Natalie Portman. RBG. Nichols & May. Baby crashes live TV set. Jewish Space Laser Jokes. Crazy Congresswoman. More Mittens. Covid art. Lawsuit to watch.
LETTY COTTIN POGREBIN. NEWSLETTER #100 FEB 1, 2021
Somehow I've produced 100 issues of this Newsletter over the last five years. Many thanks for sticking with me from the beginning or joining at some point along the way. As you've no doubt discerned, my focus is on politics, culture, women, and Jewish issues, with special attention to feminism and Israel/Palestine. But, since Covid, I've added a heavy dose of humor to help boost all our spirits. Today's harvest should make you laugh, smile, smirk, and marvel at matters both marvelous and bizarre.
[above; RBG with one of her favorite handbags on her lap]
* Don't miss this one-time free screening tomorrow at 3. I was utterly charmed by Jennifer Callahan's short film about Ruth Bader Ginsburg's passion for purses. An unapologetic fashionista, RBG says she loves bags with pockets and shows you exactly what she puts in them. Also does an adorable show-and-tell about her favorite evening bag, one from the old Metropolitan Opera gift shop, one from Shanghai, a beautiful suede bag and more. And, since I know her mother died the night before Ruth's high school graduation, I was touched when she recalls the sound of the clasp on her mom's purse. Register here to watch this endearing glimpse of a side of the Supreme Court Justice you've never seen. Plus you'll see a panel discussion including Kathleen Peratis, Clara Spera, Allison Abner, Emily Mortimer, Alessandro Nivola, and the film maker. Register here. The screening goes from 3-4 PM EST and offers no option to pause or rewind. If you join late, you'll miss it. Here's Vogue's back story on RBG and her purses.
* Abigail Pogrebin interviews Natalie Portman about her new book for kids, her favorite writers, her film career, and her role models. Portman was Abigail's first guest in her interview series for the Streicker Center entitled "Women Inspiring Women" which asks the women we most admire to talk about the women they most admire. Next in the series: Nina Totenberg. 2/9; Tiffany Haddish, 2/17; Mayim Bialik, 2/25; Debbie Wasserman Schultz, 3/2; Hillary Rodham Clinton, 3/11.
* Reality intrudes; meteorologist adapts gracefully. Baby enters live TV shot during mom's weather report. Welcome to what goes on every day in the lives of professional women.
WOMEN IN POLITICAL LIFE
* While we were paying attention to U.S. politics, the world was changing. This video has gone wildly viral. Subscribers in England, Australia, Israel, S. Africa, and elsewhere keep sending me the link. Watch it and you'll feel better!
* Which is not to say that any female who achieves political power deserves it. Newly elected Georgia GOP Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene surely does not. Among her other fringey lunacies, Greene (above, right) has called for executing Nancy Pelosi and killing more Democrats, has promulgated off-the-wall conspiracy theories, i.e that a Jewish space laser caused the 2018 California wildfires, Zionists promote non-white immigration into Europe to replace white people, and the Sandy Hook and Parkland school shootings were faked. Democrats in the House are calling for Greene's ouster. Jewish groups have condemned her views. At the request of Rep. Cori Bush. (D-MO. above left), Pelosi moved Bush's office away from Greene's to protect Bush's health and safety.
* Someone just caught two Jews in the act of launching the Jewish laser (above). Of course, Greene's antiSemitism tropes are no laughing matter; her views are toxic and dangerous. But Jews, being famously self-mocking, have come up with some pretty good jokes about her and her crazy claims: to wit: Lazer Wolf from "Fiddler on the Roof" is to blame, and clever and therefore forgivable use of otherwise infuriating stereotypes of Jewish Mothers. Honorable mention to The Forward's send-up on the Jewish Space Laser Agency.
* If not Lazer Wolf, it must have been the Jewish Senator from VT who lasered the CA forests with his Hanukkah menorah, above. (Whoever made this meme is a genius. )
SUE A NAZI
* I'm excited about the lawsuit against white supremacists who marauded in Charlottesville. Leading the legal charge is Integrity First for America whose goal is to hit hate groups with massive financial penalties and starve their coffers. Watch this panel discussion about the work of IFA and click on the arrow to hear lead counsel, Roberta Kaplan, and IFA Exec Dir., Amy Spitalnick explain the case in full. Or just donate here.
