Observations, Reflections, And Rants On A Variety Of Subjects. From The Mysterious To The Apparent, From the Unusual To The Commonplace, From The Newsworthy To The Trivial, From The Sacred To The Profane. The Pagan Temple Is A Refuge From Absurdity, And Yet Is A Repository Of It.
What would you pay for a person who could be absolutely anything you wanted him or her to be, a person who could be programmed to do anything you wanted, an individual whose memories of everything they did would then be erased forever? That is the premise behind Dollhouse, a show by Josh Whedon, the former creative genius behind Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Angel, and Firefly. It stars Eliza Dushku, formerly the star of Tru Calling. In this show she plays Echo, who in an attempt to escape her past agrees to have her true memory and identity erased, thus becoming the “Active” who is the central character of the show.
The Dollhouse, as it is known, is illegal, to say nothing of unethical, and a doggedly determined FBI agent is determined to find it and shut it down. First, he has to prove its existence to his skeptical and even derisive fellow agents.
Sure, the program has its obvious flaws. For example, anyone with the money can hire an Active to perform any task they want or need. The flaw here is, how many people who could afford such a high fee could also be trusted to keep the details of the operation secret? It seems to me that it would be better to hide the true nature of the Dollhouse from the clients. All they need to know is these people can perform the needed tasks beyond any ordinarily reasonable expectations. On the other hand, many of the tasks involved are illegal to begin with.
The procedure is fraught with danger. The various personalities grafted onto the Actives are real ones, and along with their talents, they are also replete with their own sets of weaknesses. Unfortunately, there is a rogue Active on the loose, one inadvertently imprinted with the memories and personality of a murderous maniac. After wreaking havoc on the operation, murdering all the then current Actives with the exception of Echo, whom he spared for some unknown reason, he then escaped. He is still on the loose, awaiting the opportunity to strike.
It’s hard to explain my liking for this show, other than I can see where it has potential to be something really special and exciting, providing it lasts long enough to develop its potential.
Eliza Dushku is delicious in the role of Echo, whose true identity and motivations are unknown as of now, though she seems to retain some slight trace of her original personality which manifests in flashbacks during periods of unexpected stress when certain projects start to go wrong. As the Dollhouse is under assault from two different fronts, from the rogue Active as well as from the one lone FBI agent determined to shut down the operation, we can expect these moments of unexpected duress to come with some degree of frequency.
As an aside to those of you-well, both of you-who read my novel Radu, which I still hope to have published and eventually become a screenplay or a mini-series, I think I’ve found my Grace Rodescu. Eliza is certainly in the top ten of my picks to play the character on screen.
I’ll say no more for now, as words can really not do it justice anyway. Watch the video I’ve provided at the beginning of the post. If it succeeds in whetting your appetite, the Dollhouse is on Friday nights at nine.
Chris Matthews wasn't the only person muttering under his breath when Bobby Jindal stiffly walked out onto the stage to deliver the Republican response to Barak Obama's State of The Union address Tuesday night. He was just the only one unfortunate enough to be overheard by a television audience as he did so into an open mike-supposedly accidentally. I say supposedly, because I do have a sneaking suspicion it was done purposely. Had it truly been an accidental occurrence, Matthew's utterance might have been more like my own-
"What in the fuck was that?"
Matthews defended himself by saying it was his response to the stagecraft, not an expression of dismay at the idea of Jindal's predictable reply. Indeed, the stagecraft, for want of a better word, set said stage for what was to follow-a distracting tone accentuated by stiffly karate-like chops of both hands that in total served to distract in almost full measure from the message of Jindal's words, and has in fact been compared to the Saturday Night Live character, perennial candidate Tim Calhoun. The sing-song, faux folksy voice and smile has also been compared to Kenneth the Page in 30 Rock.
Since this appearance, which has been panned on a bi-partisan basis, it seems, by Republicans as well as Democrats-and even by many of the same people who criticized Matthews for his open-mike utterance-much speculation has been offered as to Jindal's future intentions, and prospects. As such, much digging has went into the Louisiana Governor's background. Of all the things unearthed so far, perhaps the most interesting is an account, written by Jindal himself, of an exorcism of a female friend in which he took part, and in fact seems to have played a pivotal role.
Unfortunately, the entire article in the New Oxford Review is not available to any but subscribers, but thankfully the opening portion which is available tells you a great deal about Jindal. It might even hint slightly at the origins of the "demoniac possession".
Though she had not said anything, I knew something was wrong. Susan and I had developed an intimate friendship; indeed, our relationship mystified observers, who insisted on finding a romantic component where none existed. I called her after the University Christian Fellowship (UCF) meeting -- UCF is an Inter-Varsity Christian group composed of undergraduate and graduate students. Though the interdenominational group's weekly program of songs and prayers had produced the usual emotional high among most members, Susan had left the meeting in a very sullen mood. I asked her to join a group of us who were attending a Christian a cappella concert to be held on campus that same evening.
Despite our intimacy, Susan and I had not spent much time together this past year. We had succumbed to pressure from our friends and decided we should not be so emotionally interdependent without a deeper commitment. To be honest, my fears of a relationship and the constraints of commitment had kept us apart; our friends' objections merely provided a convenient excuse. Still, I felt comfortable asking her to come to the concert, and she accepted the invitation. Though Susan appeared composed throughout the concert, her sudden departure in the middle of a song convinced me otherwise and affirmed my earlier suspicions.
There was no doubt in my mind that I had to leave my friends and follow her outside. I was not exactly sure what I would do or say, but I knew I had to run after her. I found that she had not gone far, but was sobbing uncontrollably outside the auditorium. Since we had been very careful to avoid any form of physical contact in our friendship, I was not sure how to respond. My inaction and her sobs produced a very awkward situation. Fortunately, a female friend who followed us out was able to comfort Susan with hugs and soothing words of reassurance; her quick action was in stark contrast to my paralysis. Once Susan had regained her composure and fell silent, I knew I had to intervene. The female friend meant well, but did not know Susan well enough to provide the advice Susan was sure to seek.
Not even knowing the cause of this raucous scene, I asked Susan if she would like to talk, and volunteered to walk her home. Wanting to avoid any additional embarrassing scenes, I thought it best to remain in silence while we walked. I dared not cause another emotional outpouring until we were safely behind closed doors. When we finally reached her dorm room, I promptly sat Susan on a bed and placed myself in a chair located several feet across the room. This physical arrangement was hardly conducive to the love and support I was supposed to be providing, but I was too scared and unsure of myself to get any closer.
Jindal's article, the rest of which is unavailable, supposedly goes on to relate how he encouraged the girl to recite certain Bible passages, many of which contained the affirmation that Christ is Lord. She was unable to repeat the phrase, but after so long, after evidently passing out, she recovered and seemed to be "healed". She even smiled and asked what happened.
This seems to be the kind of story that almost seems tailor made to go into the annals of political folklore, much like Washington's chopping down the cherry tree, or Lincoln's walking several miles to return loose change, or William Henry Harrison's log cabin and hard cider days. Only this might be considered the perfect story to appeal to the Republican Christian conservative base, but unfortunately not much of anybody else.
Not that this account disqualifies him in my view, at least not on the face of it, but it does suggest several points.
One, those of strict religious beliefs tend to be also the most ideological and immovable. This can be good or bad, depending on the situation, but the fact that he would openly write something like this, even in a subscription web-site, suggests that he is very devout, or very deluded-or possibly very self-serving and manipulative. In fact, Jindal's parents are apparently devout Hindus who did not approve of his conversion to the Catholic Church, right about the same time he inexplicably changed his name to Bobby after one of the boy characters in the old Brady Bunch series. What to make of all this?
The problem with Jindal is, this history will be enough of a distraction, without the added problem of a false and insincere sounding speech delivery. Some would even call it phony. I would be one of them. Naturally, you can put this down, possibly, as a certain discomfort at appearing on the national stage for the first time, giving a response to the President of the United States, a man with yet high poll approval numbers-still over 60%-and who is obviously a gifted speaker. Barak Obama is a man who, despite the very real opposition against him, most people want to succeed.
There was nothing wrong with the words of Jindal's speech. The problem was, there was nothing new about them, nothing to invigorate or excite. The red meat thrown to the GOP faithful, still so relatively close on the heels of a solid election defeat, left the rest of us cold.
But, in the final analysis, it wouldn't have mattered regardless. Jindal failed in his mission the second he stepped onto the stage. Everything that followed, the mannerisms, the phony smile and wooden yet sing-song, deliberate folksy voice accentuated by the hand chops, all of which served to make him appear robotic, just sealed his fate, one it would have been hard enough to extricate himself from regardless of how well he spoke.
Many people are going to take exception to my view of Jindal's speech. If so, I would suggest you look at it this way.
Suppose Sarah Palin had been chosen instead of Jindal to give the rebuttal speech. Suppose she was the one who strolled out from the back of the stage, only in her case, she wore nothing but high heels and a semi-see through gown which drew attention to the shadowed genital area, under the kind of stage lighting that forced you to keep your attention focused despite yourself on her body-your eyes drinking in first her waist, and then her hips, thighs, etc.
From that moment on, it wouldn't matter what she said, would it? Of course not. Whatever she had to say at that point, no matter how relevant, valid, or well said, would be lost. Nevertheless, if what she said came across as wooden, phony, and insincere, it would most certainly be noted by her detractors. Why? Because delivery is everything.
Jindal's delivery was like that. Horrid, without any sex appeal, or any other kind of appeal. And it all started to go wrong the minute he walked out onto the stage.
And that smile, as he was walking out on the stage. That ghastly, horrid smile. Were you in your home and suddenly see this creature appear from the shadows, you would have to think, here is a dangerous man.
Indeed, Bobby Jindal is a dangerous man. Not because he is religious, or ambitious, or shallow, or insincere, or even because of his ability or lack thereof.
He is dangerous because he just isn't ready for the prime time so many people would seek to thrust upon him. That's just the problem. By the time the GOP party establishment is through with him-and also by the time they're through with Palin, for that matter-he, and she, will have turned into pale and hollow caricatures of their true selves, their individual talents and ethics sublimated to the ideological dogma of the party elites that from this point on are on the hunt for the proper image to present to the public-not the true face of the candidates with all their appeal, along with their true convictions and ideals-but a mere projection of the Republican Party, or more aptly put, the image the Party wants you to buy.
In this case, they seem to have their work cut out for them. In both cases, they will most assuredly work to co-opt the message and persona of the candidates to their own benefit, before the candidates have the slightest opportunity to make the party their own.
In both cases, as in all such cases, buyer beware. You don't necessarily always get what you pay for.
Some long-time readers of this blog might remember a post I did some time ago in which I did my own ranking of presidents.
Well, lately C-Span commissioned a ranking of presidents by professional historians, which they and others seems wont to do on a fairly regular basis. My reaction-you could do a Family Feud audience survey on the rankings of American presidents that would be as valid as this most recent one of historians commissioned by C-Span. Really, it's all over the place. If you can make heads or tails of the criterion by which they judge former chief executives, please explain it to me.
Sure, there are some surprises, such as Reagan's listing in the top ten, at in fact the number ten spot, but for the most part, it's about what you would expect. Or, well, maybe not, if you are going for possibly the most important criterion of all-objectivity.
It is ludicrous in the extreme for, for example, John F. Kennedy to be placed in the top ten at number six. It is just as ludicrous, if not more so, for Woodrow Wilson to be in the top ten at number nine. Richard Nixon's spot is pretty well where you would expect it to be, in the lower numbers, though granted perhaps a tad higher than he deserves as well at number twenty-seven. In the meantime, here we have John Adams at number seventeen. Abe Lincoln is at the top of the list, where he usually is. Historians tend to automatically put him there without really giving it a lot of thought.
So why exactly do I single out these presidents-Kennedy, Wilson, Nixon, Lincoln, and Adams? Well, it is because all of these presidents had one very important thing in common. More than other chief executives, they tampered with civil liberties. In some cases-hello, Mr. Lincoln-they suspended them altogether. This, to a historian, should be of the utmost concern, and certainly worthy of some note.
Adams did it with the passage of the hated Alien and Sedition Acts which sought to curtail freedom of speech and the press, particularly as it applied to criticisms of his administration. Yet, he gets a pass, despite the fact that this is to all intents and purposes the defining event of his administration.
Lincoln did it as a wartime measure, under the guise of national emergency, by also curtailing press freedoms and by suspending habeas corpus. He gets a pass today, and perhaps this is understandable, but he sure didn't get a pass by a great many of his contemporaries, who skewered him mercilessly over the issue.
Wilson went after anyone who openly spoke against America's involvement in world War I. Yet, he gets a pass, probably because of his domestic economic reforms, but mainly no doubt due to good intentions in helping form the League of Nations, practically the only one of his Fourteen Points in the aftermath of the war to be adopted by the European community. Even at that he failed (thankfully) to convince Congress to allow the US to join the first major international body. He also failed at restraining the excesses of the victorious allied nations of the Triple Entente.
Kennedy-what can you say, other than this man was little more than a common criminal who used the CIA in an illegal manner to overthrow regimes not to his liking, engaging in assassinations and attempts at such. And that's not all. Acting on the urgings and encouragement of the Attorney General, his brother Robert-who has over the years morphed from a savage, ruthless punk into a personage nearly as deified as his presidential brother-wiretapped anyone whom they deemed a potential threat, including but not limited to Martin Luther KIng Jr. They also violated the civil liberties of alleged Mafia figures, including one man whom they kidnapped and forcibly threw out of the country without a trial or hearing.
Yet, he gets a pass because so many middle-aged, and for that matter younger and older historians get all misty-eyed (and in some cases they probably get a woody to boot) over the myth of Camelot-which, by the way, doesn't say a hell of a lot for their historian credentials.
Nixon-maintained a secret enemies list, spied on his enemies, and even corrupted the Justice Department in order to prevent investigation and prosecution of individuals involved in the Watergate break-in.
Strangely, he has jumped up nine notches from the last presidential rankings. Why is that? Well, he founded the EPA, which is all the rage these days amongst the chattering classes who want to do something about global climate change, he paved the way for normalizations of relations with China, and he did finally do something about that pesky Vietnam War, after all. But we've always been aware of those things. Did professional historians just now catch on to their historical significance? I find that hard to believe.
What I don't find hard to believe is the ranking of George W. Bush at number thirty-six in the rankings. Granted, he doesn't deserve to be anywhere near the top ten, and maybe not even in the top twenty-but 36? I ranked him at eighteen, and though this is tentative, and there is hopefully nowhere for him to go but down-36? This is obviously not an objective poll, for a variety of reasons, one of the most important to do with the subject of this post-the record on civil liberties.
One of the most valid and yet as far as I'm concerned still the most obviously and unfairly exaggerated complaints of Bush Jr.s tenure of office, is the way the Bush Administration abused civil liberties. Bush's enemies point to the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and, most especially, to the passage of the Patriot Act as the defining moments of his presidency in terms of abuse of office and the usurpation of powers by the executive branch.
Or at least, that used to be the case. Now, the major complaints against him remain most of the other same old stuff he has always been roundly criticized for-the war in Iraq, the deficit, out-of-control spending, America's standing in the world, torture of terrorism suspects, etc. Added to all of this lately is of course the current financial meltdown, which he only deserves, by the way, a significant and yet still relatively small amount of the blame for.
The point to all this being, I have an idea you are going to hear less and less about his alleged abuses of civil liberties, such as they are. After all, there is a new game in town, a new face of hope and change who is, I have an idea, ready and willing to step into the same federal infrastructure George Bush inhabited and, in some cases, built and expanded. Thus far, the most far-ranging vision Obama has truly exhibited in earnest is his sudden change of heart and decision to support the Telecommunications Bill that granted immunity to phone companies charged with illegally wiretapping customers as a service to the federal government. Obama's most vociferous supporters questioned his about-face on this, and even displayed concern, and criticism. For a day or two, that is, before they decided they would just shut the hell up about it.
You might infer from this that the prospect of the Unitary Executive suddenly doesn't seem like such a horrible one after all.
