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BuzzMachine
by Jeff Jarvis
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March 31, 2002
Easter
: I had a bad moment at church this morning, Easter morning. I choked for a moment in the middle of singing the Hallelujah Chorus as I thought of the families of the victims of 9.11 at the same time that I was suffering my every-Easter doubts about resurrection and life everlasting and the very foundations of this day and this faith.
I've learned to live with these doubts. I measure the gap between doubt and certainty and call that faith. I'm not sure about this mystery, never have been, never will be (until I die). I choose to accept it, on faith.
But today, it hurt again to think about those people who fell and burned and crashed on 9.11 -- for my doubts, my failure of faith, meant that I was not sure whether there was any comfort for them and their families in an afterlife, in meaning. I felt as if I failed them.
And as I kept thinking about this and about all the victims in this war -- the innocents in the Middle East who have been blown up merely for the sin of living -- I realized, as I often do, that if it were not for the resurrection and a belief in the afterlife and a few other fine points of theology, I might as well be Jewish (and this is why I have always wondered why Christianity separated itself so far from Judaism and its traditions; why do we not celebrate Passover together?). 9.11 made me feel closer to them.
Part of me wishes that we could send everyone in the Middle East to their rooms together until they can get along together -- and leave us in peace. But, of course, the rest of me, the sane part, realizes that they can no longer be left to their own devices and that the time has come to take action and take sides. I choose to get past history -- for it's hard to decide how far back one has to go to decide who started this fight: to 1948 or to the pharoahs? I choose to judge the players on their actions today. I choose to ally myself with other victims of terrorism against terrorism.
The Passover murders are Easter murders as well. That is a lesson for today.
: David Warren arrives at the same place -- namely, Jerusalem -- from a different route. My mind cannot wander to Jerusalem this year, without feeling a deep solidarity with my Jewish brothers and sisters, in Israel, under daily assault from suicide bombers, and in the shadow cast by a horrible war -- the backward shadow of a war that is approaching. I pray for the Muslims, too, with all who stand at Heaven's Gate, who must walk through "the valley of the shadow of death."
But for the Jews I pray in solidarity, for they are once again under attack, not because there is a war, but because they are Jews.
After the Holocaust we vowed, Never again. Have we already forgotten?
It is time for all Christendom to remember, Never again. That we will not stand by, as Jewish people -- as pregnant mothers, children, teenagers, old women and old men -- are selected for extermination. That we are not indifferent in this matter, that we are not neutrals as between the victim and the murderer. That as Christians, and in the name of Christ, we stand by our brother and sister Jews. Amen.
Jonestown: Jerusalem
: Arafat is looking like a cult leader, pure and simple. He reminds me of Jim Jones in the days before Jonestown, all paranoia and wishful martyrdom. Listen to Arafat on Arab TV: ...we ask Allah to grant us martyrdom, to grant us martyrdom. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions... Jones destroyed his people, more than 900 of them, having them commit murder and suicide for him. Is that what is to become of Palestine?
Suicide murderers
: My worst fear, the one I've dared not say aloud -- for fear it would actually happen -- is that a suicide bomber and then another and then another would strike the U.S. as they have Israel. Our crowded targets are easy to imagine: We gather in such large numbers and, conveniently, we do it at icons of American culture and plenty. The devastation would be huge. The ease with which this could be done frightening. The terror unimaginable.
But now Thomas Friedman has said it aloud in a column warning that we -- yes, we -- must stop the Palestinian suicide murderers or their tactic, their crime, their evil will spread even here. Friedman says the Palestinians are "testing out a whole new form of warfare, using suicide bombers — strapped with dynamite and dressed as Israelis — to achieve their political aims. And it is working." His warning reaches a fevered crescendo: Let's be very clear: Palestinians have adopted suicide bombing as a strategic choice, not out of desperation. This threatens all civilization because if suicide bombing is allowed to work in Israel, then, like hijacking and airplane bombing, it will be copied and will eventually lead to a bomber strapped with a nuclear device threatening entire nations. That is why the whole world must see this Palestinian suicide strategy defeated....
The Palestinians are so blinded by their narcissistic rage that they have lost sight of the basic truth civilization is built on: the sacredness of every human life, starting with your own. If America, the only reality check left, doesn't use every ounce of energy to halt this madness and call it by its real name, then it will spread. The Devil is dancing in the Middle East, and he's dancing our way. It already is spreading. Look at yesterday's news, bringing Islamic suicide murderers to India. What is to stop it from traveling here? Is it just that Saudi terrorists -- our tormenters -- prefer big bangs and they're the ones going after us? Are the Palestinians using up all their lone bombers at home? Is it just a matter of time?
Note well the warning -- the bald threat -- Charles Johnson -- the Web's leading watchdog vs. Arabs -- found in the Boston Globe from the head of Arafat's Fatah, who said: "Only the Americans can stop this massacre. They can stop the massacre with one phone call. If there is harm to one hair of the head of Arafat, the United States should protect its interests all over the world. We are not like bin Laden, but we have our own style." Their own style has been quite clearly demonstrated in Israel: They use their own people, their own women, their own children, for God's sake -- they murder their own -- to murder their enemies.
Glenn Reynolds takes that as an opportunity to rattle some American sabre: "We've got our own style, too, buddy." But note our style: We bomb the bejesus out of the bad guys. That's how we got the Taliban and bin Laden out. Is that we are prepared to do here? How are we going to halt this evil? For we must.
: Another attack at an ambulance station, this by a 17-year-old. And another killing 14 at a mall.
Easter
: I had a bad moment at church this morning, Easter morning. I choked for a moment in the middle of singing the Hallelujah Chorus as I thought of the families of the victims of 9.11 at the same time that I was suffering my every-Easter doubts about resurrection and life everlasting and the very foundations of this day and this faith.
I've learned to live with these doubts. I measure the gap between doubt and certainty and call that faith. I'm not sure about this mystery, never have been, never will be (until I die). I choose to accept it, on faith.
But today, it hurt again to think about those people who fell and burned and crashed on 9.11 -- for my doubts, my failure of faith, meant that I was not sure whether there was any comfort for them and their families in an afterlife, in meaning. I felt as if I failed them.
And as I kept thinking about this and about all the victims in this war -- the innocents in the Middle East who have been blown up merely for the sin of living -- I realized, as I often do, that if it were not for the resurrection and a belief in the afterlife and a few other fine points of theology, I might as well be Jewish (and this is why I have always wondered why Christianity separated itself so far from Judaism and its traditions; why do we not celebrate Passover together?). 9.11 made me feel closer to them.
Part of me wishes that we could send everyone in the Middle East to their rooms together until they can get along together -- and leave us in peace. But, of course, the rest of me, the sane part, realizes that they can no longer be left to their own devices and that the time has come to take action and take sides. I choose to get past history -- for it's hard to decide how far back one has to go to decide who started this fight: to 1948 or to the pharoahs? I choose to judge the players on their actions today. I choose to ally myself with other victims of terrorism against terrorism.
The Passover murders are Easter murders as well. That is a lesson for today.
: David Warren arrives at the same place -- namely, Jerusalem -- from a different route. My mind cannot wander to Jerusalem this year, without feeling a deep solidarity with my Jewish brothers and sisters, in Israel, under daily assault from suicide bombers, and in the shadow cast by a horrible war -- the backward shadow of a war that is approaching. I pray for the Muslims, too, with all who stand at Heaven's Gate, who must walk through "the valley of the shadow of death."
But for the Jews I pray in solidarity, for they are once again under attack, not because there is a war, but because they are Jews.
After the Holocaust we vowed, Never again. Have we already forgotten?
It is time for all Christendom to remember, Never again. That we will not stand by, as Jewish people -- as pregnant mothers, children, teenagers, old women and old men -- are selected for extermination. That we are not indifferent in this matter, that we are not neutrals as between the victim and the murderer. That as Christians, and in the name of Christ, we stand by our brother and sister Jews. Amen.
Jonestown: Jerusalem
: Arafat is looking like a cult leader, pure and simple. He reminds me of Jim Jones in the days before Jonestown, all paranoia and wishful martyrdom. Listen to Arafat on Arab TV: ...we ask Allah to grant us martyrdom, to grant us martyrdom. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions. To Jerusalem we march – martyrs by the millions... Jones destroyed his people, more than 900 of them, having them commit murder and suicide for him. Is that what is to become of Palestine?
Suicide murderers
: My worst fear, the one I've dared not say aloud -- for fear it would actually happen -- is that a suicide bomber and then another and then another would strike the U.S. as they have Israel. Our crowded targets are easy to imagine: We gather in such large numbers and, conveniently, we do it at icons of American culture and plenty. The devastation would be huge. The ease with which this could be done frightening. The terror unimaginable.
But now Thomas Friedman has said it aloud in a column warning that we -- yes, we -- must stop the Palestinian suicide murderers or their tactic, their crime, their evil will spread even here. Friedman says the Palestinians are "testing out a whole new form of warfare, using suicide bombers — strapped with dynamite and dressed as Israelis — to achieve their political aims. And it is working." His warning reaches a fevered crescendo: Let's be very clear: Palestinians have adopted suicide bombing as a strategic choice, not out of desperation. This threatens all civilization because if suicide bombing is allowed to work in Israel, then, like hijacking and airplane bombing, it will be copied and will eventually lead to a bomber strapped with a nuclear device threatening entire nations. That is why the whole world must see this Palestinian suicide strategy defeated....
The Palestinians are so blinded by their narcissistic rage that they have lost sight of the basic truth civilization is built on: the sacredness of every human life, starting with your own. If America, the only reality check left, doesn't use every ounce of energy to halt this madness and call it by its real name, then it will spread. The Devil is dancing in the Middle East, and he's dancing our way. It already is spreading. Look at yesterday's news, bringing Islamic suicide murderers to India. What is to stop it from traveling here? Is it just that Saudi terrorists -- our tormenters -- prefer big bangs and they're the ones going after us? Are the Palestinians using up all their lone bombers at home? Is it just a matter of time?
Note well the warning -- the bald threat -- Charles Johnson -- the Web's leading watchdog vs. Arabs -- found in the Boston Globe from the head of Arafat's Fatah, who said: "Only the Americans can stop this massacre. They can stop the massacre with one phone call. If there is harm to one hair of the head of Arafat, the United States should protect its interests all over the world. We are not like bin Laden, but we have our own style." Their own style has been quite clearly demonstrated in Israel: They use their own people, their own women, their own children, for God's sake -- they murder their own -- to murder their enemies.
