RIP Gore Vidal; From MYRA BRECKINRIDGE: Mae West- Hard to Handle

Gore Vidal, author, raconteur, provocateur and occasional candidate for public office, passed away today (July 31st).  Though Vidal disliked Michael Sarne's film version of MYRA BRECKINRIDGE, it is a colossal old-Hollywood-meets-counterculture guilty pleasure of sorts.

How far we've progressed as a nation since the 1961 Inauguration.

As can be expected, there's some retro gushing over the "style" of JFK and Jackie and looking back at the 1961 Inauguration which began the reign of Camelot: http://www.latimes.com/features/lifestyle/la-ig-firstladies18-2009jan18,0,1567286.story

It doesn't hurt to remember what happened to Sammy Davis, Jr. that year. From the NEW YORK TIMES 1990 obit for Sammy: The 1989 book [WHY ME?, written by Sammy with Burt and Jane Boyar] said that John F. Kennedy had asked Mr. Davis and Miss [May] Britt not to participate in the 1961 Presidential inauguration, lest the sight of an interracial couple anger Southerners. Mr. Davis also recounted the racism that haunted his life, from bloody fights in the Army to being turned away from New York nightclubs.

Something to think about in 2009, as we embark on a new and hopefully better era where we as a nation continue to move towards fulfilling the dream Martin Luther King, Jr. articulated in 1963.