Web Log Archive, January 27th through February 9th, 2008

Saturday, February 9th, 2008       The Thirty-Seventh Anniversary of the San Fernando Earthquake, north of Los Angeles

All national institutions of churches, whether Jewish, Christian, or Turkish, appear to me no other than human inventions set up to terrify and enslave mankind, and monopolize power and profit.
I do not mean by this declaration to condemn those who believe otherwise; they have the same right to their belief as I have to mine. But it is necessary to the happiness of man, that he be mentally faithful to himself. Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists in professing to believe what he does not believe.
It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.

From Part I, Chapter I of The Age of Reason, published on January 28, 1794 by 

Thomas Paine, 1737-1809

Friday, February 8th, 2008

Thursday, February 7th, 2008

From the 'Corrections' column of today's local fish wrap: 'A wrong Little Man appeared with the review of "Lipstick Jungle" in Datebook on Wednesday. He should have been sleeping.'

Now...I rely on that Little Man's posture/demeanor when deciding upon which videos to rent; but he's often 'wrong'! He's got four (call 'em) 'conditions' which range from sleeping all the way to jumping out of his chair while clapping! For me to rent it, the Little Man has to, at least, be sitting up and clapping. Many times I have not shared the Little Man's reaction to a given flick. Perhaps it's just that he and I are not ingesting the same psychotropic medications.
And so it was with Interview, a barker starring Steve Buscemi (he, of Fargo fame) and Sienna Miller (she is Jude Law's ex-girlfriend). Interview begins its eighty-four minute slog with a three minute vignette in which Buscemi reprises his role in Fargo: talking ceaselessly to someone who never says anything back. Come to find out that the mute 'actor' sharing the 'stage' with him is his brother, Michael Buscemi, of whom little else is known and who is not seen again during this production. Interview reminded me a bit of  'My Dinner With Andre' (sans the suspense and excitement which derive (for those of you who have not seen that 1981 action thriller) from watching  two old acquaintances eat a gourmet meal...and listening to them discuss the meaning of life).
Nearly all of Interview consists of Steve and Sienna screaming at each other in her Manhattan loft apartment.
Oh! I goofed! The Little Man has a fifth condition. 

Wednesday, February 6th, 2008

Today marks the 57th anniversary of the commuter train wreck that killed my father, Joseph, a 35 year-old Mechanical Engineer for the DuPont Chemical Company. At left is the first color photograph I've ever seen of what was left of 'The Broker', an eleven-car, steam-locomotive-drawn  passenger train that derailed at 5:43 PM in Woodbridge, New Jersey. Eighty five people were killed and as many as five hundred were injured. The New Jersey Turnpike was then under construction and the Pennsylvania Railroad (PRR) was re-routing some of its tracks to accommodate the new super highway.
This was, by any measure, an 'accident waiting to happen' due to the hang-loose safety procedures in place at the time. The doomed train was traveling at more than twice the temporary track's rated speed of twenty-five miles per hour. On this very first day that the track was pressed into service, there were no posted warning signals and, even if there were, the locomotive had no speedometer! The engineer was expected to be able to estimate his train's speed as well as its proximity to the reduced-speed zone!
Criminal charges were, for a time, pursued against the engineer and against PRR's upper management. In the end, however, prosecutors withdrew those charges because of the anticipated high cost of such unprecedented trials...and much uncertainty as to their outcomes.   
The photograph (above) was taken on the crisp, cold morning of February 7th, 1951 by a Mr. John Dziobko (right), then 18 years-old, who went on to become a published professional photographer, specializing in railway history.

Tuesday, February 5th, 2008

I still think that Hillary Clinton would make a more interesting President than Barack Obama. But it's hard to deny that the Illinois Senator was right-on during the speech he delivered on October 2, 2002, while he was only a State Senator. 

Here's an abridged version of that speech:

I don't oppose all wars. What I am opposed to is a dumb war. What I am opposed to is a rash war. What I am opposed to is the cynical attempt by armchair, weekend warriors in this administration to shove their own ideological agendas down our throats, irrespective of the costs in lives lost and in hardships borne. I'm opposed to a war based not on reason but on passion, not on principle but on politics. 
I suffer no illusions about Saddam Hussein. But I also know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors. I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the middle east, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world. 
The consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not travel down that hellish path blindly. Nor should we allow those who march off and pay the ultimate sacrifice...to make [that] sacrifice in vain.

Click here to read the unabridged text of this masterful and prophetic speech. It is worthy of note that Obama's position in 2002 was virtually identical to that of Dick Cheney, Colin Powell and even George H. W. Bush in the aftermath of the first Gulf War!

Sunday, February 3rd, 2008

Some new words for today...

Petechia = a minute, round, non-raised hemorrhage in the skin or in a mucous or serous membrane.

Portmanteau = 1. a large traveling bag made of stiff leather; 2. a new word formed by joining two others and combining their meanings like ('brunch', 'smog', 'motel' and) Chinglish: 

Saturday, February 2nd, 2008                                      Yes!  Groundhog Day!

