{"id":56840,"date":"2025-05-25T06:00:10","date_gmt":"2025-05-25T13:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=56840"},"modified":"2025-05-24T12:45:54","modified_gmt":"2025-05-24T19:45:54","slug":"open-thread-may-25-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2025\/05\/25\/open-thread-may-25-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread May 25 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today is Kyiv Day – the (this year the 1543rd) anniversary of the founding of Kyiv. Happy Kyiv Day to all who celebrate. Here’s a link to the picture at left<\/a>, and a little back story. (Also, UNITED24 is raffling off 24 sweatshirts with a Kyiv monogram – to enter, they ask a contribution of $24 by May 31. I couldn’t find it on their website, but will gladly forward the email on request.)<\/p>\n

Yesterday, the radio opera was a new opera by John Adams (“Nixon in China,” “Doctor Atomic”) which for once is not set in modern history: “Antony and Cleopatra” – based on Shakespeare. (One thing hasn’t changed – Gerald Finley is still one of his favorite baritones.) The opera was staged in the 1930-s, more or less, and had some references to fascism. At least one review – the one I found – wasn’t crazy about it, but I found it very listenable Having learned to like Adams’s other compositions has made me comfortable with his style..<\/p>\n

This is pretty cool<\/a>. Anyone who wants to repurpose Alcatraz should read this first.<\/p>\n

This good news from Amazon Watch<\/a> is qualified – but it is good news for now. And we don’t often hear good news from Amazon Watch. (I wonder if the new Pope’s election had any influence.)<\/p>\n

The original of this parody is from Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “Cinderella” made for TV and originally starring Julie Andrews (later remade with Lesley Ann Warren.) The fairy godmother sings it : “Impossible.”
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