Last month the Border Patrol stopped a car when it set off radiation detectors at a checkpoint. They detained the University of Arizona professor who was driving the car and her passenger, a 96-year-old Hispanic man. The man showed the agents ID and explained that he was probably the source of the radiation as he had recently had some medical treatments (unspecified in any of the articles on this incident). Agents took the man to a tent for secondary inspection, where they ran a radiation detector up and down his body. Then they told him he would have to wait in the tent. The temperature was nearly 100. His companion asked if they could wait in the car, which was air-conditioned. The agents said no. The man had to stay in the tent for a half hour.
To recap: border patrol agents stop a car because it sets off a radiation detector. In the car is an employee of that hotbed of terrorism, the University of Arizona, and a man old enough to remember the presidency of Herbert Hoover. Source of said radiation is explained. Nevertheless, the senior citizen is detained in a tent in summer in the desert for half an hour.
Icing on the cake: the senior citizen in question is a former governor of Arizona. His name is politically unfortunate (Raul Castro), but did they really think Fidel's brother was taking a road trip out West?
After the Border Patrol told the two they were free to go, they asked to see his ID again.
You can never be too careful.
Incidentally, Anne Doan, the University of Arizona professor driving the car, was never asked to show ID.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Wednesday, July 4, 2012
Fourth of July Thoughts
The Continental Congress actually voted to declare independence on July 2, 1776, leading John Adams to write to his wife:
"The 2nd day of July 1776 will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. ... It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forevermore."
However, it wasn't until two days later that the Continental Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence (and only after some editing that severely wounded the young author's ego). Then someone rang the bell of the State House of the Province of Pennsylvania (that's the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall to you). You know the rest.
The members of the Continental Congress didn't even sign the Declaration until August 2, 1776.
Too busy, I guess.
One of the more interesting aspects of the events of 1776 is their effects on other countries. Years later, the United States' example inspired Spain's American possessions to revolt. And two Canadian revolts against British rule in 1837 led to Canada gaining a degree of self-government. The revolts had been successfully defeated by British forces, but instead of cracking down on the colonists as George III would have done, the British government—remembering how well the George III approach worked—sent a member of parliament named John Lambton (nickname: "Radical Jack") on a fact-finding mission to Canada. He found a politically viable way to release the captured leaders of the revolt instead of hanging them, and in his Report on the Affairs of British North America, Lambton recommended that the Canadian provinces be given some degree of control over their own affairs. Parliament approved his recommendations. By 1848 Canada was more or less self-governing, and in 1867 had all but full independence (London still had final say on Canadian foreign policy; that didn't change until 1930).
**********************************
In spite of having been but a small horrible child at the time, I well remember the bicentennial celebrations of 1976. One of the more curious observations was the series called Bicentennial Minutes. Every day throughout the year, CBS ran a painfully earnest one-minute spot featuring a B-list celebrity (think Mark Shera or Valerie Harper) standing in a book-lined study recounting what happened on that day in 1776. Unfortunately for CBS employees, not every day in 1776 was a day of principled stands and heroic deeds. The researchers for that series had to really dig to find enough material. I remember one somewhat vividly (I'm pretty sure I don't have the names right, however):
"This is Vic Tayback. On this day in 1776, Thomas Putnam set out from Philadelphia with a company of rangers to fight British forces in upstate New York. They soon got lost in the Allegheny Forest when they were abandoned by their Indian guides. They marched on through the forest, hoping against hope to reach American settlements. They ran out of provisions. They ate their horses and dogs. Their bones were found in the spring. I'm Vic Tayback, and this has been a Bicentennial Minute."
Searching on YouTube I discovered a nice send-up of Bicentennial Minutes from the Carol Burnett Show, and here's an actual Bicentennial Minute that recounts the valiant last stand of a patriotic tree:
"The 2nd day of July 1776 will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. ... It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shews, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forevermore."
However, it wasn't until two days later that the Continental Congress formally adopted the Declaration of Independence (and only after some editing that severely wounded the young author's ego). Then someone rang the bell of the State House of the Province of Pennsylvania (that's the Liberty Bell and Independence Hall to you). You know the rest.
The members of the Continental Congress didn't even sign the Declaration until August 2, 1776.
Too busy, I guess.
One of the more interesting aspects of the events of 1776 is their effects on other countries. Years later, the United States' example inspired Spain's American possessions to revolt. And two Canadian revolts against British rule in 1837 led to Canada gaining a degree of self-government. The revolts had been successfully defeated by British forces, but instead of cracking down on the colonists as George III would have done, the British government—remembering how well the George III approach worked—sent a member of parliament named John Lambton (nickname: "Radical Jack") on a fact-finding mission to Canada. He found a politically viable way to release the captured leaders of the revolt instead of hanging them, and in his Report on the Affairs of British North America, Lambton recommended that the Canadian provinces be given some degree of control over their own affairs. Parliament approved his recommendations. By 1848 Canada was more or less self-governing, and in 1867 had all but full independence (London still had final say on Canadian foreign policy; that didn't change until 1930).