The suicide rate in Japan is 24 per 100,000. In the United States, that rate is 11 per 100,00. Lithuania has the highest reported rate in the world...at 39 per 100,000.
The reasons usually given to explain Japan's relatively high suicide rate (hanging is the most popular method) center around financial concerns. The rate has been rising since the onset of economic recession in the 1990's which was accompanied by the shattering of the traditional 'cradle-to-grave' work relationship which many workers had come to expect from their employers. But according to Hioyuki Takahashi, director of the Office for the Policy of Suicide Prevention, "In the Japanese culture, there is a positive view toward taking one's own life. It is seen as taking responsibility for one's own actions." 
Source: Yuriko Nagano of the Chronicle Foreign Service

But...in which countries...or in which parts of the world...are suicide rates lowest?

World Health Organization

Suicide rates have always been difficult to assemble and even more difficult to compare. Few will argue that suicide is ever over-reported if for no other reason than that, in many parts of our world, it is considered shameful and embarrassing to declare that a family member has taken his or her own life. The World Health Organization, in its most recent statements, claims that suicide rates have climbed sharply in the last half-century to "a 'global' mortality rate of 16 per 100,000, or one death every 40 seconds." There is a table on that group's Web site, updated through 2003, which breaks down the rates by country and gender. Some generalizations emerge from the data: rates are highest in Northern and Eastern European regions and lowest in the tropics...and men are at least twice as likely as women to kill themselves. However, as also can be seen from the map, above (where red indicates high rates, blue indicates low rates and yellow is somewhere in-between), data are unavailable (white regions) for much of the world. 

Friday, February 1st, 2008

Yesterday's local fish wrap carried an Associated Press story citing an article in the New England Journal of Medicine purporting to demonstrate that avid sports fans with heart problems are significantly more likely to suffer a 'cardiac emergency'  while watching a 'Big Game'...like the Super Bowl and World Cup Soccer matches. Really?

"People who are not interested in sport find it very difficult to comprehend this," observes Dr. Douglas Carroll of the University of Birmingham, England.

Dr. Lori Mosca, who ain't all that bad lookin', of New York-Presbyterian Hospital, was good enough to summarize her recommendations (at left) to those for whom football is a big hairy deal.

Thursday, January 31st, 2008

For thirty-five years, Paul Hume (1915-2001) was the Washington Post's music editor and critic.

On December 6, 1950, he had an occasion to review a singing performance at Washington, D.C.'s Constitution Hall by then President Harry Truman's daughter, Margaret. It was Mr. Hume's educated opinion that the First Daughter was "flat a good deal of the time, has not improved in the years we have heard her" and, in short, "still cannot sing with professional finish."


The President was unrestrained in his outrage at this criticism of his only child. He shot back:

Mr. Hume:

I've just read your lousy review of Margaret's concert. I've come to the conclusion that you are an "eight ulcer man on four ulcer pay." It seems to me that you are a frustrated old man who wishes he could have been successful. When you write such poppy-cock as was in the back section of the paper you work for it shows conclusively that you're off the beam and at least four of your ulcers are at work.
Some day I hope to meet you. When that happens you'll need a new nose, a lot of beefsteak for black eyes, and perhaps a supporter below! H.S.T.

Wednesday, January 30th, 2008

Every one is right...between his own ears. 

Better to live on a corner of a roof (or in a desert) than in a house with a quarrelsome wife.

Proverbs, Chapter 21: Verses 2, 9 and 19

Tuesday, January 29th, 2008

The Five Precepts of Buddhism:

1-Be reverential toward all life.

2-Respect the property of others.

3-Be sexually responsible.

4-Be truthful.

5-Take care of your body.

Monday, January 28th, 2008                                        Twenty-two years since the Challenger disaster. 

Ever wonder why God invented house fires? 

Hardly anyone thinks that moving is fun, but it does present an opportunity, if not an imperative, to get rid of stuff! 

About five years ago, an old lady who lived at the end of the block here, moved away to live with her granddaughter in Nebraska. Hilka was already ninety-one then and, from what I can gather, is still alive. 

As she prepared to vacate the house she had occupied for at least twenty years (and in which she had lived with her now-deceased brother), she simply gave away what she didn't want to take with her. Her neighbors were told to help themselves to anything they didn't want to leave for the trash collector. And there was plenty! I accepted at least a dozen boxes and crates...the contents of which I've never carefully examined. 

But this morning, in the grip of a rare urge to bring order to my surroundings, I started to sift through that stuff. Among the never-used items I found was this: a Trouser Waist Stretcher! 

One reason, perhaps, that this marvelous invention was never used is because a doctorate in Mechanical Engineering is required just to assemble it! I gave up. And anyway, lately my problem hasn't been pants that are too small, but ones that are too big: i.e., already too stretched! I've taken to wearing suspenders. 

Sunday, January 27th, 2008

When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said, 'Let us pray.' We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.
Children are a wonderful gift. They have an extraordinary capacity to see into the heart of things and to expose sham and humbug for what they are.
Resentment and anger are bad for your blood pressure and your digestion. Without forgiveness, there is no future.
History, like beauty, depends largely on the beholder, so when you read that, for example, David Livingstone discovered the Victoria Falls, you might be forgiven for thinking that there was nobody around the Falls until Livingstone arrived on the scene.
If you are neutral in situations of injustice, then you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa

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