• Dick Clark

    R.I.P. Dick Clark 1929-2012

    Dick Clark and American Bandstand

    Dick Clark has passed away.

    Dick Clark, the creator of “American Bandstand” and “Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve,” died Wednesday morning.

    He was 82.

    Clark suffered a massive heart attack after entering St. John’s Hospital in Santa Monica on Tuesday night for an outpatient procedure, his family said in a statement.

    Attempts to resuscitate him were unsuccessful.

    Clark had suffered a stroke in 2004, which forced him to significantly curtail his hosting of “New Years’ Rockin’ Eve,” a show he created in 1972.

    Long dubbed “the world’s oldest teenager” because of his boyish appearance, Clark bridged the rebellious new music scene and traditional show business, and equally comfortable whether chatting about music with Sam Cooke or bantering with Ed McMahon about TV bloopers. He long championed black singers by playing the original R&B versions of popular songs, rather than the pop cover.

    Ryan Seacrest, who took over main hosting duties on the New Year’s countdown show from Clark after years of working beside the legend, said in a statement Wednesday that he was “deeply saddened.”

    “I idolized him from the start, and I was graced early on in my career with his generous advice and counsel,” Seacrest said. “He was a remarkable host and businessman and left a rich legacy to television audiences around the world. We will all miss him.”

    I have grown old along with Dick and I will miss him.

    Rest in Peace….

  • Pinboard Links,  The Morning Flap

    The Morning Flap: April 18, 2012

    These are my links for April 17th through April 18th:

    • The $5 Trillion Man: Debt Has Increased Under Obama by $5,027,761,476,484.56 – In the 39 months since Barack Obama took the oath of office as president of the United States, the federal government’s debt has increased by $5,027,761,476,484.56.

      Although he has served less than a term, Obama is now the first American president to see the federal government’s debt increase by more than $5 trillion during his time in office.

      During the full eight years that George W. Bush served as president, the federal government’s debt increased by $4,899,100,310,608.44. (Rising from $5,727,776,738,304.64 to $10,626,877,048,913.08.)

      The $5,027,761,476,484.56 that the debt has increased during Obama’s presidency equals $16,043.39 for every one of the 313,385,295 people the Census Bureau now estimates live in the United States.

    • Panetta says he regrets cost of trips home – Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Monday he regrets the cost to taxpayers for his weekend trips to his Carmel Valley home, but says it’s important “just to get your mind straight and your perspective straight.”
      Panetta said he’d try to find some savings, with each round trip costing approximately $32,000.
      “I regret … that it does add costs that the taxpayer has to pick up,” Panetta said during a Pentagon briefing Monday, speaking publicly for the first time about the flight costs. “A taxpayer would have to pick up those costs with any secretary of state or secretary of defense. But having said that, I am trying to look at what are … the alternatives here that I can look at that might possibly be able to save funds and, at the same time, be able to fulfill my responsibilities, not only to my job, but to my family.”
      The Associated Press earlier this month detailed the costs of the 27 roundtrip flights home Panetta has taken since he became Pentagon chief last July, as well as the amount he has reimbursed the government for the trips.
    • Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog » Day By Day April 18, 2012 – The Game – Day By Day April 18, 2012 – The Game
    • Walker makes his case before Illinois Chamber of Commerce – Gov. Scott Walker came to the capital city of Illinois on Tuesday to make the case that he should be retained as Wisconsin’s chief executive.

      He told the Illinois Chamber of Commerce that Wisconsin made the tough decisions to close its budget deficit, while Illinois continued to be burdened by an $8.5 billion deficit despite a 66% increase in the personal income tax rate.

      “The simple reality is, Illinois and Wisconsin, like nearly every other state, had big deficits to deal with. In our case, it was a $3.6 billion deficit. . . . And we looked around, other states are going to make poor decisions, we want to avoid that in Wisconsin,” Walker said.

      “We avoided a tax increase,” he said, recalling how after Illinois passed its increase, he came to Chicago with a bumper sticker that read, “Escape to Wisconsin.”

      “When you raise taxes on individuals, on businesses, that wealth, opportunity and jobs go somewhere else,” he said.

      Walker was greeted with three standing ovations from the crowd of 250 business leaders assembled at the President Abraham Lincoln Hotel and Conference Center.