**********************************
In spite of having been but a small horrible child at the time, I well remember the bicentennial celebrations of 1976. One of the more curious observations was the series called Bicentennial Minutes. Every day throughout the year, CBS ran a painfully earnest one-minute spot featuring a B-list celebrity (think Mark Shera or Valerie Harper) standing in a book-lined study recounting what happened on that day in 1776. Unfortunately for CBS employees, not every day in 1776 was a day of principled stands and heroic deeds. The researchers for that series had to really dig to find enough material. I remember one somewhat vividly (I'm pretty sure I don't have the names right, however):
"This is Vic Tayback. On this day in 1776, Thomas Putnam set out from Philadelphia with a company of rangers to fight British forces in upstate New York. They soon got lost in the Allegheny Forest when they were abandoned by their Indian guides. They marched on through the forest, hoping against hope to reach American settlements. They ran out of provisions. They ate their horses and dogs. Their bones were found in the spring. I'm Vic Tayback, and this has been a Bicentennial Minute."
Searching on YouTube I discovered a nice send-up of Bicentennial Minutes from the Carol Burnett Show, and here's an actual Bicentennial Minute that recounts the valiant last stand of a patriotic tree:
Tuesday, June 26, 2012
The World Just Keeps Getting Weirder
"The poor world is almost six thousand years old..."—As You Like It.
Thanks to those Trojan Horses of stupidity (a.k.a. school vouchers), during the coming academic year some Louisiana school children will be taught at taxpayer expense that the Loch Ness Monster is an argument against evolution. Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake, Lousiana uses textbooks provided by Accelerated Christian Education Ministries, which raises the bar on toxic nuttiness to staggering heights. Students at schools following the ACE curriculum will be taught that South African apartheid was good for everyone because it enabled "each group to maintain and pass on their culture and heritage to their children," that the Ku Klux Klan fought "declines in morality," and that evolution clearly never happened because there are no "transitional fossils" (you can read what's wrong-headed about this belief here).
And then there's this gem:
Are dinosaurs alive today? Scientists are becoming more convinced of their existence. Have you heard of the ‘Loch Ness Monster’ in Scotland? ‘Nessie,’ for short has been recorded on sonar from a small submarine, described by eyewitnesses, and photographed by others. Nessie appears to be a plesiosaur.
Why is this important to these nut jobs? If the Loch Ness Monster exists and it's a plesiosaur, then it's a surviving dinosaur. And (the reasoning* goes) the survival of a dinosaur is much more plausible if the world is only 6,000 years as old as opposed to millions of years old. One of the strategies employed by creationists is to contrive arguments that the world is much younger than it actually is.
It's bad enough that these "schools" exist. Unfortunately they're not confined to the U.S. In the U.K. approximately 2,000 young people are being subjected to this insanity. What's more, the National Recognition Information Centre, the UK office that evaluates educational degrees for universities and employers, has declared an ACE diploma comparable to an A-Levels diploma, the prerequisite for entering a British university.
A kid that's been through the ACE curriculum is in for a shock when he gets to a secular college (or most religious ones, for that mattter).
*If you can call it that.
Addendum: If you want to read a superb takedown of the ACE from a medieval perspective, go here.
Thanks to those Trojan Horses of stupidity (a.k.a. school vouchers), during the coming academic year some Louisiana school children will be taught at taxpayer expense that the Loch Ness Monster is an argument against evolution. Eternity Christian Academy in Westlake, Lousiana uses textbooks provided by Accelerated Christian Education Ministries, which raises the bar on toxic nuttiness to staggering heights. Students at schools following the ACE curriculum will be taught that South African apartheid was good for everyone because it enabled "each group to maintain and pass on their culture and heritage to their children," that the Ku Klux Klan fought "declines in morality," and that evolution clearly never happened because there are no "transitional fossils" (you can read what's wrong-headed about this belief here).
And then there's this gem:
Are dinosaurs alive today? Scientists are becoming more convinced of their existence. Have you heard of the ‘Loch Ness Monster’ in Scotland? ‘Nessie,’ for short has been recorded on sonar from a small submarine, described by eyewitnesses, and photographed by others. Nessie appears to be a plesiosaur.Why is this important to these nut jobs? If the Loch Ness Monster exists and it's a plesiosaur, then it's a surviving dinosaur. And (the reasoning* goes) the survival of a dinosaur is much more plausible if the world is only 6,000 years as old as opposed to millions of years old. One of the strategies employed by creationists is to contrive arguments that the world is much younger than it actually is.
