Friday Bird Blog: Who-o Am I ?

Illustration by
Louis Agassiz Fuertes
My sister lives on a former prairie, farm and woods, all three sacrificed to development. Her site, though, overlooks a preserve where, so they tell her, no building will ever occur. The landscapers even do controlled burns and scatter seeds of native prairie plants each year to help nature along if the burns don’t sufficiently resuscitate the flora and fauna. She has the best view of any, and that’s as it should be, considering her love of the wild things that are looking to reestablish a home base.

On Christmas night, after our fête, she heard her owl, so she and her daughter Amanda and I went out to stand still and listen. Sure enough. Hoo-hoo-hoo. Hoo hoo.

“Not the Screech Owl,” said we. He is named for his call, a sound almost like a glass harmonica, or an eerie whistle. Our visitor’s voice was resonant and deep.

I didn’t have time to look up her owl-in-residence until just now. What we heard was the Great Horned Owl, a male announcing his GPS locus. According to the bird books, he isn’t friendly, but, hell, how would you act if crazy, destructive humans kept you on the run? He is among the most adaptable of the owls, however. His diet is small animals, unlike the Screech Owl, who prefers mice.

My sister’s cat, Charles, prefers mice, too. I was concerned that he might run into more competition that he’d bargained for, if the owl was looking for mice. As it turns out, the owl might be looking for Chuck. The picture here shows a deceased skunk in its talons. Charles has encountered skunks, as well, in his travels, and FYI, giving a cat a tomato juice bath (the home remedy for skunked puddy cat) is both dangerous and a waste of time and tomato juice. Just ask Chuck.

This link has a succinct description and audio links with its call. Woo hoo!

Boxing Day Greetings from Arthur

Today is Boxing Day in Jolly Olde England. Even though I am a Welsh American, I appreciate the Queen. She has such excellent taste in canine companions.

On Boxing Day masters are supposed to give their servants presents. Most of my dog friends celebrate Christmas, because they are part of the family. For example, I got cards from Winston and Truman, my Maltese cousins in Iowa; Butch Brand, my cousin in Elmhurst; Rock Parker, a really cool guy who lives in my old neighborhood; and an email from my friend Jim. He is not a dog. All were Christmas cards, so you can easily see I am not a servant.

I don’t understand why the servant dogs don’t just pull themselves up like I did after I was sold by the breeder for $350.00. That’s quite a body blow, to be sold for only $350.00. But I would not quit until I reached the top. I spell 'luck'
'w-o-r-k'.

Quite a few cats sent us cards, too, but they can get their own blog column.

Speaking of, here’s how the freeloading dopes celebrated Christmas. First, they got catnip from management, but I happen to know that it isn’t a new package. It’s the same old cat nip she gives them on Saturday nights. Then “Santa” provided a gift from Hartz Mountain, whatever that is. It is a Wacky Mouse 3-Pack. There are 3 calico catnip fake mice with a jingle bell on the rear end. Big Whup. Since the cats can’t count, I ate two of them, and now they are fighting over the last one. Management will think they lost the other two. Ho ho ho. This is so funny.

Catnip gives you the munchies, though. I wish management knew someone who would buy her a box of Godiva chocolates. She’s too cheap to buy them herself.

Peace on Earth

'Listening to some wonderful harp arrangements of Christmas music. I think I can go to bed in about an hour if I don't fool around at all. 'Traveling Christmas morning. A lovely day to all. be safe and happy. Merry Christmas!

'Hope you've all been nice, not naughty

Friday Bird Blog: A Wandering Willet

Illustration by Louis Agassiz Fuertes
l. Western Willet, r. Eastern Willet

A Willet is lodging at the Whiting Power plant discharge canal in Monroe County, Michigan. It has been sighted there since November 25th and was counted in the official Christmas bird count recorded on December 17th by the local enumerators. As I think I mentioned before, a census of the bird population takes place every year at this time. The period this season during which bird watchers, generally organized by an Audubon chapter, will identify and take note of all birds who happen to present themselves within a specified area is December 14th to January 5th, 2006.

