November 8, 2014

MEADE: "I just watched a movie called 'Valerie.' Starring Anita Ekberg. What rock star was she married to?"

ME: No. No. No. You're thinking of Britt Ekland.

MEADE: It had everything: betrayal, justice, frontier justice...

ME: The telephone rang, it would not stop, it was President Kennedy calling me up. He said, "My friend, Bob, what do we need to make the country grow?" I said, "My friend, John, Brigitte Bardot, Anita Ekberg, Sophia Loren."

(I was quoting Bob Dylan's "I Shall Be Free," and Meade knew it.)

ME: Britt Ekland was married to Rod Stewart.

MEADE: Yeah, so the movie is called "Valerie."

ME: Did you watch the whole thing? You never watch movies.

MEADE: It's only an hour long. The theme is: War on Women.

ME: Why did you start watching that?

MEADE: Because Valerie Jarrett.

(We'd both seen the Politico article "Fire Valerie Jarrett" and had talked about it, so I didn't need more info about how the search got started.)

MEADE: And on YouTube, I saw this movie "Valerie," and I just got drawn in. It's very cheesy, but it's also very good for its time. And then the other thing that got me is: It has Italian subtitles, and some of the Italian words were great. Like a guy says "yeah," and it's "sim," not "si." It also had a theme of xenophobia. It's a Hollywood movie made after World War II and a lot of people were still dealing with their fear of foreigners.

ME: Yeah, but what was War on Women about it?

MEADE: The husband was an evil man. He hits her, he tries to drug her, he rapes her on the wedding night, and when he finds out she's pregnant, he basically tries to cause an abortion by whipping the horses, and that doesn't work. He's a hard drinker. And he tortures her. He has this whole evil plan.... And there's a scene where he literally gives her the back of his hand. Remember when Debbie Blabbermouth Schultz said that about... who did she say that about?

ME: Scott Walker!

MEADE: So, anyway, there's a trial, and you get 3 testimonies.

ME: Like "Rashomon"!

MEADE: And the final testimony is Valerie's, so that's the true testimony. The truth is revealed. It ends very abruptly. 

58 comments:

pm317 said...

What!? you passed on doing a post on 'Fire Valerie Jarret' to write this (inane) thing about Meade watching a movie called Valerie..

That Politico article is epic. What will the real Valerie (not the fiction) do now? Get out the popcorn. It is three against the whole DC establishment, right and left.

Ann Althouse said...

Why I'm married to Meade and not to pm317...

Anonymous said...

Here's to "The 8th of November, 1965" and the "Sky Soldiers" of the 173rd Airborne.

Absent Companions...

Virgil Hilts said...

I am not into conspiracy theories, at all. But with Jarrett -- a person universally condemned (including by Obama’s staff) as incompetent, a negative force and a bad influence on Obama and the white house -- why is she still around? Obama refuses to drop her either (i) because he i blind/somehow under Jarrett’s evil spell, (ii) he is absolutely whipped by Michelle into keeping her around, or (iii) Jarrett knows secrets about the Obamas’ rise in Chicago politics which would destroy them. One of these, it seems to me, has to be the explanation. Occam’s razor suggests (iii) is the most likely, but (i) and (ii) also make Obama look pretty bad. I think this would make a wonderful poll question for Ann. Ann, do you think there are other possible explanations for Obama keeping her on?

pm317 said...

LOL....touché

My world (on the blogs) revolves around showing up Obama, the one we saw in 2008.

dustbunny said...

Eric Clapton is not God, Meade is God, or a god or a voice of a god of his generation. Whatever, I will follow him. I want him it write and direct and star in a show for HBO called Boys, or maybe Dogs. I'll watch it.

pm317 said...

@Virgil Hilts,

there is no way Obama can publicly show his displeasure with her and fire her or let her go. She has to opt to leave the scene out of the goodness of her heart for Obama at this point.

Ann Althouse said...

"LOL….touché"

I linked to the "Fire Valerie Jarrett" article, so feel free to talk about it if you want. I'd already passed on it as something I felt like weighing in on.

Fire somebody. Fire Schnurer. Bleh.

Ann Althouse said...