Glenn Reynolds takes that as an opportunity to rattle some American sabre: "We've got our own style, too, buddy." But note our style: We bomb the bejesus out of the bad guys. That's how we got the Taliban and bin Laden out. Is that we are prepared to do here? How are we going to halt this evil? For we must.
: Another attack at an ambulance station, this by a 17-year-old. And another killing 14 at a mall.
March 30, 2002
Hell is getting crowded
: Israel is not the only place being terrorized by suicide bombers of the Islamic stripe. Ten people at a Hindu temple in India were just murdered by a Muslim suicide bomber.
You won't like what comes next
: Inspired by Victor Davis Hanson's line, "There will be no second Holocaust," Will Warren pens a few right-on lines of his own: Not concerned with what Allah wants or doesn’t,
Don’t care what it says in your holy text,
Doesn’t matter if your sad story was or wasn’t.
Don’t try it: you won’t like what comes next. The lights: A chorus is growing to keep the towers of light. I strongly agree. The lights should become a permanent part of our skyline, part of the permanent memorial.
Now add the fact that it is going to take as long as six years, they say, to build on the site (can't find the link now); we need these lights there to fill in the hole.
But Mayor Bloomberg is being a bozo about this, saying that the lights will go dark in April and may come back again. He's whining about the cost. Damnit, a mayor of vision would not quibble. He's acting like a CEO, not a leader.
Get me rewrite
: So Noam Chomsky is going to start a newspaper about the war. From where else? San Francisco, of course. Chortle.
Hell is getting crowded
: Israel is not the only place being terrorized by suicide bombers of the Islamic stripe. Ten people at a Hindu temple in India were just murdered by a Muslim suicide bomber.
You won't like what comes next
: Inspired by Victor Davis Hanson's line, "There will be no second Holocaust," Will Warren pens a few right-on lines of his own: Not concerned with what Allah wants or doesn’t,
Don’t care what it says in your holy text,
Doesn’t matter if your sad story was or wasn’t.
Don’t try it: you won’t like what comes next. The lights: A chorus is growing to keep the towers of light. I strongly agree. The lights should become a permanent part of our skyline, part of the permanent memorial.
Now add the fact that it is going to take as long as six years, they say, to build on the site (can't find the link now); we need these lights there to fill in the hole.
But Mayor Bloomberg is being a bozo about this, saying that the lights will go dark in April and may come back again. He's whining about the cost. Damnit, a mayor of vision would not quibble. He's acting like a CEO, not a leader.
Get me rewrite
: So Noam Chomsky is going to start a newspaper about the war. From where else? San Francisco, of course. Chortle.
March 29, 2002
Dead letter box
: Penthouse's parent company is in danger of folding.
Arafat's Panic Room
: Question: What happens if Israel does kill Arafat? They say they're not trying to, but they're attacking his headquarters, as he cowers in one room. A stray bullet or missile or angry soldier could take him out. What then? War tonight?
: Dear Mrs. Arafat, says Tres Producers. Sorry we blew your husband up. We were trying to "isolate" him from the rest of his terrorist leadership, and we ended up “isolating” his ass from the rest of him. Our mistake. Nightmares: I had nightmares last night. People have often asked me whether I've had them, after 9.11. I haven't, not many anyway. And if I did, I wouldn't talk about them as if they had meaning. I hate dream sequences in movies and books; they try to infer meaning where it does not necessarily exist. Besides, they're boring.
My nightmares came directly from something I heard on Howard Stern the other day: A guy was promoting high-rise-escape parachutes and he doing a reasonable job of it, simply arguing that having these things would be better than nothing. He explained that in talking to fire departments about high-rise fires he learned that people who fall usually do not jump -- as we all assumed people did at the World Trade Center. ("How terrible must it be up there if people are jumping?" we all asked.) He said that people trapped in these fires go to windows for air and as they struggle for oxygen, they lean farther and farther out windows to escape the smoke but then they pass out and they fall. He said he believed that most of the people who fell out of the World Trade Center towers were unconscious when they fell. Somehow, that made me feel better. The images of those people are the most horrible images I live with from that day; I will not talk about them. I shudder to think what they had to be thinking. But if I'm to believe this man, they were not conscious. Small comfort.
But last night, I had the nightmares about falling and not being able to get a parachute on and dropping the parachute, nightmares that played into my fear of heights and falling and into the horror and fear of 9.11.
I've been thinking lately that the time is coming to stop talking about all this, for surely there are folks who are thinking, "Get a life, man; get a grip; move on." They'd be right. I've said it myself.
And then we all saw the story this week that said that there was a higher rate of depression among people who live near the World Trade Center: More than 150,000 adults living in the southern half of Manhattan suffered post-traumatic stress or depression following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to the first detailed study of the psychological aftershocks.
The survey, conducted five to eight weeks after the attacks, found nearly double the usual rate of psychiatric illness: 7.5 percent of interviewed Manhattanites living below 110th Street had post-traumatic stress disorder and 9.7 percent had depression linked to the terrorism. When I saw that, I thought the number was ludicrously low. Less than 10 percent were depressed? Hell, that many New Yorkers have always been depressed. After 9.11, all of New York was depressed to one degree or another. Half of New York still is.
And that's normal; that is a quite sane reaction to this insane event and insane times.
I don't go to therapy. I don't poo-poo it for others but I do for myself. It's my job as a mature adult to cope and I'm coping just fine. Thank goodness, I don't need shrinks or drugs to help me cope.
I'm coping with even this; most are. But still, I have reason to be depressed; we all do. It is a proper response to everything that has happened to be depressed and sad and scared and angry. It is a proper response to have nightmares.
And so, I cannot imagine living in Israel today. The danger comes from everywhere: on buses, at Passover Seders with old people in hotels, and today, in the grocery store. The evil is all around. Life is a nightmare. I don't know how they cope.
: Amygdala picks up the baton in the blogwatching relay race and does a damn fine job of it.
Good Friday
: From Killing the Buddah, Jon Hooten shares observations appropriate to the news and the day: While Judas took 30 pieces of silver, Cardinal Law is giving his 30 (million) pieces away. Some might consider Law's settlement an act of justice, a payment of reparation for those so grievously wronged over the years. Yet, the heart of the comparison of Cardinal Law to Judas Iscariot lies not in the accounting. The rub is in the betrayal, what is lost in the exchange. : And Tony Pierce advises: i havent spread the word in so long and here it is Good Friday and this is what i'll say about it.
read a few chapters of the Good Book this weekend.
it might surprise you. I see so little religion in life, I'm surprised to see so much religion online.
Dead letter box
: Penthouse's parent company is in danger of folding.
Arafat's Panic Room
: Question: What happens if Israel does kill Arafat? They say they're not trying to, but they're attacking his headquarters, as he cowers in one room. A stray bullet or missile or angry soldier could take him out. What then? War tonight?
: Dear Mrs. Arafat, says Tres Producers. Sorry we blew your husband up. We were trying to "isolate" him from the rest of his terrorist leadership, and we ended up “isolating” his ass from the rest of him. Our mistake. Nightmares: I had nightmares last night. People have often asked me whether I've had them, after 9.11. I haven't, not many anyway. And if I did, I wouldn't talk about them as if they had meaning. I hate dream sequences in movies and books; they try to infer meaning where it does not necessarily exist. Besides, they're boring.
My nightmares came directly from something I heard on Howard Stern the other day: A guy was promoting high-rise-escape parachutes and he doing a reasonable job of it, simply arguing that having these things would be better than nothing. He explained that in talking to fire departments about high-rise fires he learned that people who fall usually do not jump -- as we all assumed people did at the World Trade Center. ("How terrible must it be up there if people are jumping?" we all asked.) He said that people trapped in these fires go to windows for air and as they struggle for oxygen, they lean farther and farther out windows to escape the smoke but then they pass out and they fall. He said he believed that most of the people who fell out of the World Trade Center towers were unconscious when they fell. Somehow, that made me feel better. The images of those people are the most horrible images I live with from that day; I will not talk about them. I shudder to think what they had to be thinking. But if I'm to believe this man, they were not conscious. Small comfort.
But last night, I had the nightmares about falling and not being able to get a parachute on and dropping the parachute, nightmares that played into my fear of heights and falling and into the horror and fear of 9.11.
I've been thinking lately that the time is coming to stop talking about all this, for surely there are folks who are thinking, "Get a life, man; get a grip; move on." They'd be right. I've said it myself.
And then we all saw the story this week that said that there was a higher rate of depression among people who live near the World Trade Center: More than 150,000 adults living in the southern half of Manhattan suffered post-traumatic stress or depression following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, according to the first detailed study of the psychological aftershocks.
The survey, conducted five to eight weeks after the attacks, found nearly double the usual rate of psychiatric illness: 7.5 percent of interviewed Manhattanites living below 110th Street had post-traumatic stress disorder and 9.7 percent had depression linked to the terrorism. When I saw that, I thought the number was ludicrously low. Less than 10 percent were depressed? Hell, that many New Yorkers have always been depressed. After 9.11, all of New York was depressed to one degree or another. Half of New York still is.
And that's normal; that is a quite sane reaction to this insane event and insane times.
I don't go to therapy. I don't poo-poo it for others but I do for myself. It's my job as a mature adult to cope and I'm coping just fine. Thank goodness, I don't need shrinks or drugs to help me cope.
I'm coping with even this; most are. But still, I have reason to be depressed; we all do. It is a proper response to everything that has happened to be depressed and sad and scared and angry. It is a proper response to have nightmares.
And so, I cannot imagine living in Israel today. The danger comes from everywhere: on buses, at Passover Seders with old people in hotels, and today, in the grocery store. The evil is all around. Life is a nightmare. I don't know how they cope.
: Amygdala picks up the baton in the blogwatching relay race and does a damn fine job of it.