Thus you have men whose presidential terms are marked by such abuses high in the rankings, and in the case of Adams, you have a relatively high ranking and respected president whose presidency is all but solely defined by it. Well, and by The Adams Chronicles, a favorite amongst historians, and no this is not a facetious statement. Suspiciously close to father John in the rankings, just two notches below him is son John Quincy Adams, another well-intentioned president who accomplished absolutely nothing of note, whom these same historians nevertheless inexplicably placed at number nineteen. So who is the sole occupant of the number eighteen position, between the Adams father and son?
George H. W. Bush.
It's almost like by their putting Bush Senior between them, they were childishly saying-
"Hey Bush Junior, you ain't nowhere near as good as your dad, like John Quincy was almost as good as his. Your dad's at number eighteen. You're eighteen too-eighteen notches below him that is, nyahh, nyaah, nyaa."
Bill Clinton, another president with some minor criticisms for abuses of civil liberties of his own (he too supposedly maintained an enemies list and was alleged to use the power of the Treasury Department to harass enemies by engaging in unfounded tax audits) amongst his myriads of other short-comings, also raised inexplicably in the ranks, from somewhere in the twenties to number fifteen.
The idea of presidential rankings has justifiably been compared to a parlor game. Recently, a group of historians were invited to contribute to another such function. Any qualified historian could participate, but from all of those who seemingly rushed in excitedly to engage in this bit of academic posturing, it seems this was the result pertaining to the standing of one George W. Bush-
Asked to rank the presidency of George W. Bush in comparison to those of the other 41 American presidents, more than 61 percent of the historians concluded that the current presidency is the worst in the nation’s history. Another 35 percent of the historians surveyed rated the Bush presidency in the 31st to 41st category, while only four of the 109 respondents ranked the current presidency as even among the top two-thirds of American administrations.
Only between one and two percent of these professional historians ranked the presidency of Bush a success. Most of the ones who ranked him a failure but did not rank him at the very bottom, nevertheless ranked him in the bottom five, along with Buchanan, Pierce, Harding, and Andrew Johnson, whom they apparently hate for not razing the south in the aftermath of the Union victory in the Civil War. In fact, it seems as though one of the typically lower ranking presidents, Millard Fillmore, had to be unceremoniously booted from his well-worn position from the bottom five. He is typically blamed for inflaming passions between southern secessionists and northern abolitionists who wanted to contain the spread of slavery, and thus creating the conditions that led to the Civil War. But, they already have Buchanan and Pierce to hate for that, one more is just overkill. Make room for Junior.
Yes, I am being somewhat facetious, but serious too. I think that is exactly how these people think. If we can't justify putting him at the very bottom where he belongs, because we need to maintain the appearance of objectivity, let's at least make sure we tag him in the bottom five. Unfortunately for this cabal, the majority of the barely more moderate participants assured Junior would average out to 36, though still in merely the bottom ten.
Me, I placed Bush in my rankings at number 18 for a reason. I placed him one notch under John Adams at 17 and one notch above John F. Kennedy at 19 (I put Kennedy this high solely for his work promoting the space program). I placed Clinton, Wilson and Nixon at 28, 29 and 31 respectively. Lincoln I placed at number 2, second only to George Washington. This is because when I went to work doing my rankings, I set about being as objective as possible, and in all these cases I have listed in this post, one thing stood-all these presidents had problems adhering to the highest of standards when it comes to the the enforcement of and protection of civil liberties. In all regards they failed the test miserably, and only in the case of Lincoln was this ameliorated by extreme conditions which arguably warranted his policies in this regard. Even at that, it served to put him below Washington in my rankings.
The other two groups were both lowered significantly in my own rankings due to their policies in this regard. The gap between the two is explainable as a matter of greater accomplishment, integrity, and/or political or other hardships endured during tenure of office both by those within the higher ranked group, and those who fell in between the two groups.
Still, of course, it's a parlor game, with little meaning, other than as an exercise in either partisanship or, in my case, objectivity. If I were to do my list over, it would be different in some regards. Reagan would go from eleven to nine. Coolidge would probably be somewhere between twenty and thirty, but still not as high as he could have been had he not allowed his adherence to ideology to prevent him from doing just a couple of things differently. FDR would be lowered, but still in the top ten. Same with cousin Teddy. Jackson would go down from an already low twenty-four to an even lower thirty something ranking, as would partner-in-crime Van Buren, whom I last put just a notch above Clinton at twenty-seven. Clinton would also go down, Nixon would go up, etc. Harding would rise higher, maybe even into the top twenty. See, it is really too subjective to ever qualify as objective, something you can only aim for, but will find exceedingly difficult to achieve.
Two things I'm pretty sure of though that would remain the same were I to do my rankings over.
George W. Bush would probably stay at eighteen, or maybe just a tad lower. George H.W. Bush would probably stay at thirty-six, or thereabouts.
Well, there is a third thing. Professional historians are mostly full of shit.
Of course, so are most presidents, who are after all politicians deep down? Are they all basically the same, maybe different only in some cases by small degrees? Maybe, maybe not. Whatever the case, you might appreciate the following video montage of each president morphing into his successor, in order from first to last.
If nothing else, it could be a good way to teach your kids the presidents in the right order.
I watched Obama's speech before Congress tonight, and though there are a lot of things there to talk about, I want to focus on just one thing that will probably get lost in the overall flood of promises, warnings, and rhetoric. In a way this is understandable given the depths to which to the national economy has sunk, and the very real problems we have relative to energy, the housing crisis, banking, credit, Wall Street, mortgages, and the by now seemingly permanent dire straights of our medical system. Add to all of these problems, as if they were not bad enough, the steadily increasing job loss, and the fact that we are, to all intents and purposes, still bogged down in the fighting of a war on two fronts, with a deficit now over a trillion dollars per year.
Yet, I have no doubt in my mind that, were this one particular topic thrown out there on its own, it would result in an overwhelming flurry of outrage and possibly even outright rebellion. Yet, tonight, it was mentioned only in passing, and seemed to elicit not so much as even a sneer from the Republicans in attendance, and even went unremarked by Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal in his later response on behalf of the GOP.
What I am referring to-and I am taking the time leading up to it because I am trying to make sure I get the point across just exactly how seriously wrong this is-is the idea that education should be reformed to such an extent that, to paraphrase Obama, it should begin "from birth".
Now of course, I don't take this too literally. Naturally, he is being euphemistic to the point of hyperbole, and I am not trying to suggest that Obama wants the government to snatch everybody's kids practically from their mother's breasts, or from their hospital cribs the minute they are born, and begin a lifelong process of indoctrination which would amount to a massive kind of brainwashing that not even George Orwell could have envisioned.
Still, it's hard to see how what he proposes isn't too far removed from that. His words were, again paraphrased-
"Those are the most formative years of a child's development."
He is meaning, apparently, the years from the age of two to four. By the age of five practically every child in the country has been subjected to some form of kindergarten and/or pre-school of some form or another, if in many cases not before that time.
There are tempting reasons to support such proposals, of course. There always are. The earlier a child can begin an education at a state sanctioned facility, the sooner both parents are relieved of a considerable amount of time that is the natural burden of child care, and can then pursue their own individual careers, without the draining costs of baby-sitters or expensive day-care centers.
And, doubtless, if run efficiently and correctly, and with all of the needs of the child in mind, this could indeed result in a much better education for the average child-at least as you would measure education according to purely technical terms. In purely clinical terms, yes, we can in this manner potentially turn out not only far more high school graduates, but also college graduates as well. We would no doubt as a result be far more competitive in the world economy, against such nations as India and China, for just two examples.
But just exactly what are we giving up in the process? Well, that's an easy answer. We are giving up our freedom and independence in the long haul, because if you think for one minute that early childhood education is not going to involve mind manipulation and indoctrination with a heavy dose of political correctness thrown in for more than just good measure, you are sadly mistaken. The Democratic Party, working in conjunction with the powerful teacher's union, the NEA-which all but controls their agenda on education issues, and is influential on others-will see to that.
We will go from a nation that believes in individual freedom to a nation of guaranteed rights. That is a bigger deal than it sounds at first glance. Of course we are now a nation of guaranteed rights, but we are entering a period where these guaranteed rights will be expanded far beyond those enumerated in the Bill of Rights.
The problem is, the more guaranteed rights there are, the less liberty there will be by definition. And its a safe bet, even a sure bet, that an early childhood education is not going to focus on an appreciation of individual rights and freedom. Individual dignity, yes, but that's a different thing altogether. It's a fine line, but it becomes a lot easier to walk that line, and eventually phase into crossing over it completely, when you're a nation of trained seals, as opposed to a nation of free people.
We as a people need to demand that our elected officials begin a really serious discussion about this prospect. I say it's a big mistake, no matter how well intentioned some might be. In competing with India, China, and Europe, is it necessary to morph into a carbon copy of them? If so, maybe we're better off just letting them fight it out amongst themselves, and then stepping back in just in time to take the spoils. This time, by the way, we should keep them.
If this thing goes too far-and eventually, it's all but guaranteed that it will go too far, over time-what it amounts to is that all children will first be wards of the state, which will be responsible for everything from their education to their health care. The state, not parents, will decide what values children should be taught. Before too many years have passed, the state will very possibly be the controlling entity of children's lives.
Parents will be no more or no less than their state-approved guardians. They will be accountable to the State-not the other way around.
I don't think we want to go down that road, but it's just around the corner. Once we head too far down that road, there might be no turning back.
She would probably know it too, but I doubt she'd throw my cell phone out of my 1000 dollar a week rented Lambourghini if I got a call from Paris Hilton or whoever the hell it was that called Rihanna's boyfriend Chris Brown on the night that he did-well, whatever the hell it was he did here.
If I had to guess I would say he probably got her down on the ground and wiped all the cosmetics off her face with a dirty, dry, rough cloth. Don't worry folks, I think she'll live. The LAPD, those paragons of virtue and ethics amongst all civil servants, are upset that the preceding photo was released to TMZ and have issued a statement urging cooperation in tracking the source of the leak. In the meantime, of course, they were all too quick to affirm that, yes, this is Rihanna from the night in question.
According to reports, she could be heard screaming on the 911 call. Now, I can tell you from experience, when a woman starts screaming, that is serious business which could in some cases have profoundly serious consequences. Just like we all know that no woman ever lies about being raped or abused, we also know that no woman would ever fake screaming, crying, or having an orgasm.
According to reports, a bystander who witnessed the events of the night made the 911 call. No one knows yet who this person is. The poor person is probably too traumatized to even think about heading to the nearest or highest paying tabloid to sell the rights to his or her story, and by reason of this must needs stay in seclusion.
Now of course Chris Brown has been arrested. His lawyer is Mark Garagos, which means it is a serious charge. He might in fact spend up to nine years in prison, just for the threats he probably uttered in the heat of the moment. He's lost his endorsement deal with Wrigleys and he ain't going to be wearing any milk mustaches anytime soon. And, of course, several radio stations have announced that they will be boycotting his songs.
Hey, I know. Why don't we take him out somewhere in the woods and hang him?
But seriously, folks-
A great many people suddenly seem to have turned against this previously "squeaky-clean" nineteen year old rapper.
I have no idea how many people have been to her MySpace page and left messages of support and condolence. Who knows, maybe one of these days she might get around to reading a few of them. I smell a publicity stunt. I also smell a great deal of hypocrisy.
Clarence Thomas. Michael Tyson. Michael Jackson. Kobe Bryant. OJ Simpson.
Chris Brown-the latest black guy its cool to hate.
Although I am far from totally convinced, to say the least, the Washington Post seems confidant that the man in the above photo is the long sought after murderer of Washington intern Chandra Levy, who went missing sometime apparently in the early morning hours of May 1st, 2001, her decomposed remains (basically by the time they were found a group of bones) discovered in the vicinity of the Klegle Mansion in Rock Creek Park more than a year later. Her disappearance was all the talk on the cable news channels for months, up until the time it, and virtually everything else, was overshadowed by the events of 9/11. The controversy served to end the Congressional career of Democratic House member Gary Condit, the blue dog Democrat from her district in California with whom Levy had been carrying on an affair for some time.
The news media, and for that matter, it seemed, the DC Police, focused on Condit to the exclusion of practically any other potential leads or suspects. To this day, in a section detailing the timeline of the main events relating to the mystery, Chandra Levy's own home newspaper, The Sacramento Bee, seems overly obsessed with the Condit connection.
Yet, Ingmar Guandique assaulted two different women in Rick Creek Park right around the time of Levy's disappearance, for which he is now serving time in prison. Upon his release, under normal circumstances he would be facing deportation, being that he is an illegal immigrant from El Salvadore. Below is his home. Charming as it might seem, it is actually a small house with no running water or electricity, in an area where work is scarce.
As a young child, he lived through a period of revolution in his country, a period of violent upheaval during which his father was kidnapped and murdered, his body found some days later.
Guandique made his way to America by way of the Mexican border through the aid of a coyote-a person who for a fee smuggles undocumented immigrants into the US. Many who know him claim he has a violent nature, including his former girlfriend and her mother with whom he lived for a brief period, and who ordered him out of the premises. He himself claims that he will tell himself to attack if he sees a person with something valuable in a secluded spot, but that he always feels bad afterward. Yet, he has consistently denied having anything to do with Levy's death or disappearance.
A former cellmate claims Guandique admitted to killing Levy, but on the other hand, yet another claims he told him that Gary Condit himself paid him twenty-five thousand dollars to murder Levy, having approached him on the street in his car out of the blue with the proposition. The police decided there was nothing to the story.
Now, in the aftermath of the Post series, the police have taken a second look at Guandique, and decided that he is their man after all, even though former assistant DC Chief Gaynor is satisfied Guandique was not involved-this based not just on his opinion, but on the opinions of the seasoned detectives under him who had questioned and investigated the hapless and obviously troubled immigrant.
My question is, why now? How can they be so sure? What do they have in the way of evidence they did not have before, and how could they have acquired it?
There is something funny about this investigation. For one thing, the Post articles assert that the police, in searching Levy's computer, made a mistake in assuming she had been searching for Klingle Mansion in Rock Creek Park. According to them, she was merely searching the general area of Rock Creek Park, evidently looking for various different places good for a walk or a jog. Klingle Mansion was just listed at the top of the page on which she searched, as it is the headquarters of the Park.
The only trouble with that explanation is, at that particular time, Klingle Mansion was not the headquarters or offices of Rock Creek Park. Klingle Mansion, at the time Levy disappeared, was nothing but a storage building. Why would a storage building be listed at the top of the page for a Park as the headquarters of its administrative offices-unless of course it was then also used as a park rangers outpost? This would seem not only plausible, but likely.
This brings me to my main point. I never considered Gary Condit to be involved with Levy's disappearance, and was mystified by the narrow focus of attention on the Congressman. There were always so many questions. I wasn't bothered that those questions were never answered, so much as I was bothered that they were never asked.
Chandra Levy was a young woman of twenty-four who in addition to carrying on an illicit affair with a Congressman who was a married father of two children roughly her own age, was also an intern for the Justice Department, specifically for the Bureau of Prisons.
Her goal was to seek a career in law-enforcement or in some other aspect of public life, but somewhere alone the way her goals were derailed. For whatever reasons, her internship ended, and earlier reports hinted that she was not happy about it. The question becomes then, who did she know at the Bureau of Prisons? Is it possible she might have threatened somebody with the power of her Congressman boyfriend? Why was her internship ended so abruptly, according to most reports well before it was due to end?
She was already supposed to be on her way home sometime soon with "big news". Why then did she take the time to go to Rock Creek Park, and who did she intend to meet there, if anyone? Did she have something on somebody that she unwisely attempted to use as leverage in a vain attempt to keep her position, maybe even possibly gain a promotion in the process?
I realize that there are many people who go way off the rails in their attempts to solve mysteries, and I don't want to come off that way. I have read everything imaginable about this case. I have seen examples where it was blamed on some wild, nonsensical conspiracy involving the Unification Church. Recently, I came across this Geo-Cities website. Here, Chandra Levy has morphed from a lowly intern to a modern day Mata Hari, with seemingly unlimited access to all levels of classified information. and in this capacity came across information about the future 9/11 attacks and Oklahoma City bomber Timothy MacVeigh's connections to government agents and Islamic terrorists, among other things. Naturally, since Gary Condit was a ranking member of the House Intelligence Sub-Committee, she used her feminine wiles to get him to tell her all the secrets that he had privy to.
