A Mystery Solved!

I have long marveled at "Mallard Fillmore," The World' Most Consistently Unfunny Comic Strip. But no more. Today's installment clears up a big mystery for me:



But of course! "Mallard" is relentlessly strident, one-note, and flat for the now-obvious reason that its perpetrator, Bruce Tinsley, doesn't understand what a joke is!

Glad to get that cleared up.

Says You

And here another handful of quotations, many if not most if not all from A Word a Day:


I cannot imagine a God who rewards and punishes the objects of his creation, whose purposes are modeled after our own -- a God, in short, who is but a reflection of human frailty. -Albert Einstein, physicist, Nobel laureate (1879-1955)

The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. -John Kenneth Galbraith, economist (1908-2006)

Patriotism is proud of a country's virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies; it also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues. The pride of nationalism, however, trumpets its country's virtues and denies its deficiencies, while it is contemptuous toward the virtues of other countries. It wants to be, and proclaims itself to be, "the greatest", but greatness is not required of a country; only goodness is. -Sydney J. Harris, journalist and author (1917-1986)

A time will come when a politician who has wilfully made war and promoted international dissension will be as sure of the dock and much surer of the noose than a private homicide. It is not reasonable that those who gamble with men's lives should not stake their own. -H.G. Wells, writer (1866-1946)

The artist brings something into the world that didn't exist before, and he does it without destroying something else. -John Updike, writer (1932-2009)

No matter that we may mount on stilts, we still must walk on our own legs. And on the highest throne in the world, we still sit only on our own bottom. -Michel de Montaigne, essayist (1533-1592)

Laughter and tears are meant to turn the wheels of the same machinery of sensibility; one is wind-power, and the other water-power. -Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr., poet, novelist, essayist, and physician (1809-1894)

A lawn is nature under totalitarian rule. -Michael Pollan, author, journalism professor (b. 1955)

Memories are interpreted like dreams. -Leo Longanesi, journalist and editor (1905-1957)

I happen temporarily to occupy this big White House. I am living witness that any one of your children may look to come here as my father's child has. -Abraham Lincoln, 16th president of the U.S. (1809-1865)

The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust, novelist (1871-1922)

We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it -- and stop there -- lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again, and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one any more. -Mark Twain, author and humorist (1835-1910)

Society is like a stew. If you don't keep it stirred up you get a lot of scum on the top. -Edward Abbey, naturalist and author (1927-1989)

I need someone to protect me from all the measures they take in order to protect me. -Banksy, street artist (b. 1974)

A language is an exact reflection of the character and growth of its speakers. -Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948)

Close-to-Home-ish

It's all over the news today that, in an effort to survive, Chrysler LLC has filed a motion with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court to effectively close 789 dealers by early June.

Although I have no sentimental ties to Chrysler--my family never owned one, and to the best of my recollection I have in three decades of driving piloted precisely two: A late-1970s Plymouth Arrow that belonged to a college friend, and a 2008 PT Cruiser rental that I had last week when my CR-V was in the body shop--I was curious to see if Chrysler had announced which dealers would close, and if any were nearby.

Somewhat to my surprise, I see by this list at ConsumerReports.org that a number of those dealerships are in South Dakota. It often seems--or the local boosters would have it seem--that the local economy is something of a bubble floating atop the raging seas. Not this time, I guess.

Here are the lucky dealerships:

BIEGLER'S INC 1502 6TH AVE SW ABERDEEN, SD 57401-3703

FLANDREAU MOTORS INC HWY 32 WEST FLANDREAU, SD 57028

HILLS EDGE AUTO SALES INC HIGHWAY 385 N HOT SPRINGS, SD 57747

LIBERTY MOTORS INC 600 CAMBELL ST RAPID CITY, SD 57701-3002

PALACE MOTORS INC 219 EAST FIRST AVENUE MITCHELL, SD 57301-3425

S.J. MARNANCE INC DBA SCHOENHARD DODGE 101 SECOND STREET SOUTHWEST HURON, SD 57350-2502

SPEARFISH MOTORS INC 1910 NORTH MAIN STREET SPEARFISH, SD 57783

I have no idea how many of those, if any, sell cars other than Chryslers, or how easy or difficult it may be to switch to another line, especially in times of a downturn. Doesn't sound like a good deal for the people who work at these dealerships.