The Willet, either a Western or Eastern subspecies, is not supposed to be in Erie, Michigan in December. Normally, the ones I’ve seen along the Lake Michigan shoreline are packing their bags for the trip south already in late July. They are Specialty birds in these parts, as their breeding and winter ranges – eastern or western – are along both ocean coasts. Here is a summer distribution map provided by the us gov:

The map doesn’t distinguish between Catoptrophorus semipalmatus semipalmatus (the Eastern Willet) and Catoptrophorus semipalnatus inornatus (his Western cousin). In the late 19th Century Willet eggs were a prized delicacy and the birds were a sporting target, so the dangerous homo sapiens put a serious dent in the population. The subspecies are nearly impossible to tell apart unless they happen to be together at a family reunion or something. A single bird among other species would be very tough to identify.

The Monroe County specimen found a pleasant and welcoming niche at the Whiting power plant. Whiting is a coal fired facility, not a nuclear one, and it has won good citizen awards for environmental stewardship from the state of Michigan and nature and environmental groups. Where native human populations manage to stay put for a few generations it seems to me that they – or many of them – take note of their surroundings and resent it if the landscape and its inhabitants start to disappear. (This rule would not apply to real estate developers and their backers.)

The employees at the Whiting facility, a Consumer’s Energy (formerly Consumer’s Power) plant, maintain a wildflower meadow, and a local Lotus club tends a pond where a native species was found to thrive. They alone can harvest the seed and propagate it.

Through the years I noted that many birds find their way to the Whiting plant, and birders know to go there, of course. Whiting has been around since the early ‘50s, so it, too, is part of the local scene. Its web site lists how much tax it pays to the local authorities and how the employees, as well, support local commerce. All true. Too bad we can’t get a clue about energy use.

(By the way, I just learned that Consumer’s is putting its Palisades nuclear plant, located on Lake Michigan’s eastern shore, up for sale. There are 5 or 6 nuclear plants on the southern tip of Lake Michigan.)

NOTE: Blogger is a pain in the backside today. I'll try to upload other images later. GRRRR!

Victorian Virtue vs. Vulturism

When I was about 10 years old I read The Bird’s Christmas Carol by Kate Douglas Wiggin, better known for her book, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm. Carol of the story, born on Christmas Day, is terminally ill, but she nonetheless embodies the virtues of faith, hope, charity and love. Her unselfish concern for her family and her neighbors touches everyone around her, so the story isn’t as maudlin as it may sound. It’s a very sweet story, full of Victorian ideals, especially of noblesse oblige.

The Birds are well off; their neighbors, the Ruggles’, are poor. Carol Bird's main preoccupation in the story is to share a generous Christmas with the less fortunate children next door. Even though Carol is an invalid she especially seeks out those in need, sharing her time and love, setting others in high esteem, treating them as she herself would wish to be treated.

Kate Douglas Wiggin wrote the story in 1886 to raise funds for early childhood education. She and her sister, Nora Smith, were pioneers in the Kindergarten movement in the late 19th Century in the United States. Both products of and contributors to the Progressive Era, they believed that each person should be enabled to develop his or her potential, regardless of the circumstances of birth. To that end they championed early childhood education.

The Progressives were proselytizers in many respects. Often they were transplanted Yankee Protestants, imprinted with a sense of community, taught to share their gifts (and their religion) with others. That Miss Wiggin chose altruism as the theme of her Christmas story was not mere sentiment. She was a woman with a mission, very much a part of the zeitgeist of late 19th Century America.

Funny then that while looking around for a bit of information on the author, I landed on a townhall.com website for children’s books. For those of you who have been lucky enough to avoid Town Hall, it is a right wing forum disparaging anyone who does not desire the establishment of an aristocracy based on wealth and inherited wealth in the United States of America. In order to attract the middle class, whom the backers of the Heritage Foundation, townhall's sponsor, actually despise, Town Hall, etc. must appeal to fear ultimately. So they bait a trap with Everyman's prejudices. It is quite cunning, too. Who among us hasn’t resented, many times without knowing the salient details, a freebie or handout to another person while we toil away without recognition or adequate recompense? All people pretty much can relate to that resentment. So when the right wing noise machine starts bellowing about welfare or entitlement programs or social causes, we know the drill: it’s those damned (fill in ethnic, social or demographic group of your choice) who are making us so unhappy.

Another book which appeared on the townhall page with The Bird’s Christmas Carol is called Help, Mom, There are Liberals under my Bed. It is written for the young. According to the reviews and synopsis, it is about two boys (very important that the main characters be boys, because, as you know if you follow the right wing talking points, boys have been shunted aside by the liberal menace taking over our society). They wish to operate a lemonade stand. Note, as well, that the theme is making money (fine with me) and materialism. They want to buy a swing set with their lemonade receipts. They're not saving for college or a musical instrument or even a snappy bicycle. A swing set seems like a pretty lame material goal, but at least the author doesn't have them saving for a sniper rifle. There is no neighborhood park with swing sets in this story, I'm pretty certain.