Oh yeah, and lest I forget-Chandra Levy was an undercover operative for a rogue branch of the Israeli spy agency Mossad.
Yeah, I know it all sounds ridiculous, because it is, but conspiracy theories are only unhinged when they lose all sense of perspective and veer into the realms of the absurd. That doesn't prove the absence of a conspiracy, it only proves the need for common sense and rational perspective.
There was nothing earth-shattering at work here, just, quite possibly, the case of a woman who went too far to get what she wanted and crossed the wrong person.
Of course, it might even be more simple than this. It could very well be that a young illegal immigrant from El Salvadore happened across the unwary Levy and assaulted and killed her, possibly raping her in the process. It could actually be that her body went undiscovered for so long due to a simple fluke in procedure, as the police claim. They were told to check within a certain distance off the paths, yet somehow this was interpreted as meaning to search so far off the actual roads. It could well be that the glaring public spotlight on Gary Condit, fueled by media speculation and sensationalism-and the desire of prosecutors to make a name for themselves by bringing a corrupt politician to justice-caused them to overlook the possible complicity of the young Guandique.
Chandra Levy's parents seem satisfied at the prospects that the case might finally be solved, which is understandable, and have stated their desires that Chandra's killer not be executed, but spend the rest of his life in prison, with no comfort or amenities. To me, that would be far more against the spirit of Freedom from Cruel and Unusual Punishment than putting a murderer to death, which is my favored option, providing the proof of guilt is more substantial than "beyond a reasonable doubt". It should in fact be applied only in those cases where there is certainty of guilt beyond all doubt.
As far as I can see, as of now this case doesn't reach either threshold. I could be mistaken, and I certainly won't go out on a limb and say that, as the case unfolds, I won't be convinced of Guandique's guilt. I really wouldn't be surprised at his guilt under ordinary circumstances, given the apparent nature of this young man, who even from his prison cell sent sexually suggestive notes and pictures to a woman, an insurance agent whom he had only seen in an advertisement. He is obviously troubled and violent. He was in the vicinity at the time in question. He would at first glance seem to be the perfect suspect.
When I first saw this cartoon by New York Post editorial cartoonist Sean Delanos, I thought The New York Post was under the delusion that the Stimulus Bill was written by former Republican President George Chimpy MacFlightsuit Bu$Hitler, so imagine my surprise when the Left was outraged-outraged, I say-at the insensitivity of such an insult to a man who, after all, has a website named in his honor-The Smirking Chimp. Come to find out, they seem to think-or so they say-that the cartoon was a racist jab at Obama. The Post itself, in their published response, seems to think it is nothing more than an excuse by the Left to give them a hard time. Following is the text of their full explanation-
Wednesday's Page Six cartoon - caricaturing Monday's police shooting of a chimpanzee in Connecticut - has created considerable controversy.
It shows two police officers standing over the chimp's body: "They'll have to find someone else to write the next stimulus bill," one officer says.
It was meant to mock an ineptly written federal stimulus bill.
Period.
But it has been taken as something else - as a depiction of President Obama, as a thinly veiled expression of racism.
This most certainly was not its intent; to those who were offended by the image, we apologize.
However, there are some in the media and in public life who have had differences with The Post in the past - and they see the incident as an opportunity for payback.
To them, no apology is due.
Sometimes a cartoon is just a cartoon - even as the opportunists seek to make it something else.
(The End)
The most pertinent part of the above is in bold, which I wanted to point out, because most leftist blogs and websites that touch on the explanation seem to be somewhat selective as to the parts they deign to reproduce.
The hard truth of the matter is, Obama did not write the Stimulus Bill. Of course he had a great deal of input into it, but by and large the actual writers of the bill were the Congressional Democrats, as wild and vicious a troop of monkeys as ever existed and who are, unfortunately, alive and well as we speak. Have no fear, I have no doubt they shall be around for some time to come yet, ready and most eager to tear off the face of reasoned public discourse as they set about ripping to shreds the very fabric of our Constitution. By the time it is all said and done, Obama's Presidency might well be as much their victim as the rest of us, it's bloody carcass torn to pieces by their wild primal urges long before the Republicans even begin to whet their appetites over it's bleeding and battered form.
Even yet, while The Huffington Post and other leftist outlets wail, and while they along with Al Sharpton and Spike Lee call for protests and boycotts, others line up to angrily throw their feces at what they perceive as the purveyors of veiled and not so veiled insults. The LGBT activist group GLAAD is up in arms over the same cartoonist's work throughout the years, and have even put up a page in which Delonas satirized the gay community.
Is it any wonder why Americans are too "cowardly", in the words of Attorney General Eric Holder to have a real dialogue about race? Who wants to deal with this kind of thing constantly? Now Eric Holder wants us to work towards integration in all aspects of our lives. He wants us to think about how we spend our weekends, and who we spend them with. Well, Eric, I know where I spend mine, which happens to be anywhere where I can get a break from this kind of crap. Sorry, dude, but me, I like to enjoy what little time I have to do so. We spend enough time walking on eggshells in our working, school, and public life. When it comes time to socialize with our friends and family, we want to be around those with whom we feel comfortable and with whom we can relax. This stuff just doesn't cut it. And, by the way, aren't you supposed to be fighting actual crime? What's this? Is the Attorney General's office suddenly The Ministry Of Public Niceness?
It's not all dire. Even The Smirking Chimp has somewhat of a reasoned, balanced view of this monkey business, in which the blogger states we should be less quick to hurl charges of racism at every perceived transgression, real or imagined, and insist on a higher standard of proof before we make such charges.
David Patterson, the Governor of New York, has issued a statement to the effect that he accepts the Post's apology, while unfortunately calling for greater care in editorial practices, in his own call for "dialogue" that kind of misses the point. According to him-
"It might be a time to open up a dialogue on just where that line is, where good clean fun and degradation are."
The point he misses of course is that editorial cartoons are not supposed to be about "good clean fun", while many times degradation is a worthy aim. Different strokes for different folks.
Patterson though has had his own set of problems lately. He has fallen in the polls, to the extent he might find himself the loser in a primary contest against any strong candidate, one such as Andrew Cuomo, who is reportedly mulling a run against the currently unpopular Patterson. Patterson has taken a hit over the debacle with Caroline Kennedy, dissatisfaction with Patterson's own appointment to replace Hillary Clinton in the US Senate, and his refusal to deal with New York's current budget woes by raising taxes or borrowing money.
Many Democrats see him as little more than a clown, a buffoon chosen by Elliot Spitzer (whom Patterson replaced in the wake of the former Governor's own sex scandal) as an Affirmative Action candidate to help shore up Spitzer's support among the black and disabled voters. Many prominent Democrats see Patterson as clearly over his head and are working round the clock to find a suitable replacement to run against him.
Otherwise, if Patterson manages to eke out a victory in the primaries, he might lose the general election to those racist Republicans.
Back sometime during the 1980’s, DC Comics purchased from Charlton Comics the rights to a string of superhero characters formerly featured in the Mighty Comics/Radio Comics line, after yet another failed attempt to make a success of publications featuring the characters in the Archie Adventure Series division.
Alan Moore, a successful and innovative writer, submitted a story idea that utilized these characters for a proposed limited edition series. The editorial department approved the project, but then convinced Moore to develop his own original characters for the series. After all, they had paid a high price for the rights to the Charlton characters, and didn’t want to waste what potential they might have. This was back in the day when most publishers followed the formula “once a character is dead, he stays dead”. Of course, if a way could be devised that made it possible to explain a character’s seeming return from the dead, they would relax this policy, but in this particular case, there was no possibility of any such explanation which would be acceptable-even, or maybe especially, in the DC universe of comics characters.
Using the old Chalton characters as guidelines and inspiration, he developed the characters of The Comedian, Doctor Manhattan, Silk Specter, Night Owl, Ozymandias, and Rorschach. These, however, were more than just knock-off cheap imitations of what others might say were, for the most part, cheap knock-off imitations. The concept behind these characters, and the story of The Watchmen, set the comic book world on fire and established a whole new genre of dark, brooding, angst-ridden, misogynistic, and even nihilistic characters guided not by the principles of fairness, justice, and the American way, but by might makes right and the ends justifies the means.
Now, after two decades of failed attempts and projects stalled for a variety of reasons, including an ultimately successful lawsuit filed by Fox Studios against Warner Brothers, The Watchmen is due for cinematic release in March of this year. The hype behind this project though has befuddled the mass of theatergoers who see the trailers for the film. The hype of course is perhaps understandable, but the marketing has ventured into the realm of the inexplicable and the bizarre. In addition to the action figures, there is Night Owl Coffee, already hailed as a potential future collector’s item. There are Rorschach ski masks. And that's not all. Not only does Doctor Manhattan have his own lunch box, but since the blue-skinned character appears in the movie fully nude he also has, of all things, his own blue condom
Though these blue Watchmen Condoms will doubtless prove to be collectors items also, please be advised-condoms for your average geek comic book fan, of course, will by necessity come in three sizes-
Small, extra small, and “What the fuck do you need me for?”
There are those who are not enthralled with the project, precisely to a great extent because of this crass commercialization. Among these you can include Alan Moore himself the writer of the original series, a long haired and bearded writer who claims to worship an ancient Roman snake god, and who in fact cursed the project. He refuses to work for DC comics any longer, or for Marvel, over what he feels is the over-commercialized aspects of the comics business of today. He claims that they exist now solely to provide storyboards for Hollywood, which he feels has ruined the comics industry.
There are also those who feel the series is suited more for development as a television mini-series than as a feature film. Frankly, I disagree with this. The movie is basically somewhere in the neighborhood of two and a half hours long, which should be somewhere around the time it would take to read all twelve comics which comprise the original limited series that was first published during the period of 1986-1987.
Others claim the story has a hidden leftist agenda, but I tend to think that is a lot of bunk, or at least is greatly exaggerated. Had DC published the series during the Carter, Johnson, Clinton-or Obama-years, it would doubtless have played up to and against the political, economic, and social situations relevant to the time in question. The point, at least the major point, to the series was an aim toward what the author felt was relevance and, perhaps more importantly, realism. It was about the reality that he saw as the underbelly and even the sewer of humanity. In this world, man’s higher aspirations were not so much denied, as rendered irrelevant to the overall scheme of things, a pretentious facade that held out a false hope of salvation and worth.
It was a world of an alternate universe, in which the presence of costumed superheroes had changed the landscape of history in significant ways. Yet, it is a dark world, and these are dark heroes, if you can even call them heroes. Their strength is that of brutal force and courage, but they are plagued with weakness and, to a degree, contempt for the humanity that they do not serve and defend for altruistic reasons so much as aid for their own self-interest, the exercise of power and ego fulfillment. They are in fact disliked, even hated, by the average person. They are free moral agents with few admirable personal qualities, and many flaws and weaknesses. The Comedian was a rapist and murderer who in this parallel universe was actually the true assassin of President Kennedy. Doctor Manhattan, though he does not act in a criminal or even an unethical manner, is nevertheless more of a soulless monster and misanthrope with no emotional attachment to anything living. Yet, his drive to learn and understand the humanity that he left behind emotionally, long before he ever temporarily does so physically, is reflected in his relationship with the Silk Specter, who, in his absence, begins a new relationship with Night Owl, a middle-aged, overweight, impotent tech wizard. The Silk Specter learns that she is actually the daughter of The Comedian, who at one time attempted to rape her mother, the original Silk Specter.
Rorschach, though a hero who fights ostensibly on the side of good, is a psychopathic brute and cold-blooded killer to whom no limitations applies in his quest to find the answers he seeks. It will be this same unrelenting determination that will ultimately prove his undoing.
Ozymandias, a high-powered business executive in real life, is a megalomaniac to whom human life is dispensable in his drive to achieve the ultimate goal of victory over, ironically, an even greater evil, a force whose existence makes even the sacrifice of millions of innocent lives inconsequential. It is easy for him to make that choice, for as he sees it, that force is humanity itself.
The story itself was so compelling, so gripping, that it changed the face of the comics business forever. It is unlikely to have that effect on the movie business, aside possibly from future superhero films. It might be a sleeper hit, possibly in time considered a cult classic. It will undoubtedly recoup its investment. It might even be a major hit. Undoubtedly, many of the myriads of comics fans will be pleased, though maybe a great many of them will not be. Judging from the reactions of many who attended the latest ComicCon, and who viewed the first seventeen minutes of the film along with other selected highlights, it seems promising.
The question becomes, will it move the bar and expand the superhero movie franchise beyond the current niche market. Only time will tell. My feeling is that it might well be a victim of its own hype as much as the Watchmen become the victims of their own all too human weaknesses. Changing the comics publishing industry is one thing. Changing the superhero movie franchise is a different matter, as there are certain forces at work there which are not so easily transformed. Even under the best of circumstances, it is still, after all, a niche market. This role of the dice might well expand that market. It’s a worthwhile gamble, and if it succeeds, it would encourage other similar projects and experimentation. Of course, there would be consequences in the form of considerable controversy far above and beyond what might be experienced by the comics industry.
There are those of us who like our heroes to be something we ourselves can never hope to be-role models for our children, not so much perfect as aiming towards the perfection most of us have long ago realized was far beyond human capacity. Many of us will decide that The Watchmen is a movie we should not take our children to see. Beyond the fantasy elements, it is far too much like the real world. It is a little too much like ourselves.
That may be too much reality to cram into a two-and-a-half hour film.
Okay, let me give it a shot. Some fool decided that because this wild animal could be trained to do things that a trained tiger couldn't come close to even thinking about doing, that somehow made him less of a wild animal, and thus exponentially less dangerous. Which, this is a view that has a good deal of merit as long as the wild animal can remain placid at all times, but where the theory falls to pieces is when you add into the equation the fact that, by definition, wild animals are unpredictable and thus there is no way you can depend on any of them, no matter how seemingly well-trained and well-behaved, remaining placid and obedient on command.
Add to this the fact that the ape had absolutely no natural fear of humans, was getting old, was sick with Lyme Disease, and had just recently been given Xanax in warm tea-without a prescription at that-and you have a disaster in the making. To sum up, you have a woman without a face who is probably not at all feeling lucky to be alive, and a dead chimpanzee, shot by the policeman who shot him as he forced open the door to his cruiser.
Yes, it's sad, and tragic, but it is by no means a mystery. This ape had been in a TV pilot, as well as commercials for Coca-Cola and Old Navy. He also appeared on the Maury Povich Show. Povich probably will never know how lucky he is. Look at Travis, the chimp in question, smiling in the above photo. Cute, isn't it?
Not really. When animals smile, as a general rule, they do so without showing their teeth, which they do mainly either as a defensive measure when they feel threatened, or when they themselves are ready to attack. The only animal that I know of that is an exception to this rule is a breed of dog-the Irish Setter. Most animals, including apes, take the showing of teeth as a threat. This ape was obviously trained to smile for the cameras, but that might have been interpreted by the ape as a sign that aggression is acceptable within limits. Does he really look natural doing that? Maybe he does, as long as you don't see him as jovial. It is never good for a wild animal to learn not to fear humans or for humans to treat them with deference. That is pouring fuel on the fire. Eventually, much like a child, they are going to throw tantrums. Of course, before they really lose it, also much like a child, they will test the limits. Well, this ape surpassed the test of his limits, such as they were, with flying colors.
This is not the first time this has happened. A chimp attacked a man not too long ago and also ripped off a large part of his face, including his nose, and one of his testicles. The man barely survived the encounter and has had to endure several surgeries to repair the damage to his face, which will never completely heal. He wears a prosthetic nose.
These animals are seriously aggressive by nature. Bear in mind, apes are the closest kin among animals that human beings have, and chimps are among the closest of all. It has been postulated that humans and chimps have an aggressive nature which is pretty much descended from the same source. That is just the problem with people who treat them like children. Travis was fed lobster, steak, and Italian food, by his owner, whose friend was the victim of the assault.
You can take the ape out of the jungle, but he's still going to be an ape. I hope nobody else has to learn that lesson the hard way.