It's All in the Telling

Headline from the New York Times in re the pope's visit to Bethlehem on May 13:

In Bethlehem, Pope Urges Lifting of Gaza Embargo

Reporting the same story, here's the headline from News from Jerusalem:

Pope calls for Palestinian state!

It is indeed all in the telling.

Today's Quotation

"What should the Pope do or say at the university? Certainly, he must not seek to impose the faith upon others in an authoritarian manner – as faith can only be given in freedom. Over and above his ministry as Shepherd of the Church, and on the basis of the intrinsic nature of this pastoral ministry, it is the Pope’s task to safeguard sensibility to the truth; to invite reason to set out ever anew in search of what is true and good, in search of God; to urge reason, in the course of this search, to discern the illuminating lights that have emerged during the history of the Christian faith, and thus to recognize Jesus Christ as the Light that illumines history and helps us find the path towards the future."

--Pope Benedict XVI, from an address that he had intended to give at La Sapienza University, Rome, January 2008. The address was canceled because of the threat of a demonstration against the pope.

One suspects that no one frothing about President Obama's speaking at Notre Dame has read the pontiff's contention that "faith can only be given in freedom" and that the pope must "invite reason to set out ever anew in search of what is true and good" and "urge reason, in the course of this search, to discern the illuminating lights that have emerged during the history of the Christian faith." But you can read it at the Vatican website.

This Is "Leadership"?

As part of the seemingly endless brouhaha over the W.H. Lyon Fairgounds here in the current neighborhood, the local rag today publishes an interesting article, "Fairgrounds for sale? County looks for options"...well, interesting if one reads between the lines.

In a nutshell: The Fairgounds, that is to say the Sioux Empire Fair Association, has for some time been bleeding money, occasionally being propped up by Minnehaha County. Earlier this year it was discovered that a bookkeeper had been embezzling, big time. So now, the horse having successfully evacuated the barn, much hue and cry is taking place--new management, audits, county commissioners pontificating, the whole schmeer--including (and this is the between-the-lines part) the "future" of the Sioux Empire Fair, held annually at the Fairgrounds, and of the property itself.

Ah. The property.

According to the local rag,

The commission also is seeking a legal opinion whether the conditions of Winona Lyon's bequest of the fairgrounds to the county in 1938 would allow the county to ever sell the land or devote a portion of it to long-term economic development, like a hotel or convention center.

That opinion, commissioners say, won't come before the June 1 deadline. But a short-term contract would allow the county to begin the process of selling or developing the land soon.

Already, one potential suitor for the land has made its interest known: Sweetman Construction, owners of a nearby quarry.

The Sweetman family, the local rag says, contributed money to the campaigns of four of the current members of the county commission, but I'm sure that's neither here nor there.

Later in the article, the local rag repeats what has always been said of the history of the Fairgrounds, viz., Winona Lyon donated the land to be used "as a fairground, and if the county broke faith with that the gift would revert to the family heirs," according to the article.

So now it appears that the county is busy spending taxpayer money to seek "a legal opinion" on how they can undercut Winona Lyon's intent and sell the land out from under her heirs, of which at least one still lives in the area. The article implies there are others.

This smells of a land grab, does it not?

Frankly, I find it disgusting that my county commissioners are wasting my tax dollars looking for
"legal" ways to steal the fairgrounds property from the Lyon heirs. I have no doubt in the world that they will find their loophole, for they are in the long habit of always getting their way, there is a world of difference between what we can do and what we should do.

If the county is unwilling to support the fair, it seems only right that they should follow the expressed wishes of the citizen who generously deeded the land for fairgoers to enjoy and allow the property to revert to her heirs. That's the right thing to do, even though it won't fatten the county's coffers.

I doubt that the county commission possesses the moral fiber to do the right thing, especially if it means waving goodbye to dollars. That would require a measure of leadership that has long been noticeably absent in that august body.

Official prediction: The county's lawyer will ingeniously discover a loophole through which the commission may slither, and they will make unseemly haste to do just that.

