DeRosaWorld

Happy New Year

"But can one still make resolutions when one is over forty?  I live according to twenty-year-old habits."  - Andre Gide

Philadelphia German Butter Cake

All I have to say, is I have never found this gooey, delicious cake anywhere else than Philadelphia.

My New Year's gift to the world...not just Butter Cake...not just Philadelphia Butter Cake, but German Philadelphia Butter Cake.

1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup shortening
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 large egg
1 envelope active dry yeast
1/2 cup warm milk
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon vanilla
Butter Cake Topping, recipe follows

Prepare dough by mixing sugar with shortening and salt. Add egg and beat with mixer one minute until well blended. Dissolve yeast in warm milk. Add flour, then milk-yeast mixture and vanilla to dough batter. Mix three minutes with dough hook or by hand. Turn dough onto floured board; knead one minute. Place in a lightly greased bowl, cover with a towel and set in a warm place to rise for one hour or until doubled. Meanwhile, prepare topping; set aside.

Divide dough in two pieces. Roll or pat to fit two well-greased 8" square pans or one 9x13X2" pan. Crimp edges halfway up sides of pan to hold topping in. When dough is spread, prick dough with fork to prevent bubbling. Divide topping; spread over dough. Let cakes stand 20 minutes. Bake at 375°F for 30 minutes or until done. Do not over-bake. Topping should be crusty, but gooey. Let cool before cutting.

Butter Cake Topping

1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter NO SUBSTITUTES
2/3 cup flour
2 cups EXTRA FINE sugar
2 extra large eggs
4 to 5 tablespoons milk

Cream butter. Stir together flour and sugar. Gradually beat sugar mixture in butter. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. By the teaspoonful, add just enough milk to bring mixture to a consistency for easy spreading over the cake, being careful not to make it too runny. Use as directed in recipe for Butter Cake.

Enjoy and Happy New Year.

Sunday Morning. Time To Go To Church.

Here is a double header for the final Sunday Morning. Time To Go To Church. series for 2007.

Jennifer Holliday singing His Eye Is On The Sparrow.

This performance is so big, it takes two videos to capture it all.

Part One:

Part Two:

Ending 2007 With A Bang

As the year rumbles to a close, 2007 was a real bummer for most Americans. Some wonder if this is it, The United States of America 1776-2008.

The Constitution is hanging by a thread. The Presidency is in shambles. Congress is useless.

Torture is in.

Passed 3,900 dead American soldiers in Iraq.

The President lost a bunch of his cronies. (Some to prison, but most to just sit out the next Democratic Administration as lobbyists or pundits).

Bhutto was assassinated in Pakistan. (History never ceases to amaze. Gunning down our leaders in the streets is something we never tire of.)

No one ever caught Osama Bin Laden.

YouTube is kind of cool.

Blogs got bigger.

The Huffington Post has put almost all its resources against Hillary Clinton in the last month.

Dick Cheney got a new heart again, I think. Stolen from a 16-year-old virgin boy whose name can't be named for national security reasons.

Republican politicians came out of the closet and started sucking dick in public places.

Gasoline at the pump is at an all time high. Bridges are collapsing. Americans can't afford to travel overseas because the dollar is worth shit. New Orleans is still gone.

Bill Kristol, a man whose philosophy has been totally and utterly discredited in front of the nation...on TV, will have a New York Times weekly column just in time for the 2008 elections. (Why can't he just get a job like everybody else?)

I'm trying to think of some positives here...the Democratic Party has Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama running for President...and leading in the polls.

The iTouch came out. I can't afford it.

Movies sucked again this year. Music really sucked. TV sucked.

Senator Jim Webb (D-VA) is kind of cool.

Ken Follet has a kind of sequel to Pillars of the Earth.

Harry Potter lived. So did Malfoy.

I got Ford At Fox for Christmas! Wow!

The Iowa caucus is next week. Here we go. 2008.

A Message To Iowa Democrats

 

"We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace‹business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering.

They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob.

Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me‹and I welcome their hatred."  - FDR, 1936

2008 is the year to force the pendulum to swing in the other direction. The direction towards peace, and hope and charity. Towards health care and a strong Federal government that will make America work for Americans. We have an opportunity, but it will be a hard fought battle, even if we win in November, the war will just begin. The Press hates us. Some of our fellow Americans have been trained to hate us.

Bipartisanship must be a dirty word. We have house cleaning to do if we are to survive as a nation.