Good Friday
: From Killing the Buddah, Jon Hooten shares observations appropriate to the news and the day: While Judas took 30 pieces of silver, Cardinal Law is giving his 30 (million) pieces away. Some might consider Law's settlement an act of justice, a payment of reparation for those so grievously wronged over the years. Yet, the heart of the comparison of Cardinal Law to Judas Iscariot lies not in the accounting. The rub is in the betrayal, what is lost in the exchange. : And Tony Pierce advises: i havent spread the word in so long and here it is Good Friday and this is what i'll say about it.
read a few chapters of the Good Book this weekend.
it might surprise you. I see so little religion in life, I'm surprised to see so much religion online.
March 28, 2002
Cool is dead
: Many will have pointed to the NY Times declaration today that the Web, like an old girlfriend, is just no fun anymore.
I welcome this.
The Web became too cool, too cute, too soon.
The Web became useless.
Yes, I do worry that has Internet companies go out of the business and real companies reduce their Internet investments, there will be less on the Internet to engage the audience and the audience could shrink.
But the truth is that people are spending less time on the Web today because they're wasting less time.
They're not surfing; we see that in every focus group we do. People know what they want; they get it; they get off.
This is not a problem isolated to the Web. Other media can get useless, too. When I was Sunday editor of the NY Daily News, I started a new section with only one mission: Every story in it had to be useful. No thumbsuckers about city hall. No days with bag ladies. No cries of injustice. Useful. For too many newspapers, I said, had started to become useless.
TV regularly becomes useless and then reforms itself when it discovers that that's a way to lose money. Ditto movies and books.
The Web was cool when it was new and then cool wasn't such a bad thing. I started a bunch of sites that were Cool Sites of the Day and I was proud of that... then.
But now the Web is about getting information, about buying things, about communicating (and weblogs do help with two of three of those things).
So I welcome the Web's new dullness. Let's hear it for dull!
Ha!
: A FoxNews anchor asks Binyamin Netanyahu whether he believes Arafat's offer of a complete ceasefire. Netanyahu seems genuinely surprised at the question and replies: "Are you joking?"
He says Israel must do to Arafat what America did to the Taliban.
This is going to get even uglier.
: To the death...
: You've been waiting for the TV trend in reality shows and extreme game shows to go too far, haven't you? Been wondering when we'd see the first serious injury or death, right? The start:
A contestant on the US version of Dog Eat Dog ended up in hospital after taking part in one of the show's stunts.
The 26-year-old man had held his breath underwater for two minutes.
He was taken to hospital by paramedics as a precaution after an emergency call was made to the Los Angeles Fire Department.
US TV network NBC identified the man only as a Los Angeles personal trainer.
Cool is dead
: Many will have pointed to the NY Times declaration today that the Web, like an old girlfriend, is just no fun anymore.
I welcome this.
The Web became too cool, too cute, too soon.
The Web became useless.
Yes, I do worry that has Internet companies go out of the business and real companies reduce their Internet investments, there will be less on the Internet to engage the audience and the audience could shrink.
But the truth is that people are spending less time on the Web today because they're wasting less time.
They're not surfing; we see that in every focus group we do. People know what they want; they get it; they get off.
This is not a problem isolated to the Web. Other media can get useless, too. When I was Sunday editor of the NY Daily News, I started a new section with only one mission: Every story in it had to be useful. No thumbsuckers about city hall. No days with bag ladies. No cries of injustice. Useful. For too many newspapers, I said, had started to become useless.
TV regularly becomes useless and then reforms itself when it discovers that that's a way to lose money. Ditto movies and books.
The Web was cool when it was new and then cool wasn't such a bad thing. I started a bunch of sites that were Cool Sites of the Day and I was proud of that... then.
But now the Web is about getting information, about buying things, about communicating (and weblogs do help with two of three of those things).
So I welcome the Web's new dullness. Let's hear it for dull!
Ha!
: A FoxNews anchor asks Binyamin Netanyahu whether he believes Arafat's offer of a complete ceasefire. Netanyahu seems genuinely surprised at the question and replies: "Are you joking?"
He says Israel must do to Arafat what America did to the Taliban.
This is going to get even uglier.
: To the death...
: You've been waiting for the TV trend in reality shows and extreme game shows to go too far, haven't you? Been wondering when we'd see the first serious injury or death, right? The start:
A contestant on the US version of Dog Eat Dog ended up in hospital after taking part in one of the show's stunts.
The 26-year-old man had held his breath underwater for two minutes.
He was taken to hospital by paramedics as a precaution after an emergency call was made to the Los Angeles Fire Department.
US TV network NBC identified the man only as a Los Angeles personal trainer.
March 27, 2002
Scum spam
: Osama bin Laden allegedly sent email to an Arab paper in London. Abdel Bari Atwan, editor of al-Quds al-Arabi, said last night that the message, headed "A Bin Laden Communique", denounced Saudi Arabia's Middle East peace initiative and praised Palestinian suicide attacks....
The message also praised Palestinian suicide attacks on Israelis and urged Muslims to launch jihad, or holy struggle, against the Jewish state.
"The Jews try in vain to flee, finding no refuge and becoming exposed to exploding bodies that make them taste death and chased by horror," it said. It described suicide bombings in Israel and the September 11 attacks as "the great events" and "the blessed jihad".
There has been no proven communication from Bin Laden since the height of the Afghan war. It was unclear last night whether the message was genuine, but if so it would be the first evidence that he has survived the bombing. If anything will bring him out of hiding, it will be his ego.
Uncle Miltie
: Milton Berle died. Of course, I'm sorry to hear that. On his last appearance on Howard Stern's show, he proved to be a wry and funny and up to any comic challenge.
I know I'll be accused of being cruel and heartless and nasty for saying this, but I dread the nostalgia that will come from this. People will be wailing about how he represented the "golden age" of TV. But that's bull. Early television was bad vaudeville; it was tinny, not golden: silly, slapstick, obvious, easy. The truth is that the golden age of TV is now; television today is filled with far greater talent and imagination and artistry. I don't mean to detract from Miltie's pioneering in a new medium; can't take that away from him. But I just have to say that young people should ignore all the nostaglic claptrap they are about to hear; things weren't always better in the old days; sometimes, things actually get better over time and TV is one of those things.
: Mac Thomason is crueler than I am.
Bastards
: Big suicide bombing in Israel, killing 19 people and injuring more than 100 (at latest count).
: And we should listen to Arafat... why?
: And we should give a shit about the Palestinians... why?
Sympathy is dying fast. Oops, it just died.
Victimology
: So now a class-action suit on behalf of all black Americans has been filed against three companies that allegedly profited from slavery well more than a century ago under the doctrine that if the Jews can do it (for genocide in their lifetime) then shy shouldn't the next guy?
Where the hell does this end, this exploitation of victimhood?
By this logic...
: The Jews should certainly sue Egypt for their time in slavery under the Pharaohs. Let's get it filed in time for Passover, eh?
: Native Americans should sue England, France, and Spain for taking their land.
: Native Canadians should sue the Hudson's Bay Company for taking their land and furs (and then PETA should sue them, too).
: Muslims should Christians for the Crusades (hey, it sure would beat murdering us en masse).
Where the hell does it end, this idiocy?
When do people stop being victims? When do people stop being perpetrators? Where does guilt end? Where does entitlement end?
My ancestors were dirt-poor hillbillies in Appalachia who couldn't afford shoes let alone slaves. Yet this suit would have me pay for the sins of others' ancestors because, just for instance, I happen to be a customer of Fleet bank, one of the defendants in the suit. So what moral code says I should pay higher checking fees because somebody 200 years ago did something wrong? And what moral code says that the next generation should carry guilt for the sins of not just our fathers but our father's father's father's father's fathers?
Idiocy. Offensive idiocy.
If the courts do not throw this out immediately, the courts are a jackass.
The cure for blogstipation
: Some folks just disappear from blogdom for awhile (Thomas Nephew, phone home!). Some store up their posts and then eat a good, big bowl of prunes and out it comes. Nick Denton is of the latter variety and he's posting like mad from PC Forum. Good stuff.
Denton is also assuring himself new nicknames as he tweaks the Sergeants (who just dubbed him a "prissy airheaded blonde"). The other day, another blogger -- I apologize for not remembering which one -- dubbed Denton a "schoolmarm" and that reputation will only be amplified with Denton's posts yesterday on proper blog etiquette.
: Update. Daypop is wonderful. I find that Reid Stott created the schoolmarm moniker for Nick.
The dreaded Afghan spring II
: If you're keeping score for the future, note that the NY Times joins the chorus warning of a rough spring (coming after the rough winter that wasn't rough) in Afghanistan. The Guardian started the spring quagmire whining on March 21.
Scum spam
: Osama bin Laden allegedly sent email to an Arab paper in London. Abdel Bari Atwan, editor of al-Quds al-Arabi, said last night that the message, headed "A Bin Laden Communique", denounced Saudi Arabia's Middle East peace initiative and praised Palestinian suicide attacks....
The message also praised Palestinian suicide attacks on Israelis and urged Muslims to launch jihad, or holy struggle, against the Jewish state.
"The Jews try in vain to flee, finding no refuge and becoming exposed to exploding bodies that make them taste death and chased by horror," it said. It described suicide bombings in Israel and the September 11 attacks as "the great events" and "the blessed jihad".
There has been no proven communication from Bin Laden since the height of the Afghan war. It was unclear last night whether the message was genuine, but if so it would be the first evidence that he has survived the bombing. If anything will bring him out of hiding, it will be his ego.
Uncle Miltie
: Milton Berle died. Of course, I'm sorry to hear that. On his last appearance on Howard Stern's show, he proved to be a wry and funny and up to any comic challenge.
I know I'll be accused of being cruel and heartless and nasty for saying this, but I dread the nostalgia that will come from this. People will be wailing about how he represented the "golden age" of TV. But that's bull. Early television was bad vaudeville; it was tinny, not golden: silly, slapstick, obvious, easy. The truth is that the golden age of TV is now; television today is filled with far greater talent and imagination and artistry. I don't mean to detract from Miltie's pioneering in a new medium; can't take that away from him. But I just have to say that young people should ignore all the nostaglic claptrap they are about to hear; things weren't always better in the old days; sometimes, things actually get better over time and TV is one of those things.
: Mac Thomason is crueler than I am.
Bastards
: Big suicide bombing in Israel, killing 19 people and injuring more than 100 (at latest count).
: And we should listen to Arafat... why?
: And we should give a shit about the Palestinians... why?
Sympathy is dying fast. Oops, it just died.
