The week in review with Bill Katz the editor of Urgent Agenda................
Guest: Bill Katz the editor of Urgent Agenda..........Trouble everywhere around the world.....Midterms coming fast and it's the economy stupid.....The Biden-Harris troubles 2024......Big defeat for Stacy Abrams and Jim Crow II......Giants vs Dodgers 1951....and other stories..
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Who has a Friday night political debate in Texas? The answer is a governor who is up by 8 points and wants to get this debate thing over and very quickly! I've lived in Texas since 1984, we had three sons who played football and no one here talks politics on a September/October Friday night. We talk high school football and good luck with anything else.
Yes, I did watch the debate on my I-phone because I couldn't find it on TV. It was a boring 60 minutes that won't make anyone's favorite video lists.
The candidates did what they had to do, I guess. O'Rourke blamed Abbott for everything and Abbott kept correcting him. I don't know who won but Governor Abbott was ready for "O'Rourke-isms" and punched back effectively.
On abortion, O'Rourke said that we should go back to Roe v Wade and did not reject late-term abortions. On the other hand, the governor spoke effectively of his adopted daughter and adoption in general. I don't think that either one was very effective but late-term abortion will not play well with Hispanic women in Texas.
On immigration and guns, O'Rourke was playing defense because the journalists played his videos about AR-15's and denying the border crisis. The governor was better in this round by simply stating the obvious that we have a huge problem on the border. O'Rourke tried to blame the governor for the Uvalde school shooting but was not effective.
On the power grid, a big issue because of the problems in early 2021, O'Rourke fell short because the lights did not go out in February nor in the super hot month of August. So the grid worked and that was good for the governor. God did not answer Beto's prayer about the lights going out.
The governor's best point was tying O'Rourke to President Biden. O'Rourke was lost because the Biden presidency is more than underwater in Texas. It's more like 20,000 leagues under the sea. O'Rourke tried but could not detach from the incumbent president's record.
I have not seen too much coverage of this debate. Maybe it's too early or maybe the press people were watching high school football too. I do agree with this from FOX:
Incumbent Texas Gov. Greg Abbott effectively tied his Democratic challenger Beto O’Rourke to the unpopular policies of President Biden in a debate between the two, according to an expert in campaign debate preparation.
Abbott and O'Rourke squared off Friday at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley, where the border was a major topic of discussion, along with abortion, gun control and energy.
The apparent tactic of Abbott, like other Republicans in the 2022 midterm election cycle, was to tie O'Rourke to the president, who has struggled with underwater approval ratings for over a year and whose party faces historical headwinds and a slate of crises. According to Brett O'Donnell, an expert in advising political candidates to debate effectively, Abbott succeeded.
Yes he did. The governor will be reelected in a month or so and our pal Beto will move on to his next adventure. I understand that Chris Wallace needs a little help with his ratings. So we may see him as Chris's sidekick!
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"The song that would make Checker rich and famous—"The Twist"—had been a non-hit in 1958 for its writer, Hank Ballard, best known for 1954's "Work With Me Annie," which was then considered filthy enough to warrant an FCC ban.
Believing "The Twist" to be a potential smash, but unwilling to have the controversial Ballard on his American Bandstand, Dick Clark picked the wholesome Chubby Checker to record a cover.
With the help of Clark's tireless on-air promotion, "The Twist" turned Chubby Checker into an overnight success when it shot to the top of the Billboard pop chart in September 1960.
As all hit records do, "The Twist" then faded away. The dance craze it popularized did, too, as America's teenagers moved on to things like the Mashed Potato and the Pony.
Chubby Checker had a second #1 hit just five months after "The Twist" with "Pony Time," and then something remarkable happened.
A full year after the initial success of "The Twist," a gossip item in the New York papers placed actress Merle Oberon and the elderly exile Prince Serge Obolensky of Russia at the Peppermint Lounge, Twisting the night away. Suddenly a fad was reborn—this time among American adults, who took to the Twist with an alacrity that must have provoked uncountable cringes among their teenaged children.
Soon enough, "The Twist" began a remarkable second run up the charts, reclaiming the #1 spot on January 13 and finally relinquishing it on this day in 1962.
It was the first and only time a pop single has fallen completely out of Billboard's "Hot 100" only to re-attain the #1 spot in a completely separate release."
Here is the song.
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