It's bad enough that these "schools" exist. Unfortunately they're not confined to the U.S. In the U.K. approximately 2,000 young people are being subjected to this insanity. What's more, the National Recognition Information Centre, the UK office that evaluates educational degrees for universities and employers, has declared an ACE diploma comparable to an A-Levels diploma, the prerequisite for entering a British university.
A kid that's been through the ACE curriculum is in for a shock when he gets to a secular college (or most religious ones, for that mattter).
*If you can call it that.
Addendum: If you want to read a superb takedown of the ACE from a medieval perspective, go here.
Wednesday, June 20, 2012
Onward, Christian Kickboxers
By now most of you have probably read about the trend among some Evangelical Christians to use mixed martial arts as a way to lure young men into the fold. The practice is the subject of a documentary in the works: Fight Church—not the most imaginative title, I'll admit, but it works. I won't even get into how theologically and ethically problematic it is to encourage young men to "Beat the Shit out of Each Other for Jesus" (as The Gawker put it), but it seems to be part of a trend for men who want a Christianity in their image (i.e., one with outlets for testosterone), whether it's founding a religion that allows men to have multiple wives, or something as comparatively harmless as artwork depicting a ripped, macho Jesus.
That Jesus of "turn the other cheek" or "blessed are the meek?" Forget that loser.
On the off-chance you haven't seen it, here's the trailer for Fight Church. While there are a lot of unintentionally funny lines, my favorite occurs in the scene in which a pastor is praying over a battered guy hold an bag of ice to his crotch: "Dear God, thank you for the win. Thank you that he's okay. And thank you that he's walkin' and I pray that there's no damage and that nothin' swells up bad later, in Jesus' name, Amen."
The juxtaposition of words and the visual is priceless.
But I also like it when a small boy gets a godly pep talk before going into a boxing ring, and he says to himself, "I'm gonna rip that kid's head off."
"And a child shall lead them." Isaiah 11:6
That Jesus of "turn the other cheek" or "blessed are the meek?" Forget that loser.
On the off-chance you haven't seen it, here's the trailer for Fight Church. While there are a lot of unintentionally funny lines, my favorite occurs in the scene in which a pastor is praying over a battered guy hold an bag of ice to his crotch: "Dear God, thank you for the win. Thank you that he's okay. And thank you that he's walkin' and I pray that there's no damage and that nothin' swells up bad later, in Jesus' name, Amen."
The juxtaposition of words and the visual is priceless.
But I also like it when a small boy gets a godly pep talk before going into a boxing ring, and he says to himself, "I'm gonna rip that kid's head off."
"And a child shall lead them." Isaiah 11:6
Sunday, June 17, 2012
I'll have a lobster and cod pizza with caviar on the side, please.A town that actually wants a Taco Bell is in pretty bad shape.
Eat like it's the Neolithic.
If you want to support restaurants that treat their employees right, don't eat at these establishments.
Don't be alarmed: your calamari is just mating in your mouth.
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
File Under "Loaded Language"
A headline from Boston.com:
"Mass. House Approves Bailout for Troubled T"
Bailout? Bailout? The T is not an ineptly managed investment bank. It's not run by a gang of greedy Wall Street vermin who gave themselves bonuses as a reward for crashing the global economy. This "bailout" is merely the state legislature forking over money to temporarily address a problem they created.
"Mass. House Approves Bailout for Troubled T"
Bailout? Bailout? The T is not an ineptly managed investment bank. It's not run by a gang of greedy Wall Street vermin who gave themselves bonuses as a reward for crashing the global economy. This "bailout" is merely the state legislature forking over money to temporarily address a problem they created.
Sunday, June 10, 2012
The Week in Food
British food: the Diamond Jubliee edition.
Mmmmm...cricket bars....
Sweet, veal-like, fishy? What do we taste like?
This would kill me.
Thursday, June 7, 2012
What Wisconsin Means
Walker's defeat of the recall effort has been the subject of a number of op-eds, blog posts, and screeds today. Ezra Klein at WaPo's Wonkbook went so far as to write, "Wisconsin Recall Shows Labor Isn't Coming Back." And even more prematurely (but inevitably), some are talking of higher office for this creep.
Is Walker's victory a setback for labor? Absolutely. Is it the death knell of unions? Too soon to say.
Let me add that I have some ambivalence about unions, given that I am a member of a union that privileges seniority over competence, which has burdened my workplace with some serious dead wood and cost a good friend her job. On the other hand, without the protections unions afford, I honestly believe city government would have made all librarian positions half-time so they could weasel out of providing us health insurance. And the better wages and working conditions unions provide usually force some private employers to keep in step to stay competitive in hiring.