    • The Campaign Against Systemic Sleaze: Team Romney Needs A Broom Pin – Solyndra. Fast and Furious. EPA and the Sacketts. Now GSA and the Secret Service.

      The federal government is suffering from systemic sleaze, the sort of excess that builds and builds and builds and then flows over from every corner. Chicago rules came to town and the result is a catastrophe for ethics in the public sector, a catastrophe which has many manifestations across the country in state and local government as well, with vast pension outlays resulting from swetheart deals with public employee unions and enormous expenditures on special interests and self-serving contracts, the sort of sleaze that reached a crescendo in the City of Bell, California scandals of last year.

    • Find Out How Fit You Are at Runner’s World – RT @runnersworld: How’s your overall fitness? These tests will help you determine what you need to work on.
    • Romney says ‘vast left wing conspiracy’ in media is attacking him – Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney said a “vast left wing conspiracy” in the media was working with the Obama campaign to coordinate attacks against him.

      “There will be an effort by the quote vast left wing conspiracy to work together to put out their message and to attack me,” Romney said in an interview with Breitbart.com. “They’re going to do everything they can to divert from the issue people care about, which is a growing economy that creates more jobs and rising incomes. That’s what people care about.”

    • Voters like President Obama to lead but prefer Romney on economic issues – A smattering of new polls shows an important divide developing: Voters like Mitt Romney on the economy but not much else. Meanwhile, they like President Obama on everything else but not nearly as much on the economy.

      So far, polls are showing a consistent, compelling divide between President Obama and the likely Republican nominee, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R). Romney often runs stronger than Obama on the question of who can better handle the economy, yet Obama’s favorability rating is usually higher — sometimes dramatically higher.

      In other words, they like Obama leading the country, Romney running it.

      The evidence is ample.

    • Bill Clinton enters 2012 race — to back his wife’s supporters – The congressional candidates former President Clinton is supporting in 2012 have something in common: They all backed his wife’s presidential bid four years ago.

      Sources close to Clinton said he wants to help those who put themselves on the line to support the former first lady’s campaign for the White House. But with Hillary Clinton serving in the Obama administration and Chelsea Clinton working for NBC News, Bill Clinton is the only member of the family in a position to hit the campaign trail.

    • Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog » @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-04-18 – @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-04-18
    • Conservatives Respond To Seamus-Gate: Barack Obama Ate A Dog – Business Insider – RT @businessinsider: Now Everyone’s Talking About How Barack Obama Ate A Dog by @grace_lightning #tcot
    • Obama Bites Dog | Dreams From My Father – Hey, if we’re going to talk about how presidential candidates treated dogs decades ago, let’s talk about how presidential candidates treated dogs decades ago.

      Can you name the author of this quote?

      “With Lolo, I learned how to eat small green chill peppers raw with dinner (plenty of rice), and, away from the dinner table, I was introduced to dog meat (tough), snake meat (tougher), and roasted grasshopper (crunchy). Like many Indonesians, Lolo followed a brand of Islam that could make room for the remnants of more ancient animist and Hindu faiths. He explained that a man took on the powers of whatever he ate: One day soon, he promised, he would bring home a piece of tiger meat for us to share.”

    • Memeorandum Colors 2012: Visualizing Bias on Political Blogs | Epicenter | Wired.com – Memeorandum Colors 2012: Visualizing Bias on Political Blogs | Epicenter |
    • Wired.com – Memeorandum Colors 2012: Visualizing Bias on Political Blogs | Epicenter |
    • Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog » Video: President 2012: Who Will Be Mitt Romney’s Vice President? – Video: President 2012: Who Will Be Mitt Romney’s Vice President?
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: Oral Rinse Shown to Significantly Reduce Plaque – Oral Rinse Shown to Significantly Reduce Plaque
    • Flap’s Dentistry Blog: The AFternoon Drill: April 17, 2012 – The AFternoon Drill: April 17, 2012
    • Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog » President 2012 Poll Watch: Romney 48% Vs. Obama 43% – President 2012 Poll Watch: Romney 48% Vs. Obama 43%
    • Flap’s Blog – FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog » The Morning Flap: April 17, 2012 – The Morning Flap: April 17, 2012
  • Twitter

    @Flap Twitter Updates for 2012-04-18

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