I’m all for enterprise and earning one's own way. So why are these kids not mowing lawns or shoveling snow or raking leaves? The pay is better. Do the moms and dads in their town all have Mexican gardeners and lawn boys? Can the little candy asses not do physical labor because they are fat and lazy?

In the story they are thwarted in their goal by Congresswoman Clunkton (Subtlety is not a right wing talent.), and Mayor Leach, etc. (Would the swing set set be able to appreciate the parody?) Said bad persons demand that the boys pay half their lemonade revenues in taxes, take down their picture of Jesus and serve broccoli with every glass of lemonade. This is not even a smidge humorous. I could do a MUCH better job of lampooning “liberals” if I had the inclination.

Say the boys in the story were really successful. Super duper. Way to go and all that. But how would they realize this success? All retailers know that location is everything. I had a friend once who grew up on a farm in rural Ohio. She yearned to have a lemonade stand, but there was no traffic on the lonely road leading to the farm. Her dad and the farm hands took pity on her and patronized her stand. When she told the story we laughed. Hell, she should have been a city kid near a busy intersection.

The theme of the Help,Mom, Liberals book is NOT entrepreneurship. It is about destroying the connective tissue created by good government. Anyone doing business must have a license if they maintain a permanent establishment. Lemonade stands are not permanent establishments, so the story is convoluted to begin with. And no state would require taxes from tykes peddling lemonade, but logic isn't a right wing strong point, either. Businesses pay sales tax to the state, which in turn funnels it back into communities for various public services. If a business sells food, it must pass a state inspection and abide by state laws regarding sanitation, food storage, etc. (Despite the fact that I very much would like to sell food commercially - at least I think I would - I do not have a commercial kitchen. Maybe I should blame Hillary Clinton.) Government can be obstructionist and a drag on productivity to be sure. But I have never heard of a commercial venture being required by the state to remove any religious symbols or images.

The reason there are laws regarding food preparation (and other activities) is because of places like the restaurant at the corner of Walton and Rush in Chicago. The city shuts it down every so often because of cockroaches, mice, rats, you name it. (The neighborhood is chi-chi, too.) Possibly the owner isn’t doling out enough payola, but my sense is that a person would want to avoid consuming anything originating from his kitchen.

It’s easy to bitch about restrictions and side with the victimized would-be lemonade stand moguls who might own six swing sets, if it weren't for Liberals, i.e. government. Some regulations are stupid, but the writers of this children's propaganda don't mention that other lemonade stand propietors, for example, promote barriers and bureaucracy for other businesses. Free trade is jim dandy for them. The established lemonade stands down the street agitate (behind the scenes, of course) for protectionist policies for their own businesses.

And another thing. Just because someone is willing to take our money doesn’t make him/her worthy of our patronage and our trust. Anti-“liberal” screeds never address these issues.

The reviewer of the kiddie’s books at townhall does not realize the faux pas he committed by grouping The Bird’s Christmas Carol with Help, Mom. They emanate from vastly different mind sets. Kate Douglas Wiggin would shudder at the greed underlying Help, Mom. The Bird's Christmas Carol is about a family, but it's also about community. Help, Mom pretends to be about self-reliance, but it teaches only ridicule and false values.

Happy Birthday, HP!!

High Flight
Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds -- and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of -- wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence.
Hov'ring there,
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand,
and touched the face of God.
~John Gillispie McGee, Jr.~







Is this the grail? If so, the town of Chester is only a couple miles from Killingworth, which was founded by one of your ancestors. Therefore, you can go ahead and start saving for a Sachs.

Anatomy of an email

Like everyone, I receive forwarded emails expressing outrage about one subject or another, usually at the "liberal" media (Note to the enraged: sleezy Hollywood "entertainment" and the analysis-free recitation of the lines on the teleprompter screen do not add up to a "liberal" media.) Has anyone heard a cogent, rational analysis of the Patriot Act or who exactly is paying for the War in Iraq on any television news program? True conservatives would be powerfully perturbed by honest revelations.