A fireball was seen over the skies of Texas, Kentucky, and Italy. It was, depending on who you believe, either the size of a basketball and metallic, or the size of a pick-up truck with the consistency of a chunk of concrete. It was not wreckage from the recent satellite collision, as this would not have produced the sonic boom that was clearly audible over Kentucky. It was, or they were, almost beyond any doubt, a meteor or meteors of exquisitely rare type.
What this means is I am going to take a Texas chick to Italy someday soon and engage in a great deal of more than just intellectual intercourse. Just look at the picture.
Usually by the time I get half way through a Hugo Chavez blog post or news article, it's time for a fucking siesta. Still, you have to admit, the latest referendum in Venezuela that ended presidential term limits is big news.
Viva Hugo! Who needs term limits? They are as unnecessary as foreign gringo investments. If they come, fine, we'll just snatch them up. The world won't mind too much, si?
Hey, come to think about it, who needs elections? Hugo won by such a large margin, are they really necessary? Why not just suspend them on some pretext. I'm sure Hugo will be able to find plenty of good reasons. Here's the part from the article in the Financial Times I like-
But analysts also suggested that the comfortable victory will also embolden the government to confront serious economic challenges caused by a collapse in oil revenues.
Economists at Barclays suggest the government will soon implement a financial transaction tax, increase the value added tax rate and cut expensive subsidies on domestic petrol prices, which are some of the cheapest in the world.
A devaluation of some 37 per cent could soon take place, argues Barclays, now that the currency has become heavily misaligned after almost four years at a fixed exchange rate at the same time as double digit inflation.
Oh, this might be a problem, no? Hey, I think I got a solution. Why not stage a referendum declaring an end to all future elections? Hugo is soooo well-loved surely it will pass.
One of the biggest failures of the preceding Bush Administration was in its dealings with Saudi Arabia, not only involving energy policy, but in its dealings with the Saudi regime regarding the threat of radical Islam. However, it is too easy to push all the blame off on Bush. He only failed to deal adequately with the threat. He did not create it. He only inherited the same viper that a host of preceding presidents nurtured at their breasts for decades. Now, the head of the snake knows that one day soon, the axe might fall and sever his head. When it happens, there is little he can do about it, but for now, he can desperately try to spew his venom in the desperate hopes of holding off the inevitable.
It really takes some degree of hubris for the Saudi Oil Minister to lecture to an American audience on the need to keep investments in oil up to sustainable levels. These people have had us in a grip or iron for going on four decades, and for six have built up a level of wealth and influence that would be the ency of Croesus. In return for our dependence on Saudi oil, our money has gone to fund radical Islamic schools-madrassas-that have taught hatred of America and the West in general, and have otherwise supported a terrorist network that ultimately led to the 9/11 attacks. While the Saudi elites have otherwise engaged in luxurious lifestyles and profligate spending, they have kept their people's standard of living down to where the Saudi people are easy prey to the radical imams who seem to command their allegiance in ever-growing numbers. Despite this, we have reciprocated by selling advanced weapons technologies to the Saudi regime, in large part to supposedly protect them from these same fundamentalists.
Ironically, a great lot of what the Saudi Oil Minister said in his Houston speech is true. There will need to be continued and probably increased investment in oil for the next two decades, at least. Energy independence isn't going to come overnight. It goes without saying, however, that the Saudi regime is unlikely to complain about American Democratic politicians limiting oil exploration within the US or off it's coasts or, in the case of ANWAR, banning it completely.
The idea that Saudi Arabia might probably at one point in time by necessity be powered by solar energy is probably cold comfort. After all, even though that particular area is ripe for solar energy development, in market terms, they would nevertheless be just another cog in the wheel.
This is our chance now to get some degree of reasonable control over the Saudis, if we but would. The radical Islamists should all contemplate going into hiding, though I doubt they are feeling undue concern. They are probably all too aware that, under current conditions, they still have little to worry about. On the other hand, the regime might actually adjust to reality by providing some degree of advancement to the well-being of their subordinated population. It might be the one chance for the regime's long-term survival.
The most likely long-term scenario, however, is that the Saudi royal family and other wealthier members of the regime will eventually abandon the country, doubtless immigrate to Europe and America, for the most part, and leave the Arabian peninsula a veritable no-man's land, a desert fit for nothing but the annual pilgrimmage to Mecca. When they leave, they will take their untold billions of dollars in wealth with them. In fact, it is probably already to a very large degree safely deposited in various Swiss and other such accounts.
Should this potential future Saudi exodus ever finally come about, the radicals may have by that time lost any appreciable degree of power and influence as well. After all, they will have lost their major source of patronage. They and their followers will be sufficiently isolated, and the world if only for this reason will be a better place.
For her first official overseas diplomatic trip as the nation's latest Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton decided not to play it safe with the typical visits to America worshiping Europe or with a leisurely tour to the peaceful, economically and socially stable region of the Middle East. Instead, summoning the legendary courage and integrity which is practically a hallmark of the Clinton legacy, she took the bold step of visiting the strife-torn, destitute, socially fractured Asian nation known as Japan-the Empire of The Rising Sun.
She has learned greatly from past mistakes, such as her trip to Bosnia in the nineties as First Lady, when she ill-advisedly allowed daughter Chelsea to accompany her on her peril-laden trip during which the two were forced to dodge sniper fire, the two of them protected only by expert Navy Seal Cheryl Crow and ace undercover CIA operative Sinbad, known in intelligence circles as "The Comedian".
This time, however, as a unique testament to her determined bravery and sense of self-sacrifice, she went armed only with that world-class trademark Hillary Clinton charm and grace as her sole companions.
We can only hope that this trip will over time lead, at long last, to a healing of the divisions and hostilities that have so marked Japanese-American relations since the beginning of World War II, some sixty seven years ago. Unfortunately, as the following video shows, she has much hard work ahead of her. Note how Mrs. Clinton stoically holds her composure and maintains her dignity and sense of optimism in the face of the hurled taunts and even manages to elude the sniper fire of maddened Imperial Japanese Army veterans, before she is finally forced to reluctantly re-board the Enola Gay in continuance of her faithful trip to Hiroshima, wearing the dark sunglasses inspired by her hero and mentor, General Douglas MacArthur, her proclaimed role model, as she brushes aside the desperate assault from the sword of a crazed Samurai warrior.
Note how French journalist Nathalie Tourrete is seemingly awe-struck by the unimaginable heroism displayed by the former US First Lady, now our nation's Secretary of State, whom even the most devoted Ninja assassins have come to respect, and fear.
We can only be grateful that Mrs. Clinton managed to continue on her journey just in the nick of time, mere seconds prior to the Banzai pilot attack which otherwise would have ended her life along with her mission, so vital to establishing, at long last, peace between her husband, true secret President Bill Clinton, and the war-weary Hirohito, the false God of Japan who has circulated false rumors of his death in hopes of avoiding a confrontation with the unmatchable Mrs. Clinton.
Fortunately, even though Tojo has vowed to fight to the end, there is always hope as long as Mrs. Clinton is in charge at the helm of State. If anyone can finally put an end to this senseless war between America and Japan, it is Hillary Rodham Clinton, by God!
The man in the above photo is Mr. Muzzammil Hassan, 44, a Muslim American from Buffalo New York. He is the founder and CEO of Bridges TV, which he started with the intention of fostering greater understanding between Muslims and Americans, aiming particularly at portraying Muslims in a more positive light. It features news and entertainment. Unfortunately, the web-site is now down for "maintenance".
The lady in the photo alongside him is Aasiya Z. Hassan, 37, his former wife who sued Mr. Hassan for divorce and got a restraining order on him, resulting in a judgment that required him to leave the couples home by the date of February 6th of this year.
Mr. Hassan, who is so desirous of increasing understanding between Americans and Muslims, murdered his wife.
The world has found it's latest punching bag in the person of Nadya Suleman, a woman on whom it feels justified in unleashing it's wrath towards the failed economy. First, this unemployed divorcee who lives with her mother in a small house barely big enough for the two of them has herself impregnated with the fertilized eggs of six children. One of these children turns out to be autistic. Not evidently satisfied with that, she has herself impregnated again with six more embryos by the same
The thought of this woman acting in such an irresponsible manner, apparently drawing at least some level of taxpayer-funded public assistance, is enough to raise the ire of the most tolerant among us. Yet, Suleman seems determined to find as many ways possible to offend.
She claimed that she would receive assistance from her church, which doubtless came as a surprise to many of the church's regular donors, who probably had other ideas. The church publicly denied her claims, probably after a hurried meeting of church elders decided this was not a good way to increase contributions from the flock.
She started a website complete with pictures and a donation button, but then was photographed shopping for video games.
The public relations group that has represented octuplets mother Nadya Suleman is stepping down because of death threats, its president said Saturday.
Joann Killeen also said the mother now has an agent: Wes Yoder, the same man who arranged book and music deals for the McCaughey septuplets a decade ago and publicity for controversial pastor Rick Warren.
The Killeen Furtney Group was ending its free representation after receiving at least 100 graphic e-mailed threats and swarms of nasty voicemails that went to the Los Angeles agency and even to some of its other clients, Killeen said.
Some messages threatened Suleman but others were aimed at her spokespeople.
Suleman has probably at least entertained the idea of selling the movie rights to her story. The only problem with that idea is her so-called story is so well known by now it is practically in the public domain by default. Why should anyone pay her for the rights to a story under her conditions. I don't think she would care much for the most likely version of her life's story, which would be the one any studio could produce without paying her a dime. It would also be the only one the public would buy.
The jaded public isn't buying much these days. They are distressed, angry, and worried about the future. One of the few products that has made a profit over the last few months? Condoms. They especially
sold well over Valentine's Day weekend, and little wonder. Some people complained about the use of the condom display, in the shape of a heart, at the one store in question, saying it sent a bad message to the kids. Most people, on the other hand, would assert that kids are just the point.
Nobody with a brain in their head wants kids. Many of them wish they had thought it through or exercised a little self-control when they had the ones they did. There is yet another little girl missing in Florida as I write this who has probably been kidnapped and sold, if not raped and murdered, or both. I am making no inference as to the reason for this in her case, but I will say this much-she will be joined by more strangely missing children. If the economy stays bad for over a year, there will probably be enough of them to form their own state.
Everybody wants to fuck, more than usual in fact. What else is there to do? But they are being far more cautious than usual about it. You can expect not only an increase in condom sales, but a corresponding uptick in the number of abortions over the coming months, and since there is now evidently a relaxing of the old welfare reform rules of the nineties, with the passage of the stimulus bill, you can expect the anti-abortion movement to become more irrelevant than possibly ever before. It will at best go back to being the fringe movement that it was in the seventies and eighties, when most conservative Christians probably secretly wished that the welfare drawing, generally Democratic voting, mostly single mothers would have at least one abortion a year.
Nadya Suleman is a poster child for welfare reform and the Pro-Choice movement, and may in fact currently be one of the best friends both ever had. Both movements will grow in popularity over the next few years. It is only when times are generally good that most Pro-Life people feel they and the world can afford the price of their convictions. What ones remain devoted to the cause will be the ones most likely to be seen standing in sandwich signs that announce the coming end of the world, which would seem all the more a conflict of priorities to the sane amongst us, who can't help but perceive a certain lack of irony, if not integrity.
In the meantime, remember-love is never having to say "Hey, how do I know it's mine?"
Now do you get it? Hope? Change you can believe in? No, this is more like change back to the old order of business and hope for the best. Democratic supporters naturally view this as a panacea, a cure-all. Republican supporters are almost certain it is going to wreck the economy and possibly put us firmly on the irreversible road to socialism.
As is usually the case, the truth probably lies somewhere in between the two extreme viewpoints, which is precisely the point. Remember when George W. Bush ran, promising his own brand of change, including a more civil public discourse? The only real change was from one of Democratic policies to Republican, with Bush touting tax cuts as the one sure answer for every situation both good and bad. Unfortunately, the was the only true policy change aside from those necessitated (or at least inspired) by the events of 9/11. Everything else remained the same. Bush actually grew the size and scope of the federal government, serving to further increase an already impressive mountain of debt. His unfunded mandates in education, and both of his wars, initially botched, and ran on borrowed money and time, exacerbated the situation.
By the time Obama came along, America was ready for a change, as it usually is after eight years on the average. This time it's the Democrats turn to offer the hoped-for change-but is it really change? An increase in welfare funding and grants to such organization as ACORN might in some cases by appropriate and understandable, maybe even necessary. We can have that debate. We can honestly discuss the need for funding of alternative energy sources and medical reform, and all of the other provisions in this bill, but let's call it what it is. This is more than just a stimulus package, this is a Democratic sponsored and taxpayer funded political pay-off to Democratic Party interest groups with a few targeted tax-cuts included just to take the edge off the pain.
And I for one am sure it will do some good in some areas. We obviously need more investment in infrastructure. There also needs to be some aid to state governments, who have, after all, been through no fault of their own severely impacted in a good many cases in no small part due to the incompetence and overbearing demands of the federal government. I am so serious about this, in retrospect, I am not even sure it would be appropriate to demand accountability insofar as how the states spend the money, but I guess there has to be some degree of oversight.
Be that as it may, this humongous porker of a bill is obviously a Democratic wish list of pay-offs and gifts that would have come about if times were as good as they now are bad, just like those Bush tax cuts. They are going to do some good, but they are going to also increase the debt, add to inflation and, in the long run, do little if any good as far as economic stimulation goes. What we are looking at is a long-range economic malaise that would probably best be compared to the Jackson-Van Buren years from 1832 to 1840, and might possibly even approach or even surpass those of the Great Depression.
Hopefully, things won't get that bad, but here's a clue-we have been digging this hole for years, and it's not going to go away overnight, nor can we spend our way out of it without making some tough, hard choices in the way of government waste reduction, which this bill most assuredly will not do.
Things might improve just enough in the short term to warrant in the minds of most voters an Obama re-election, but I truly dread the long term consequences of this bill, and further Democratic initiatives, which would over the course of the next eight years be even more greatly compounded by the appointment of two to three, at least, Ruth Bader Ginsburg clones to the Supreme Court, to say nothing of the countless federal court appointments.
By the time another eight years (or possibly four) rolls around, people will be yet clamoring for yet more "hope" and "change" (the oldest campaign slogans in the world, incidentally), and they will gravitate to the nearest guarantor of this promise.
This time, of course, it will be a Republican who will, in all seeming sincerity, announce to the nation that "It's time for a change", and we all will undoubtedly collectively fall for it-again. And, just like the last time, it will be a change from Democratic orthodoxy to Republican orthodoxy.
When Nazis and racists deny the Holocaust, what they are saying, in effect, is that they publicly denounce the notion of genocide. After all, they would otherwise hail Hitler's "master plan" as an ingenious idea that was years ahead of its time, and would accept this as an article of faith. Their denial is then a rejection of such policies, by denying that they actually occurred. What they are doing is tantamount to having their cake and eating it too. In a great many cases, they are probably guilty of ideological masturbation.
What Pope Benedict has done in his latest move seems to me to be somewhat the spiritual equivalent of spanking the monkey. The Pope, however, in his infinite wisdom and doctrinal infallibility, is jacking off publicly, and it is not a pretty sight.
First he denounces the statements of Bishope Williamson in the latter's expressed views which amount to Holocaust denial, he reprimands him, and then he expresses what he clearly elaborates as the known and well established Church policy, which almost amounts to a form of Church dogma. Yet, the Bishop himself gets a mere slap on the wrist, if it amounts to even that much. Bear in mind, Williamson made his statements in clear and knowing contradiction of official Church policy. What would the Pope say if Williamson claimed Mary was probably just an unwed pregnant mother who made up a really cool excuse?
Abraham Foxman had this to say about the Pope's astonishing actions-
“You can’t condemn anti-Semitism and Holocaust denial and then reinstate someone who’s a Holocaust denier,” Mr. Foxman said. He called the pope’s statements “significant and very important,” but said they “did not bring closure.”
After the global outcry over Bishop Williamson’s remarks in recent weeks, the Vatican has said that the members of the St. Pius X Society will have to accept the teachings of Vatican II in order to return to full communion with the church. This week, the bishop was removed as the head of his seminary in Argentina.