Victimology
: So now a class-action suit on behalf of all black Americans has been filed against three companies that allegedly profited from slavery well more than a century ago under the doctrine that if the Jews can do it (for genocide in their lifetime) then shy shouldn't the next guy?
Where the hell does this end, this exploitation of victimhood?
By this logic...
: The Jews should certainly sue Egypt for their time in slavery under the Pharaohs. Let's get it filed in time for Passover, eh?
: Native Americans should sue England, France, and Spain for taking their land.
: Native Canadians should sue the Hudson's Bay Company for taking their land and furs (and then PETA should sue them, too).
: Muslims should Christians for the Crusades (hey, it sure would beat murdering us en masse).
Where the hell does it end, this idiocy?
When do people stop being victims? When do people stop being perpetrators? Where does guilt end? Where does entitlement end?
My ancestors were dirt-poor hillbillies in Appalachia who couldn't afford shoes let alone slaves. Yet this suit would have me pay for the sins of others' ancestors because, just for instance, I happen to be a customer of Fleet bank, one of the defendants in the suit. So what moral code says I should pay higher checking fees because somebody 200 years ago did something wrong? And what moral code says that the next generation should carry guilt for the sins of not just our fathers but our father's father's father's father's fathers?
Idiocy. Offensive idiocy.
If the courts do not throw this out immediately, the courts are a jackass.
The cure for blogstipation
: Some folks just disappear from blogdom for awhile (Thomas Nephew, phone home!). Some store up their posts and then eat a good, big bowl of prunes and out it comes. Nick Denton is of the latter variety and he's posting like mad from PC Forum. Good stuff.
Denton is also assuring himself new nicknames as he tweaks the Sergeants (who just dubbed him a "prissy airheaded blonde"). The other day, another blogger -- I apologize for not remembering which one -- dubbed Denton a "schoolmarm" and that reputation will only be amplified with Denton's posts yesterday on proper blog etiquette.
: Update. Daypop is wonderful. I find that Reid Stott created the schoolmarm moniker for Nick.
The dreaded Afghan spring II
: If you're keeping score for the future, note that the NY Times joins the chorus warning of a rough spring (coming after the rough winter that wasn't rough) in Afghanistan. The Guardian started the spring quagmire whining on March 21.
March 26, 2002
WYSIWYG blog editing ... within the blog page
: Follow Me Here discovers a very cool-looking tool that allows you to edit your blog on the blog itself, in the plain old browser (just IE... take that, you Netscape liberals). The Blog "Adminimizer" is explained here. This is more than just a cool blog toy. This is about the wonders of XML: displaying and editing content in any form. We've had a drought of cool on the Internet lately. This is cool.
Wages of sin
: A topnotch Ken Layne column at FoxNews today on Saddam's payments to suicide bombers' famlies.
Anthrax culprits
: It's not every day that I say "amen" to a Wall Street Journal editorial, but I do today. They say that the administration's domestic team is too quick to assume that the source of the anthrax murders is domestic. They point to the evidence I pointed to in recent days: an apparent anthrax lesion on one of the hijackers and the discovery of more biological warfare labs in Afghanistan. ...the FBI persists in asserting that the anthrax letter writer was probably a domestic nut with no ties to al Qaeda. Maybe so. But it's also true that U.S. law-enforcement experts have been wrong about the sources of terror in the recent past, and are capable of becoming fixated on one theory of a case, which they then set out to prove. The first World Trade Center bombing, of course, turned out to be the culmination of a coordinated project carried out by a broad radical-Islamic network, not just a few disaffected crackpots living in the U.S.
The FBI, like the CIA and the other government intelligence-gathering agencies chasing terrorists, is a bureaucracy, and bureaucracies tend to operate under their own imperatives. In that context, it's not reassuring that two senior law-enforcement officials involved in the anthrax investigation are quoted in yesterday's Journal as saying that much of their work is aimed at ensuring that any evidence they bring forth will survive challenge in a courtroom. Well, we'd all like to arrest, convict and put away the individuals who dropped the anthrax letters in the mail, but the real national priority has to be forestalling more such attacks against the American people.
That means that we must be prepared to pursue the anthrax trail wherever it leads, even if it takes us to places, such as Iraq, that complicate choices about foreign policy for U.S. leadership. Amen again. [via Instapundit]
Tragedy nuggets
: I get mail from James Archer reacting to my whining about the Oscars turning the Twin Towers into a politically incorrect image we shouldn't see (below). He writes: Why is it that every article, every news segment, every documentary, every essay, every song, every event, everything must mention "9-11!" every two minutes or be branded unamerican?
The events of that day have been transformed into a meme, a little postmodern nugget of political correctness that can be passed around like a pet rock, adored and petted and passed on to someone else. It's no longer a historic event, it's just an abstract concept. 9-11. Ground Zero. WTC. Firefighters. Flags. Giuliani. Images. Concepts. Lit: Will Warren at Unremitting Verse takes on Jonathan Franzen's hyper-hyped The Corrections.“Shadows lengthened on yellowing zoysia”:
Note the masterstroke: zoysia.
Nothing so mundane in FranzenLand as grass.
You can hear the men talking in that northern clime:
“Hey, Clem: your zoysia’s gettin’ a mite long, friend.” I've already written how I was reading The Corrections on 9.11, how I threw out my copy because it was infused with The Dust, how I bought another copy and tried to pick it up again, how I gave up because the book felt so damned self-indulgent, especially after everything that had happened. So I'm gratified to see Warren tweaking the self-proclaimed master of American fiction. (Seeing this guy go up against Oprah was almost enough to make me side with Oprah... almost.)
My real confession out of this is that I haven't been reading much at all since 9.11; haven't had the will or the attention span (and been busy blogging). The other day I heard someone on NPR saying that she put Franzen's book on her list of the best of last year and now regretted it, after reading Atonement by Ian McEwan. So I picked up that book.
WYSIWYG blog editing ... within the blog page
: Follow Me Here discovers a very cool-looking tool that allows you to edit your blog on the blog itself, in the plain old browser (just IE... take that, you Netscape liberals). The Blog "Adminimizer" is explained here. This is more than just a cool blog toy. This is about the wonders of XML: displaying and editing content in any form. We've had a drought of cool on the Internet lately. This is cool.
Wages of sin
: A topnotch Ken Layne column at FoxNews today on Saddam's payments to suicide bombers' famlies.
Anthrax culprits
: It's not every day that I say "amen" to a Wall Street Journal editorial, but I do today. They say that the administration's domestic team is too quick to assume that the source of the anthrax murders is domestic. They point to the evidence I pointed to in recent days: an apparent anthrax lesion on one of the hijackers and the discovery of more biological warfare labs in Afghanistan. ...the FBI persists in asserting that the anthrax letter writer was probably a domestic nut with no ties to al Qaeda. Maybe so. But it's also true that U.S. law-enforcement experts have been wrong about the sources of terror in the recent past, and are capable of becoming fixated on one theory of a case, which they then set out to prove. The first World Trade Center bombing, of course, turned out to be the culmination of a coordinated project carried out by a broad radical-Islamic network, not just a few disaffected crackpots living in the U.S.
The FBI, like the CIA and the other government intelligence-gathering agencies chasing terrorists, is a bureaucracy, and bureaucracies tend to operate under their own imperatives. In that context, it's not reassuring that two senior law-enforcement officials involved in the anthrax investigation are quoted in yesterday's Journal as saying that much of their work is aimed at ensuring that any evidence they bring forth will survive challenge in a courtroom. Well, we'd all like to arrest, convict and put away the individuals who dropped the anthrax letters in the mail, but the real national priority has to be forestalling more such attacks against the American people.
That means that we must be prepared to pursue the anthrax trail wherever it leads, even if it takes us to places, such as Iraq, that complicate choices about foreign policy for U.S. leadership. Amen again. [via Instapundit]
Tragedy nuggets
: I get mail from James Archer reacting to my whining about the Oscars turning the Twin Towers into a politically incorrect image we shouldn't see (below). He writes: Why is it that every article, every news segment, every documentary, every essay, every song, every event, everything must mention "9-11!" every two minutes or be branded unamerican?
The events of that day have been transformed into a meme, a little postmodern nugget of political correctness that can be passed around like a pet rock, adored and petted and passed on to someone else. It's no longer a historic event, it's just an abstract concept. 9-11. Ground Zero. WTC. Firefighters. Flags. Giuliani. Images. Concepts. Lit: Will Warren at Unremitting Verse takes on Jonathan Franzen's hyper-hyped The Corrections.“Shadows lengthened on yellowing zoysia”:
Note the masterstroke: zoysia.
Nothing so mundane in FranzenLand as grass.
You can hear the men talking in that northern clime:
“Hey, Clem: your zoysia’s gettin’ a mite long, friend.” I've already written how I was reading The Corrections on 9.11, how I threw out my copy because it was infused with The Dust, how I bought another copy and tried to pick it up again, how I gave up because the book felt so damned self-indulgent, especially after everything that had happened. So I'm gratified to see Warren tweaking the self-proclaimed master of American fiction. (Seeing this guy go up against Oprah was almost enough to make me side with Oprah... almost.)
My real confession out of this is that I haven't been reading much at all since 9.11; haven't had the will or the attention span (and been busy blogging). The other day I heard someone on NPR saying that she put Franzen's book on her list of the best of last year and now regretted it, after reading Atonement by Ian McEwan. So I picked up that book.
March 25, 2002
Airport insecurity
: Frightening stats from USA Today on the still-miserable state of airport security. Read it and shiver: In the months after Sept. 11, airport screeners confiscated record numbers of nail clippers and scissors. But nearly half the time, they failed to stop the guns, knives or simulated explosives carried past checkpoints by undercover investigators with the Transportation Department's inspector general.
In fact, even as the Federal Aviation Administration evacuated terminals and pulled passengers from more than 600 planes because of security breaches, a confidential memo obtained by USA TODAY shows investigators noticed no discernable improvements by screeners in the period from November through early February, when the tests were conducted.
At screening checkpoints, the memo reads, "only the opaque object (such as a film bag) were routinely caught." Guns passed through in 30% of tests, knives went unnoticed 70% of the time, and screeners failed to detect simulated explosives in 60% of tests.