It's like saying: Divorce Michelle!

dustbunny said...

Him to not him it

MayBee said...

Valerie is mysterious. Also mysterious are the reasons she is less vilified and known that Karl Rove was during Bush's term.

I suspect it is because nobody wants to question her role too much for fear of what they'll find out.

It sounds like she is responsible for the letter that was sent to universities that spawned the "Affirmative Yes or it's rape" rule. Which is swell.

jacksonjay said...

Virgil has it right. Swaggy is pussy-whipped by Michelle and Val!

dustbunny is also right. I too have a man crush on Meade.

Virgil Hilts said...

Ann, even though you don't want to discuss it, it sounds like you think "Obama is Michelle-whipped" is the answer. Still think that makes Obama look pretty bad; hard to imagine Romney keeping on an incompetent senior adviser who was hurting his administration simply because he/she is good friends with Ann R. Obama is the POTUS for God's sake.

Virgil Hilts said...

I also have a massive man crush on Meade. But its more fun/less embarrassing to write about Jarrett.

pm317 said...

Obama is the POTUS for God's sake.

But, but Valerie is the creator of Obama, the POTUS. That gives her more dibs on that office than even Obama does.

pm317 said...


I linked to the "Fire Valerie Jarrett" article, so feel free to talk about it if you want.


Yep, saw the link in your post which is why my first comment -- I would not dare hijack the thread otherwise.

Laslo Spatula said...

Britt Ekland makes me think of the movie "The Wicker Man". Of course it does. But then sometimes I confuse her with Susan George, who was in "Straw Dogs". Wicker, straw: there is a connection. Susan George was also in "Dirty Mary, Crazy Larry". She was not Larry.

Laslo Spatula said...

"MEADE: So, anyway, there's a trial, and you get 3 testimonies. "

With three testimonies you would have 1498.5 proteins.

jacksonjay said...

Swaggy tried to put Val in the Senate. (Got Blago put in prison, what a screw-up!) That suggests to me that he knew that Val AND Michelle would be a tag team he couldn't contain.

jono39 said...

Fire Valerie? Blaming her because The One has revealed who he has always been -- a poseur, a lounger, who spent 20 years licking the ass of a professional antisemite. We are in deep voodoo and only America can restore itself. We need to work for a decade to convene a constitutional convention and restore the Republic,

Ann Althouse said...

I encourage the "Everybody Loves Meade" topic.

Lord knows there are websites that have pursued the "Everybody Hates Meade" topic.

Unknown said...

Britt Eklund is (I believe) one of the better celebrity artists. She does (or used to do) paintings. So too David Bowie, Ron Wood, Tony Curtis, Winston Churchill and George W. Bush.

Or maybe it was Elke Sommer.

Laslo Spatula said...

"I encourage the "Everybody Loves Meade" topic."

He is the subject of a veritable array of metaphorical bukkake.

chillblaine said...

Obama's legacy will be remembered as the full flowering of identity politics. As consigliere, Valerie deserves credit for running marxist memetic programs that seek to limit individual liberties in favor of protected classes.

By the way, I adore the Meade + Althouse posts. It's a vicarious delight analogous to watching an admirable tv couple. Newhart comes to mind.

jacksonjay said...

A man who grows garlic and uses an old-school push reel mower is my kinda man. Does Meade have an overgrown insecure brother named Robert?

Virgil Hilts said...

Interesting article in US News. http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/mark-davis/2014/11/05/obama-needs-to-shake-up-white-house-after-midterms-oust-valerie-jarrett
"Jarrett is often described as the president’s Rasputin, but Nicholas and the czarina never afforded Rasputin the official respect lavished on this White House senior adviser. She has roughly three dozen White House staffers who work directly under her."

Ann Althouse said...

Susan George? Not Susan Anspach?

Ann Althouse said...

"Yep, saw the link in your post which is why my first comment -- I would not dare hijack the thread otherwise."

Thanks, pm317.

A dare is my middle name.

pm317 said...

OK, this is fun to watch, not the Meade + Althouse romance (slow down, Meade fans, tongue in cheek, tongue in cheek) but the articles on Jarrett coming out. The genesis of this was another article right after Tuesday on memeorandom that screamed the headline (paraphrasing), the right and the left leadership agrees that Obama needs to be separated from Jarrett. They have had it.

