NAIA
The National Championship game between Grand View University and Morningside College is set for December 18th at 7PM Eastern Time.
NCAA DIVISION TWO
FIRST SEMIFINAL – The VALDOSTA STATE BLAZERS took on the COLORADO SCHOOL OF MINES OREDIGGERS in this game. A 10-3 1st Quarter lead for the Blazers turned into a 24-14 advantage by Halftime. Valdosta State made it a 34-14 game to end the 3rd Quarter, then withstood an Orediggers rally in the 4th for a 34-31 victory. Continue reading
Filed under college football
BR’ER RABBIT’S CHRISTMAS CAROL (1992) – Balladeer’s Blog’s Twelfth Annual Christmas Carol-A-Thon continues! Br’er Rabbit, Br’er Fox, Br’er Bear, Br’er Gator and many other characters created by Joel Chandler Harris are featured in this animated version of the Dickens tale.
Br’er Rabbit’s Christmas Carol is my favorite out of all the versions which present A Christmas Carol as the framework of a Mission Impossible/ Leverage “con job” to make a greedy character change their ways. To nobody’s surprise, Br’er Fox is the Scrooge stand-in who requires a wakeup call.
All the characters live in a town in the American South, where a charity stage production of A Christmas Carol is being performed, with the proceeds going to benefit the terribly ill Timmy Mouse. No, not “Br’er Timmy” or anything like that, just Timmy Mouse as our Tiny Tim stand-in.
Br’er Fox has no time for silly fiction and is completely unfamiliar with the Dickens Christmas classic. That fact gives Br’er Rabbit the idea to work with his friends to instill some holiday spirit into Br’er Fox, who refuses to help Timmy Mouse and charges the other animals exorbitant prices for the firewood he sells. If they can’t afford to pay, they go cold. Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Here’s Part Fifteen of Spider-Man 1970s Classics. For Part One click HERE.
SPIDER-MAN Vol 1 #147 (August 1975)
Title: The Tarantula is a Very Deadly Beast
Villains: The Jackal and the Tarantula
Synopsis: We pick up a few days after the end of our previous installment. Spider-Man swings his way to the Daily Bugle building, where he switches to Peter Parker and walks into the offices. After standard hostile byplay with J Jonah Jameson, Peter is called over to the desk of crime reporter Ned Leeds.
Ned is still investigating the Gwen Stacy clone and who might have made it. (Peter has not told anyone that he fears the Jackal made the clone since that villain has apparently figured out Spider-Man’s secret identity.)
Leeds gives Peter copies of the long line of medical tests that the new Gwen has undergone in the past few days. Somehow the cloning process was accelerated, meaning she was created mere months ago, even though she is an adult as much as the real Gwen was when she was killed.
Meanwhile, the enigmatic villain the Jackal strikes again, busting Spider-Man’s old foe the Tarantula out of prison to use him as his latest operative against our hero as his plans approach fruition. Continue reading
Filed under Superheroes
If you missed it, Jussie Smollett was found guilty in his trial over the consequences of his hate hoax from a few years back when he and some accomplices faked an attack by alleged “Trump supporters in MAGA hats” in the latest in a long line of such Hate Crime Hoaxes in America. For a list of over 170 more such hoaxes click HERE. For a more comprehensive list of 449 (as of this writing) hate hoaxes click HERE.
The doltish Smollett even did a rehearsal of the fake crime, a rehearsal that was captured on film. The black men he hired to pretend to be his white attackers testified against him, too. All of this would be laughable if not for the toxic effect such race-baiting hoaxes continue to have in this country. Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
WHITE LIGHTNING (1973) – Some readers have been asking for non-Christmas blog posts, so here we go with a review of this Burt Reynolds movie back before he settled in to lazily being a clownish parody of himself. Back when he was still legitimately a film star who could play things seriously.
In White Lightning Reynolds was at his dead-serious, dangerous best as an Arkansas convict who starts out the movie with just a year and a half left in his prison term for running moonshine whiskey aka “white lightning.” For the benefit of overseas readers or for readers in their teens or twenties let me take a moment to add some background on the illegal liquor business.