Perhaps just as troubling, investigators "were successful in boarding 58 aircraft" at 17 of the 32 airports tested. "In 158 tests," the memo says, "we got access to either the aircraft (58) or the tarmac (18) 48 percent of our tries."...
"We still have the same people doing the same jobs they did before Sept. 11," says Reynold Hoover, an expert on counterterrorism who conducts screening seminars. Towers? What towers?: I'll tell you what pissed me off about the Academy Awards last night: The movie industry has suddenly decided that the World Trade Center towers are politically incorrect. They think we shouldn't show the towers; we shouldn't talk about them; it would be wrong.
They have Woody Allen come to show how Hollywood loves New York and give us clip after clip of New York from many great movies but what's most noticable is what they do not show: The World Trade towers.
And we constantly hear Hollywood fret about whether they should edit movies to edit out the towers.
Stop. The Towers were part of the life of New York; they defined our skyline; they now define our history. We are not ashamed of the towers. We are not so tender that we want to act as if they were never there. We are proud of our towers as a symbol of New York's greatness.
If they had shown the towers last night, I guarantee that the audience would have given them a bigger ovation than Woody got.
But Hollywood has no good sense. Hollywood has a tin heart.
A watched blog never boils
: First Will Vehrs threw in the blogwatch towel; he was doing a great job but he needed to pay attention to his real job. Then Tim Blair -- who started this, didn't he? -- quietly abandoned blogwatching. Now Kathy Kinsley has run out of NoDoz and is claiming exhaustion (too bad on two counts: she was a great blogwatcher ... and she was watching me). Blogwatching was a good idea but, like the Internet, it had one problem: there's no money in it. I know somebody who may be working on a solution but I can't talk about that now....
Airport insecurity
: Frightening stats from USA Today on the still-miserable state of airport security. Read it and shiver: In the months after Sept. 11, airport screeners confiscated record numbers of nail clippers and scissors. But nearly half the time, they failed to stop the guns, knives or simulated explosives carried past checkpoints by undercover investigators with the Transportation Department's inspector general.
In fact, even as the Federal Aviation Administration evacuated terminals and pulled passengers from more than 600 planes because of security breaches, a confidential memo obtained by USA TODAY shows investigators noticed no discernable improvements by screeners in the period from November through early February, when the tests were conducted.
At screening checkpoints, the memo reads, "only the opaque object (such as a film bag) were routinely caught." Guns passed through in 30% of tests, knives went unnoticed 70% of the time, and screeners failed to detect simulated explosives in 60% of tests.
Perhaps just as troubling, investigators "were successful in boarding 58 aircraft" at 17 of the 32 airports tested. "In 158 tests," the memo says, "we got access to either the aircraft (58) or the tarmac (18) 48 percent of our tries."...
"We still have the same people doing the same jobs they did before Sept. 11," says Reynold Hoover, an expert on counterterrorism who conducts screening seminars. Towers? What towers?: I'll tell you what pissed me off about the Academy Awards last night: The movie industry has suddenly decided that the World Trade Center towers are politically incorrect. They think we shouldn't show the towers; we shouldn't talk about them; it would be wrong.
They have Woody Allen come to show how Hollywood loves New York and give us clip after clip of New York from many great movies but what's most noticable is what they do not show: The World Trade towers.
And we constantly hear Hollywood fret about whether they should edit movies to edit out the towers.
Stop. The Towers were part of the life of New York; they defined our skyline; they now define our history. We are not ashamed of the towers. We are not so tender that we want to act as if they were never there. We are proud of our towers as a symbol of New York's greatness.
If they had shown the towers last night, I guarantee that the audience would have given them a bigger ovation than Woody got.
But Hollywood has no good sense. Hollywood has a tin heart.
A watched blog never boils
: First Will Vehrs threw in the blogwatch towel; he was doing a great job but he needed to pay attention to his real job. Then Tim Blair -- who started this, didn't he? -- quietly abandoned blogwatching. Now Kathy Kinsley has run out of NoDoz and is claiming exhaustion (too bad on two counts: she was a great blogwatcher ... and she was watching me). Blogwatching was a good idea but, like the Internet, it had one problem: there's no money in it. I know somebody who may be working on a solution but I can't talk about that now....
March 24, 2002
Tom Ridge is a dork
: How many ways can we call the guy a dysfunctional idiot? His continuing refusal to testify before Congress is a mark of stupidity, cowardice, and bureaucracy. Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge stood firm Sunday in his refusal to testify before Congress about the White House's anti-terrorism budget, saying his appearance would violate the constitution's separation of powers. Dork.
Speaking of dorks
: Tom Cruise is one, too.
Fly Naked
: Daniel Taylor resurrects my Fly Naked campaign -- it being preferable to flying clothed but being exposed in those new X-ray machines that should have been invented by a teenage Woody Allen.
The sound of silence
: I think I've been quite tasteful avoiding punchlines about Lady Thatcher being forbidden to speak in public anymore because of her health. I'll continue my stretch of virtue if for no other reason than that the punchlines are all so obvious.
And this week, David Warren writes: Baroness Thatcher was taken ill this past week, and I've been asked to write her obituary as a precaution. (This isn't it.) I happily agree to most such assignments, for when I write an advance obituary, the subject invariably survives; lives so many years that my essay is eventually lost in the files. I attribute the longevity of Ronald Reagan, the Pope, and the Queen Mother, to the obituaries I wrote of them back in the 'nineties. On the other hand, I now deeply regret having written an obituary of Osama bin Laden. Tacky tourism II: Below, I lampoon Californians for turning Ground Zero into a tourist attraction. But it turns out New York is not above the sin, witness this NY Times story: he destruction of the World Trade Center has emerged as a powerful selling point for New York City, invoked again and again over the last six months to make the case that big events like the Super Bowl, the Grammy Awards ceremony and a proposed joint meeting of Congress all belong in New York....
The argument goes like this: Bringing an event like the Super Bowl to New York City will stimulate tourism and help the city and the country recover; it will be an expression of solidarity with New Yorkers; it will strike a blow against terrorism; it will enable visitors to share in the New York spirit.
The case being made is striking in its appeal, in part, to sympathy for the purpose of drumming up tourist business. It appears to link notions of patriotism and civic duty to things like hotel bookings. It centers for once not on the glamour of New York, but on its most tragic moment. Supporting New York is good. Exploiting this tragedy is not.
An improper memorial
: I agree with the NY Times editorial yesterday that came out against a New York State holiday on Sept. 11: Relieving people of work does not necessarily move their thoughts in a desired direction.... Few people caught up in Memorial Day traffic bestir themselves to remember the Union's Civil War dead." I cannot stand the idea of workers and schoolchildren thinking, "Oh, good, it's Sept. 11: That means a day off!"
That date should not mean a day off or anything happy. That date should mean solemn remembrance.
The towers
: Paul Morris at Killing the Buddha writes a striking essay on the towers-of-light memorial at the World Trade Center. [via wood s lot]
He doesn't like the memorial; he says the lights that matter are the flood lights shining "down to the scorched earth, where heads bow in prayer and bend in toil." He adds: Don't be fooled; nothing has been restored. What you see is what you get, a skyline without substance, a tribute that lacks soul. You can find better replicas of the towers from any vendor on the street.
Even so, Morris has many poetic and memorable visions of the towers of light: You'd be forgiven if, after 9/11, you thought you'd never crane your neck to look that high up again, because there it is, against all gods, a great Babel tower siphoning the light of stars barely visible above lower Manhattan. It's as though the flood lamps huddling around ground zero suddenly looked up one by one to create an ethereal halo in the sky....
When dust from the debris removal drifts west and enters the columns, the heat from the bulbs forces it to rise and the towers become a swirl of particles. The effect of watching their ascension is dizzying. At a certain spot in the sky difficult to determine, the columns of light begin to destabilize. They seem almost to be tipping, leaning into each other for support while simultaneously buckling outward....
Nearing midnight, Con Edison cuts the juice and the towers collapse. This time they fall in reverse, as the lights that created them shoot like twin rockets reaching escape velocity. And then they're gone. Again.
Night after night, the towers are extinguished this way, over and over as midnight approaches. And day after day, they are rebuilt anew, photon by photon -- today, tomorrow, and the next after that in a series of power surges embraced by a city impatient to heal. I like the towers of light. But he's right: It's because I'm part of a city impatient to heal. Well said.
Terror tourism
: The LA Times runs a tourism guide to Ground Zero. Tasteless Californians. [via Victory Coffee]
Tom Ridge is a dork
: How many ways can we call the guy a dysfunctional idiot? His continuing refusal to testify before Congress is a mark of stupidity, cowardice, and bureaucracy. Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge stood firm Sunday in his refusal to testify before Congress about the White House's anti-terrorism budget, saying his appearance would violate the constitution's separation of powers. Dork.
Speaking of dorks
: Tom Cruise is one, too.
Fly Naked
: Daniel Taylor resurrects my Fly Naked campaign -- it being preferable to flying clothed but being exposed in those new X-ray machines that should have been invented by a teenage Woody Allen.
The sound of silence
: I think I've been quite tasteful avoiding punchlines about Lady Thatcher being forbidden to speak in public anymore because of her health. I'll continue my stretch of virtue if for no other reason than that the punchlines are all so obvious.
And this week, David Warren writes: Baroness Thatcher was taken ill this past week, and I've been asked to write her obituary as a precaution. (This isn't it.) I happily agree to most such assignments, for when I write an advance obituary, the subject invariably survives; lives so many years that my essay is eventually lost in the files. I attribute the longevity of Ronald Reagan, the Pope, and the Queen Mother, to the obituaries I wrote of them back in the 'nineties. On the other hand, I now deeply regret having written an obituary of Osama bin Laden. Tacky tourism II: Below, I lampoon Californians for turning Ground Zero into a tourist attraction. But it turns out New York is not above the sin, witness this NY Times story: he destruction of the World Trade Center has emerged as a powerful selling point for New York City, invoked again and again over the last six months to make the case that big events like the Super Bowl, the Grammy Awards ceremony and a proposed joint meeting of Congress all belong in New York....
The argument goes like this: Bringing an event like the Super Bowl to New York City will stimulate tourism and help the city and the country recover; it will be an expression of solidarity with New Yorkers; it will strike a blow against terrorism; it will enable visitors to share in the New York spirit.