We must take this opportunity to move the pendulum of American history away from the Republican Party, in which the powers of greed, treason, lies and corporate war mongering have become bloated and have feasted gluttonous on the American people and the world.

Sunday Morning. Time To Go To Church.

Here is Peter, Paul and Mary singing Leaving On A Jet Plane.

I'm off to visit family back east for the Holidays. Thanks for a great year.

(Don't believe a word the President says. I'll be back in a few days.)

"I Believe The Children Are Our Future..."

We are winning their hearts and minds. The children of Iraq can look up to the Americans, especially Condi Rice and dream and hope to someday...someday...

"More than four years after the United States invaded Iraq, the country's children continue to face a litany of problems from disrupted educations to unsafe drinking water, detentions and violence, UNICEF reported Friday."

"Health took a hit, too, as children living in remote areas were faced with poor nutrition and diseases such as cholera. Those living in remote areas were often cut off from health services, although a door-to-door immunization campaign protected 4 million from polio and 3 million from measles, mumps and rubella."

Cholera?

Among the preliminary report's findings:

• Twenty-eight percent of Iraq's 17-year-olds took final exams this summer; 40 percent in south and central Iraq passed.

• Eighty percent of children outside Baghdad don't have working sewers in their communities, limiting access to safe water.

• An average of 25,000 children per month were displaced within Iraq by violence or intimidation.

• An estimated 760,000 children were out of primary school in 2006, and 220,000 more displaced children had their educations interrupted in 2007.

• By the end of 2007, about 75,000 children were living in camps or temporary shelter.

• About 1,350 children were detained by military and police, "many for alleged security violations."

So do you think this report will be:

A.) Made TOP SECRET for national security reasons

B.) Edited and explained to us only by hot Dana Perino

C.) Defamed by FOX News and the right wing pundits as liberal, democratic propaganda

D.) It's a Clinton's fault

Oh, This Should Drive The Anti-Hillary Wing of the Progressive Left Absolutely Nuts

Some Senator Clinton = Franklin Roosevelt musings from adtnext: Driving the left wing readers of Daily Kos crazy.

"Hillary Clinton may not be perfect, but she does seem to have a firm grounding in her values. She cares about her fellow humankind, and is willing to give a helping hand up to those that can't help themselves. Basically, Hillary is doing her part to continue building upon the good legacy that FDR left us."

So you mix some big, powerful Federal program like Health Care into a stew of Union support, foreign policy experience, two terms as Senator from New York, her husband hanging around to bounce ideas off of, General Wesley Clark for Vice President, a painful awareness of how both the left wing press and the right wing press will attack you and your policies, and you have pretty powerful and hope-filled Presidency.

A New Deal it may not be, but it might be the Best Deal we can get.

Happy Birthday Joe Stalin: Now That Was a Dictator

 

Uncle Joe was born born on December 21, 1879. Well if his life isn't an argument for the Pro-Choice camp I don't know what is.

Kill Tally:

"Approximately 20 million, including up to 14.5 million needlessly starved to death. At least one million executed for political "offenses". At least 9.5 million more deported, exiled or imprisoned in work camps, with many of the estimated five million sent to the 'Gulag Archipelago' never returning alive. Other estimates place the number of deported at 28 million, including 18 million sent to the 'Gulag'."

I guess small-timers like Bush, Jr. and Dickhead Cheney still have a way to go to make the big leagues.

Run Republicans, Run!

The Republican Party presidential candidates are a bunch of fucking insane, lying, mean sad and creepy white men, without a shred of decency or honor among them.

Mayor Bloomberg from New York City and Senator Hagel from Nebraska would not only be a breath of fresh air, manliness and sanity, intelligence...and yes maybe true conservatism for the Republicans, but they would suddenly up the "sane candidate" count to two.

The Republican rank and file can not be happy with their current play list: Mormons, bad actors, serial adulterers, and John McCain.

"New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Nebraska Senator Chuck Hagel have been conducting regular, private phone conversations over the past few months in an effort to "feel each other out" for a possible presidential run, sources have told the Huffington Post.

The development feeds speculation that the two men could mount a third-party White House ticket. And while the maverick Republican and the independent mayor have met in the past, the ongoing conversations provide the clearest indication yet that they are considering such a move.

Sources with knowledge of the conversations say they are done in private, and so the topics of discussion remain unclear. But one high-ranking aide confirmed that the two have discussed Hagel joining the presidential campaign should Bloomberg decide to run."