Moonshine liquor was illegal because not only were no taxes paid on the sale of the alcoholic product but because its illicit manufacture meant there were no safety standards. Anti-freeze or other fluids might have been used as ingredients, plus if you’ve ever seen an illegal still there might be drowned rats or squirrels that needed skimmed off the top of the vat from time to time. Continue reading
Filed under opinion
December’s retrospective resumes with Balladeer’s Blog’s Best of March.
DREAM NO EVIL (1970) – A horror movie so bad that I was almost devastated that I never knew it existed until March of this year. Edmond O’Brien and cult favorite Michael Pataki are in the cast. Click HERE.
FOOL KILLER: DECEMBER 1911 – The Fool Killer targets the Supreme Court, U.S. Steel and whoever’s negligence caused the Great Molasses Flood which had hit New Orleans back on September 11th, 1911. Click HERE.
X-MEN: THE NEW TEAM’S FIRST TWENTY 1970s STORIES – In 1975 Wolverine, Storm and others joined the team, beginning a legendary run of stories. Click HERE.
THE IRISH WILD GEESE – Expatriate Irish military units from 1585 to 1815. Almost like an Irish Foreign Legion. Click HERE.
UNMASKED – Andy Ngo’s expose about the fascist thugs of Antifa (really KLAN-tifa). Click HERE.
FIVE NATURAL DISASTERS THAT STRUCK AMERICA (1811-1937) – Five monumentally horrific natural disasters. Click HERE.
GARRISON TALES FROM TONQUIN (1895) – American James O’Neill, who served in the French Foreign Legion in the 1880s and 1890s, wrote this collection of short stories based on his Legion experiences in Vietnam. Jaw-droppingly prescient material from this man. Click HERE.
TRANSGRESS WITH ME – My recurring segment, this one with sayings like “If you want people killed or injured just because they voted differently than you did, then they aren’t the fascists – YOU ARE.” plus “Left-wing Archie Bunkers are still fighting a version of America that hasn’t existed for decades.”and more. Click HERE.
IRON FIST: HIS FIRST TWO DOZEN STORIES – Click HERE. Continue reading
Filed under opinion
It’s the latest installment of Faculty Lounge Fascist Roundup! It’s no secret that privileged white Democrats aka “baizuos” have distorted the educational system into a partisan “church” of irrational thought and ugly intolerance.
DEMOCRATS AT MIDDLE SCHOOL SEGREGATE “SAFE SPACES” BY RACE. Democrats apparently still feel “Segregation forever!”
DEMOCRATS AT ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY USE TRICYCLES AND LEGO (Yes, tricycles and lego) TO SOOTHE THE EMOTIONAL CRIPPLES WHO PRETEND TO BE COLLEGE STUDENTS. The infantilization of “higher” education (LMAO) continues. Continue reading
Balladeer’s Blog’s Christmas Carol-A-Thon 2021 continues with another look at lost Carol versions from early television. For the previous look click HERE.
A CHRISTMAS CAROL (1947) – Yet another Christmas Carol version produced by the long-gone Dumont Network. This one aired live on December 25th, 1947 and starred John Carradine as Ebenezer Scrooge. According to Variety the broadcast was simulcast in New York City, Philadelphia, Washington D.C. and Baltimore. There were 22 cast members and 12 sets.
The one and only Eva Marie Saint made her television debut in this production. Bernard Hughes also appeared in this Carol which costarred Ray Morgan as Nephew Fred, who did double duty as the narrator. A young David Carradine was in the cast, by some accounts as a Cratchit child but not Tiny Tim.
Variety panned this program, calling it “stiff and formal” with a “slow, drawn-out opening” which “became tedious.” The publication also trashed John Carradine’s performance as Scrooge, saying he “lacked conviction” and that “He was too ready to be kind – never the nasty, selfish, money-grubbing tyrant of Dickens.” Continue reading
Filed under A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Because December is the time for end of the year retrospectives, here is a look at Balladeer’s Blog’s Best of February 2021.