The case being made is striking in its appeal, in part, to sympathy for the purpose of drumming up tourist business. It appears to link notions of patriotism and civic duty to things like hotel bookings. It centers for once not on the glamour of New York, but on its most tragic moment. Supporting New York is good. Exploiting this tragedy is not.
An improper memorial
: I agree with the NY Times editorial yesterday that came out against a New York State holiday on Sept. 11: Relieving people of work does not necessarily move their thoughts in a desired direction.... Few people caught up in Memorial Day traffic bestir themselves to remember the Union's Civil War dead." I cannot stand the idea of workers and schoolchildren thinking, "Oh, good, it's Sept. 11: That means a day off!"
That date should not mean a day off or anything happy. That date should mean solemn remembrance.
The towers
: Paul Morris at Killing the Buddha writes a striking essay on the towers-of-light memorial at the World Trade Center. [via wood s lot]
He doesn't like the memorial; he says the lights that matter are the flood lights shining "down to the scorched earth, where heads bow in prayer and bend in toil." He adds: Don't be fooled; nothing has been restored. What you see is what you get, a skyline without substance, a tribute that lacks soul. You can find better replicas of the towers from any vendor on the street.
Even so, Morris has many poetic and memorable visions of the towers of light: You'd be forgiven if, after 9/11, you thought you'd never crane your neck to look that high up again, because there it is, against all gods, a great Babel tower siphoning the light of stars barely visible above lower Manhattan. It's as though the flood lamps huddling around ground zero suddenly looked up one by one to create an ethereal halo in the sky....
When dust from the debris removal drifts west and enters the columns, the heat from the bulbs forces it to rise and the towers become a swirl of particles. The effect of watching their ascension is dizzying. At a certain spot in the sky difficult to determine, the columns of light begin to destabilize. They seem almost to be tipping, leaning into each other for support while simultaneously buckling outward....
Nearing midnight, Con Edison cuts the juice and the towers collapse. This time they fall in reverse, as the lights that created them shoot like twin rockets reaching escape velocity. And then they're gone. Again.
Night after night, the towers are extinguished this way, over and over as midnight approaches. And day after day, they are rebuilt anew, photon by photon -- today, tomorrow, and the next after that in a series of power surges embraced by a city impatient to heal. I like the towers of light. But he's right: It's because I'm part of a city impatient to heal. Well said.
Terror tourism
: The LA Times runs a tourism guide to Ground Zero. Tasteless Californians. [via Victory Coffee]
March 23, 2002
Privacy? Crap!
: The most overused, panicky, paranoid buzzword of the last decade is "privacy."
Privacy paranoia dogs the Internet. Somehow, it became a sin to use evil cookies to target ads on free Web pages. Y'know, if the New York Times uses its registration data to know that I am male so it doesn't waste an impression selling a feminine hygiene product tp me, that's just fine. If Amazon uses my buying history to recommend books I might like, that's a service. If a smart supermarket learns that people who buy beef buy more ketchup and they sell that data to Heinz, good for them. No harm done.
Now the privacy bugaboo monster is being brought to bear to harm our efforts against terrorism. That's not only stupid. It's dangerous.
The feds are planning to put surveillance cameras on national monuments in Washington and suddenly, the amorphous club of "privacy advocates" is whining in stories in the Washington Post and NY Times). "It is becoming more evident that Congress may have to step in and ensure that this technology does not take away our right to be left alone," Rep. Constance A. Morella (R-Md.) said in the Post.
What a bunch of crap! There is no privacy issue here.
First, this is public property. Cops could be standing there watching what you're doing. Photographers could legally record what you're doing and air it because you're doing it publicly. I could watch what you do and tell the world. You don't have privacy in public.
Second, and far more important, these monuments are likely targets of terrorists. It is a vital necessity of national security to watch and record what happens there so we can perhaps prevent an attack or at least catch the terrorists in the act.
For self-appointed privacy whiners to stand in the way of this is not only stupid, it is obstructing our national security.
I can't quite grok the ideology of privacy panic. Sometimes, it comes from PC liberals like the frightening Ed Markey; sometimes it comes from libertarians and right-wing government-haters. And the media too often just accept this whining without questioning the wisom or logic or simple common sense of it. No matter: It's time to call this privacy whining what it is: Stupid.
Yesterday, I had FoxNews on my office TV and watched the high-speed chase du jour -- not the dump truck chase, that was Thursday's high-speed chase, but Friday's high-speed chase with copters -- news and police copters -- chasing a bozo in Florida as he drove nowhere and then got out of his car and ran. All the while, those copters kept him in sight, even zooming in on him in the backyard of a house; you could practically read the brand name on his dorky shorts. And I thought: Damn, I wish we could bring this technology -- this wonderful, Big Brother technology -- to catch criminals other than idiot dorks in fast cars.
I wish we had more surveillance cameras to catch the murderer who dropped anthrax in mailboxes.
The anthrax connection
: Here's new evidence that the hijackers could have been behind the anthrax attacks. The NY Times reports today that one of the hijackers on the Pennsylvania jet was treated for a skin lesion that the doctor and other experts now believe was anthrax. The doctor in Ft. Lauderdale, Christos Tsonas, reported this to the FBI in October; it's coming out only now, thanks to a Johns Hopkins report that says this "raises the possibility that the hijackers were handling anthrax and were the perpetrators of the anthrax letter attacks." Now add this: Dr. Tsonas's comments add to a tantalizing array of circumstantial evidence. Some of the hijackers, including Mr. Alhaznawi, lived and attended flight school near American Media Inc. in Boca Raton, Fla., where the first victim of the anthrax attacks worked. Some of the hijackers also rented apartments from a real estate agent who was the wife of an editor of The Sun, a publication of American Media.
In addition, in October, a pharmacist in Delray Beach, Fla., said he had told the F.B.I. that two of the hijackers, Mohamad Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, came into the pharmacy looking for something to treat irritations on Mr. Atta's hands....
For his part, Dr. Tsonas said he believed that the hijackers probably did have anthrax.
"What were they doing looking at crop-dusters?" he asked, echoing experts' fears that the hijackers may have wanted to spread lethal germs. "There are too many coincidences." But that's not all, folks. The Times also reports today that we've found a biological warfare lab in Afghanistan being built to product anthrax.
I have long believed that the anthrax attacks came from the foreign terrorists -- not that I know anything; I'm just another blathering blogger. But I fear that the FBI has been chasing domestic geese when they should have been looking for foreign connections that can still do more damage here with anthrax or with dirty radioactive bombs or just with suicide bombs.
Rocky binBoa
: The apparent ring-leader of the gang that murdered Washington Post reporter Daniel Pearl laughed in court as he was charged with the crime. The Times of London reported on the scumbucket's youth in Britain with a particulary strange tidbit about his idol: Former schoolmates in London described Omar Sheikh as a bully who constantly sought attention. As a teenager he would lie about his age so that he could enter arm-wrestling contests with younger opponents. The sport became an obsession after he saw his idol, Sylvester Stallone, arm-wrestling in the film Over the Top, and Omar would tour pubs in the East End of London, winning money in local contests.
What he said: Ken Layne said it before I did: The "demonstrators" from Anderson "protesting" in favor of the company look like Scientologists: "the same empty slogans, glazed eyes and sweaty fear."
They also look doughy, too white, and more boring and nerdy than even an accountant should look. They're not doing themselves any PR favor here. I wouldn't trust them. Would you?
Privacy? Crap!
: The most overused, panicky, paranoid buzzword of the last decade is "privacy."
Privacy paranoia dogs the Internet. Somehow, it became a sin to use evil cookies to target ads on free Web pages. Y'know, if the New York Times uses its registration data to know that I am male so it doesn't waste an impression selling a feminine hygiene product tp me, that's just fine. If Amazon uses my buying history to recommend books I might like, that's a service. If a smart supermarket learns that people who buy beef buy more ketchup and they sell that data to Heinz, good for them. No harm done.
Now the privacy bugaboo monster is being brought to bear to harm our efforts against terrorism. That's not only stupid. It's dangerous.
The feds are planning to put surveillance cameras on national monuments in Washington and suddenly, the amorphous club of "privacy advocates" is whining in stories in the Washington Post and NY Times). "It is becoming more evident that Congress may have to step in and ensure that this technology does not take away our right to be left alone," Rep. Constance A. Morella (R-Md.) said in the Post.
What a bunch of crap! There is no privacy issue here.
First, this is public property. Cops could be standing there watching what you're doing. Photographers could legally record what you're doing and air it because you're doing it publicly. I could watch what you do and tell the world. You don't have privacy in public.
Second, and far more important, these monuments are likely targets of terrorists. It is a vital necessity of national security to watch and record what happens there so we can perhaps prevent an attack or at least catch the terrorists in the act.
For self-appointed privacy whiners to stand in the way of this is not only stupid, it is obstructing our national security.
I can't quite grok the ideology of privacy panic. Sometimes, it comes from PC liberals like the frightening Ed Markey; sometimes it comes from libertarians and right-wing government-haters. And the media too often just accept this whining without questioning the wisom or logic or simple common sense of it. No matter: It's time to call this privacy whining what it is: Stupid.
Yesterday, I had FoxNews on my office TV and watched the high-speed chase du jour -- not the dump truck chase, that was Thursday's high-speed chase, but Friday's high-speed chase with copters -- news and police copters -- chasing a bozo in Florida as he drove nowhere and then got out of his car and ran. All the while, those copters kept him in sight, even zooming in on him in the backyard of a house; you could practically read the brand name on his dorky shorts. And I thought: Damn, I wish we could bring this technology -- this wonderful, Big Brother technology -- to catch criminals other than idiot dorks in fast cars.
I wish we had more surveillance cameras to catch the murderer who dropped anthrax in mailboxes.
The anthrax connection
: Here's new evidence that the hijackers could have been behind the anthrax attacks. The NY Times reports today that one of the hijackers on the Pennsylvania jet was treated for a skin lesion that the doctor and other experts now believe was anthrax. The doctor in Ft. Lauderdale, Christos Tsonas, reported this to the FBI in October; it's coming out only now, thanks to a Johns Hopkins report that says this "raises the possibility that the hijackers were handling anthrax and were the perpetrators of the anthrax letter attacks." Now add this: Dr. Tsonas's comments add to a tantalizing array of circumstantial evidence. Some of the hijackers, including Mr. Alhaznawi, lived and attended flight school near American Media Inc. in Boca Raton, Fla., where the first victim of the anthrax attacks worked. Some of the hijackers also rented apartments from a real estate agent who was the wife of an editor of The Sun, a publication of American Media.
