Know that your nieces and nephews will enjoy them without end. Know that your overweight rival in the office will gobble them down and thus be one step closer to taking six months of medical leave due to the triple bypass. Know that the two women sharing the apartment down the hall are going to be just as pleased as punch.

Do not leave these around your own premises. You may keep a half dozen for yourself and a friend. If you do not disperse these immediately you will end up looking like the Pillsbury Doughboy, a sad cross between an adorable adult infant and the guy from the old neighborhood who still lives in his grandparents’ basement, is at least 200 pounds overweight and gives off vibes similar to a bad slasher movie.

You have been warned.

½ cup unsalted butter (one stick)
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon almond extract
a wee bit of milk
½ cup sliced almonds, roughly chopped
Powdered Yet Drippy Sugar Icing

Take the butter and egg out of the refrigerator an hour before you want to make these. You have to get the ingredients in the mood. Warm them up a bit. Ease into it. None of that, “Honey, I’m home, let’s do it” shit. Room temperature ingredients. This is the French way.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Beat the crap out of the butter with an electric mixer for about thirty seconds at medium speed. If you don’t have an electric mixer, you probably already have massive forearms so I’m not going to help you out.

Toss in 1 cup of flour, all the sugar, your warmed, desirable egg, baking powder, as well as the almond extract. Hit it again with the mixer until completely integrated then toss in the rest of the flour and beat it. Really beat it.

Take this dough and toss it onto a marginally floured cutting board. Chop the dough into four equal parts. Take each one of these and roll it into a twelve inch long roll. You will feel like an idiot but just do it. Take out an ungreased cookie sheet and place the rolls on it about five inches apart. Using the karate chop edge of your hand, flatten the rolls until they’re about three inches wide.

Take out your pastry brush (I know, I know), and lightly paint the now flattened rolls with a wee bit of the milky.

Shove that cookie sheet into that 325 oven and let ‘er rip for 13 minutes, give or take sixty seconds. When you eyeball these toasted tubes, the edges should be slightly brown, like really over whitened coffee. Take them out of the oven then diagonally slice the suckers into 1 (one) inch(“) strips. Cool these babies down on a wire rack (I said, I already know). Drip the disgusting looking icing (recipe follows) all over these puppies. And then get them out of your house.

(Powdered Yet Drippy Sugar Icing - cup powdered sugar, 1/4 teaspoon vanilla, a little milk. Mix sugar, vanilla, and a tablespoon milk together. Add milk a teaspoon at a time until it looks drippingly, disgustingly perfect for slobbering over your almond non-comic strips.)

Then get them out of your house, Doughboy.
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Breschard or Ricketts? One reason why this matters

One of the most important functions of any government is the education of children. A  major part of the National Gallery of Art's brief is to aid in the development of America's next generation of citizens. When the government starts disseminating incorrect information to children, and this error is discovered, immediate action should be taken.

Now one might think that Stuart's portrait of a Circus Rider is a small thing. One painting out of hundreds of Stuarts out there. What's the big deal?

follow this link: National Gallery of Art - Gilbert Stuart for Kids

This is the NGA own childrens' guide to Gilbert Stuart. The first painting selected is obvious, The Skater. But the second? Even before the portrait of George Washington! Before the founder of this country! Before Adams, Jefferson, Madison and Monroe! Why it's Breschard, the Circus Rider. Amazing. Before George Washington is Jean Baptiste Breschard, the Circus Rider, Circus Owner, Theatrical Impresario, and a major donor to the first public school in New York City. And, look, there's the story of how Jefferson and Lafayette attended the opening of the Walnut Street Theatre with Breschard. Read it yourself. It's right there in the guide for children.

But wait. That's not the story that's there. And the NGA says that the portrait is of somebody named Ricketts, not Breschard. Instead they tell a story of John Bill Ricketts and George Washington. Probably a true story but it has nothing to do with this painting. It's simply a convenient story which the NGA thinks is as good as any to tell children. The facts of the story may be true, but the reason for it being told isn't factual.

It's not right for the National Gallery of art to spread misinformation to children. Or is it?
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Another Gilbert Stuart Lost Painting

In my most recent book, CIRCUS RIDER; a novel history of the first American circus, the identity of the sitter for a Gilbert Stuart portrait is an object of debate. The two contenders for who’s who in this piece of early American art history are John Bill Ricketts, an Englishman who brought the first circus to the United States in the 1790s; and Jean Baptiste Breschard, who with his partner, Victor Pépin, captivated the newly liberated colonists with their performances from 1807 until 1815. Traveling a seasonal circuit including New York, Philadelphia, Richmond, Boston and Charleston; Breschard, a Frenchman, and Pépin, a native New Yorker, entertained Americans at their permanent circus theatres with years of sold-out performances including equestrian shows, circus acts, classical drama, melodramas, comic plays, hippodrama and lots, lots, more!

In 1970 the National Gallery of Art renamed this portrait “John Bill Ricketts,” disregarding the definitive 1879 identification of the sitter as Jean B. Breschard by George C. Mason (author of The Life and Works of Gilbert Stuart), George Washington Riggs (known as “The President’s Banker” and a founder of the Corcoran Museum of Art) and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. Mason’s book and the Boston Museum’s exhibition weren’t sufficient evidence for the NGA. Living witnesses to Breschard’s performances weren’t enough. Instead they turned to a small note by T. Allston Brown, a gentleman with a reputation for inaccuracy, and changed the name of Stuart’s painting from "Breschard, the Circus Rider" to "John Bill Ricketts."