ISRAEL/PALESTINE
* To understand the current political situation in Palestine, join this Zoom webinar sponsored by Americans For Peace Now. Speaker: Zaha Hassan, a human rights lawyer and Visiting Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace will discuss the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the use of international legal mechanisms by political movements, and U.S. foreign policy in the region. Wed. Feb 3, 1 PM EST. Register here.
LIFE IMITATES ART
* Art masterpieces predicted Covid: masks, quarantine & social distancing. See video.
MORE MITTENS
https://tobeytimecrochet.com/ Bernie's mitten meme won't quit.
* Bernie's mittens worm their way into one's head. (above). Handicrafters can crochet their own meme. Order pattern from TobyTime Crochet (below)
COVID
"Dr. Anthony Fauci on MSNBC, Jan 25: "Ever since I told the alarming truth when speaking on TV as a member of a Trump appointed committee on virus control and was summarily fired, called 'an idiot' by Trump, my wife, my children and I have received written and phoned death threats. When opening a mailed envelope, I lacked caution and some of the contents, a white powder, spilled on my hands. I thought, 'Well, if it's anthrax, I'll get ciprofloxacin as an antidote! If it's ricin, I'll be dead in a half hour!' It was just a scare missive, I guess!"
COMIC RELIEF
In the 14th century, a surgeon named Henri de Mondeville said laughter is the best medicine (which doesn't mean you shouldn't get vaccinated.)
* Classic Jewish Mother joke updated
The year is 2024 and the United States has elected the first woman as well as the first Jewish president, Susan Goldstein. She calls up her mother a few weeks after Election Day and says, "So, Mom, I assume you'll be coming to my inauguration?"
"I don't think so. It's a ten-hour drive, your father isn't as young as he used to be, and my arthritis is acting up again."
"Don't worry about it, Mom, I'll send Air Force One to pick you up and take you home. And a limousine will pick you up at your door."
"I don't know. Everybody will be so fancy-schmantzy; what on earth would I wear?"
Susan replies, "I'll make sure you have a wonderful gown, custom-made by the best designer in New York."
"Honey," Mom complains, "you know I can't eat those rich foods you and your friends like to eat."
The President-to-be responds, "Don't worry Mom. The entire affair is going to be handled by the best caterer in New York; kosher all the way. Mom, I really want you to come."
So Mom reluctantly agrees and on January 20, 2025, Susan Goldstein is being sworn in as President of the United States. In the front row sits the new President's mother, who leans over to a Senator sitting next to her and says, "You see that woman over there with her hand on
the Torah, becoming President of the United States?"
The Senator whispers back, "Yes, I do."
Mom says proudly, "Her brother is a doctor."
* Common cliches revisited
WISDOM
[Excerpts from unknown source]
Everyone has a photographic memory. Some don't have film.
On the other hand, you have different fingers.
Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.
I just got lost in thought. It was unfamiliar territory.
Seen it all, done it all, can't remember most of it.I feel like I'm diagonally parked in a parallel universe.
You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say will be misquoted,
then used against you.I wonder how much deeper the ocean would be without sponges.
Honk if you love peace and quiet.Just remember...if the world didn't suck, we'd all fall off.
If you line up all the cars in the world end to end, someone would try to pass them.
You can't have everything, where would you put it?.
A fine is a tax for doing wrong. A tax is a fine for doing well.I started out with nothing, and I still have most of it.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.
*
* The astonishingly brilliant, unfailingly hilarious, Elaine May salutes the late Mike Nichols at one of many theater galas honoring him. (photo left, in the 1950s; right, in 2010)
FEBRUARY IS BLACK HISTORY MONTH
* Peter Beinart writes, for Martin Luther King, Jr., "non-violence was not a moderate position. It was a breathtakingly radical one because it challenged the constant, taken-for-granted, often invisible, violence practiced by the most powerful government on earth—not only overseas, but at home. King condemned urban riots, yet he saw them as a rounding error compared to the lawlessness and violence of Americans in power. “If the total slum violations of law by the white man over the years were calculated and were compared with the lawbreaking of a few days of riots,” King wrote during the “long hot summer” of 1967, “the hardened criminal would be the white man.” See special issue on King in The Atlantic.
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