But back to Wisconsin: the vote shows nothing more than the unpopularity of union employees during recessions. If you're working two jobs just to pay your bills and you've got terrible insurance (if you have it at all), it's natural to resent somebody who can go home at five every day and who can get sick without becoming destitute. Furthermore, the pro-union forces were at a severe disadvantage in campaign finances (a shocker, no?), although the ubiquitous "outspent 7-1" seems to be debatable.Nevertheless, it's not a complete victory for Walker: the Democrats may re-take control of the Wisconsin Senate.
And while the failure of the Wisconsin recall has emboldened opponents of unions, the labor movement is still winning some victories. Last year the Ikea factory in Virginia unionized (think about that: Virginia). Also in Virginia a group of Eastern Shore chicken catchers who work for Tyson Foods have voted to unionize, after getting fed up with horrendous working conditions and making $40 a day. Here in Boston workers at the Hilton Boston Downtown are joining the local hospitality workers union, and in Chicago the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees will soon be negotiating wages and benefits for the registered nurses at Loretto Hospital.
And back in Wisconsin, Scott Walker shouldn't feel too smug: odds are he'll soon be facing criminal indictment.
Is Walker's victory a setback for labor? Absolutely. Is it the death knell of unions? Too soon to say.
Let me add that I have some ambivalence about unions, given that I am a member of a union that privileges seniority over competence, which has burdened my workplace with some serious dead wood and cost a good friend her job. On the other hand, without the protections unions afford, I honestly believe city government would have made all librarian positions half-time so they could weasel out of providing us health insurance. And the better wages and working conditions unions provide usually force some private employers to keep in step to stay competitive in hiring.
But back to Wisconsin: the vote shows nothing more than the unpopularity of union employees during recessions. If you're working two jobs just to pay your bills and you've got terrible insurance (if you have it at all), it's natural to resent somebody who can go home at five every day and who can get sick without becoming destitute. Furthermore, the pro-union forces were at a severe disadvantage in campaign finances (a shocker, no?), although the ubiquitous "outspent 7-1" seems to be debatable.Nevertheless, it's not a complete victory for Walker: the Democrats may re-take control of the Wisconsin Senate.
And while the failure of the Wisconsin recall has emboldened opponents of unions, the labor movement is still winning some victories. Last year the Ikea factory in Virginia unionized (think about that: Virginia). Also in Virginia a group of Eastern Shore chicken catchers who work for Tyson Foods have voted to unionize, after getting fed up with horrendous working conditions and making $40 a day. Here in Boston workers at the Hilton Boston Downtown are joining the local hospitality workers union, and in Chicago the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees will soon be negotiating wages and benefits for the registered nurses at Loretto Hospital.
And back in Wisconsin, Scott Walker shouldn't feel too smug: odds are he'll soon be facing criminal indictment.
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Quote for the Day
“I need the rest of you to help me fix the world. The rest of the world is getting stupider.”
—Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, speaking at Mount Holyoke's commencement.
—Astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, speaking at Mount Holyoke's commencement.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
I'm Back
After a long neglect of this already seldom-updated blog, I've decided to resume posting. Given my longtime obsession with the instruments of government intended to drive us all completely insane keep us safe, I'm restarting this blog by telling you what words to avoid using in social media posts if you want to stay off government watch lists. Recently (and uncharacteristically), the government actually responded to a Freedom of Information Act request and released the Department of Homeland Security's National Operations Center's Analyst's Desktop Binder, which includes a "current list of terms that will be used by the NOC when monitoring social media sites and to provide situational awareness and establish a common operating picture" (starts on page 20). Some of the words seem like sensible choices, like "anthrax," "dirty bomb," "assassination," and "Artistic Assassins" (the name of the contract killers for the Sinaloa cartel, but which could just as easily be the name of a rock band). Other words seem plausible depending upon what other words they appear with, like "El Paso" (since it's on the US-Mexico border, which is where the Mexican drug cartels operate), "crash," "bridge," "port," or "delays." Then there are choices that seem utterly bizarre, like "pork." So if I send a Facebook message to a Texas uncle, "I've experienced some delays in my trip to El Paso for the family barbecue because there have been traffic delays due to a car crash on the San Luis Rey bridge; but don't worry, I'll be there in time to help cook the pork," the gubmint might start monitoring my online activities? Seems unlikely on the face of it, but given their track record, they might well waste time on little ole me. The staff of Homeland Security are, after all, the same people who waste time on nonsense like asking a 79-year-old if she's wearing a sanitary napkin, and yet a guy without a boarding pass manages to bypass TSA staff and get on a plane without a boarding pass, only to be busted by a stewardess.
