Today has been designated "Pee On Earth Day".
Web Log Archive, June 11th through June 24th, 2006
Saturday, June 24th, 2006
"More tears are shed over answered prayers than over unanswered ones." St. Theresa de Avila, 1515-1582
Friday, June 23rd, 2006
Sometimes, the MSM
news reporting bias is subtle, but often it is not. A few days ago, during a
discussion of last weekend's quite horrible kidnapping and murder of two young
American soldiers, talk
show genius Larry King casually asked one of his guests (Michael
Weisskopf, a Time magazine reporter who himself was gravely injured in
Iraq in March of 2004), regarding the Iraqi insurgents who
had killed this pair of young men, "Historically...why
are they [the insurgents]
so brutal?" As if
there is nothing 'brutal' about dropping half-ton bombs on houses wherein our
enemies are thought to have taken shelter and as if
there is nothing 'brutal' about posting the battered face of Abu
Musab al-Zarqawi...as if it were a 'trophy'! And...if
a
few innocents happened to have died along with him? Oh well.
That's 'collateral damage' and it's merely because these cowardly terrorists
routinely put civilians at risk by hanging out with them.
Often, spokespersons for the Bush Administration speak of Iran's 'interference'
in neighboring Iraq's affairs. As if
we had not invaded Iraq (thousand of miles from our own borders) on a pretext
and as if we have not occupied that
country (without a date certain for withdrawal) for already more than
three years with ~150,000 soldiers...yes...as
if that's not 'interference'.
Thursday, June 22nd, 2006 The Summer Solstice
According to a reliable source, the Solstice actually happened yesterday at 5:26 AM, California time. The name 'Solstice' derives from two Latin words: sol (Sun) and sistit (stands). This refers to the fact that during the days before and after about the 22nd of June (and December), the sun's path and elevation in the sky do not seem to change much. That is, the Sun seems to 'stand still'.
Wednesday, June 21st, 2006 The Longest Day of The Year!
Today has been
designated "Pee On Earth
Day".
Tuesday, June 20th, 2006
By
way of her elder daughter in Australia, I got word yesterday morning that my
friend Kirsten Burge (KB) drew her last breath in Berkeley on Sunday morning.
Her passing, though 'natural', was quite unexpected. By
accounts, she simply collapsed...perhaps as the result of a 'cardiac event'. KB
was in her 66th year and possessed a remarkable talent for words. It was a
talent, however, for which she herself had little regard.
Without contrivance, she could compose a series of rhyming couplets on any topic
that happened to catch her attention. It seemed to be a 'savant
thing'...something she could simply do.
For me, it was an illustration of (to
paraphrase Fred, himself now long dead) 'what
we do best is not what comes hardest to us'.
KB had seen more movies (foreign and domestic) than anyone else I've ever met.
Several times of late, I had encouraged her to set up an online movie review Web
site...simply as a hobby...an outlet for her talents and experience.
My sympathy to Leslie and Liz.
Monday, June 19th, 2006
"He's making a political speech. He's sitting in his air-conditioned office on his big, fat backside saying, 'Stay the course.' That's not a plan." John Murtha
"Those who are most enraged about the administration’s reckless misadventures are incredulous that it repeatedly gets away with the same stunts. What’s most impressive about Mr. Rove...is not his ruthlessness, it’s his unshakable faith in the power of a story. The story he’s stuck with, Iraq, is a loser, but he knows it won’t lose at the polls if there’s no story to counter it. And so he tells it over and over, confident that the Democrats won’t tell their own. And they don’t — whether about Iraq or much else. It’s better to have the courage of bad convictions than no courage or convictions at all." Frank Rich
Sunday, June 18th, 2006 Paul McCartney is sixty-four.
It's Hot!
Saturday, June 17th, 2006
Thirty-five years ago today, the Watergate burglars were arrested.
"Even if I had gone to their
church, I don't think it would have saved my job," said Crystal,
but her employers had already
told her that they wanted to approach this
issue as "employers, friends and Christians."
And why not? The job does, after all, pay $9.25 an hour! Or
it did!