I see where Foxman is coming from. It's either a matter of personal opinion, or a Bishop is seen as a representative of the church's views and must conform to church dogma. I don't see how Benedict can justify taking both positions simultaneously, but that seems to be what he's doing. He doesn't really know what he's doing, in my opinion. It's obscene for a religious figure to act in such a way, and expect the world's Catholics to sit by and join him in what would amount to one giant public group circle-jerk. His final actions in removing him from his seminary in Argentina would seem to be more of a political response than a spiritual judgment.
Of course, this too is understandable. Most lay Catholics over the course of the last century seem to have wised up over this papal infallibility business, which is now explained as mere doctrinal infallibility. Benedict seems to have failed even that test with this debacle, and explaining away his actions as those of a comparatively weak pope only serves as a further revelation of this divine truth.
Michael Phelps smoking a bong doesn’t set too well with a lot of people, especially people with teenage children, and so it might seem understandable that at least one of his sponsors, Kelloggs, has announced they will not be renewing their contract with the record-breaking gold-medal Olympic swimming champion. The truth is probably even more offensive than it sounds to some pro-marijuana advocacy groups. They were probably planning to end the contractual relationship anyway. It wasn’t going to last forever. How long exactly did preceding record-holder Mark Spitz appear on boxes of Wheaties? Alas, Olympic champions even of the caliber of Spitz and Phelps have limited marketing potential. Time passes quickly.
Nevertheless, they felt this was yet another potential marketing ploy, and so they released the following statement.
"We originally built the relationship with Michael, as well as the other Olympic athletes, to support our association with the U.S. Olympic team. Michael's most recent behavior is not consistent with the image of Kellogg. His contract expires at the end of February and we have made a decision not to extend his contract."
This might be a big mistake, as already several groups are calling for a boycott of all Kellogg’s products.
The leader of one of the biggest legalize-pot organizations,
Marijuana Policy Project, called Kelloggs action "hypocritical and disgusting," and said he'd never seen his membership so angry, with more than 2,300 of them signing an online petition.
Also urging a boycott were the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, Students for Sensible Drug Policy and the Drug Policy Alliance. They encouraged their members to contact Kellogg to vent their views.
It’s the least we can do. We can accomplish two things. We can come to the aid of an American champion, and make the point that the majority of American people want an end to the current ridiculous and oppressive marijuana laws, which remain on the books despite most of our wishes. Especially given the current state of the national economy, they are all the more inappropriate.
These days, the power of the wallet is the only power we really have-such as it is. Let’s make it plain, if you want our business, you might not want to piss us off by promoting policies most of us don't support or at least wish to see greatly reformed.
Seth Myers of Saturday Night Live also got into the act when, during a Weekend Update segment, he leveled the following criticism-
"Every one of your mascots is a wild-eyed cartoon character with uncontrollable munchies," Myers said. "Every one of your products sounds like a wish a genie granted at a Phish concert."
The USA Swimming team has nevertheless lowered the boom on Phelps, and issued the following public reprimand-
"This is not a situation where any anti-doping rule was violated, but we decided to send a strong message to Michael because he disappointed so many people, particularly the hundreds of thousands of USA Swimming member kids who look up to him as a role model and a hero. Michael has voluntarily accepted this reprimand and has committed to earn back our trust."
That of course might be the least of Phelps worries. Several of the South Carolina college students with whom he partied during the time in question have been arrested, and Phelps himself might be subject to future charges, according to Richland County South Carolina sheriff Leon Lott, who issued the following statement-
"This case is no different than any other case. This one might be a lot easier since we have photographs of someone using drugs and a partial confession. It’s a relatively easy case once we can determine where the crime occurred."
Aside from the concerns of a handful of South Carolina college students (one of whom probably made a fistful of dollars by taking and selling the photo to begin with), some people seem to think the government, and law-enforcement, have other things to deal with that are of far greater importance, and fear that Michael Phelps latest problems might provide a greater emphasis to push for more stringent enforcement of already overly harsh and out-dated marijuana laws, to say nothing of reducing the likelihood of marijuana and drug law reform.
Still others blame Phelps, not for putting himself in such an untenable position, but for kowtowing to the dictates of a repressive anti-drug policy, which they claim is based more on hysteria than anything. They urge him to more or less stand up for himself, and not apologize. In effect, they encourage him to "get off your knees".
Indeed, they seem to assert that he should wear the pothead badge with pride while pointing out that he is, after all, a fourteen time Olympic gold medalist. The following statement by a friend of Phelps who was present at the party in question would seem to suggest that it wasn't an unusual thing for Phelps. According to him-
"At one point someone asked him if he wanted to smoke some weed. Michael didn't hesitate and headed to a small back room, where he was immediately handed a big red bong. He grabbed the bong and a lighter and ripped a huge smelly bong rip." The source continues, "He knew exactly what he was doing. He looked just as natural with a bong in his hands as he does swimming the backstroke."
Be that as it may, it is probably unrealistic to think Phelps might suddenly become an activist for legalization or de-criminalization of marijuana. Phelps is first and foremost concerned with his future career and contract potential, to say nothing of the fact that he is probably not concerned with activism on this issue to begin with. This of course is the reason why he released the following statement-
Phelps issued the following apology:
''I engaged in behavior which was regrettable and demonstrated bad judgment. I'm 23 years old and despite the successes I've had in the pool, I acted in a youthful and inappropriate way, not in a manner people have come to expect from me. For this, I am sorry. I promise my fans and the public it will not happen again.''
The following statement seems far more contrite and personal, yet it is also tinged with an understandable hint of bitterness.
"It's time like these that you really get true support. I've been able to really find out who my friends and family are. It's by no means been easy - bad judgement, yeah, and it's something I plan learning off of. I don't take drugs. I get drug-tested all the time. You can look at the records and you can see. It was bad judgement and a bad mistake."
As for any future effect on drug laws, I doubt there will be any long-lasting effect. There will be some noise made “For The Good Of The Children”(tm), but after so long it will fade into the ether. By the time this is over, a good many of the children in question will be on their way towards mastering all levels of the latest version of Grand Theft Auto, probably while higher than hell. while Michael Phelps will have groped his seventeenth exotic dancer, thus continuing to habitually alienate yet another special interest group.
As for Phelps, when he fails to compete in the next Olympics, or if he fails to medal if he does compete-or even if he merely fails to break his own record-these same people will be blaming it on the pot, or perhaps a real or imagined gambling addiction, one that might well be enhanced by an attraction to cocktail waitresses and exotic dancers.
He seems determined to match or surpass his medal count with the number of outraged special interest groups he seems to constantly offend.
More power to him. Way too many of us seem to like our heroes pure, whether we are pure ourselves or not. Ironically, our kids could care less. They just like their heroes. After all, they need all of them they can get. Ironically, then can now identify with Phelps more than they ever could before, and this is including even the ones who never have and never would smoke marijuana, gamble, or frequent exotic dance clubs-or dance therein. Sometimes I think they understand better than do their parents that, in fact, there really are no perfect people, maybe especially including the heroes. The first people to drive this lesson home to them are, of course, their parents. It’s only when we get older that we strive for perfection, probably out of some misguided need to atone for our own follies, or those of our parents. As always, we fall flat on our asses and continue the vicious cycle. Those who expect it from their children are engaged in the cruelest of follies, having learned nothing from one of the most important lessons life throws at all of us. Those who expect it from others are simply arrogant hypocrites.
She won, but will probably lose when Benyamen Netanyahu forms what will actually be the future ruling Israeli coalition-a conservative coalition. This is good news on all levels. Israeli society is obviously veering center-right, and though this will give Bibi a great deal of leverage, he will appreciate the fact that he doesn't really have a solid mandate, which will make him amenable to reasonable compromise.
Overall, this is good news for Israeli security, as well as for overall Middle Eastern stability, which needs all the stability it can muster. This should in turn help stabilize oil prices. Well, we can always hope.
Labor and Kadima have both proven they are inept, weak, and corrupt, and wholly unable to do more at best than keep the barbarians at the gate, not counting the flurry of missiles which have seemed to make their way past the gate on a near daily basis.
Obama can work with Bibi. He will have to. The US needs competent governance in Israel, not a temperamental lapdog that does little more than eat and bark.
Some of the more far right Israelis, Jews, and Jewish supporters, such as my friend Mad Zionist, will of course be wholly or at least greatly dissatisfied with Bibi, and in part for much good reason.
Still, from my perspective, this is the overall best possible scenario, realistically speaking.
About one third of California's inmate population will be freed over the course of the next two to three years in what seems to be the only viable answer to the state's prison overcrowding, which a Federal Court has deemed unconstitutional, according to this AP report.
Without a U.S. Supreme Court reprieve, California will have to free roughly a third of its prison inmates in a few years, and how that can be done safely is still hotly debated.
Corrections officials said Tuesday they are struggling with their response to a tentative federal court ruling this week that the state must remove as many as 57,000 inmates over the next two or three years.
The state's 33 adult prisons now hold about 158,000 inmates. But the judges said overcrowding is so severe it unconstitutionally compromises medical care of inmates, and releasing prisoners is the only solution.
Well, I guess that could be a way to deal with the state's budget woes. Kentucky has toyed with roughly the same idea, with non-violent offenders. Frankly, probably a good third of most prison's inmates have no business there, but are themselves victims of minimum sentencing guidelines, put mostly in place during the Reagan years as a means of addressing the problem of illicit drug use.
Still, this might be a good idea that is finally being implemented at the worst possible time. Most of these prisoners, or at least a large percentage of them, will probably end up on public assistance, therefore saving California no money, and possibly even costing more. Add to this the very real problem of the huge surge in unemployment and you can see where this is adding gasoline to an already blazing fire. What choice will they have but to turn to public assistance-or to crime? Speaking of which, let's be candid here-a good many of them probably do belong in prison after all, and that's probably exactly where they will be heading back to at some point, regardless of the economy, under the best of circumstances.
What struck me most about this news item though was its seeming presumption that time will stand still for the next three years. I am sure there will be plenty of new arrivals that will serve to keep the California prison system as overcrowded over the next few years as it is now-unless of course they either change a few unnecessarily oppressive drug laws, or just flat out ignore them. Either one would be sufficient to help solve the budget woes of many a cash-strapped state.
Well, if they are just going to turn around and put them right back on the streets anyway, what purpose does it serve to enforce the law to begin with? Isn't that a waste not only of taxpayer's money, but police resources?
In addition to the stimulus package, there was a variety of nonsense discussed during Obama's first official presidential news conference that of worthy of note.
This was the first presidential news conference to which The Huffington Post was invited, at least to ask a question, and one would hope, however vainly, that they might ask something pertinent and perhaps a little less partisan than whether or not Obama would support charging past Bush Administration officials with crimes.
Not a very good first impression to leave the general public, but anyway, here it is-
STEIN: Thank you, Mr. President. Today, Senator Patrick Leahy announced that he wants to set up a truth and reconciliation committee to investigate the misdeeds of the Bush administration. He said that, before you turn the page, you have to read the page first.
Do you agree with such a proposal? And are you willing to rule out right here and now any prosecution of Bush administration officials?
Obama's response was non-specific, and about as moderate an answer as you could hope for under the circumstances. The basic gist of his reply?
My view is also that nobody's above the law and, if there are clear instances of wrongdoing, that people should be prosecuted just like any ordinary citizen.
Note how he specified "clear instances of wrongdoing". That won't set too well with a large segment of the Post's readers, who would probably prefer to pour over every document and public utterance with a fine-toothed comb in order to ferret out any slight hint of objectionable actions with the aim to conduct as partisan a witch hunt as possible. Nor would they content themselves with a handful of high-level officials.
That this question is based on a proposed Judiciary Committee investigation by Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy makes it all the more ominous, precisely because the page has been read-and read, and read, and read, and read-for the last roughly five years, at least. What else is there to know? If there is something actionable, it should already be on the table. Make the case now or shut up about it. Don't try to be dragging the country through yet another extended public character assassination ritual.
The Huffington Post had a golden opportunity to make an impression on behalf of the blogosphere that it has grown into a serious facet of the world of actual journalism. Instead, it doubtless left many the impression of a spoiled child that should have been left outside to play while the grown-ups endeavored to conduct adult business.
Unfortunately, many of the adults came across no better, and certainly no more mature.
Perhaps the most foolish question asked was about lifting the ban on the showing of coffins as they returned to the states, of soldiers killed in the Iraq and Afghan wars. Many, such as HuffPo, want to assert that this is showing respect to the fallen heroes.
Hell, why stop at just showing the coffins as they arrive? Why the hell not just open the damn things up and give everybody a good look inside? That would really impress people, once they got a good look at just how horrible a sacrifice these brave soldiers made for their country. Who cares what the families think? There's surely no way it would inflame passions further against the wars, would it?
Of course, no assessment of the drivel that was spewed during the course of this press conference could possible be complete without a recounting of the contribution by Helen Thomas.
The correct answer, of course, would have been "the only one that really needs them", but Obama skirted around the obvious inflammatory, and actually accusatory question with admirable skill.
All in all, Obama handled himself pretty well throughout all this bilge, and actually made somewhat of a good case for his stimulus package, though I am still not convinced that it is anything but a political stunt designed to buy and shore up support.
Hopefully, the Huffington Post, Helen Thomas, and others of their ilk will be just as harsh and demanding as to the truth and veracity of these and other such Obama Administration policies as they have been those of the Bush Administration, but I seriously have my doubts.
It's only a minor irritation that Barak Obama might well take to the public airwaves tonight to promote his so-called stimulus package, therefore depriving me of what is typically my favorite night of television viewing, but what really makes it bad is that if he does so, he will in effect preempt what is generally good fiction for poorly-conceived outright fantasy.
He could at least arrange to have a horror music score with nerve-raking crescendos timed at just the right parts of his speech. We could all use the comic relief.
Besides, according to Gallup, a majority of Americans are all sufficiently terrified of the potential consequences of not passing the stimulus. However, note that this is only fifty-one percent, leveraged against a forty-eight percent approval rating for Congressional Democrats versus a meager thirty-plus percent approval for Congressional Republicans. The only thing likely keeping this thing afloat is Obama's own relatively high popularity ratings-a solid 67 percent. Translation-he is still riding high off the fumes of his victory and hopes to make the most of it while he still has a chance to pay off his constituents and supporters-known in Newspeak as "save the economy before it is too late".
Although most Republicans have held firm against this obvious and blatant misuse of taxpayers money-including, surprisingly, John McCain-there are a handful of GOP Senators willing to go along with the scam-three of them in the Senate, to be precise, including Arlen Specter (Pennsylvania) and Susan Collins (Maine).
Obama has also managed to bring on board none other than Florida Governor Charlie Crist, who seems to be looking toward a run for the US Senate in 2010 to replace Senator Mel Martinez.
In the meantime, several House Republicans have been the recipients of several automated calls urging their cooperation.
The calls are set to run against GOP Reps. Bill Cassidy (La.), John Fleming (La.), Brett Guthrie (Ky.), Leonard Lance (N.J.), Christopher Lee (N.Y.) and Blaine Luetkemeyer (Mo.), in addition to Rooney.
The calls come as a new Gallup Poll shows 51 percent of Americans say a stimulus plan is "critically important" and a week after the DCCC launched radio ads targeting 28 Republican members who voted against the package. The radio ads will end their run tomorrow. All seven freshmen targeted by the phone calls also had radio ads run against them.
An example of one such ad aimed at the constituents of a GOP Congressman is as follows-
"Did you know Congressman Tom Rooney voted against economic recovery that would immediately create and save nearly 330,000 Florida jobs?" asks a call targeting the freshman Florida Republican.
"Times are tough. Tell Congressman Rooney to put families before politics," the caller intones.
In the meantime, in the hurry to push this monster spending bill through, put on the back burner has been the plan of Treasury Secretary Geitner to utilize the 700 billion dollar stimulus bill from last year (what is left of it) to shore up those banks affected by bad mortgages. Many seem to think this news, once it is officially announced, will result in an upswing in the stock market, which of course would take a lot of the wind out of the sails of those pushing Obama's plan. His announcement, nevertheless, has been put off until Wednesday, at the earliest, in order to buy more time for Obama's plan to gain sufficient support to insure passage, preferably with at least some semblance of bi-partisanship.