(Hat tip to Scribd).
(Hat tip to Scribd).
Thursday, March 1, 2012
The Way We Live Now...
...or the joys of auto correct.
A Georgia school was put on lockdown for two hours yesterday after a student received a text message that appeared to warn of the arrival of a gunman.
A student wrote, "Gunna be at West Hall today." Auto correct changed it to "Gunman be at West Hall today."
A Georgia school was put on lockdown for two hours yesterday after a student received a text message that appeared to warn of the arrival of a gunman.
A student wrote, "Gunna be at West Hall today." Auto correct changed it to "Gunman be at West Hall today."
Monday, February 20, 2012
The Week in Food (The One Day Late Edition)
In honor of Downton Abbey, NPR answers the question of the ages: why was British food terrible for most of the twentieth century?
Slate's Explainer tackles another important question: does sloth taste veal?
First you kill a seal. Then you catch some auks. How to make the Inuit equivalent of the turducken.
Mmmmm....smokehouse fire.
The latest foodie craze...rats (at least in Thailand). Note: if you are at all squeamish don't click on the link.
Slate's Explainer tackles another important question: does sloth taste veal?
First you kill a seal. Then you catch some auks. How to make the Inuit equivalent of the turducken.
Mmmmm....smokehouse fire.
The latest foodie craze...rats (at least in Thailand). Note: if you are at all squeamish don't click on the link.
Saturday, February 11, 2012
The Three Stooges, Part Two (and the Apocalypse)
Santorum is on the rise (I apologize for any unpleasant mental imagies provoked by that sentence). In the Missouri, Minnesota and Colorado primaries, he won the anyone-but-Mitt vote (rumor has it that in Missouri, dogs voted in record numbers). A recent national poll placed the former Pennsylvania senator in the lead, with Romney second, and Gingrich third. And there's a tell-tale sign that Santorum has his eye on Gingrich's (and the Republican party's) hard core base: fundamentalist Christians.
In a speech last week in Plano, Texas, Santorum repeated his assertion that the Obama Administration is hostile to religion, and came up with this gem:
Some commentators have been scratching their heads over Santorum's references to the French Revolution, but any members of the Bourbon, Capet or Valois families currently living in the U.S. can relax. An online associate who had the misfortune of being raised in a fundamentalist church gave me some much-needed context by directing me to Revelation 20:4:
I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.
When a speaker publicly invokes hostility to religion and decapitation, he's invoking a narrative of the end of the world believed by millions of Americans: after the saved are swept up into the Heaven, the Antichrist takes over the world and those who still worship Jesus (or at least refuse to worship the Antichrist) are executed. Now it's never been adequately explained to me why if the saved have been gathered up into Heaven there's anyone left on earth who still worships Jesus, but nobody has ever asked me to edit apocalyptic narratives for logic and consistency.
But the larger point: any fundamentalist Christian who believes that narrative and who heard Santorum's speech heard a presidential candidate imply that President Obama is the Antichrist, or at best paving the way for him. If you think this conclusion is a bit of a stretch, take a look at this clip from a film called The Image of the Beast. My recovering Christian friend was required to watch it as a teenager by his church youth group. I've read the film is still popular with evangelical churches. It's on sale as a DVD at a site called Christiancinema.com. In this clip, a Christian is decapitated with a guillotine.
WARNING: The film you are about to see has really bad production values. And even worse facial hair.
Oddly, at the same time that Santorum was invoking an American future where Christians are guillotined, he seemed to want to sound relatively sane to appeal to independents because he closed by saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, we’re a long way from that."
Don't ask me how you call your political opponent an evil overlord with supernatural powers foretold by Biblical prophecy and then expect to be able to back-pedal from that, but Santorum has never asked me to edit his speeches for logic and consistency.
Hat tip to David Harnden-Warwick for the background information.
In a speech last week in Plano, Texas, Santorum repeated his assertion that the Obama Administration is hostile to religion, and came up with this gem:
Some commentators have been scratching their heads over Santorum's references to the French Revolution, but any members of the Bourbon, Capet or Valois families currently living in the U.S. can relax. An online associate who had the misfortune of being raised in a fundamentalist church gave me some much-needed context by directing me to Revelation 20:4:
I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.
When a speaker publicly invokes hostility to religion and decapitation, he's invoking a narrative of the end of the world believed by millions of Americans: after the saved are swept up into the Heaven, the Antichrist takes over the world and those who still worship Jesus (or at least refuse to worship the Antichrist) are executed. Now it's never been adequately explained to me why if the saved have been gathered up into Heaven there's anyone left on earth who still worships Jesus, but nobody has ever asked me to edit apocalyptic narratives for logic and consistency.
