Human beings with a sense of decency are demanding that Montana’s Big Sky Tea Party remove Tim Ravndal from his position as President of the state party after he joked about killing LGBTQ people and the torture and murder of Matthew Shepard.

Ravndal had stated in a Facebook post that marriage should be between a man and woman (blah blah blah) and one of his fans commented, “I think fruits are decorative. Hang up where they can be seen and appreciated. Call Wyoming for display instructions.”

Ravndal’s response: “Where can I get that Wyoming printed instruction manual?”

The original commenter then responds to Ravndal, “Should be able to get info Gazette archives. Maybe even an illustration. Go back a bit over ten years.”

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Bach had a lot of mouths to feed – twenty children or so?  He wrote this concerto (probably by the light of burning Vivaldi manuscripts – he emulated a lot of earlier composers) as a violin concerto first, if memory serves, then transposed it down a key to D major and sold it off as a keyboard concerto.  This is the first movement, could not find a video of Gould doing the third movement, my favorite.

We had intended to write a clever little post about how the U.S. Department of Labor’s History of Labor Day page neglects to mention the inspirational role of the Pullman Strike of 1894 in establishing the federal holiday that year.

But we ran into a glitch.

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Used to be able to get thru the first Goldberg Variation … not so much anymore. Gould’s 1981 taping of the Goldberg Variations is still the most staggeringly impressive thing I’ve ever seen done on a keyboard. And he was using a beat-up Yamaha concert grand (instead of his usual Steinway).

The New York Times has a story today on the hottest new trend in Emergency response: fee for service.

ABOUT a year ago Cary Feldman was surprised to find himself sprawled on the pavement in an intersection in Chicago Heights, Ill., having been knocked off his motor scooter by the car behind him. Five months later he got another surprise: a bill from the fire department for responding to the scene of the accident. Read more »

Title: “A Journey: My Political Life”

Author: Tony Blair

Rank: 7

Blurb: “In frank, unflinching, often wry detail, Tony Blair charts the ups and downs of his career to provide insight into the man as well as the politician and statesman.”

Review: “Perhaps we were all fooled to some extent by the young, pretty boy, self assured image — although it is an image that has now also caught on in other parties!”

Customers Also Bought: “Our Kind of Traitor,” by John le Carré.

Footnote: “Tony Blair pelted with eggs at book signing in Dublin” [BBC]

A Journey [Amazon]

Buy or Die [Stinque@Amazon kickback link]

However bad traffic gets this holiday weekend, just remember: It could be worse. It could be China’s latest 75-mile instant trailer park.

Bumper-to-bumper as epic China traffic jam returns [AFP/Yahoo]