As to the "liberals" composing the "liberal" journalism corps, yesterday I read a brief interview with the supposedly liberal Mike Wallace, and he went out of his way to mention what a talented, smart guy is Roger Ailes, who runs Fox News. Mike's son works for Fox. Get it? Roger Ailes, who may very well be talented and smart, was/is the lance piercing liberalism's side on many issues, including shilling for Philip Morris and the tobacco industry when California introduced a bill to increase taxes on a package of cigarettes. (For those wishing a really interesting and in-depth account of the tobacco industry vs. humanity, read A Question of Intent by David Kessler. The tobacco industry never was an innocent bystander to those hapless addictive personalities. Nope. They pumped up the nicotine level on purpose. ) Mike did impugn 'W' by questioning what possible qualification 'W' had to think he could be President - which just shows that Mike is losing it - or he is lying. Mike has been around the block, and he is rich, rich, rich. He knows very well how it is that 'W' ascended to the Presidency. But he throws us off (NOT) by reflexive 'W'-bashing, which is a poor substitute for an IDEA - like how the hell we're going to fix the epic mess the aristocrats and Bible thumpers that championed 'W' have wrought.

My contention is that the main preoccupation of America, including Citizen Mike Wallace, is money with which to buy all the consumables we have been taught that we need by the capitalists behind every supposedly "liberal" initiative in the marketplace. Examples would be the introduction of "The Pill" - and I'm all for it, understand - by the pharmaceutical industry, hardly a pillar of liberal philosophy and time/work-saving devices like the washing machine or the typewriter. Perhaps a more accurate statement would be that good liberal-inspired ideas and concepts get co-opted by capitalists, who generally are fascistic if allowed free range. (like what we're experiencing today) Oh, and we love total lock-sealed "security". But we have these myths to contend with - like "let freedom ring" and "liberty and justice for all" and "land of the free and the home of the brave".

In a former life I worked with lots of conservative men. They pride themselves on a la mode discourse learned from the endless emails probably written in Grover Norquist's weekly colloquiums (i? - colloquii?) or in a Heritage Foundation cubicle. Rarely do I respond. I read them, agree with maybe 30% of what they contain and that's that. But today I decided to check out the statements contained in the following, which I have reproduced in its entirety:

"Subject: What the Media doesn't tell us..

Before subjecting you to a possible hoax, I had this set of statements checked out. [ emphasis added] Although collected over a period of time, apparently ( according to Snopes) they are accurate. I , as some of you know, consider the media America's most dangerous enemy; a third party [the party of the first part and the party of the second part being? the government and the citizenry? Very telling phrase. The military and the citizenry? -D.F.F.] with sinister motivations. Talk about being left in the dark by our so-called unbiased press.

Did you know that 47 countries have reestablished their embassies in Iraq?
Did you know that the Iraqi current government employs 12 million Iraqi people?
Did you know that 3100 schools have been renovated, 364 schools are under rehabilitation, 263 schools are now under construction and 38 new schools have been built in Iraq?
Did you know that Iraq's higher educational structure consists of 20 Universities, 46 Institutes or colleges and 4 research centers, all currently operating?
Did you know that 25 Iraq students departed for the United States In January 2005 for the reestablished Fulbright program?
Did you know that the Iraqi Navy is operational?! They have 5- 100-foot patrol craft, 34 smaller vessels and a navel [navel? This allegedly was written by a Marine, however. - D.F.F.] infantry regiment. [What the hell is a "navel" infantry regiment? D.F.F.]
Did you know that Iraq's Air Force consists of three operational
squadrons, which includes 9 reconnaissance and 3 US C-130 transport aircraft (under Iraqi operational control) which operate day and night, and will soon add 16 UH-1 helicopters and 4 bell jet rangers?
Did you know that Iraq has a counter-terrorist unit and a Commando Battalion?
Did you know that the Iraqi Police Service has over 55,000 fully trained and equipped police officers?
Did you know that there are 5 Police Academies in Iraq that produce over 3500 new officers each 8 weeks? !
Did you know there are more than 1100 building projects going on inIraq? They include 364 schools, 67 public clinics, 15 hospitals, 83 railroad stations, 22 oil facilities, 93 water facilities and 69 electrical facilities. [Oh, oh. This test is way too easy. Maybe the United States tax payer is paying to rebuild these structures, because the United States taxpayer's money was used to destroy them in the first place? -D.F.F.]
Did you know that 96% of Iraqi children under the age of 5 have received the first 2 series of polio vaccinations?
Did you know that 4.3 million Iraqi children were enrolled in primary school by mid October?
Did you know that there are 1,192,000 cell phone subscribers in Iraq and phone use has gone up 158%? [probably Osama bin Laden and all his cousins calling each other when they're not holed up at the Naples (FL) Ritz. - D.F.F.]
Did you know that Iraq has an independent media that consist of 75 radio stations, 180 newspapers and 10 television stations?
Did you know that the Baghdad Stock Exchange opened in June of 2004? [ True. It re-opened under CPA rules, operates two days a week and is a minor player in Iraq's economy. See this for a short description. -D.F.F.]
Did you know that 2 candidates in the Iraqi presidential election had a televised debate recently?
OF COURSE WE DIDN'T KNOW! WHY DIDN'T WE KNOW?-OUR MEDIA WOULDN'T TELL US!
Instead of reflecting our love for our country, we get photos of flagburning incidents at Abu Ghraib and people throwing snowballs at presidential motorcades.The lack of accentuating the positive in Iraq serves two purposes. It is intended to undermine the world's perception of the United States thus minimizing consequent support, and it is intended to discourage American citizens.---- Above facts are verifiable on the Department of Defense website.
Semper Fi,
name withheld "