Friday, June 16th, 2006
"For
those who believe in God, no explanation is necessary,
for those that do not believe in God, no explanation is possible."
The
Song of Bernadette B&W, 1943; based on the 1941 novel by Franz
Werfel (1890-1945).
"In 1858 France, Bernadette, an adolescent peasant girl, has a vision of
"a beautiful lady" in the city dump. She never claims it to be
anything other than this, but the townspeople all assume it to be the virgin
Mary. The pompous government officials think she is nuts, and do their best to
suppress the girl and her followers, and the church wants nothing to do with the
whole matter. But as Bernadette attracts wider and wider attention, the
phenomenon overtakes everyone in the the town, and transforms their lives."
Plot summary from IMDB.com
Thursday, June 15th, 2006 Happy Birthday, Jay! Happy Birthday, Alice!
'She was given a plate of spaghetti with meat sauce, which she placed on the table but didn’t eat.
She
asked the audience to think about the challenges. “Could
you imagine our security if Al Gore had been elected in 2000? Could you imagine
what would have happened to our economy if John Kerry had been elected in 2004?”
She was starting to make me sad. I could imagine both of those things. I could
imagine the $200 billion spent on a war with Iraq spent instead on education. I
could imagine an America with serious partners and an agile military that
wasn’t bogged down in an unwinnable war and wasn’t intent on forming a
blockade around Iran. But Katherine wasn’t asking me to envision these
things, and everybody else was eating.
Then she...mentioned the recession that George Bush inherited, 9/11, two foreign
wars, greedy corporate executives in New York, SARS, anthrax, avian flu. “That
would have been enough to destroy most countries’ economy,” she
said. “But not ours. Why? Tax relief.”
But she assured everyone she still wanted Mexicans to come in and work in
tourism and rebuild the houses after hurricanes. She didn’t want the citizenry
to have to worry about who was scraping the leaves out of the pool.'
Stephen Elliott
Wednesday, June 14th,
2006
Flag Day!
"Hoop
Dee Doo!
Hoop Dee Doo!
I hear a polka and my troubles are through!"
Perry Como
& The
Fontane Sisters, March 16th, 1950
Tuesday, June 13th, 2006
"They
are smart, they are creative, they are committed. They have no regard for life,
neither ours nor their own. I believe this was not an act of desperation, but an
act of asymmetrical warfare waged against us."
Rear Admiral Harry B. Harris Jr., Commander,
Joint Task Force, Guantánamo
"Taking their own lives was not
necessary, but it certainly is a good P.R. move. It does sound like this is part
of a strategy — in that they don't value their own lives, and they certainly
don't value ours; and they use suicide bombings as a tactic."
Colleen P. Graffy, Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy
"Having driven to suicide men in
its custody whom it blocked from counsel and whom it unilaterally asserted were
terrorists, it complains that it has been the victim of an act of war."
Eric M.
Freedman, legal consultant for the Guantánamo detainees
Monday, June 12th, 2006
"Unlike traditional religious ways, the Fourth Way has no permanent institutions. It appears and disappears according to the time, the place and the people. Work is done on all [parts of the person] at once and thus when and if the end result is attained, it is already attained in all [parts] simultaneously. Because it makes use of one's own life situation without requiring outward changes, it is a possible path for all types of people." Kathleen Riordan Speeth
Sunday, June 11th, 2006 Forty one years ago today: RIP, little Megan, Carol's French Poodle
There
are three common ways that we (attempt to) deal
with the recognition that we are not going to get out of this
alive:
The first is to ignore it and to live our life
distracted and entertained, as if it will go on forever. This is, in fact, what
most of us do...most of the time.
The second is to viscerally
(if not vigorously) acknowledge it in the worship of some ill-defined 'power
greater than ourselves'. That is, the second way
is to be 'religious'!
The third is to 'understand' it...perhaps
all-the-better to 'control' it or to mitigate
it. That is, the third way is to be 'intellectual'.
Clearly, most of us have tried more than one way or (even) all three ways at various times in our lives.
But there is a Fourth Way.