But the larger point: any fundamentalist Christian who believes that narrative and who heard Santorum's speech heard a presidential candidate imply that President Obama is the Antichrist, or at best paving the way for him. If you think this conclusion is a bit of a stretch, take a look at this clip from a film called The Image of the Beast. My recovering Christian friend was required to watch it as a teenager by his church youth group. I've read the film is still popular with evangelical churches. It's on sale as a DVD at a site called Christiancinema.com. In this clip, a Christian is decapitated with a guillotine.
WARNING: The film you are about to see has really bad production values. And even worse facial hair.
Oddly, at the same time that Santorum was invoking an American future where Christians are guillotined, he seemed to want to sound relatively sane to appeal to independents because he closed by saying, "Ladies and gentlemen, we’re a long way from that."
Don't ask me how you call your political opponent an evil overlord with supernatural powers foretold by Biblical prophecy and then expect to be able to back-pedal from that, but Santorum has never asked me to edit his speeches for logic and consistency.
Hat tip to David Harnden-Warwick for the background information.
Sunday, February 5, 2012
The Week in Food
Public schools: the enemy of baked goods and entrepreneurship.If you want to buy foods with a long shelf, put lard first on your list.
Purple tomatoes: you know you want them.
There was chocolate everywhere. Oh, the humanity!
Citrus: it's what's for dinner.
Sunday, January 29, 2012
The Week in Food
Great news: Fried food—it's not all bad for you.
Fans of the National Mustard Museum can breathe a sigh of relief.
American Fans of Canadian orange juice (if any exist) are in for a disappointment.
What a waste of good cognac.
What's different about McDonald's in France.
Fans of the National Mustard Museum can breathe a sigh of relief.
American Fans of Canadian orange juice (if any exist) are in for a disappointment.
What a waste of good cognac.
What's different about McDonald's in France.
Saturday, January 28, 2012
Quote of the Week
From a Newt Gingrich ad running in Florida:
"What kind of man would mislead, distort and deceive just to win an election?....This man would be Mitt Romney."
This from Newt Gingrich.
"What kind of man would mislead, distort and deceive just to win an election?....This man would be Mitt Romney."
This from Newt Gingrich.
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Thoughts on Patriotic Song
The other night I was rummaging through my shelves looking for an Elgar CD. I couldn't find it, and being in the mood to listen to some Elgar I started searching YouTube for some performances. I found some clips of the last night of the proms from recent years (the proms are a series of summer concerts in London). I had forgotten (if I ever knew) that at a certain point during the performance of Pomp and Circumstance everyone starts singing "Land of Hope and Glory," a British patriotic song whose lyrics were written to the music of P & C. I found myself staring in disbelief as members of the audience started waving Union Jacks and singing "wider still and wider may thy bounds be set/God who made thee mighty make thee mightier yet." It's fifteen years since the handover of Hong Kong, the Scots could well be on the verge of declaring independence, and a London audience is singing a prayer for imperial expansion.
I kept thinking, "The Brits really need to update their patriotic songs." I also kept wondering what was up with the people in the audience waving Norwegian flags (29 seconds in). But nationalism is about sentiment not rationality. No one in that audience seriously wants the UK to re-take India. Nevertheless it did make me reflect on the sense of national exceptionalism reflected in the some of the other songs from the proms, such as "Rule Britannia" and "Jerusalem" (the latter a Blake poem inspired by the legend that Jesus visited Britain as a boy).
Of course an American is hardly one to point fingers at the people of another country for any cultural hint they think they're better than everyone else. Hell, in this country nobody hints any such thing: they shout it from the rooftops (or on Fox News). And yet that's strangely absent from most of our patriotic songs. Our national anthem is essentially a prayer for national survival. "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and "America the Beautiful" are songs that bespeak love of a physical place ("I love thy rocks and rills/Thy woods and templed hills"). If I actually had to choose a new anthem (not that anyone's ever going to ask me) I might opt for "Shenandoah" (O Shenandoah, I long to hear you/Away you rolling river...Away, I'm bound away, 'cross the wide Missouri"). It refers to a specific, albeit prolonged historical event (the settling of the West by Americans of European descent) but it reflects the immigrant's sense of loss, the reality that to go somewhere new, however much promise it holds, you have to give up something. It's not a peculiarly American experience—but it's certainly part of who we are as a nation.
And then of course, there's "This Land Is Your Land."
