In My Life (Bette Midler) from For the Boys (1991)
It's not the greatest quality, this video. But the song is significant. Sixteen years ago yesterday I walked down the aisle to this song to marry my best friend and sweetheart. We dance to it every year. Sixteen years, two kids, several jobs, one mortgage and two black labs later, I still love him more.
And I wanted to show this particular clip because the spectre of yet another Middle Easter quagmire looms above us. So while Bette Midler's incomparable voice rises up this beautiful little song, let us pause to remember for whom she is singing.
For eight years I've given you the In Memoriam segment every Sunday, listing thousands of lost sons and daughters, husbands and wives, fathers and mothers. I've seen thousands of faces of service people who will never dance that special song with their loved one again, never walk their little girl down the aisle and never lie in bed on Sunday morning with their best friend cuddling. I know that Secretary of State Kerry said that there would be no boots on the ground in Syria, but I've yet to see any way this games out without that inevitability arising, especially with McCain's "regime change" addition to the AUMF. So please, if you are as pained by the In Memoriam segment as I am, contact your congressperson and senators and tell them you do not support a military strike in Syria.
ABC's "This Week" - White House chief of staff Denis McDonough; Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas; Panel: Rep. Adam Kinzinger, R-Ill., Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, co-founder of the Foreign Policy Initiative Dan Senor, editor and publisher of The Nation and WashingtonPost.com columnist Katrina vanden Heuvel, Fox News anchor Greta Van Susteren, former FBI special agent Ali Soufan, ABC News Chief Investigative Correspondent Brian Ross, and ABC News Senior Justice Correspondent Pierre Thomas. Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler, R-Wash.
NBC's "Meet the Press" - McDonough; Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M.; Reps. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, Peter King, R-N.Y., and Loretta Sanchez, D-Calif. Political roundtable: former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich; former senior adviser to President Obama, David Axelrod; Director of the Wilson Center and fmr Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA); and NBC News Political Director and Chief White House Correspondent, Chuck Todd. NYC mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner.
CBS' "Face the Nation" - McDonough; Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Mich., Justin Amash, R-Mich., and Elijah Cummings, D-Md. Panel: Bob Woodward of the Washington Post, Bill Kristol of the Weekly Standard, David Sanger of The New York Times, David Ignatius of the Washington Post and Danielle Pletka of the American Enterprise Institute. CBS News correspondents Elizabeth Palmer and Clarissa Ward.
MSNBC's "UP with Steve Kornacki" - Rep. Steve Israel (D-NY); Kurtis Lee, Denver Post; Todd Zwillich, NPR; Jane Hall, American University.
MSNBC's "Melissa Harris-Perry" - Mayor Ed Pawlowski, Democratic Mayor of Allentown Pennsylvania; Emme, plus size super model / body image advocate; Toccara Jones, model; Patrick Murphy, MSNBC Contributor / Former U.S. Congressman / Iraq War Veteran; Jon Soltz, Chairman of VoteVets.org; Charlotte Golor Richie, Democratic Boston Mayoral Candidate; Farai Chideya, Professor of Journalism at NYU; Sandra Boynton, noted children’s author; Bob Franken, syndicated columnist; Michelle Bernard, President of the Bernard Center for Women, Politics and Public Policy.
MSNBC's "Disrupt with Karen Finney" - Fawaz Gerges, London School of Economics; Anne Gearan, Washington Post; Mark Tapscott, Washington Examiner; Ronen Bergman, New York Times Magazine; Bill Burton, MSNBC Contriibutor; Victoria DeFranesco Soto, MSNBC/NBCLatino Contributor; Rula Jebreal, MSNBC Contributor; Rep. Trey Radel (R-FL).
CNN's "State of the Union" - McDonough; Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del.; Reps. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., Jim McGovern, D-Mass., Howard "Buck" McKeon, R-Calif., Barbara Lee, D-Calif., and Gerry Connolly, D-Va. Panel: Crossfire Co-Hosts Stephanie Cutter and Van Jones, and CNN Political Commentators Ana Navarro and David Frum. Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
CNN's "Fareed Zakaria GPS" - former Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz, former Deputy National Security Advisor James Steinberg, General Wesley Clark and former senior U.S. diplomat Nicholas Burns. CNN legal analyst and New Yorker contributor Jeffery Toobin, Heritage Foundation’s Steven Groves. French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy.
CNN's "Reliable Sources" - Guest host Frank Sesno, Director of The George Washington University's School of Media and Public Affairs. CNN's Senior International Correspondent Arwa Damon, Tara Sonenshine, former Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs and Shibley Telhami, Professor for Peace and Development at the University of Maryland, College Park. CNN’s own digital political reporter, Peter Hamby, Christina Bellantoni, politics editor for The PBS NewsHour and former senior Romney campaign advisor and CNN political commentator Kevin Madden. Former executive editor of The Washington Post Len Downie. POLITICO’s Susan Glasser.
"Fox News Sunday" - McDonough; Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. Brit Hume, Fox News Senior Political Analyst; Howard Kurtz, Fox News Media Analyst; Karl Rove, Former Bush White House Senior Adviser; Juan Williams, Fox News Political Analyst.
So what's catching your eye this morning?