Laslo Spatula said...

"By the way, I adore the Meade + Althouse posts. It's a vicarious delight analogous to watching an admirable tv couple. Newhart comes to mind."

I was thinking "Who's the Boss' but without Alyssa Milano. Now I am thinking about Alyssa Milano. Which then makes me think of Pepperidge Farms' Milano cookies. Which makes me think of eating Milano cookies with Alyssa Milano. She likes to eat cookies naked, I can tell.

Ann Althouse said...

"I Want Love," by Robert Meade.

Meade has 2 brothers, neither of whom is named Robert, and nobody in that family is insecure.

Laslo Spatula said...

When I am in bed eating Milano cookies with the naked Alyssa Milano I picture us reading about Althouse+Meade on the laptop. I bet Alyssa Milano would like the pictures Althouse takes. Of course, at some point my proteins take over.

Ann Althouse said...

I added a poster of Valerie, so you can get an idea of what kind of Western this was.

The horrible villain was played by Sterling Hayden, who played a hilarious villain in one of my very favorite movies, "Dr. Strangelove."

He was Brigadier General Jack Ripper.

"Have you ever seen a Commie drink a glass of water?"

Laslo Spatula said...

Susan Anspach? Not Susan Anton?

Laslo Spatula said...

Me and the naked Alyssa Milano were binge-watching old "Who's the Boss" episodes when, during one particular show, she pointed out that during the filming of that episode she had had her very first period. Which was funny, because that was the first episode I ever masturbated to her. Boy, did we laugh.

Laslo Spatula said...

For Halloween Alyssa Milano didn't want to have to dress up as anything, so we compromised: she went as herself and I went as Tony Danza. It was fun, but the sex afterward was a bit weird.

Laslo Spatula said...

It seems early to me, but Alyssa Milano already wants me to tattoo her name on my butt. I guess I can put it above the Justine Bateman tattoo.

chillblaine said...

Luis Peix is wondering why his little Youtube movie is suddenly racking up hits. The movie poster set the hook, and the Sterling Hayden reference reeled me in.

Laslo Spatula said...

Alyssa Milano was in bed, naked, telling me about how she would run into Lauren Tewes from "The Love Boat" behind the studio sets. One thing lead to another and now I know why Alyssa Milano calls a particular part of her body 'The Lido Deck'.

Laslo Spatula said...

Behind those same sets Alyssa Milano ran into "The Love Boat"'s Fred Grandy, who kept asking "Did you know Gopher likes beaver?" Thirty years later it is still an awkward memory for her.

Laslo Spatula said...

When Alyssa Milano was a teenager a famous director took nude photographs of her for an 'audition'. She won't say who it was, but that he made movies that sounded like "Trailers of the Moss Park" and "Snicker's Lisp". Alyssa Milano knows how to keep a secret.

William said...

Valerie Jarrett appeared on the Gates' show where they trace people's family trees. Her grandfather was the first black MIT graduate. He went on to become the first licensed black architect and to design the buildings at (if I remember correctly) Tuskegee University. She had an ancestor in early 18th century New Orleans who freed his slave mistress and their children. Her family has been free and prosperous for quite a long time. You wouldn't think so from her politics. I don't think her life has been a story of deprivation and hardship, but, much as Seinfeld has to struggle with autism, she has to struggle with prejudice.

Greg said...

Now here's a great song titled "Valerie": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nO1MiwFRsM0

pm317 said...

A dare is my middle name.

Well, the thread is now completely hijacked (by a wannabe betamax).

And, you are the only blog showing up on meme with the Fire Valerie Jarrett article. That is funny. Nobody wants to touch it (and even you didn't, technically).

Laslo Spatula said...

The famous director told Alyssa Milano that he was casting the part of a young girl who befriends an Extra-Terrestrial in her suburban home. However, for her screen test he just kept handing her rubber dildos and calling them 'alien fingers': he said the alien had a long finger that spewed light from the end. Needless to say, there was no such movie.

Tyrone Slothrop said...