So, I went to snopes.com and read the following regarding this very email I've just reprinted:

"These types of items are generally impossible to categorize with a single truth value because they typically contain a mixture of fact, opinion, subjective statements, inaccuracies, and literally true but often misleading claims. An Iraqi citizen whose response to the earlier piece quoted above was published on the Voices in the Wilderness web site chronicled some of the differences he saw between the claims the pieces offered and his viewpoint as an Iraqi. Last updated: 21 February 2005"
from Snopes.com

Snopes does not say, as reported in the email, that "apparently" the statements are "accurate". But the use of the term 'apparently', and the salesmanlike, "Trust me, I had this checked out, so you wouldn't get hoodwinked" intro give people the impression that this is an objective bit of news.

On the face of it - which is as deep as the vast majority reading this email will get, either because they want to believe every word in it or because they simply do not have the time or resources to validate (or dispute) every statement - many of the "facts" presented appear reasonable. For example, the assertion that two candidates for President had a televised debate, is probably accurate. But who are the candidates? And who put them up for office? What is the real issue? That a debate took place? Or religious acrimony and hatred that can't be appeased by democratic-sounding events? Does this mean that Iraq is stabilizing? When was the debate? Have conditions improved or deteriorated or remained the same since the debate took place? [Use a number 2 pencil to fill in the little circle beside your answer, please]

Then they move, as always, into the false dichotomy. The "liberal" media reports on Abu Ghraib - by accident, but whatever - but doesn't tell about rebuilding schools or vaccinating Iraqi children. Did the email writer here compose a piece about Janice Karpinski, the Reservist General who was demoted because of Abu Ghraib and what she had to say about the imbroglio? Do they understand that for the current leadership of Iraq to survive, it might be better for them if they kicked the US out? Do they report on the construction of permanent U.S. military bases in Iraq and elsewhere? How does that foot with Iraqi Freedom? Why the hell does the US government care so much about Iraq? Where's the oil revenue that Paul Wolfowitz told Congress would pay for this imperial adventure? How many stories do you see about Americans reaching out to their Muslim neighbors? (I have a good one I will write about sooner or later.)

It's the chest-beating, us-or-them that appeals to people. Our lives do not allow time to learn about or think about the complexities of a global enterprise, yet globalization is the mantra of every "leader", Democrat or Republican. You think they want us to think? Heh.

Dodging the Christmas War Draft

Authentic Victorian Era trade card which would have been distributed by merchants or manufacturers in America.



As an adult who has spent quite a few Christmases in very un-festive circumstances, sometimes alone, sometimes with other people, I still love the idea of hearty good times, a big party, lots of laughter, happiness. Finding the perfect gift for someone is so gratifying, and having the resources to buy it or make it is even better. I’m nuts about the smell of fresh evergreens, especially Balsam or Fraser fir, although they’re costly, and someday again I’d like to have a place where I can drape cedar and Balsam rope festooned with dried flowers and herbs from the garden. I keep my wreaths up until Candlemas, February 2, because I don’t put them up until right before the 25th (You can get them cheap about Dec. 23). It seems like a waste to take them down again right away.