Where to begin? It is just beyond my comprehension that public servants should be so vile, or that so many of the American public could be so servile. Is this truly the level to which we have descended? Evidently, the American public who hold out such great hope for this package have neglected to consider one important fact-just because somebody says it's so, doesn't make it true.
Even if the stimulus bill would work, under the current set of circumstances, there is so much that could happen that could render it totally useless within a matter of weeks, if not days. What if there was yet another major flare-up in the Middle East that caused the price of oil to once more skyrocket near the one hundred forty dollar-per-barrel range, or more. Much more? What if there were another major terrorist attack, especially on American soil? What if yet another major corporation went belly-up? Or two, or three? What if the stars colluded to the extent that all of these things happened over a relatively short period of time? Can we take it all back? Of course not.
The most maddening thing is, according to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, it might all be unnecessary to begin with-even on the highly unlikely chance it could work-for the simple fact they have projected that the current recession will finally end, on its own, during the early part of the second half of this year.
So now we see yet another potential reason for this rush to implementation of a bad, ill-advised piece of legislation that just aims to throw yet more good money after bad. If the CBO's prediction holds true, then Obama and the Congressional Democratic majority can claim at least a degree of credit for the improvement. The problem is, of course, the stimulus package might actually make matters worse. In that case, they need as many Republicans as possible to help share the blame. Of course the many that refuse to support the bill will be blamed anyway.
As for the Democrats, they will continue to confuse, manipulate, obfuscate, and outright lie their way through the next two years, while average Americans will just hope, perhaps beyond all reasonable hope, that things will work out and that, indeed, the recession will end by the start of the second half of this year, as the CBO predicts.
Here's what might be the vital part of the article.
Although testicular cancer is normally curable when caught early, some patients are not diagnosed until the disease is advanced. Undescended testes in childhood and a family history of the disease are known to increase the risk.
The disease is thought to begin in the womb when germ cells in the foetus (those that will eventually make sperm in the adult) fail to develop properly. Exposure to male hormones in adolescence is thought to trigger development of cancer in the affected cells. Chronic cannabis use is known to reduce sperm quality and increase impotence, which are linked with testicular cancer.
The testes have receptors for tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the main psychoactive ingredient in cannabis, and the male reproductive system is known to naturally produce a cannabinoid-like chemical that is thought to protect against the disease.
The researchers speculate that cannabis may interfere with this anti-tumour effect, increasing the risk of the cancer developing.
Well, that explains Lance Armstrong's prior relationship to a certain nutcase female rock star. Somebody be sure and point this out to Michael Phelps.
It's easy to see how feisty Etta James is for an old broad in the video above, and why she would take exception to the impression she had that she was treated disrespectfully during the Obama inauguration party at which Beyonce Knowles sung her signature song "At Last", while newly sworn-in President Obama and wife Michele shared the dance floor.
I'm not taking sides here, but I will point out in Beyonce's defense that, as she was an early and vocal supporter of Obama, it makes sense that she might receive an invitation to sing the song that she covered in the movie Cadillac Records, in which she played the role of a young Etta James.
Nor has her life been as particularly or relatively easy as some might assume. Her success came after years of training, practice, and generally hard work, through which her father quit his job to act as the manager of the girl's group that would go on to become Destiny's Child. Because of this, the family income was halved and the strain resulted in the break-up of the marriage of the budding young stars parents.
Etta James, on the other hand, was born into hard circumstances in Los Angeles, as the illegitimate child of a single mom who claimed (and probably wrongly believed) that Jamesetta was the daughter of legendary pool great Minnesota Fats, who happened to have lived and worked as a pool hall manager in Washington DC during the time in question.
The future Etta James, however, took her own destiny into her own hands, and with her own girl group of friends, ran off to San Francisco and auditioned, where they quickly were taken under the wing of various session men and record producers. Their first hit, "Roll With Me Henry", was an answer song to an earlier R&B hit by a male artist. Due to the suggestive nature of the title and lyrics and the resultant protests by some radio stations, the title was changed to "The Wallflower (Dance With Me Henry). Etta James was fourteen years old at the time.
She found regular work as a back-up vocalist and scored several other hits, some of which did well on the R&B and blues charts, but it wasn't until 1961 and "At Last" that she scored her first crossover hit. Even then, it might surprise many to know that this now standard classic hit (which was actually a cover of an earlier version by the Glenn Miller Orchestra released twenty years earlier) never got above number 41 on the pop charts.
Over the years, James became an addict and alcoholic, but remained a prodigious performer and recording artist, eventually garnering a slew of awards and separate Hall of Fame inductions.
They seem to be complete opposites in many regards. Beyonce worked hard to achieve success, and now has it relatively easy. James achieved success with amazing ease, but her life since then seems to have been a constant struggle. Why wouldn't she want to kick Beyonce's ass? She says now of course she was joking, and in a sense she probably was. However, the best jokes are based on some degree of real sentiment.
Etta James probably has seen her share of abuse from the time she was a beginning young girl star, and never really saw any choice but to go with the flow if she wanted to achieve her dream, which she probably still in her mind has never quite grasped to the level to which she still aspires, now from the confines of the motorized wheelchair upon which she rides out on the stage for her limited sets, which yet draw respectable, and respectful, crowds.
Nor is she particularly impressed at Obama, who she probably sees as someone who would be hard-pressed to survive in the rough-and-tumble world that was the era in which she grew up, let alone rocket to the position of power to which he has soared, also with seeming relative ease.
Her statements regarding Obama and Beyonce at the Seattle concert were in keeping with her own rough-edged stage persona, crafted over years of concert appearances with the likes of B B King, Doctor John, and other such luminaries whom she would probably view as real, honest, tough, legitimate artists and performers like herself. That she would be willing to express such disdainful views is actually in keeping with her character, which can be crude to the point of obscene.
To her own way of thinking, she didn't really threaten to just kick Beyonce's ass-she actually did kick Beyonce's ass, right there and right then, and gave Obama a good knee to the groin for good measure. Beyonce declined comment, while Obama's response came through a spokesperson.
In the parlance of Etta James world, they punked out.
Adrian Desmond has written an article which serves as something of a preview to a new book he has co-written with James Moore in which they assert Charles Darwin was inspired to arrive at his theory of evolution through his experience with slavery. So disgusted by the practice was he, that he proposed the theory at least in part as a way of asserting the universal brotherhood of all mankind. Of course, he didn't stop there. According to Darwin, all living things are related and descended from an original life form.
The BBC article makes for very interesting reading. Evidently, Darwin kept a great lot to himself, as it seems he was not the only one who propounded a similar theory, and he knew very well how other proponents of similar theories were treated by the scientific community of his day. Yet, he took it to the point that he was able to amass a body of work that could be presented as proof of the validity of the theory.
In so doing, Charles Darwin changed the world, and so has to be viewed as one of the great people of all time. I would go so far as to say it I were to make a list of historical figures whom I most admire, he would almost undoubtedly make my top ten. Even if I didn't agree with a single word of the theory of evolution, I would have to be impressed by the sheer brilliance of it.
Evidently, a group of churches in England agree with my perspective, and in recognition of his two hundredth birthday-as well as the 150th anniversary of Darwin's "The Origin Of Species"-have been holding a seminar in which they have discussed his contributions to science and ways in which they can get the point across that the theory of evolution does not necessarily conflict with religion.
Although I am sure many of the more literalistic minded, fundamentalist religions would disagree, I would have to say it's about time.
It seems that early conservation efforts have produced an over-abundance of dangerous animals in a variety of places, including Texas, where the Texas State Legislature is considering adopting the same approach Sarah Palin has to reducing the wolf population in Alaska. Soon-and evidently it can't be too soon to suit the numerous farmers and ranchers of West Texas-you will be able to pay a fee in order to engage in the sport of aerial hunting. The target?
A word of caution though about that link. I used it due to it's focus on the Texas legislation, despite it's many inaccuracies, the most egregious being the statement by the reporter to the effect that, though feral hogs are dangerous to small animals and even some livestock, they are not dangerous to humans, from whom they would just as soon run away from "on their stubby legs".
In fact, they are as dangerous to humans as they are to any other animals. They are in fact very aggressive, especially when hungry or horny-which seems to be a perpetual state in all cases.
Aside from their aggression, they wreak havoc on plants and crops, thus endangering the food supplies of other animals in their native habitats. They will in fact eat anything and everything that is biodegradable.
A commenter to the article gives a compelling description of the feral hog, as well as a rundown of the many dangers it poses.
The feral hog population is completely out of control. We will do something about it when they take down a couple of kids near the populated areas. And when they get into a feeding frenzy, they will eat anything, including each other. I was riding around a ranch with the owner in South Texas and asked how do you know there are feral hog out here? He said "do you see any cow poop"? They travel in packs and they have werewolf-looking heads – snouts grow out, balding hair patterns, gnarly looking teeth that go ever which way, and beady little eyes mounted on the side of big ol heads. They are incredibly fast. And there are millions of them now. They have no known predator. They carry Brucellosis. They have nasty scent glands. The males are caped with an inch of tallow armor, a clavicle protecting a heart shot, a thick bone head that bullets glance off of. And they are smart until they get hungry or horny, then they make mistakes – just like us. And you can make them mad. Good eating, tho (ha!). But save the last pistol shot for yourself, if the hunt goes bad.
Admittedly, this is by no means an expert opinion, and the numbers that he cites-millions-are doubtless exaggerated, but it provides a good anecdotal backdrop to the story.
Here is another web-site that gives probably a more accurate description of the animal, along with numerous separate articles pertaining to them.
Some might mistakenly confuse them for wild boars, and although to a great extent they are part wild boar, an animal which was brought over centuries ago from Europe, they are for the most part predominantly the offspring of escaped or abandoned domesticated hogs, and native American wild hogs, which was seemingly the intended breeding target among those who brought the wild boar across the Atlantic. Now they are a big problem, not only in the ways previously listed, but due to the simple fact that they can live in, and adapt to, any type of terrain. Although they are relatively limited for now, this could easily change, given their adaptability and prodigious rates of reproduction.
Of course, there are some who object to the aerial hunting bill, though it is hard to conceive of how they could possible have the grounds to do so, and certainly garner any kind of significant support, especially in Texas, where this is a growing problem of some significance.
On the other hand, I never would have thought it possible that hunting bears would ever be illegal in Kentucky, but it was, and now that there is an official bear hunting season, opponents are trying their best to limit the kinds of weapons that could be used to kill these animals, despite the fact that they are with ever greater frequency finding their way into areas of human habitation. Despite the obvious danger involved here, the anti-bear hunting activists insist that hunters during bear season should be limited to flint-lock loading rifles and cross-bows, out of some misguided sense of fairness to the bears-one of which not too long ago broke into a man's house. Despite the fact that had the man not killed the bear it would have killed his dog and possibly himself, to say nothing of the property damage that might have resulted, the man was actually prosecuted.
Some people just don't get it, and probably never will. It's going to be interesting to see what kind of excuses these so-called wildlife activists come up with in Texas. I guess the folks there had better be thankful there are no Republican politicians supporting this bill who have a conceivable shot at achieving national office.
Evidently animal rights activist think farmer and ranchers like to kill wolves and other predators in what little spare time they have, as if they don't have more important things to do. As for the Inuit who subsist off of the moose and caribou populations in Alaska, evidently they need a cultural readjustment or some form of social retraining.
Sarah Palin is therefore taking heat from several animal rights groups, including the Defenders Of Wildlife, who have utilized the talents of actress and film star Ashley Judd in a promotional video in opposition to Palin's practices of paying bounties for the severed forelegs of killed wolves. You can see the video at the site by way of the link.
The Scotsman has what seems to be a pretty well-balanced piece on the controversy, but there is considerable more information to be found in Salon that gives a fairly detailed account of the activists position.
This following passage gives a pretty good indication of one of the major disconnects between the two opposing camps-
Detractors consider the airborne shootings a savage business, conducted under the euphemism "predator control." The airplanes appear in the winter, so the wolves show up like targets in a video game, sprinting across the white canvas below. Critics believe the practice violates the ethics of hunting, while supporters say the process is not hunting at all, but a deliberate cull.
Well, obviously the emphasis here from the vantage point of the pro-wolf hunting forces is in culling the herd, in keeping their numbers down to manageable levels in order to prevent their decimation of the moose, caribou, and other animal populations. That some might be approaching the aerial wolf hunting program as a sport might be unfortunate, but somewhat understandable. That, however, is not the major focus, so there is no need for undue emphasis on sportsmanship or giving the wolves a "fighting chance". The point is to reduce their numbers.
At the same time, I am not altogether unsympathetic to the point of view of the animal rights advocates, at least in this case. According to them, most wolves that eat caribou and moose eat them as carrion, in other words after they have died by other means. Or, perhaps, as is often the case in nature, they have run down and killed the oldest and sickest of the herd, which would undoubtedly die soon at any rate.
Those in favor of the aerial hunting of wolves and also bears, by the way, should make sure they are on firm ground here. I have a strong and unnerving suspicion that a great lot of these folks would be fine if every wolf in Alaska were destroyed, and that would be a great loss to nature if it were allowed to occur.
Politically, this is a chance for Palin to reach out to the other side and seek some form of rational compromise. She needs to double check, and even triple check her data on the moose, caribou, and wold populations and make sure they are accurate, as there does seem to be some legitimate questions as to this, and indeed as to the accuracy of the number of wolves being killed by the aerial hunting program initiated by her predecessor, Governor Mikowski, which she has greatly expanded upon.
There might also be another way of controlling the wolf population, if indeed it is too large, that would not only be less cruel, but just as effective and perhaps even less expensive. Trapping and relocating should be given a greater emphasis, and ways should be studied to see if that is a viable option.
However, the activist groups opposed to the hunting need to understand that the needs of indigent populations, such as the Inuit, as well as farmers and ranchers and those who depend on them, cannot afford to sit idly by for perhaps two or three decades in the hopes that the cycles of nature will eventually swing the pendulum back and even things out.
That is how the real world works. But, not really.
Kentucky has been hit with the old triple whammy. First, although the Mighty Quinn spared me during the course of his rampage across the Bluegrass, a good portion of Kentucky got slammed by an ice storm, followed by rain and snow, that resulted in downed power lines and loss of power to wide areas of the state. As a result of this, Kentucky, as well as Arkansas, is now officially a disaster area, and so qualifies for federal aid.
Whammy number two came in the form of the food aid which, it turns out, includes peanut butter-and/or products that include peanut butter-which seems to have originated from the same plant that has been accused of shipping products even after inspections turned up traces of salmonella, which went on to kill a number of people across the country. It is worth noting that the same Peanut Corporation of America has had it's federal contract canceled to supply food products for government aid programs, although this did not prevent previous contributions from being sent to Kentucky and Arkansas.
Now, in the midst of a federal investigation in which some members of Congress have expressed the opinion that somebody needs jail time over this fiasco, FEMA has issued warnings that people who receive food aid should avoid eating the peanut butter products included in the federal food-aid to Kentucky, due to an understandable risk of salmonella infection.
Today, I got a glimpse of whammy number three, but this was collectively self-induced by the voters of Kentucky in the person of Governor Steve Beshear, who, during a local news broadcast today, urged calm because, as he put it, there has been not one single report of a salmonella case in Kentucky related to the food aid given the state.
Does that tell you something about how bad off we are in Kentucky? Things are so rotten here, our governor is forced to eat federal food aid for his sustenance.
Actually, what it should tell you more than anything is that when a politician underestimates the intelligence of the general public, he usually ends up sounding like as big an idiot as he assumes they are.
Since there are so many posts, and some of them are quite long, I decided to move them around from the original order. Perfectionist that I am, I was unsatisfied with the original order, but unfortunately I just didn't have the time yesterday to put a lot into it. Anyway, without further ado-
Since I always like to start off Sabbat post series with a song video, I started this set on the previous post with Wah-Wah by George Harrison, recorded live at Madison Square Garden in 1971 at the Concert For Bangla-Desh.
Validation is a short comedy film starring T J Thine, and demonstrates the need for joy in life, and how a simple good-natured smile can be so infectious.