Doing some cursory research for this blog post I did discover some fascinating gems of American patriotic song. I had never heard "Hail Columbia" before. Composed in 1789, it has a delightfully eighteenth century sound:
But my possible favorite among my discoveries when I googled "American Patriotic Songs" is "Stalin Isn't Stallin'" a song written to drum up solidarity with one of Our Gallant Allies during World War II:
I'm sure the songwriter was blacklisted in the fifties. Songs such as "Stalin," "Hail Columbia" and "Shenandoah" should be better known to us—provided we could think about them in some historical context.
I kept thinking, "The Brits really need to update their patriotic songs." I also kept wondering what was up with the people in the audience waving Norwegian flags (29 seconds in). But nationalism is about sentiment not rationality. No one in that audience seriously wants the UK to re-take India. Nevertheless it did make me reflect on the sense of national exceptionalism reflected in the some of the other songs from the proms, such as "Rule Britannia" and "Jerusalem" (the latter a Blake poem inspired by the legend that Jesus visited Britain as a boy).
Of course an American is hardly one to point fingers at the people of another country for any cultural hint they think they're better than everyone else. Hell, in this country nobody hints any such thing: they shout it from the rooftops (or on Fox News). And yet that's strangely absent from most of our patriotic songs. Our national anthem is essentially a prayer for national survival. "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and "America the Beautiful" are songs that bespeak love of a physical place ("I love thy rocks and rills/Thy woods and templed hills"). If I actually had to choose a new anthem (not that anyone's ever going to ask me) I might opt for "Shenandoah" (O Shenandoah, I long to hear you/Away you rolling river...Away, I'm bound away, 'cross the wide Missouri"). It refers to a specific, albeit prolonged historical event (the settling of the West by Americans of European descent) but it reflects the immigrant's sense of loss, the reality that to go somewhere new, however much promise it holds, you have to give up something. It's not a peculiarly American experience—but it's certainly part of who we are as a nation.
And then of course, there's "This Land Is Your Land."
Doing some cursory research for this blog post I did discover some fascinating gems of American patriotic song. I had never heard "Hail Columbia" before. Composed in 1789, it has a delightfully eighteenth century sound:
But my possible favorite among my discoveries when I googled "American Patriotic Songs" is "Stalin Isn't Stallin'" a song written to drum up solidarity with one of Our Gallant Allies during World War II:
I'm sure the songwriter was blacklisted in the fifties. Songs such as "Stalin," "Hail Columbia" and "Shenandoah" should be better known to us—provided we could think about them in some historical context.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
Southern Dispatch, or The Three Stooges
A friend of mine pointed out to me the "upset" language in the Boston Globe's coverage of Gingrich's primary victory in South Carolina. The paper's headline writers described Gingrich as "roaring" to his win and denigrated Mitt Romney as "formerly high-flying."I honestly don't know why anyone thought Romney had a chance in South Carolina: he's from Massachusetts and he's a Mormon. I would add that he's a terrible campaigner, but that doesn't really make him stand out among his competitors: at the end of last year Gingrich's campaign couldn't even get it together to collect enough signatures in time to get him on the ballot in Virginia, and last spring he didn't seem to realize that the Eastern Mediterranean isn't where you go to campaign for president. He now defends his cruise by saying it was intended to test his staff and show he's a "different kind of candidate." Then there's Rick Santorum, who publicly objected to Dan Savage's creative definition of his last name, thereby causing some of his more ignorant supporters to google it out of curiosity and thereby making it the top hit when anyone googles "Santorum."
But back to Gingrich. Other than Perry, he's the candidate who best appeals to the tribalism of a particular type of Southern white voter: the man or woman who's scared at who much browner America is than it used to be, who feels threatened or alienated by politicians who talk about issues in any manner approaching complexity. Gingrich is one of them. Even his Catholicism can't eclipse his essential Bubbaness. The South Carolina primary: think of it as one of White America's last stands.
Meanwhile, the show continues....
Thursday, January 19, 2012
2011: The Year in Review
(A little late, I know, but bear with me).
Normally I would have opened 2012 on this blog with a list of all the books I've read, but I'm a little intimidated by some of the other 2011 reading lists out there.
Instead I present you with:
These Are A Few of my Favorite Things (2011 edition):
Favorite novel: Galore by Michael Crummey, a multi-generational novel set in Newfoundland that puts this hitherto little-known Canadian author in a league with Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Favorite book of short stories: In This Light: New and Selected Stories by Melanie Rae Thon, a collection of heartbreaking portraits of society's castoffs.
Favorite cookbook: Simply Ming One-Pot Meals page after page of simple and suprising fusion East-West fusion recipes.
Favorite political ad: Herman Cain's He Carried Yellow Flowers (below).
Favorite description of He Carried Yellow Flowers: "Dadaist meta-western."
Favorite parody of a political ad: James Kotecki's parody of Perry's "Strong" ad.