LIFEPOD (1981) – My review of another of the 10 cheapjack Robert Emenegger/ Allan Sandler science fiction movies from 1980 and 1981. In my view this is the best of the bunch. For the review click HERE.
ANALOG ARCHIVES & CHANNEL 7 – Balladeer’s Blog’s review of two of the internet’s best works of “Unfiction” (all-video ARGs mixed with elements similar to Creepypastas). These two are complete and can be viewed in their entirety. Click HERE.
THE DEFENDERS: THEIR FIRST TWENTY 1970s STORIES – The opening tales of the Defenders, back before they were the mere street-level heroes that fans consider them today.
Members included Hulk, Dr Strange, Sub-Mariner, Valkyrie, Silver Surfer and more. Click HERE.
1912: BATTLE OF THE THREE PRESIDENTS – The memorable race of 1912, pitting Theodore Roosevelt against Woodrow Wilson and William Howard Taft. Click HERE.
FOOL KILLER: NOVEMBER 1911 – Click HERE.
RIVALS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES: THE MOABITE CIPHER – My review of the final episode of the 1971-1973 BBC series, this one featuring a Dr Thorndyke mystery. Plus a look at the subsequent radio series about Holmes’ rivals. Click HERE.
TRUMBO (2015)- My review of the movie that proves Democrat hypocrisy is hilarious. We need 3rd Parties. Click HERE.
FOURTEEN FAILED PREDICTIONS BY SCIENTISTS – Women buying embryos to get implanted? Moon colonies by the year 2000? Soldiers with Anti-Grav belts? Japan and China facing mass starvation? Click HERE.
AUSTRALIA POINTS OUT JOE BIDEN’S SENILITY – Click HERE. Continue reading
Filed under opinion
We desperately need alternate political parties in America.
AMBUSH SLAYINGS OF POLICE OFFICERS IN THE U.S. HAVE GONE UP 28%. More HERE. Joe “Is he Jimmy Saville?” Biden and his fellow Democrats who thrive on demonizing and “defunding” the police had no comment.
SEVENTEEN STATES HAVE SEEN THEIR SCHOOL BOARD ASSOCIATIONS WITHDRAW FROM THE FEDERAL VERSION OVER THE BIDEN REGIME’S ACTION LABELING PARENTS AS “DOMESTIC TERRORISTS” FOR RAISING OBJECTIONS AT SCHOOL BOARD MEETINGS. And remember, TWENTY-SEVEN of America’s 50 states have at least objected to that labeling. Biden is divisive trash.
Also remember that to get into most School Board meetings you have to show photo I.D., yet Democrats still act like showing photo I.D. to vote (like they do in Europe) is (yawn) “racist.” In reality photo I.D. hinders the Democrats’ chronic vote fraud efforts, THAT’S why they oppose it.
LOS ANGELES COUNTY ASSISTANT SHERIFF SPEAKS OUT ON THE WAY THE DEMOCRATS’ “NO CASH BAIL” POLICIES RESULT IN BURGLARY SUSPECTS BEING RELEASED. Plus THIS. And we’ve all seen the news on how that and other Democrat policies have led to the Smash And Grab crime sprees around the nation. Plus the Waukesha Massacre.
DEMOCRATS
DEMOCRAT CRIME SURGE DISPROPORTIONATELY ENDING BLACK LIVES.
CHINA-OWNED JOE BIDEN AND CONGRESSIONAL DEMOCRATS BLOCKING MEASURE TO PROHIBIT IMPORTING CHINA’S SLAVE LABOR-MANUFACTURED GOODS. Also THIS. The biggest regret of my life is having belonged to the Democrat Party before leaving it to become an Independent Voter.
JOE BIDEN’S INFLATION AND SUPPLY CHAIN DEBACLES CONTINUE INFLICTING DAMAGE. The Biden Regime’s war on the working class and the poor rolls along.
JEN PSAKI DODGES QUESTIONS ABOUT HOW MORE PEOPLE HAVE DIED OF COVID UNDER BIDEN THAN UNDER TRUMP. Biden’s death toll is now over 360,000. Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
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