Imbolc Food, Fun, And Games-what can i say, it's not for everybody, but you still might want to give it a try. It might even be good for your heart.
Of course, no good Sabbat celebration would be complete without a good drink, and this one is in keeping with the season, complete as it is with the fire of the God and the mother's milk of the Goddess. I am referring of course to Hot Buttered Rum Cow.
After that comes a film that celebrates human potential in the form of Free-Style Skiing.
Kiva is about a charitable web-site that raises money to aid struggling entrepreneurs in third world countries, which is a worthy endeavor to acknowledge during a Sabbat that aims to encourage positive growth and independence and yet recognizes the need for guidance along the road to success.
Thorn is a new pagan magazine that itself shows great promise and potential for future growth into hopefully something of established and lasting success.
My "Sermon" For Imbolc might be taken by some as an ideological rant, but I did put quite a bit of thought into it. I don't think you have to be an ideologue of any stripe to appreciate where I'm coming from, or at least so I hope.
Finally, the Imbolc series ends with a Druid Meditation For Imbolc, which I lifted from a Yahoo Group in which it was posted by group owner Shadowhawk.
Well, that's it for now. I'll get around later to adding the links, for the benefit of those who find it difficult to navigate a lengthy series of new posts, especially those who aren't particularly fond of reading a large number of posts at one time. The links should make it easier, somewhat. Hopefully I'll be able to get around to adding them sometime today, sooner rather than later. Hope you enjoy them or find at least something to your liking.
Me, I'm taking a couple of days off from this, but I'll return hopefully before the weekend.
Here is a little short film I thought was somewhat in keeping with the spirit of the Imbolc season and with the theme of my series of posts in celebration of the Sabbat. It's about not losing hope, about holding on to the joys in life, and how those who know how to do that can find themselves an inspiration to others in an infectious way.
Some of you might recognize T J Thine, the star of this film, from his work on the Fox series Bones.
Of course, I wouldn't be me if I didn't point out that there is one slight flaw with the premise of this film, or to be more accurate, with how it is resolved. There is a contradiction. Without going any further I'll make up for my wet blanket perfectionism by making a game out of it. See if you can spot the contradiction I'm referring to which is the one flaw in this film. Failing that, just enjoy.
Dried beans such as pintos need to be thoroughly washed before cooking, and ideally should be soaked overnight, the night before they are to be cooked and consumed. This preparation can in itself be a magical ritual calling on the blessing or the deities while imbuing the beans with ones own personal power. They are rich in fiber, iron, and protein, and so are themselves a vast source of physical and even magical energy.
After they come to a heavy boil, reduce the heat to medium and continue cooking while covered for three hours, adding water at regular intervals. Add salt and some other form of seasoning, such as bacon grease, fat meat, or jowell bacon. Add onions and either catsup or hot sauce when serving the beans, which you should eat with a slice of bread and a glass of strong brewed ice tea.
For iced tea, allow to boil moderately for five minutes, about six tea bags to half a gallon of water in a large pot. After boiling, allow bags to steep in brew for an hour over low heat. Afterwards, remove the bags. Add enough water to make about a gallon of tea, to which you should add approximately one third cup of sugar, but no more.
Nothing gives power and strength quite like dried beans, and what more appropriate food to consume for Imbolc? Okay, I guess you might think of something better as far as taste, and you can certainly find more exotic and "fun" fare, but name me something more bristling with raw power, with pure protein energy?
Not only is there magical power to be harnessed and utilized, folks, but lo and behold, you can participate in that tried-and-true children's game that surely transcends the ages-who let that fart?
And you can do it in the context of ritual as well, especially group or coven ritual.
Following a meal of pinto beans augmented with onions and hot sauce and a nice strongly brewed tea-and I can't stress strongly enough you really do need a good strong caffeine tea (nor can i stress enough that one third cup of sugar per gallon is quite sufficient)-you settle in for your group ritual. As this is Imbolc, each participant should bring his and her own candle to light at the appropriate time, which can be either prior to casting circle or after it is released, or for that matter any time during the circle ritual.
The game you play prior to this though is one you might also call Tell Us Your Darkest Secrets, which of course no one is really going to do. Remember, this is all in good fun, though there is a point to it.
Sometime during the course of the evening, someone might well let out a good rip-roaring fart. Naturally, in ordinary circumstances this would prove quite embarrasing, but in this case, you have found your Imbolc Lord or Lady-or both. In the best of circumstances, a round of farts will greet the assembly, which should by all rights be occasion for great merriment. If this does not happen, then it is up to the High Priest or Priestess, or both, to conduct the round of questioning. This can consist of a number of written questions which everyone draws out of a hat or a box. The person should then answer the question as though it applied to them, whether it truly does or not.
They should be sufficiently provocative. Have you ever had an affair? Do you masturbate? Is there someone you would like to hit? If you could get away with stealing something, what would it be? As the questions are read aloud by each participant in turn, and answered forthrightly, it could get noisy.
A word of caution is advised however, and this is where the game turns serious. The smelliest, stinkiest farts are those you never hear. These are indeed what we term the "Silent Killer". People who let silent farts are in fact repressed people, and by their nature it might ordinarily be impossible to bring them out into the light of day. This is not to say they are hiding some monstrous evil, just that they have numerous hang-ups. This occasion, if handled correctly, might be an opportunity to draw them out and set them on a path towards releasing these neurotic feelings which might well be hindering their growth as a person.
Nor will they be that difficult in this sort of environment to pick out. They will be the ones who will seem shyly uncomfortable or perhaps even project an inordinately amused persona, one that is exaggerated to what might even be an inappropriate degree at the louder discharges of another.
Bear in mind, this is not to be done as a malicious undertaking performed in a judgmental manner, it is a manner of heralding the growth of the individual(s), but in a caring yet relaxed manner.
That is after all the message of Imbolc, the formation of the new person through recognition of his or her true potential, a potential that meeds guidance and nurturing, in addition to positive encouragement.
As the sun begins to grow in strength and stature on it's journey through the Wheel of The Year, it is incumbent on us to launch our own journey of discovery and inner growth. Still, we should always remember to not take ourselves too seriously. We are, after all, at this stage in our development during this year, children, and children, while they need positive direction and discipline, also need encouragement and, perhaps as importantly, they need to have some fun and joy. As adults in reality, we can bring forth that lesson by loosening up a bit while aiming for that growth.
Nothing brings that lesson home, nor brings out the best in a group, quite like a good old fashioned rip-roaring round of farts.
Whether for grounding purposes following an Imbolc ritual, or simply just to relax at the end of a long, cold day (especially when it turns into even a colder night), the Hot Buttered Rum Cow should deliver the goods. Just take a gander at it. Doesn't that make your mouth water? Now scroll down for the recipe from TraderTiki
Hot Buttered Rum Cow • 1 tsp Hot Buttered Rum Batter • 1.5 oz Gold Puerto Rican • .5 oz Dark Jamaican Rum • 6 oz. Whole Milk Preheat mug by filling with warm water. Warm the milk on the stove (microwave if you’re impatient) until hot, but still drinkable. Toss the water in the mug and premix the rum and batter, then fill with milk and stir thoroughly. Serve with grated or grinded nutmeg on top.
Of course you're going to need the recipe for Hot Buttered Rum Batter, which is as follows-
Hot Buttered Rum Batter
1 pound brown sugar 1/4 pound butter (1 stick) pinch of salt Ground Spices (Cinnamon, nutmeg, clove) Cream the sugar and butter together in a standing mixer until smooth. Mix in the spices and salt, and stir until spices are well distributed.
Unfortunately, the author neglected to give the measurements for the spices, but it shouldn't be that hard to gauge, and might even make for another little fun bit of magical ritual adding them to taste. Just bear in mind that a little bit of spices goes a long way.
On the other hand, this might seem all a little bit much. If so, you might prefer to opt for the much simpler and yet quite satisfying recipe, that tried-and-true
HOT BUTTERED RUM
I've got to be honest here, back in the day when I used to consider the prospect of one day going to a ski lodge, I used to envision myself sitting by a comfortably lit fireplace in the lodge lounge sipping one of these far more often than I ever saw myself actually on the slopes. This recipe is courtesy of ExtraTasty
Mike's Hot Buttered Rum by s1998m2002
Rum
Brown Sugar Butter Cinnamon Water
Powdered sugar Nutmeg
Mix togeather 1 Cup Brown Sugar 1/2 cup Powdered Sugar 1 teaspoon Cinnamon 1 teaspoon Nutmeg Blend ...
So there you have it. Yes, I know it's Imbolc, and as we are all "children" now in a symbolic sense in attuning with the growing Sun, perhaps some might suggest that we should not indulge in alcohol. Truthfully, they might have a point, but I just can't help myself. I wanna get smashed.
When I get up tomorrow I'll just take the excruciating hangover as a much-needed lesson. What better way than to learn a little self-discipline, eh?
These are professional free-style skiers showing what they're made of in this very high quality and compelling video. Can you imagine how much practice and patience it takes to develop this kind of skill, to say nothing of the courage it takes to actually do this kind of stuff?
I've always been kind of partial to winter sports in general, and I've always been in awe of world-class skiing. I started to post a video of a young girl of six who is a pretty decent snowboarder for her age, as I thought that was in keeping with the spirit of Imbolc in it's own right. As children, we have potential which is really unimaginable, and sadly, most of us don't even begin to tap into it to nearly the fullest extent.
However, I opted instead for this, which shows what can come of the long-term result of consistent and dedicated practice and hard work. It is indeed a form of magic in its own right.
Incidentally, the sound seems to have been removed from this video for some reason, despite a caption which declares a song in dedication to somebody. But really, it's just as well, and would probably be a distraction anyway. The skiing is awesome enough it needs no accompaniment.
By the way, notice the tarot card readings spaced at various intervals, including at the beginning. The person who made this film obviously know his stuff.
I eschewed drawing a power animal for this year's Imbolc after I discovered an article in Science News which is quite, well, compelling. Seeing as how it involves the polar bear, and hints to at least a small degree of veracity as to the theory of Global Warming, I thought it might be of interest. It seems as though grizzly bears are migrating in significant numbers towards more northerly climates, and as a result may be in the process of interbreeding with polar bears. Tha above photo upon DNA examination has proven to be a hybrid. The mother was a polar bear, the father a grizzly, and so it is, depending on your preference for now, a Pizzly or or a Grolar.
It's really too bad the bear in the picture had to be killed, as that makes for a pretty gruesome photo for what is supposed to be a part of a Sabbat series. Unfortunately, I could not find any photos of living Grolar bears, and I thought this story was of sufficient interest that it warranted some kind of descriptive accompaniment, grim though it is.
What is most remarkable about this particular discovery is that the mating habits of bears are such that a male ans female will spend a considerable amount of time-for a bear-before they will consummate the sex act. It takes place over a period of days, which means it was not a matter of an incidental contact with a female in heat that just rolled over for the first male bear that happened alone.
Could this herald the end of the Polar Bear as we know it? Could this turn into an entirely new breed which is equally at home hunting on land as fishing for its food from the ice. Probably not, if for no other reason than conservationists will probably insist on taking steps to prevent the total extinction of the Polar Bear, while at the same time allowing nature to take it's course within the confines of limited regions.
I just thought that was interesting, as it seems to be an aspect of evolution in action, taking place in our own modern day.
It's a story that has been on-going since the beginnings of life on earth-migration and adaptation. The Grolar Bear-the perfect power anumal for these trying times.
For the astrological connoisseur among us, this years Imbolc doesn't offer much in the way of exciting aspects that are particularly noteworthy, at least not at first glance. However, it does bear mentioning that this will be the last Imbolc in any of our lifetimes in which the Sun will be in a conjunction with the planet Neptune. It is a conjunction separated by ten degrees, the most two bodies can be separated and still be considered a conjunction.
It is also easy to draw a connection with current events. Many people are now in the process of losing sight of their dreams and aspirations, in some cases even their most precious hopes. Unfortunately, it is also true that in all too many cases they see their illusions shattered for good reason, in that they were never built on a solid foundation, if in fact many of them were ever based on realistic aspirations to begin with. That is the danger of illusion. By it's nature it seems more real than reality, and even if this is viewed in the negative, it can still be comforting to wallow in our own sense of despair. It makes it easy to hang it up. In today's economy, and with all of the other negative factors at work in the world today, it is all that much easier to wonder if there is really any hope.
Yet, on Imbolc, it is those childlike dreams and fantasies that we must strive to reach for, and nourish. There are in fact a string of conjunctions that give us extra energy on this night, if we but know how to tap into it.
Mercury is in conjunction in the sign of Capricorn with Mars, which is conjunct with Jupiter in the sign of Aquarius, where that last planet is in conjunction yet with the Sun, thus giving us faith, strength, and hope, so long as we but reach for it. Never should we give up on our grandest designs. We should however approach them from a more realistic perspective. They might be distant, but they are not unnattainable, so long as they are realistic goals approached in a similarly realistic manner. That then is the message of this years astrological aspects as applied to the Imbolc Sabbat.
The fact that the Moon in the beginning degrees of Taurus, in which it progresses throughout the day, adds extra energy in the form of a square to the Sun which grows stronger as the night advances, in the meantime approaching a slight sextile with Uranus in Pisces and a trine with Saturn in Virgo. The effect the opposition between Saturn and Uranus is then brought ever so slightly into play and is further heightened by a slight conjunction of Uranus with Venus-but this is so slight it is almost negligible.
Yet, on the other hand, though their direct effect is negligible, their indirect effect by way of the Moon, which forms over the course of the day a sextile with Uranus and a trine with Saturn, might well be considerable.
Finally, the solar conjunction with Neptune might seem minimal, but in this case, the slightness and seeming unimportance of the conjunction is precisely the point. It's hard to let go, even when we must do so. This year might then be the year to, as a wise man once said some time or another "put aside childish things" (okay, no hate mail people).
There is a difference of course between childish and child-like, and that latter is the one thing we should never let slip from our grasp.
I could almost just let this one pass without comment. Come to think of it, I can let it go with just one minor observation. We don't always make our own luck, but a lot of times we do at least in part. The rough part is where it seems to be too late to change anything. Sometimes you just have to go with the flow. These days, for many of us, that is really all we have-the flow. Oh well, just make the best of it I guess. Who knows, maybe things will turn out to not really be that bad. The Wheel Of Fortune of course can stand for good luck as easily as bad. As applied individually, it really means a change in fortune. So if you have had it rough, I guess this would mean you've got something to look forward to. Maybe that's the whole point, looking forward. Everybody has something they could stand to change for the better in their lives, so maybe this could be interpreted as a sign to concentrate on these things where we need the most improvement. If you are successful, it will lead to an improvement in different aspects of your life.
Of course, it could mean maybe you might just want to stay in bed the rest of the day.
Since the Imbolc Sabbat involves, on a spiritual level, learning and growing in new directions which by it's nature involves a kind of self-discipline that might in many cases require guidance and nurturing much as a child, I thought it might be appropriate to give a shout out to a worthwhile charity that I first learned about on Rufus's blog at Grad Student Madness.
The charity in question is Kiva. What they do is not so much give a hand-out as a hand-up, to struggling entrepreneurs in third world countries. The site contains a list of potential recipients from across the globe, engaged in a variety of business pursuits. Many if not most of them are just starting their businesses for the first time. Moreover, this is not just a list of statistics. You can choose directly whom you want to support. Some people have banded together to form teams to support specific business owners.
I think the way it works is, your money is donated to the site, which then forwards the loan to the recipient of your choice, after which that person will repay the site according to the terms. Since it is a not-for-profit site, the terms are very relaxed and not at all burdensome. What repayment there is just goes to helping run the site with overhead expenses, but the owners of the site are not going to take the recipients to court or try to confiscate their property in the event they are unable to pay.
I thought it was in keeping with the spirit and the meaning of the Sabbat, so give it a look. We all need encouragement and guidance from time to time, and this is one way you can help make a big difference in the lives of real people who need such help, in a way that is neither demeaning nor demanding.
You can also monitor the person's progress at the site, how much they have repaid over time, how well they appear to be doing, and so on.