In addition, in October, a pharmacist in Delray Beach, Fla., said he had told the F.B.I. that two of the hijackers, Mohamad Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, came into the pharmacy looking for something to treat irritations on Mr. Atta's hands....
For his part, Dr. Tsonas said he believed that the hijackers probably did have anthrax.
"What were they doing looking at crop-dusters?" he asked, echoing experts' fears that the hijackers may have wanted to spread lethal germs. "There are too many coincidences." But that's not all, folks. The Times also reports today that we've found a biological warfare lab in Afghanistan being built to product anthrax.
I have long believed that the anthrax attacks came from the foreign terrorists -- not that I know anything; I'm just another blathering blogger. But I fear that the FBI has been chasing domestic geese when they should have been looking for foreign connections that can still do more damage here with anthrax or with dirty radioactive bombs or just with suicide bombs.
Rocky binBoa
: The apparent ring-leader of the gang that murdered Washington Post reporter Daniel Pearl laughed in court as he was charged with the crime. The Times of London reported on the scumbucket's youth in Britain with a particulary strange tidbit about his idol: Former schoolmates in London described Omar Sheikh as a bully who constantly sought attention. As a teenager he would lie about his age so that he could enter arm-wrestling contests with younger opponents. The sport became an obsession after he saw his idol, Sylvester Stallone, arm-wrestling in the film Over the Top, and Omar would tour pubs in the East End of London, winning money in local contests.
What he said: Ken Layne said it before I did: The "demonstrators" from Anderson "protesting" in favor of the company look like Scientologists: "the same empty slogans, glazed eyes and sweaty fear."
They also look doughy, too white, and more boring and nerdy than even an accountant should look. They're not doing themselves any PR favor here. I wouldn't trust them. Would you?
March 22, 2002
Burgers sted burqas
: I don't know why but I'm writing about trivial, meaningless things today -- burgers, dogs, Dave Letterman, and the most meaningless of all, Liza Minelli -- instead of important things like war and terrorism and mourning and molestation. Feels good.
Burgers
: I'm jealous of Ken Layne and Matt Welch for many things (and they're probably jealous of me for one thing: a paying job). I'm jealous of their weather, their cameraderie, their books... but mostly I'm jealous of their ability to dash out and meet at In-N-Out Burger or Fat Burger. And I'm jealous of their ability to eat burgers. I used to eat burgers practically every day; I had personal relationships with my neighborhood McDonald's staff. But then I (a) got married and (b) got my cholesterol tested. I got old. Well, older.
So now I eat chicken sandwiches (no mayo).
Feel pity for me.
But that's why I'm happy that Burger King just introduced its BK Veggie. Howard Stern and company made fun of it this morning. But I say it's not so bad. It's much better than McDonald's veggie burger (sold in a few places in New York). McD makes the big mistake of trying to make vegetables into meat; they miss and turn them into rubber. Burger King, on the other hand, lets veggies be veggies. Their burger isn't afraid to be nutty, even crunchy. It's unashamed to show the random carrot bit. And they put low-fat mayo on it.
That made me happy.
And when I'm really old and lose all my teeth, I'll also like it because it's good gumming food.
With those pathetic caveats in mind, I recommend the BK Veggie.
I should add that I don't like the BK Veggie as much as my current fast-food fave: the grilled-stuffed burrito (chicken, of course, not beef) at Taco Bell.
Now I know that Layne and Welch will make fun of me for that because they can go down the street and get real burritos from real burrito stands. But I don't live in L.A. I live in New Jersey, where pasta is the official state food. A restaurant without pasta is soon to be an empty storefront.
But mark my words, boys: You, too, will get old or older. You will find hair growing in your ears and plaque in your arteries. You, too, will lead such a dull life that your day can be brightened by the arrival of a new veggie burger.
Thank God I can still drink.
Man bites man
: Ever since I started running, I've developed a new relationship to dogs. I now fear them. They now hate me. I don't know why; do they presume guilt of some dog law because we're running (and in my case, not very fast)? Do they think I look dorky in my running togs (I do... but, hell, they're just dogs)? Whatever, they tend to want to attack me and a few times have.
So I'm glad to see the dog verdict in California. Sure, that was extreme. But I plan to wave it in front of every irresponsible dog owner on my route: Controlling your animal is your responsiblity.
Conan/Dave... Conan/Dave...
: Conan O'Brien is getting his show repeated on cable at a civilized hour (6 or 7p and noon on Comedy Central). I repeat: That's what CBS should be doing with Dave Letterman. How about 7-8p on VH-1? They could use the boost.
Liza OD
: Rex Reed (who better) reports on Liza's wedding [via Amy Welborn]: I’m here to tell you that when I arrived a block from Ground Zero on Saturday night, entered a rose-filled ballroom that used to be the first New York Stock Exchange and saw Martha Stewart dancing with Donny Osmond to the blasting “live” music of Little Anthony and the Imperials, with Margaret O’Brien on one side of the floor and Lauren Bacall on the other, I knew we weren’t in Kansas anymore. : Meanwhile, somebody tries to steal Liza's diamond crucifix (can we say sacrelige in stones?) in London.
: Everybody who wants Liza to return to hasbeendom, raise your hand.
Burgers sted burqas
: I don't know why but I'm writing about trivial, meaningless things today -- burgers, dogs, Dave Letterman, and the most meaningless of all, Liza Minelli -- instead of important things like war and terrorism and mourning and molestation. Feels good.
Burgers
: I'm jealous of Ken Layne and Matt Welch for many things (and they're probably jealous of me for one thing: a paying job). I'm jealous of their weather, their cameraderie, their books... but mostly I'm jealous of their ability to dash out and meet at In-N-Out Burger or Fat Burger. And I'm jealous of their ability to eat burgers. I used to eat burgers practically every day; I had personal relationships with my neighborhood McDonald's staff. But then I (a) got married and (b) got my cholesterol tested. I got old. Well, older.
So now I eat chicken sandwiches (no mayo).
Feel pity for me.
But that's why I'm happy that Burger King just introduced its BK Veggie. Howard Stern and company made fun of it this morning. But I say it's not so bad. It's much better than McDonald's veggie burger (sold in a few places in New York). McD makes the big mistake of trying to make vegetables into meat; they miss and turn them into rubber. Burger King, on the other hand, lets veggies be veggies. Their burger isn't afraid to be nutty, even crunchy. It's unashamed to show the random carrot bit. And they put low-fat mayo on it.
That made me happy.
And when I'm really old and lose all my teeth, I'll also like it because it's good gumming food.
With those pathetic caveats in mind, I recommend the BK Veggie.
I should add that I don't like the BK Veggie as much as my current fast-food fave: the grilled-stuffed burrito (chicken, of course, not beef) at Taco Bell.
Now I know that Layne and Welch will make fun of me for that because they can go down the street and get real burritos from real burrito stands. But I don't live in L.A. I live in New Jersey, where pasta is the official state food. A restaurant without pasta is soon to be an empty storefront.
But mark my words, boys: You, too, will get old or older. You will find hair growing in your ears and plaque in your arteries. You, too, will lead such a dull life that your day can be brightened by the arrival of a new veggie burger.
Thank God I can still drink.
Man bites man
: Ever since I started running, I've developed a new relationship to dogs. I now fear them. They now hate me. I don't know why; do they presume guilt of some dog law because we're running (and in my case, not very fast)? Do they think I look dorky in my running togs (I do... but, hell, they're just dogs)? Whatever, they tend to want to attack me and a few times have.
So I'm glad to see the dog verdict in California. Sure, that was extreme. But I plan to wave it in front of every irresponsible dog owner on my route: Controlling your animal is your responsiblity.
Conan/Dave... Conan/Dave...
: Conan O'Brien is getting his show repeated on cable at a civilized hour (6 or 7p and noon on Comedy Central). I repeat: That's what CBS should be doing with Dave Letterman. How about 7-8p on VH-1? They could use the boost.
Liza OD
: Rex Reed (who better) reports on Liza's wedding [via Amy Welborn]: I’m here to tell you that when I arrived a block from Ground Zero on Saturday night, entered a rose-filled ballroom that used to be the first New York Stock Exchange and saw Martha Stewart dancing with Donny Osmond to the blasting “live” music of Little Anthony and the Imperials, with Margaret O’Brien on one side of the floor and Lauren Bacall on the other, I knew we weren’t in Kansas anymore. : Meanwhile, somebody tries to steal Liza's diamond crucifix (can we say sacrelige in stones?) in London.
: Everybody who wants Liza to return to hasbeendom, raise your hand.
March 21, 2002
Airline slugfest
: Hmmm, is that an Irish name?
: See also the Happy Fun Pundit's lesson in statistics and ethnicity.
The dreaded Afghan springtime
: Remember when we were told that winter in Afghanistan would be a killer, assuring us a quagmire?
Now we're supposed to dread the melting snows of springtime.The Guardian: American military and intelligence chiefs are bracing themselves for an upsurge in guerrilla-style attacks from al-Qaida and Taliban forces in Afghanistan when the snows melt in a few weeks time.
As concern continued to grow among British backbench MPs of a possible "mission creep" in Afghanistan, the CIA director, George Tenet, warned that al-Qaida terrorists were poised to step up their activities following the spring thaw. We advance from guagmire to "mission-creep."
I dread that Afghan summer.
A holy alliance
: This is how bad it is for the Catholic Church: Andrew Sullivan, Maureen Dowd, and Howard Stern all agree about what's wrong with the institution. They all say that the fundamental fault in the church is that it excludes and mistreats women.