Favorite tributes to Christopher Hitchens:
This one by Christopher Buckely for its infectious warmth.
This one by Katha Pollitt for not being afraid to say the truth about Hitch's personal and intellectual failings.
Favorite political event: my native state voting down a referendum that would have criminalized many forms of birth control.
Favorite stupid thing Republicans did: Arizona Republicans selling their state capitol building for $81 million to help balance the state budget. They are now paying $105 million to get it back. That's some great financial planning there.
Favorite Internet time-waster: reading the pairings of panels from Peanuts cartoons with random tweets. Sadly there will be no more new ones thanks to those humorless dullards who run Charles Schulz's estate.
Favorite silly animal photo:
Favorite iconoclastic take on a children's toy: Barbie re-imagined as a hoarder.
Normally I would have opened 2012 on this blog with a list of all the books I've read, but I'm a little intimidated by some of the other 2011 reading lists out there.
Instead I present you with:
These Are A Few of my Favorite Things (2011 edition):
Favorite novel: Galore by Michael Crummey, a multi-generational novel set in Newfoundland that puts this hitherto little-known Canadian author in a league with Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
Favorite book of short stories: In This Light: New and Selected Stories by Melanie Rae Thon, a collection of heartbreaking portraits of society's castoffs.
Favorite cookbook: Simply Ming One-Pot Meals page after page of simple and suprising fusion East-West fusion recipes.
Favorite political ad: Herman Cain's He Carried Yellow Flowers (below).
Favorite description of He Carried Yellow Flowers: "Dadaist meta-western."
Favorite parody of a political ad: James Kotecki's parody of Perry's "Strong" ad.
Favorite tributes to Christopher Hitchens:
This one by Christopher Buckely for its infectious warmth.
This one by Katha Pollitt for not being afraid to say the truth about Hitch's personal and intellectual failings.
Favorite political event: my native state voting down a referendum that would have criminalized many forms of birth control.
Favorite stupid thing Republicans did: Arizona Republicans selling their state capitol building for $81 million to help balance the state budget. They are now paying $105 million to get it back. That's some great financial planning there.
Favorite Internet time-waster: reading the pairings of panels from Peanuts cartoons with random tweets. Sadly there will be no more new ones thanks to those humorless dullards who run Charles Schulz's estate.
Favorite silly animal photo:
Favorite iconoclastic take on a children's toy: Barbie re-imagined as a hoarder.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
The Way We Live Now
Forgive me if this is old news, but I just had to write about this.One Ronald Ball of Madison County, Wisconsin, claims that in November 2009 he found a dead mouse in a can of Mountain Dew he had just bought. Unfortunately he didn't find the mouse before he took a drink out of the can. He claims he became "violently ill" and started vomiting. Only afterwards did he or a friend empty the can and find the mouse. Ball supposedly wrote a letter of complaint to Mountain Dew (with the mouse enclosed).* He then initiated a lawsuit against Mountain Dew's manufacturer, PepsiCo, for $50,000 in damages.
Mr. Ball has apparently finally had his day in court and here's where it gets interesting: PepsiCo's representatives recently offered the defense that Mr. Ball's account of events is simply impossible. Not because their quality control protocols would have prevented a mouse (dead or otherwise) from making its way into a can of Mountain Dew, but because Mountain Dew is so acidic that within thirty days the mouse would have dissolved into a "jelly-like substance" (the words of Lawrence D. McGill, an expert in veterinary pathology). PepsiCo asserts that at least 74 days elapsed between the can being sealed and Ball opening it.
So think about that, gentle reader: the next time you open a can of soda, you could be getting a protein bonus, a rodent smoothie, if you will.
Aged to perfection.
This isn't actually as horrifying as it sounds: the company is simply arguing that Mountain Dew is an acidic beverage, far less acidic than the fluids in anyone's stomach. Nevertheless, the public assertion by its manufacturer that a drink can dissolve bones and render flesh to jelly will probably make some people shudder with revulsion at the thought of consuming it. And given that PepsiCo already has financial problems, fewer buyers of Mountain Dew is the last thing they need.
I haven't enjoyed a junk food legal battle this much since Proctor & Gamble was reduced to arguing in a British court that Pringles potato chips aren't really food in a slimy try at weaseling out of paying Value Added Tax.
Given that sales of PepsiCo products are declining overall, maybe the company can use the publicity to market Mountain Dew for less conventional uses. Instead of cremation, maybe some people will opt for "jellyfication" of their bodies after death. Or the next time a group in the developing world commits genocide, the perpetrators can order tankers full of Mountain Dew to hide the evidence.
The possibilities are tantalizing.
*Now I'm wondering how you mail a dead mouse.
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