Sure, Meade is intoxicating, but beware the hangover.

Laslo Spatula said...

Alyssa Milano said her friend Drew Barrymore worked with this very same director, and that he insisted on wearing a pair of her panties on the set to ensure the film's 'good luck'. One day Alyssa and Drew swapped panties, so the joke was on him, the creep.

Laslo Spatula said...

Alyssa Milano said those days with her friend Drew Barrymore were much more innocent than one would think of young girls in Hollywood. They'd shop together and eat ice cream cones and shave hearts into each other's burgeoning pubic hair: you know, silly girl stuff.

Laslo Spatula said...

For her fourteenth birthday Tony Danza gave Alyssa Milano a giant rubber penis he called 'The Danzanator'. Just as a joke, there was no intent behind it; she still keeps it in a drawer to this very day. Still, I don't like to look at it. For my fourteenth birthday I got a bicycle: different worlds.

Laslo Spatula said...

It is amazing, really: after all these years Alyssa Milano still has the body of a teenager. Especially anally.

m stone said...

...much as Seinfeld has to struggle with autism, she has to struggle with prejudice.

I don't find prejudice from what I read and have read. Show me.

I think the Seinfeld and Jarrett analogy is off. Seinfeld's struggle would have been from within, given the fact he blended fairly well in social situations (stand-up comedy can be torture) given his lower-end autism.

Prejudice is imposed. No?

Titus said...

I am really into the Bletchly Circle on netflix.

Did you old farts know about Bletchlly?

British women doing their part, during ww2, to save lifes, but could never tell anyone.

kiss kiss

Wince said...

Valerie Jarrett is the snake that swallowed Obama.

Anonymous said...

I like Meade because he's a Reds fan who takes you to Miller Park.

I am a Brewer fan but have a certain mysterious affection for the Reds that I can't explain.

averagejoe said...

Sterling Hayden strikes me as someone who was blessed despite himself. One of the most monochromatic actors ever, like John Wayne with a lobotomy, yet he became a movie star and appeared in some great movies including Asphalt Jungle, The Killing, Dr. Strangelove, and The Godfather. He was a member of the Communist Party USA, then later "named names" during the McCarthy hearings, then recanted. Not only did he not suffer ostracism or condemnation from either pro or anti communists, but instead grew in stature- John Huston for example called him Kingly. He was one of those ingrate actors who derided the craft that brought him fame and fortune and enabled him to live lavishly and travel in high style. I don't know- some guys don't know how good they got it.

Anonymous said...

averagejoe said...
He was a member of the Communist Party USA, then later "named names" during the McCarthy hearings, then recanted.


I don't know much about his politics, but I respect his guts. The back story from wiki....

After two film roles, he left Hollywood and joined the United States Marine Corps as a private, under the name "John Hamilton" (a pseudonym Hayden only used in the military). While at Parris Island he was recommended for Officer Candidate School. After graduation, he was commissioned a second lieutenant and was transferred to service as an undercover agent with William J. Donovan's COI office. He remained there after it became the OSS.

As OSS agent John Hamilton, his World War II service included sailing with supplies from Italy to Yugoslav partisans and parachuting into fascist Croatia. Hayden, who also participated in the Naples-Foggia campaign and established air crew rescue teams in enemy-occupied territory, became a first lieutenant on September 13, 1944, and a captain on February 14, 1945. He received the Silver Star (for gallantry in action in the Balkans and Mediterranean; "Lt. Hamilton displayed great courage in making hazardous sea voyages in enemy-infested waters and reconnaissance through enemy-held areas"), a Bronze Arrowhead device for parachuting behind enemy lines, and a commendation from Yugoslavia's Marshal Tito. He left active duty on December 24, 1945.

His great admiration for the bravery of the Communist partisans led to a brief membership in the Communist Party.

averagejoe said...

Yes sir, Sergeant, I read that too. No doubt that the guy was a bad ass and a warrior. So what if he couldn't act like Montgomery Clift. He had "presence".

Bob said...

I wonder if Meade was thinking of Anita Pallenberg, who starred in Performance with Mick Jagger, and was Keith Richards's common-law wife?