Durning Needled

With more than 200 screen credits on his resume, if you’ve never seen Charles Durning, you’re either Amish, lying or, as his appearances included both The Sting and The Muppet Movie, an idiot. He was one of the first men on the beach at Normandy on D-Day, and the lone member of his unit to survive an ambush. In Belgium, he was stabbed seven times in hand-to-hand combat before beating the German soldier to death with a rock, then was captured in the Battle of the Bulge and marched into the forest at Malmedy, where he was one of the only survivors when the Germans opened fire on 90 POWs. After that, surviving in the rough and tumble streets of Hollywood was a piece of cake. Among his more memorable roles were Lt. Snyder, the crooked cop trying to shake down grifters in The Sting; Doc Hopper, the frog leg cooking restaurateur in The Muppet Movie; Pappy O’Daniel, good ol’ boy governor in O Brother, Where Art Thou?; Les, the widower who finds Dustin Hoffman attractive in Tootsie; and Moretti, the hostage negotiator dealing with the idiot crooks in Dog Day Afternoon. Along the way, he earned supporting Oscar nominations as another slippery governor in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas and as a horny Nazi in To Be or Not to Be, and 9 Emmy nominations, most recently as Tommy’s father in Rescue Me, but never won. He had to mollify himself with a Silver Star for valor and three Purple Hearts, and a Tony for playing Big Daddy in a revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

No Way

(Props to Monty)

Or

Aloha

Daniel K. Inouye, hands down the finest senator in the history of Hawaii, has died of respiratory complications at the age of 88. A medical volunteer at Pearl Harbor during  the Japanese bombings, Inouye headed off to Europe while more than 7,000 of his fellow Japanese-Americans were in internment camps. Inouye was a member of the first all-Nisei volunteer unit, which became the most decorated unit in American military history. In 1945, during an assault on three machine gun emplacements, Inouye destroyed one with a grenade, another with submachine gun fire, then, already shot in the stomach, had his right arm severed by enemy fire, with a grenade still gripped in his right hand. He retrieved the arm and destroyed the last bunker with the grenade, earning the Medal of Honor. From the start of Hawaii’s statehood, he represented it in Washington, DC, first in Congress, then, since 1962, in the Senate, the first Japanese-American in both houses. He was in influential member of the committees investigating Watergate and the Iran-Contra Affair, and helped reform the intelligence committee as chairman of the Senate Committee on Intelligence.

He Gave All He Had, and a Wee Bit More

Or
He cannae take it any more, cap'n
Or
Beam Him Up
(Epitaphany shared with Keith, Tammy, Monty and Shawn)

Or
He’s Dead, Jim
(Solo props for Shawn)
James “Scotty” Doohan, has boldly gone where only DeForest Kelley among Star Trek regulars had gone before, passing away at 85. Doohan, a member of Space Command in the early sci-fi serial and… Oh, who are we kidding – he was the lovable chief engineer who kept the Starship Enterprise from falling apart. After trying a number of different accents, Doohan decided the Scottish brogue was the most authoritative and Edinburghers were forever chagrined. Doohan appeared in all but the first episode of the series, then the first 7 movies, including a cameo with Chekov in Generations where Captain Kirk was killed, and had a cameo in an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Doohan also developed the origins of the Klingon language, which was later expanded from a few words and phrases to a full language. Performing heroics in the stars was an extension of real life for Doohan, who fought with the Royal Canadian Artillery in World War II, storming Juno Beach on D-Day, where he was shot 6 times, including one that cost him the end of his middle finger.

Four of us expected Scotty’s voyage to the Undiscovered Country: Shawn’s Team Two moves into 5th, Keith’s Nine Old Men (and One Old Woman) move into 6th, my Better Dead than Red State moves into 12th, and with her first hit ever, Tammy climbs out of the cellar and into 22nd place. This gives Don the all-time futility record all to his lonesome, currently 19 months, 19 days (and counting). Michelle had Scotty on her list 3 years ago, marking the 5th person she had listed at one time who has died this year.