Without any doubt, what the world needs is another pagan magazine-not only the pagan world, but the world at large. There have been various attempts at such projects, the most notable being the fabled Green Egg, which finally folded for the second and last time as a print magazine due to overwhelming financial difficulties, and which has now been resurrected as an on-line e-zine. Although you have to subscribe to read the entire thing, you can read parts of the new Green Egg
However, this is not so much about what is probably a vain attempt to revive something whose best days are probably long gone, but about a new, fresh attempt at an endeavor that is stunning in the boldness of its sheer audacity-an attempt to go where few would seek to venture, into the seemingly endangered world of print journalism.
Thorn Magazine aspires to be the new Green Egg, and as it now can legitimately be viewed as past the embryonic and birth stages, and well on it's way to growing into a promising young venture, I would be remiss if I did not mention it in the context of this Imbolc Sabbat.
I don't buy for a minute that the print media is in danger of vanishing completely. There is something about the look feel of a newspaper or a magazine in your hands-whether it is a treasured collector's item that shows slight signs of again, or whether it has the freshness and scent of newly printed and delivered pages with all the vibracy of the colors that caress the senses-that will never be equalled or even approached by the process of sitting in a hunched position, rigidly bound by the natural boundaries imposed by a computer monitor.
Because of this, Thorn can grow and prosper over time, provided it receives the proper care and guidance. It certainly has great promise and potential. I have read a few sample articles and segments that are offered as samples on the on-line site.
There is a bit of something for everybody, from poetry to scholarly articles, magical theories, biographical sketches, historical ruminations-and as one might expect from a pagan magazine, a smattering of nonsense that I could do without. I have high hopes tht this journal can transcend what seems to be an obvious ploy geared towards the less sophisticated among the growing pagan community, whose numbers are legion.
By this I refer specifically to an article entitled Hanging With Thor. A sample of the article should suffice to make my point-
As I brought the beers out of the back room, I was not surprised to hear a familiar voice in the back of my mind, not unlike a clearing of the throat. I knew that it was Thor, making sure we remembered to fill His cup on the altar when we poured ours. What was surprising to me was our guest, who suddenly looked around and asked, “What was that?” Since our kids have all been brought up to listen for the voices of the gods, the whole family suppressed smiles at our non-pagan friend’s surprise. “That’s just Thor,” we reassured him.
There is more along those lines, including the assertion by one of the children as to having spotted a unicorn, which the author seems to think is not undue cause for concern, but rather is evidently something to be encouraged. I frankly have to wonder if the kid is having her jollies at the author's expense.
ALl that aside, this magazine does have the potential to transcend such obvious drivel, and hopefully as it grows, it will reach a level of maturity that will look at such absurd posturings as not conducive to reaching status as a respected and respectable bastion of journalistic responsibility.
And of course, as this is a pagan magazine, you can expect there to be a preponderance of concern over environmental issues, which might or might not be a good thing, depending on whether or not it is carried to an extreme. I seriously question the need to burden what should be a joyous occasion such as the observance of Yule with a fundamentalist, finger pointing and condescendingly environmentalist approach, as seems to be urged in an article, from the December issue, on Tips For Yule.
Don't get me wrong, encouragement of responsible behavior towards the environment and other matters are to be encouraged, of course, but at the same time, I sincerely hope that this magazine doesn't end up going down the same fundamentalist and dogmatic path that I for one am reasonably certain contributed to the demise of the aforementioned Green Egg. After all, we learn from the mistakes of others or we follow in the footsteps of their failures.
That being said, the seeds are certainly there for this magazine to blossom into something that could indeed be special, if it is given the proper care and guidance. I am encouraged by the focus towards real scholarship, for example, when it comes to such things as supposed matriarchal societies and the dubious as best theory of a Near Eastern Great Goddess who some seem to think answers for all manifestations of goddess worship, no matter how varied and widely spread.
To the great credit of many in the pagan community, including those who comprise the staff of this magazine, they do sincerely want to move us beyond such crap as the Burning Times cult of victimhood. Re-evaluating the Work of Marija Gimbutas Christine by Hoff Kraemer is an example, and well worth your time for an evaluation of how the work of Miss Gimbutas may have been influenced by the necessity of adherence to Soviet orthodoxy, which interestingly enough seems to have been insistent on the belief in a pre-historical matriarchy.
The Ogham Alphabet: Hyperlinks of the Gods by Edwin Chapman is an interesting article that ponders the meaning behind an ancient Druid alphabet that might have been constructed as much as a code for secret communication as for magical purposes.
Walking the Broken Path by Jimmy Two-Hats is an interesting take on the importance in paganism of the practice of magic, and of doing it correctly-and for the right reasons. It touches on the difference between pagans who mostly view religion as a private matter as opposed to most other faiths who put their faith in the divine as the main if not sole impetus for change.
Kitchen Magic might appeal to those more interested in the specifics of a specialized form of magic.
Cherry Hill is an article about the establishment, in South Carolina of all places, of a theological school that offers degrees for those interested in pursuing a career in the pagan clergy.
I for one prefer coven settings, with all the privacy, mystique, and intimacy that entails, but for those who are interested in pursuing such a path, or merely learning about it, well, there it is.
There is more, but I will end this with the following passage about the life of Wilhelm Reich and his controversial theory of orgonomy-
Reich's credentials are impressive. While he was still a student, he was given membership in the Vienna Psychoanalytic Society, directly under Sigmund Freud. As a veteran, he was allowed to graduate from the University of Vienna's six year course in four years and did so with a degree in medicine and top honors. He did postgraduate work both at University Hospital in Vienna and at the Neurological and Psychiatric University Clinic and started a private practice at the same time. He was Director of the Seminar for Psychoanalytic Therapy at Psychoanalytic Polyclinic in Vienna for six years, publishing a distinguished book of psychology, Der Triobhafte Charakter, before the age of thirty. He became Vice-Director of the Polcyclinic in Vienna, publishing half a dozen more books before fleeing Hitler's takeover of Germany. Possibly, he fled fascism itself; possibly, he fled death threats and book-burning. As is characteristic of Reich's life, accounts vary.
His was clearly a distinguished career from an early age, and he had a very promising career ahead as a psychiatrist and psychotherapist. However, his path would take him elsewhere. During this time, Reich began what he viewed as his greatest success, indeed his life's work— research that would see him hounded from country to country, eventually jailed and, after his death, frequently reviled as a crackpot, madman, or fraud. That was his journey from adept young therapist to researcher in the literal energy of orgasm— as he called it, "orgonomy."
Reich of course may have been ahead of his time, or he might well have been a crackpot, but one thing is for certain-he was interesting, to say the least. Hopefully the publishers of Thorn will take that as a kind of road map to success. It doesn't so much matter whether or not you're or right or wrong, so long as you are willing to learn from your mistakes. In the meantime, if you follow your dreams, that is all that really matters. If the two previous statements sound contradictory, consider this-in almost every case, being right or wrong isn't a matter of the dream, it's a matter of the approach to fulfilling it.
If Thorn evolves into a magazine that is consistently fresh, inspiring, invigorating, and compelling, it will grow and prosper. If it falls into a rigid form of dogmatism and obligatory PC orthodoxy, especially if it offers little to no dialogue in the way of debate on given matters, they will suffer the fate of so many before them, including the legendary Green Egg. Their readership will dwindle until it too folds like all the rest.
For now, though I am sure there are many who will try to push them down that path, I am trying to be hopeful they will not heed such advice.
I thought the following comment I made to an anarchist by the name of Larry Gambone on the socialist blog Renegade Eye constituted what amounts to a pretty good sermon, and if I do say so myself, is worthy of reprinting here as a part of this day's Imbolc festivities-such as they are.
The message here is simple and timely. If people want to change the world, they have to start with themselves. In our Western society, our own decadence and profligate spending has been our undoing. The main point to this can be boiled down as-if you don't like it, don't buy it. If it tastes bad, don't eat it. If it smells, don't fuck with it.
The beauty of the capitalist system, at it's best, is that people already have the power, if they would but exercise it. Many of my comments will seem inexplicable, because they are in the context of earlier conversations. Still, the gist of it is there. A new age might well be dawning, and it might well be more difficult than anything most of us have ever transitioned. However, we can not only adapt, we can adopt and make it our own.
We do have the power to grow a brave new and young world the way we want our world to be, out of what might well turn into the ashes of the old. Nor do we have to adopt something radical to do so. We just have to go back to the basics, as I explain in the following reproduced comments-
I don't mean to be coming off like an apologist for big business, because I am not that at all. I think they should be reined in to a very great extent more than what they are. But you have to be careful with how you go about doing that, with what laws you use and how you implement them, because you are setting a very serious precedent.
If you use government power to break up large corporations, then you had better make sure you are on solid ground. We have anti-trust laws, and we have notable exceptions to those laws (major league baseball is one example of of this). Aside from those anti-trust laws, which should be rigidly enforced, what can you do?
I've already told you, people have to change their habits, their lifestyles, in fact they have to change their hearts. This rampant consumerism is what is driving this. Nobody is holding a gun to people's heads and forcing them to spend money that in a good many cases they don't even have to spend. The government isn't doing that, nor is business, though they go out of their way to promote and encourage it.
Get with the program, Gambone, I thought you and Ren were all about giving power to the people. What do you think you are going to accomplish taking a few people out on the streets shouting with bullhorns.
Reason it out in your head. How many people have changed their minds about having an abortion because some right-wing fanatic shoves a picture of a chopped up fetus in their face.
I'm not saying that you do anything anywhere near that disgusting or reprehensible (though I can somehow see you throwing a pie with horse semen marangue in Donald Trump's face), I'm just saying that these kinds of things have limited value at best-and that's usually limited to entertainment value.
If you want to do something constructive to change the system, start a movement to discourage people from profligate spending and dependence on credit cards. If people were more frugal with their money some of these behemoth corporations would collapse from the weight of their own debt. What ones survived would have to adopt to a more viable business model that was more human and community friendly.
I know it might not quite have the dramatic appeal of burning flags and blocking street traffic, but the difference is, my way might actually accomplish something.
You're addicted to politics still and are still hooked on the notion of political solutions by way of organized party activities. Me, I believe in people power.
As Madison told Jefferson once "your people, sir, are a great beast".
He was never more right than when he uttered those words, and it's time to rouse that beast. Screw the government, and screw political parties-all of them.
So there you have it. In our society, consumers have the power to bring down the government and the huge corporations on which they are dependent, and can do so without firing a shot. You merely ceases and desist from spending more than you have to spend. You can make allowances from time to time, of course, but as a general rule, exercise your power judiciously while you still have a modicum of it to wield.
The real beauty of this idea is, you can do this legally. If everyone would refuse to buy into the consumer culture to the extent that luxuries become seen as near-necessities, the nonsense would stop. As I said, businesses would adapt or die.
Moreover, what can anybody do about it? A person who tries to overthrow the government through force or rebellion, or even by supporting an alternate party, will accomplish little to nothing. In the worse case scenario, they can be tried for treason or sedition, and in the best of circumstances, their party of choice, if victorious, eventually becomes a part of the same establishment, and thus a part of the problem, at least sooner or later (or they substitute an even bigger set of problems in some cases).
No one can be prosecuted or tried for failing to take out a credit card or for buying things they don't really need, or for making do with less (especially since what they usually purchase in many cases is well beyond their needs). You can do this merrily and cheerfully, and change society.
The best thing about it is it doesn't require scrapping the constitution or adopting communism or fascism, far from it. In fact, it might be the very thing that could save our system and make it once more function in the way it was originally meant to function-a nation where the people rule and the government is their servant, not as the enforcers of a corporate or any other kind of special interest elite.
Obama, McCain, Palin, etc.-none of them can save us. We have to save ourselves.
The following is a Druid invocation for Imbolc which was forwarded to the Missouri Druid Alliance by group owner Shadowhawk.
With your eyes closed, take a few moments to breathe and feel your place on the Earth.
Close your inner eyes and when you open them, find yourself standing in the corner of a meadow bordered by a mixed hedge. The ground slopes away from you towards a wood that lies just beyond a small stream. It's winter and the meadow grass looks tired and flat; but cobwebs tangle the dry and rattling remains of willowherb, meadowsweet and hogweed, catching the last of the light as the sun sinks behind the trees. You see your breath rise in clouds of vapour and the air feels cold and damp against your face, but you are dressed warmly for your journey. From where you stand, there is no obvious way into the wood, but as you start towards it, you notice a robin perched in the top of a hawthorn beside you. He cocks his head and makes his fluted call as though in greeting, then flits a few yards further on; pausing to look back.
You take this as an invitation to follow him and so begin to make your way along the line of the hedge towards the place where the stream emerges from among a stand of trees. You can see enough in the failing light to identify hazel with its hanging yellow catkins and elder with its tangle of gnarled branches, but they are dominated by a group of alders, their catkin-laden branches making distinctive patterns against the clear sky. As you come closer, you notice how the roots of the alder reach into the stream; allowing the water to flow through them and yet the trees stand secure and solid.
A blackbird, disturbed by your presence, flies from the bramble thicket, calling in alarm and draws your attention to a deer track through the scrubby undergrowth on the other side of the stream. You cross, using the support of the alder branches for help and then start to make your way into the wood, your feet crunching softly on the forest floor.
There is much less light here and you begin to feel a little apprehensive, not sure of your destination. Crouching low to avoid the snagging branches, you can just make out the track through the trees as it winds its way up a slope, through the damp and decaying leaf litter. There are more mature trees here; you can feel their age and the weight of their presence above and around you as you make your way onward. Soon the gloom turns into true darkness and you feel your way forward with each step; using your hands as you climb the slope, the rich scent of the earth fills you with each breath. You seek the peace of your intention within yourself and whisper to the spirits of the forest to guide you and, raising your eyes, you see a pale glimmer ahead of you.
You make towards it in wonder, discovering a clearing at the top of the incline which is carpeted by snowdrops, seeming to glow under a quarter moon. You murmur your thanks to the spirits and move to sit in the shelter of the tangled roots of an old oak tree, wrapping your arms around yourself for warmth. Beneath the benign gaze of the moon, with the solid presence of the oak against your back, you begin to drift into a trance-like state.
You feel yourself sinking; down. Down into the leaf litter beneath the mighty oak. Down into the cold, damp earth. Down into the dark. You are small. A tiny seed in the heart of the forest and you feel the press of the Earth all around you as you sleep safe within her womb. Your brothers and sisters are all gathered around you and you can hear the soft humming of their song joining with your own as you dream beneath the frost of winter.
It is hard to say what changes, but suddenly there is a stirring; the first tiny flickering of wakefulness sends out shimmers through the darkness. You hear a change in the cadence of the song and know that your brothers and sisters are waking and you respond. Tentatively, you stretch out; unfurling from your foetal ball, drawing energy from the remembered songs of summer and the earth around you, you begin to push upward. You can feel the weight of winter pressing down on you, but you have untold power within your tiny form and you push against it, seeking to break through, as the songs of your siblings draw you ever onward into wakefulness.
Suddenly you feel the first touch of warmth on the crown of your head and you find a new strength. Stretching upward, you raise your arms to embrace the first rays of the sun; your head bowed in honour, yet fully awake and alive to his presence and blessed by his message of hope for new life…
The robin trills somewhere close by and you are aware once more of your human form, resting against the oak tree. Opening your eyes, you see the dawn light bringing a glow to the sea of pale flowers all around you. You feel a kinship with them and the air seems to be full of their soul song and the story of their growing. You give thanks and reach into your pocket for a gift; an offering to the forest.
Then, stretching out the stiffness in your limbs, you rise from your resting place beneath the oak and face the sunrise, revelling in even the small warmth it offers after the chill of the night. You breathe deeply in the frosty air, allowing it to dispel the last clinging traces of sleep and make you fully alert and aware of the world around you.
As you make you way down the slope between the trees, it strikes you how different the woods look in the morning light. Great tits call to one another in the branches above you and somewhere ahead, you can hear the chattering song of the wren. You follow the deer track to the edge of the wood, hearing the music of the stream by the foot of the alders and, coming closer, you see more clearly the patterns made by the flow of the water.
You pause to give thanks for all you have been shown and then cross the stream and make your way back up through the meadow. As you climb, slowly become aware of your physical body; feel yourself here upon the earth; become aware of the space around you. Return to this place alert and refreshed.