The entire NGA identification rests upon unsupported statements by T. Allston Brown as to who owned the portrait previous to George Washington Riggs. According to Brown the last owner before Mr. Riggs was a certain Peter Grain, a Frenchman and artist. This is the NGA provenance and primary reason for changing the identification. http://www.nga.gov/fcgi-bin/tinfo_f?object=3160&detail=prov

Oddly enough Peter Grain’s son, Peter Grain, Junior, spent most of his professional career working as a scenic director at the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia which was built by Pépin and Breschard. If someone could show that Peter Grain, the elder, was a member of the Circus of Pépin and Breschard, it certainly would go a long way to discrediting the NGA provenance based on the words of T. Allston Brown (This was a man who could publish six factual mistakes within a single paragraph. See my January 8, 2010 blog post. ).

By request of Beth Ahrens-Kley who publishes a Gilbert Stuart blog and is currently researching this particular debate, what follows is fairly definitive proof that Peter Grain was a member of the Circus of Pépin and Breschard. Peter Grain would certainly be capable of identifying his old boss, Jean Baptiste Breschard and passing this information along to George Washington Riggs. This should put an end to any justification for the current NGA stand that the portrait is of Ricketts. Any reasonable institution should once again identify the portrait as Breschard, the Circus Rider.

An 1809 advertisement for the Circus of Pépin and Breschard in New York

 

“This Evening, Aug. 2, 1809, Messrs. Pepin, & Breschard, will have the honor to give a brilliant representation of Horsemanship, Vaulting and Dancing.

To which will be added for the first time the New Pantomime of BILLY, or the Reward of a Good Action, performed with combats, &c. by Mr. P. Grain”

and now from the Walnut Street Theatre

 follow this link: Stuart portrait identified as Breschard

This is  only the beginning. It's time to bring back this forgotten piece of history.

CIRCUS RIDER

a novel history of the first American circus

and a great Gilbert Stuart American portrait

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Bad history

Just for fun I decided to revisit the work of T. Allston Brown, who the National Gallery of Art depends upon greatly for their provenance.

from T. Allston Brown's History of the American Stage, 1870 (nine years after the citation used by the NGA)

Peppin and Burschard. - Peppin and Burschard, with a French Circus, landed in Boston in 1806, from Spain. They performed in conjunction with West, at Philadelphia. Peppin built the Walnut Street Theatre. Peppin had a thorough military education. He was an officer in the cavalry of France. He was born in Albany. His parents were French. They left Albany for Paris when Peppin was two years of age.

http://www.circushistory.org/History/Brown.htm#P

Aside from not knowing how to spell Pépin or Breschard, getting the year they arrived in the USA wrong, 1807 not 1806, Pépin and Breschard together not ever working with West, both Pépin and Breschard building the Walnut Street Theatre in Philadelphia, not Pépin alone, and Mrs. Pépin having never gone to France, I guess the rest of his piece is correct.

For someone who is relied upon as a source for the Smithsonian, getting six facts wrong out of a possible ten is a poor, poor performance.

This is the author the NGA uses to negate Mason, Riggs, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

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More governmental errors

(The following is  in reply to an inquiry.)

As has been mentioned, Peter Grain worked in the Circus of Pépin and Breschard. At the moment I’m looking at an image of an 1809 newspaper notice. P. Grain’s drama “Billy” is advertised by Pépin and Breschard and Grain has the leading role. Grain was a member of the company for at least a year. Having worked with Jean Breschard, I feel comfortable in assuming Grain would be capable of recognizing a portrait of his former boss.

You should look into exactly who George Washing Riggs was. Among other things he was probably the richest man in the United States during his time, an advisor to Presidents, and one of the founders of the most prestigious Corcoran Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. It was he who identified the sitter to Mason. In my files is a copy of a handwritten note from Riggs to Mason identifying the portrait as being that of Breschard.

Pépin and Breschard were the premiere performers in the U.S. from 1808 until 1815. (Very few people in this country can name the most popular performers of any decade during the 19th century.) Calling either of them a minor circus equestrian shows poor scholarship on someone’s part. Some research into historical newspapers will prove an education on this point. The NGA has been professionally negligent about this.

Ricketts’s brother being the first owner of this particular painting is a misreading of an extremely dubious source. This attribution is at best a rumor and at worst, well, never mind. This is by far the weakest part of the NGA provenance and does not rise to meet any academic standard.

When someone is in the entertainment business, there are numerous reasons why one would wish their portrait painted.

M indicates that Ricketts left for the West Indies before the painting was finished. This is without any factual basis. A Mr. C at the NGA had serious doubts about the Ricketts ID in the late 60s (I’d have to look at my notes for a more precise date), his research into the identification was a bit shallow since, I believe, the NGA is basically more interested in the portrait being by Stuart than in exactly who the sitter is.

Breschard, the Circus Rider by Gilbert Stuart

In 2004, thanks to the wonders of Google, a portrait of Jean Baptiste Breschard by Gilbert Stuart became known to me. Having only discovered the existence of this historical Breschard a few years previous, I was intrigued. Unfortunately, the name of this particular painting was no longer “Breschard, the Circus Rider,” the sitter was now designated as “John Bill Ricketts,” the portrait's identification being changed by the National Gallery of Art sometime in the 1970s.

After having completed a great deal of research and having read pertinent parts of the NGA archive, I became convinced by the existing evidence that in all probability the portrait by Gilbert Stuart was indeed that of Jean Baptiste Casmiere Breschard.

So I wrote a book about the man, the circus, the artist, the painting, the NGA, etc.. I’m presently in the process of having it published.

The main reason I’m writing this is due to the fact that another student of Stuart has come across the controversy and is using some of the entries I’ve helped edit in Wikipedia as sources for posts to her blog. All I can say is that like all encyclopedias, Wikipedia doesn’t contain all the facts, and if I can be of any help, let me know.