Baking is always on my Christmas To Do list, but sometimes it doesn’t get done. Right now I suppose I could bake a number called Fruit Cake Hater’s Fruit Cake which I clipped out of Gourmet Magazine a long time ago. It’s full of apricots, raisins, pecans, dates, apricot nectar, honey, and you splash it with brandy and let it sit for a couple of weeks in the refrigerator wrapped in foil. My sister, who is the Christmas queen, used to bake cookies, put them on those deeply scalloped paper plates, wrap them in wax paper, and my dad would drive her around to deliver them. One year my aunt Donna and I baked cookies two Saturdays in a row, the 10th and 17th of December . I have the dates marked in the cookie book I had purchased at Wanamaker’s in Philadelphia at Christmas of 1964. It’s falling apart, but I can’t get rid of it. Some day when I die, my lawyer can toss it out. That’s optimism for you.

Oh, and a very big thing for me – the music – a ton of it – lots of it excellent, especially from the Renaissance, Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, the Vaughn Williams Hodie, Menotti’s Amal and the Night Visitors to name a paltry few.

So why am I not in O’Reilly’s battalion to defend Merry Christmas?

They stirred this pot last year, as I recall, and I admit that I find it ridiculous for people who celebrate Christmas to go around wishing one another, “Happy Holidays”. I like the sound of the words “Merry Christmas”. But I have lived in big cities where there are many people of all faiths, so I can’t expect that everyone celebrates Christmas. And I am not going to blame some store clerk who’s probably making $8.00 an hour if she falls back on “Have a nice day” or “Enjoy the holidays”. So what? It’s what’s in my heart that counts.

As we know, Christmas is the biggest consumption bonanza of the year, and it has nothing whatsoever to do with the significance of Jesus’ birth. Yes, the gentiles, the Wise Men, brought gifts, and the tradition is lovely, but, come on, Fox, would Jesus want people to spend themselves into bankruptcy? Aren’t generosity of spirit and compassion the most valuable gifts we can give? Should we not try to be kind and thoughtful the other eleven months of the year? Should we not honor the teachings of Jesus at times other than the winter solstice? (Would Jesus defend this loathsome war in the Middle East?)

If we wanted to put Christ back into Christmas we might start by reviewing the Sermon on the Mount, the high point of his preaching. Since O’Reilly and crew are preaching at us, let’s review the number one sermon of all time. Here is a translation of the Beatitudes section of the Sermon on the Mount by a scholar who specializes in Jewish Christian dialogue. He uses the word “successful” instead of “blessed”, because contemporary people understand success in approximately the way Jesus' First Century audience might have understood the term blessed:

“You’re successful if you know how to mourn; God will comfort you. You’re successful if you’re gentle; you’ll inherit God’s earth. You’re successful if you’re starving to be God-centered; God will satisfy you fully. You’re successful if you’re compassionate to others; God will be compassionate to you. You’re successful if your purpose is always pure; you’ll see God. You’re successful if you work for peace; you’ll be called God’s children. You’re successful if you’re persecuted for being God-centered; God’s reign is yours. You’re successful if people insult you, persecute you, and slander you on my account. Be happy! Be glad! Your reward is great where God reigns. Remember that the same things happened to the prophets who lived before you.”
(The Hidden Gospel of Matthew [page 31.] by Ron Miller. Go here to view his website and read his thoughts on the new Pope. Highly recommended.)

In my grade school there were two Jewish kids, Lewis and Sarah Jacobsen, and Lewis was in my class and was my friend. We walked to school together most days. He was super smart, and my mother really liked him, because he discussed science and nature with her, so she’d let him do his experiments at our house if he ran out of room at his. Every year we’d have a Christmas program at school, of course, and in those days it was a Christmas thing, not a holiday thing. One year we had three wise men I know because Mrs. Austin, the second grade teacher, borrowed a red silk-lined velvet drawstring purse I used to carry (my mother’s), and they turned it inside out and used it as an offering to the baby Jesus. Another year I sang the verse from The Friendly Beasts, “I said the donkey shaggy and brown, I carried his mother up hill and down, I carried his mother to Bethlehem town, I said the donkey shaggy and brown.”

Lewis, my friend, had to participate in the Christmas program, and that was wrong. In retrospect, I think the teachers were prejudiced against him because he was brainy but not athletic. And he was Jewish, not Christian. He shouldn’t have been required to sing Christmas carols or be an elf or whatever. We might have learned something from Lewis, as well, since Jesus was a Jew and would have participated in the very same observances and rituals that Lewis’s family did in the 1960s. But, school was a place to condition kids to follow all the rules and conform, not educate them about the world right under their noses.