Here's Dowd, going about 10 miles too far, trying to blame every sin in society on men (which, by the way, I do resent; she is guilty of mistersogeny): A monsoon of sickening stories lately illustrates how twisted societies become when women are either never seen, dismissed as second-class citizens or occluded by testosterone: the church subsidizing pedophilia; the Afghan warlords' resumption of pedophilia; the Taliban obliteration of women; the brotherhood of Al Qaeda and Mohamed Atta's mysogynistic funeral instructions; the implosion of the macho Enron Ponzi scheme; the repression of women, even American servicewomen, by our allies the Saudis. Here's Sullivan: ...it seems to me that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is the root of the problem. None of this hideous abuse of children would have occurred in the same way if women were fully a part of the institution. Not only would they have blown the whistle on some of this evil, their very presence would have helped prevent it from happening. There is simply no profound theological reason for the exclusion of women from ecclesiastical power, nothing but the inheritance of a patriarchal anachronism that is suffocating the Church from its apex to its roots. No church can exclude half of humanity from its sacred offices without denying the fundamental dignity and equality of the human person. And here, with characteristic brevity and bluntness and wisdom, is Stern: The burqa is no different from the habit. dot.con: I reserved my copy of Ken Layne's novel, previously unavailable Up Over. Have you?
: Tim Blair capitalizes Up Over, so now I will, too.
Airline slugfest
: Hmmm, is that an Irish name?
: See also the Happy Fun Pundit's lesson in statistics and ethnicity.
The dreaded Afghan springtime
: Remember when we were told that winter in Afghanistan would be a killer, assuring us a quagmire?
Now we're supposed to dread the melting snows of springtime.The Guardian: American military and intelligence chiefs are bracing themselves for an upsurge in guerrilla-style attacks from al-Qaida and Taliban forces in Afghanistan when the snows melt in a few weeks time.
As concern continued to grow among British backbench MPs of a possible "mission creep" in Afghanistan, the CIA director, George Tenet, warned that al-Qaida terrorists were poised to step up their activities following the spring thaw. We advance from guagmire to "mission-creep."
I dread that Afghan summer.
A holy alliance
: This is how bad it is for the Catholic Church: Andrew Sullivan, Maureen Dowd, and Howard Stern all agree about what's wrong with the institution. They all say that the fundamental fault in the church is that it excludes and mistreats women.
Here's Dowd, going about 10 miles too far, trying to blame every sin in society on men (which, by the way, I do resent; she is guilty of mistersogeny): A monsoon of sickening stories lately illustrates how twisted societies become when women are either never seen, dismissed as second-class citizens or occluded by testosterone: the church subsidizing pedophilia; the Afghan warlords' resumption of pedophilia; the Taliban obliteration of women; the brotherhood of Al Qaeda and Mohamed Atta's mysogynistic funeral instructions; the implosion of the macho Enron Ponzi scheme; the repression of women, even American servicewomen, by our allies the Saudis. Here's Sullivan: ...it seems to me that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is the root of the problem. None of this hideous abuse of children would have occurred in the same way if women were fully a part of the institution. Not only would they have blown the whistle on some of this evil, their very presence would have helped prevent it from happening. There is simply no profound theological reason for the exclusion of women from ecclesiastical power, nothing but the inheritance of a patriarchal anachronism that is suffocating the Church from its apex to its roots. No church can exclude half of humanity from its sacred offices without denying the fundamental dignity and equality of the human person. And here, with characteristic brevity and bluntness and wisdom, is Stern: The burqa is no different from the habit. dot.con: I reserved my copy of Ken Layne's novel, previously unavailable Up Over. Have you?
: Tim Blair capitalizes Up Over, so now I will, too.
March 20, 2002
Dead weight
: A NASA guy tells Space.com that we can and should take a journey to the nearest star, which would take at least 43 years and necessitate breeding the next generation of space cadets on board since the trip (and return) would take longer than a life Landis has even suggested sending out crews consisting only of women to save on weight, replacing men with frozen sperm to ensure reproduction later down the line. Like I didn't feel useless already.
His church
: Andrew Sullivan has a personal, honest, painful, and wise post today on his fears for his church: ...It seems to me that something far more profound is happening to the Church than its leaders now recognize. This is big. The horror any decent person should feel at the brutal exploitation of children in the Church’s charge has turned into something even deeper in the collective Catholic soul. We wonder whether there really is something rotten at the heart of this institution. We wonder whether its continued indefensible subjugation of women, its cruelty and condescension toward gay people, its reflexive hostility to inspection or openness, even in defending and shrouding the abuse of children, doesn’t bespeak something that isn’t the antithesis of the Gospels. Like everyone else in the Church, I’m a sinner and I’m not speaking out of any sense of moral superiority. On the contrary. But the evil that we have discovered in our church these past few months is not simply incidental. It is structural. It comes from a hierarchical structure that, far from reflecting the truth of the Gospels, has become its own rationale. I am sick of belonging to a church where even its own priests do not believe some of the tenets they are supposed to uphold, where most of the laity cannot understand the reasons behind some of the doctrines we are supposed to adhere to, where reasoned dissent is dismissed or ignored, where the dignity of the human person is denied in the very rules by which the institution is governed....
Others may differ, but it seems to me that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is the root of the problem. None of this hideous abuse of children would have occurred in the same way if women were fully a part of the institution. Not only would they have blown the whistle on some of this evil, their very presence would have helped prevent it from happening. There is simply no profound theological reason for the exclusion of women from ecclesiastical power, nothing but the inheritance of a patriarchal anachronism that is suffocating the Church from its apex to its roots. No church can exclude half of humanity from its sacred offices without denying the fundamental dignity and equality of the human person.... It's not just the Catholic Church though, Lord knows, what's happening there now is tragic on a frightening scale and must be dealt with by its heirarchy -- the Church in its own confessional, the Church paying penance, the Church seeking guidance for a higher path -- or it will explode at its foundation.
As I've written here, I left the Presbyterian Church because of its bigotry against gays, saying (again and again) that they are unworthy to be ordained, and because of plenty of destructive, hateful politics not just inside a church but in its heirarchy; Presbyteries are filled with bureacracy and bile. I decided not to stay and fight because I did not want to raise my children there, with the expectation that what they saw was worth emulation.
I left that denomination after trying to survive in more than one congregation. I have seen lots of Catholics leaving their church and coming to mine. I don't know whether it's better to stay or leave. Sullivan says he will stay and fight and I respect that. But I fear that it will take many people leaving to wake up the heiarchy to the crisis in the soul of their institution.
Dead weight
: A NASA guy tells Space.com that we can and should take a journey to the nearest star, which would take at least 43 years and necessitate breeding the next generation of space cadets on board since the trip (and return) would take longer than a life Landis has even suggested sending out crews consisting only of women to save on weight, replacing men with frozen sperm to ensure reproduction later down the line. Like I didn't feel useless already.
His church
: Andrew Sullivan has a personal, honest, painful, and wise post today on his fears for his church: ...It seems to me that something far more profound is happening to the Church than its leaders now recognize. This is big. The horror any decent person should feel at the brutal exploitation of children in the Church’s charge has turned into something even deeper in the collective Catholic soul. We wonder whether there really is something rotten at the heart of this institution. We wonder whether its continued indefensible subjugation of women, its cruelty and condescension toward gay people, its reflexive hostility to inspection or openness, even in defending and shrouding the abuse of children, doesn’t bespeak something that isn’t the antithesis of the Gospels. Like everyone else in the Church, I’m a sinner and I’m not speaking out of any sense of moral superiority. On the contrary. But the evil that we have discovered in our church these past few months is not simply incidental. It is structural. It comes from a hierarchical structure that, far from reflecting the truth of the Gospels, has become its own rationale. I am sick of belonging to a church where even its own priests do not believe some of the tenets they are supposed to uphold, where most of the laity cannot understand the reasons behind some of the doctrines we are supposed to adhere to, where reasoned dissent is dismissed or ignored, where the dignity of the human person is denied in the very rules by which the institution is governed....
Others may differ, but it seems to me that the exclusion of women from the priesthood is the root of the problem. None of this hideous abuse of children would have occurred in the same way if women were fully a part of the institution. Not only would they have blown the whistle on some of this evil, their very presence would have helped prevent it from happening. There is simply no profound theological reason for the exclusion of women from ecclesiastical power, nothing but the inheritance of a patriarchal anachronism that is suffocating the Church from its apex to its roots. No church can exclude half of humanity from its sacred offices without denying the fundamental dignity and equality of the human person.... It's not just the Catholic Church though, Lord knows, what's happening there now is tragic on a frightening scale and must be dealt with by its heirarchy -- the Church in its own confessional, the Church paying penance, the Church seeking guidance for a higher path -- or it will explode at its foundation.
As I've written here, I left the Presbyterian Church because of its bigotry against gays, saying (again and again) that they are unworthy to be ordained, and because of plenty of destructive, hateful politics not just inside a church but in its heirarchy; Presbyteries are filled with bureacracy and bile. I decided not to stay and fight because I did not want to raise my children there, with the expectation that what they saw was worth emulation.
I left that denomination after trying to survive in more than one congregation. I have seen lots of Catholics leaving their church and coming to mine. I don't know whether it's better to stay or leave. Sullivan says he will stay and fight and I respect that. But I fear that it will take many people leaving to wake up the heiarchy to the crisis in the soul of their institution.
March 19, 2002
Alleged anchor allegedly says...
: FoxNews' midday anchor, David Asman (I believe that's the right Dave) was talking about the withdrawl of Israeli troops from Palestinian areas when he said that troops had just withdrawn from: Bethlehem, where Jesus is alleged to have been born. Now this will endear him to the Heartland.
I'm reminded of a character in Calvin Trillin's Floater, about a writer at a Time-like magazine, who hated writing religion stories and got taken off the beat by always referring to "the alleged resurrection of Jesus."
Yo momma wears burqas
: Another fabulous (I'm feeling positively presidential) story in the Washington Post on 9.11 teen argot: : Their bedrooms are "ground zero." Translation? A total mess.
: A mean teacher? He's "such a terrorist."
: A student is disciplined? "It was total jihad."
: Petty concerns? "That's so Sept. 10."
: And out-of-style clothes? "Is that a burqa?"
: "It's like 'Osama Yo Mama' as an insult."
: "If you're weird, people might call you 'Taliban' or ask if you have anthrax."
: "My friends call me 'terrorist' or 'fundamentalist,' sometimes as a nickname," said Nabeel Babaa, 17, who came to this country from Kuwait when he was 3 years old and is now a senior at Sherwood High School in Olney. "It's not hurtful in the way we say it, 'cause we are kidding around with each other."
: Teenagers breeze through such expressions as "He's as hard to find as bin Laden," or "emo" to describe people who are very emotional about Sept. 11.
: Girls might say a boy is "firefighter cute"
: 'Tha | |