In bigger cities people assume I am Jewish because my surname is one frequently associated with German Jews. I’ve been wished a happy Passover or Chanukah, receive literature from the JDL, etc. I don’t take offense. It’s not meant to offend: “Happy Passover – or ELSE!!!” like this Merry Christmas jazz being hyped by the right wing gas bags.

But the biggest canard in the Christmas War disputation is the suggestion that Jews are trying to ruin the U.S. economy by harrumphing over Christmas and Merry Christmas and fa la la la la. (This “reasoning” has deep, deep roots in Western culture and should be examined under klieg lights whenever anyone suggests that there is a Jewish plot of one kind or another.) Pardon me while I introduce some facts into this argument. Many retail merchants and department store conglomerateurs are Jewish. Many more are brokers, analysts and investment bankers, ad men and women, manufacturer’s reps, entertainment barons, etc. The last thing they want is for a lousy Christmas shopping season. This faux paranoia – Is anyone really worried that Jews are trying to destroy Christianity? Christians are doing a mighty fine job of it themselves if you ask me. – is a media event perpetrated to keep the little people pissed off at “liberals” and fixated on the so-called threat to their religion. This is the perfect season for the transferrance of frustration and fatigue onto a supposed evil cabal of secular humanists and non-Christians, who "hate us for our freedom" or are "jealous" because we’re having so much more fun, and oh, yes, we’ll all be going to heaven while they burn elsewhere.

If the nominal Christians promoting this balderdash are so insecure, maybe they aren’t believers after all. Here I’ll quote from Paul for them: “For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 8:38 & 39, KJV)

Happy Holidays, Bill.

UnCAPping Sam Alito

When he had hair.
"Justice? You get justice in the next world, in this world you have the law." William Gaddis, A Frolic of His Own

What’s the men’s movement all about again? The usurpation of the white male by women and black people? If I were a white male, I’d be more worried about my job being exported or eliminated by other white males with better alpha markers. Like a rich, powerful patriarch or a crackerjack ability to suck up to someone else’s. Superior smarts, hard work and a smooth patch of ice will get you just so far. Ruthlessness is helpful, as is selfishness. But to be a master of the universe, complete with a stay-out-of-jail card**, one needs the right kind of access.

The “literature” of the angry white male agitators like James Dobson and Phyllis Schlafly explains that uppity gals and the gay “agenda” are all that’s wrong with America. Men exposing their larger equipment to their young sons by taking them into the shower with them will prevent boys from catching gayness, presumably from their mothers who, for the most part, don’t have a phallus. Slapping that bitch around when she talks back or has a better idea than you also will return America to its former greatness. It’s so simple, but all those queer liberal Jews and feminists have ruined everything.

But wait! There’s more to it! The diversity phobic can comfort themselves between issues of the Focus on the Family newsletter with this soothing fact: of the 111 Justices of the United States Supreme Court, exactly four (4) have not been white males, and only two, as we know, have been from the distaff side. And only two (2) have been black, and one of those hates most other black people. So you see? It isn’t so scary after all.

Now we have another white male vying for a seat on the Supreme Court. The right wing is atwitter, giddy than finally, FINALLY, they’ll get to have everything their way, and we can return to the early Nineteenth Century without any land to farm or power to deal with disappearing employment. Maybe the early Eighteenth Century would be closer. There still were indentured servants and slaves. And widespread illiteracy. But a few more decades of television will solve the problem of serfs who can read.

It’s pretty clear Samuel Alito will work primarily to overturn Roe v. Wade – not to accuse him of judicial activism or anything - and as long as everyone is clear that Roe is based on the right of personal privacy implicit in the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, observing self-righteous “Christians” on the receiving end of their own “values” when the government they so deplore starts snooping in their bedrooms will provide a small distraction from the hum drum sameness of watching individual rights evaporate. My guess is that Larry Flynt would blush at what goes on in the boudoirs of the hypocritically devout. Scooter Libby, for example, a BushCo Sanhedrin member, wrote a novel featuring caged adolescents and a bear. Excuse me, but where’s the outrage, SpongeDob? A right wing theocrat stated that pornography increased 95% in the Clinton years. That’s a meaningless statement, of course, but Scooter was writing his X-rated prose during that time, so perhaps they were measuring the output of unemployed GOP fascists. Abortion will not cease with the reversal of Roe v. Wade. The moneyed will do what they did before – go elsewhere. The rules don’t apply to them anyway.

Sam Alito likes coffee, so I give him a few congeniality points for that. He’s very smart, an experienced judge, appointed with enthusiasm to the Appeals Court in 1990 by a bipartisan panel including Sen. Kennedy. He’s not a raving lunatic, which is a major step up from Robert Bork, whom Alito is said to supplant.

However, it came out this week that while at Princeton in the early ‘70s, Sam-I-Am found that coveted access, a mother lode of ruling class alumni gold in the Concerned Alumni of Princeton (CAP), a reactionary, anti co-ed association founded and funded by two Tory high hat WASPs with baronial establishment pedigrees, Asa Bushnell and Shelby Cullom Davis.

I did a little research on those two and discovered that, sure enough, even though Concerned Alumni Bushnell and Davis were in a state over girls and Negroes screwing up the demographics of their once lily white, old boy alma mater, their wives were a.) Very well educated; and b.) Rich in the case of Davis. Samuel Alito’s wife is, as well, educated. That’s the way the east coast establishment ruling class works, kids. Two sets of rules – one for you and another, unwritten, for them. Defenders of this crassness will jump to the rescue. The wives prove, they’ll say, that the old boys were worried about Vietnam or FDR or the Commies behind every potted palm, not women with a diploma. But we know that the apologists are hoping for a few crumbs in thanks. Too late, guys. Hansel und Gretel are dead.

(“There’s only one direction, and time is its only measure.” Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead)

Sam Alito’s mother raised her kids to be number 1. That’s very admirable. I used to believe that striving for number 1 status was we were created for. I had lists of everything I wanted to accomplish in life. Then I figured out how the world actually operates. But the world has been good place for Samuel Alito and his sister, Rosemary, a lawyer ("top" lawyer is how she’s always described) with the firm of Carpenter Bennett & Morrissey in Newark. I’m not sure I’d want both my kids to be lawyers. One is plenty. A doctor and a lawyer – better. You see, Sam is from the people, son of immigrant Italians. Law school the working class can sometimes negotiate financially. Takes only three years and the money can start to flow fairly soon. Doctoring is another matter, and if one specializes, he can be mid-30s before payday. Not too many working class children can pull that off. But don’t expect any sympathy from Sam.

The New Jersey connection is timely considering that New Orleans destroyer Michael Chertoff, the Israeli with an American passport, also comes from there, and, what do you know, but Chertoff used to work for Sam when he was US Attorney. Chertoff, Big- Brother-in-Waiting to Cheney and Gonzales, agreed that a 10 year old girl and her mother should not be strip searched. But Sam, the defender of female subservience, allowed that is was OK, even though neither the girl nor her mother were named on a search warrant or even suspects in whatever godawful mess they were privy to. But they were poor. Would Sam Alito want his 10 year old daughter and wife strip searched? Get serious. The cops would know better!

Sam supports the death penalty, even though he is a devout, conservative Catholic. I believe that the official line in Rome is against capital punishment. Ratzi the Nazi will probably issue an encyclical, though, calling for more executions of gays, feminists, Muslims, peace activists, Lutherans, all other Protestants, American Catholics who practice birth control, decadent artists, Jews, the Archbishop of Canterbury … Call me inflexible but how can someone be against abortion and for capital punishment? Oh, I know. A fetus can’t take personal responsibility.

Let’s suggest that Sandra Day O’Connor start popping more vitamins and hire a couple extra law clerks. Sam is smart and a success story, but leave him off the Supreme Court.


**Note to Andrew Fastow, Jeff Skilling, et al.: Here’s the part they didn’t tell you about at Harvard and Northwestern. When you, a mere capitalist tool, lie, cheat, steal and treat other people like trash and get caught, expect to be the guy who goes to jail. The Bush Clan nor Phil and Wendy Gramm nor the CEOs of all your investment bank collaborators will ever have to trade in their Saville Row threads for a neon orange jump suit with a number on the back. Ever.

A nitwit cat from Neenah

As usual, America is succumbing to liberalism and low moral standards. This time it is over a stupid cat named Emily that walked into a crate and ended up in France. Friends, what about personal responsibility? What about consequences? The nanny welfare state is to blame. These leftists and liberals love a story like Emily the careless cat. I hope my tax dollars aren’t going to pay for this. Management is all glowing about a cat rescue. I can’t even get her to take me for a walk. ‘Think I’ll go pee in the dining room again. That’ll get her attention.


Photo AP/Darren Hauck