The Neighbors

I shared this earlier with a comrade:

I am informed that a couple-hundred non-hetero couples in Iowa took out marriage certificates yesterday--I am under the impression that some were in fact married--and yet, from next door here, little seems to have changed. I spent some considerable time on the roof of my house, scanning the eastern sky with my binoculars, but failed to observe any of the following:

Bolts of lightning from the sky
Fire raining down from the sky
Frogs, locusts, etc., from the sky
Sky itself falling from the sky

Nor have there been any reports of earthquakes, ground opening up to swallow hapless county clerks, or cloven-hoofed creatures cavorting down the streets of Davenport, although I am given to understand that some hogs got loose for awhile at the yards in Sioux City, which may be a portent of something. All in all, pretty quiet over there, from what I can tell. Must be a big disappointment to some. I know I was counting on free fireworks.

But What if there's Money Involved?

I came upon this a few days back in the Washington Post, and found it mildly interesting, for reasons that will be revealed:

Our Endangered Catholic Schools
By Chester E. Finn Jr. and Andy Smarick
Tuesday, April 21, 2009

The positive findings in the Education Department's recent evaluation of the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program provide more evidence that high-quality private and parochial schools can have invaluable benefits for low-income, minority students. Tragically, however, Catholic schools, long the heart and soul of urban private education, are disappearing. Last year, seven Catholic schools in Washington were converted into charters, and the Dioceses of Brooklyn and Cleveland are considering another round of school closures.

This accelerating crisis, which robs disadvantaged city students of desperately needed educational options, has such profound and negative implications that two U.S. presidents, almost two generations apart, urged intervention. One of us helped staff Richard Nixon's "panel on non-public education" in 1970; the other wrote the Bush administration's report last year. Yet schools keep closing.

If America is to preserve inner-city Catholic education, help is needed from the other side of the aisle. We hope the Obama administration will step forward.

Read the entire article here.

Now, it should be said that I am a product of Catholic schools--two elementary schools and one university--and I have nothing at all against Catholic education. I do happen to think that those who want to send their kids to Catholic school should be prepared to open their checkbooks and not expect the taxpayer to help out, but that's neither here nor there.

No, what caught my attention most is the sentiment in the last paragraph reproduced above, specifically the last sentence of that paragraph:

We hope the Obama administration will step forward.

And, again, I have no particular truck with that sentiment, either. I'm fully willing to accept that D.C. Catholic schools play an important role in the lives of the urban poor there, and that the institution probably is worth helping.

But I can't help but think of the tempest in a teacup that is the "outrage" associated with Notre Dame's inviting President Obama to speak at its commencement. In a fit of pique, the Catholic bishop of South Bend, Indiana, home of Notre Dame, has said he won't attend commencement because the university plans to give Obama an honorary degree.

Cathy Lynn Grossman has a fine exposition on the silliness at her Faith & Reason blog at USA Today. Grossman quotes the looney-tunes ultra-rightist Cardinal Newman Society thus:

It is an outrage and a scandal that "Our Lady's University," one of the premier Catholic universities in the United States, would bestow such an honor on President Obama given his clear support for policies and laws that directly contradict fundamental Catholic teachings on life and marriage.

(John K. Wilson has a fun take on the "scandal" at The Daily Kos, in which he rightly points out that the Cardinal Newman Society, "although adept at getting publicity, is far outside the Catholic mainstream. The Association of Catholic College and Universities denounced the Cardinal Newman Society for making accusations that are 'distorted, inaccurate and in some cases simply untrue.'")

Alrighty, then.

We now can can naught but conclude that the right-wingnut contingent of the Catholic Church must rise up as if one and insist--insist!--that the Archbishop of Washington refuse in no uncertain terms any assistance from the Obama administration, such as that called for in the Washington Post column, since, as expressed above, the leader of said administration has "given his clear support for policies and laws that directly contradict fundamental Catholic teachings on life and marriage."

We can't have any of that! Nor can we have any of their filthy lucre!

Yes? If not...why?

Says Who?

Spring has come to the prairie, which means that the quotations have begun to sprout. This time out, I think all of the dozen or so aphorisms that follow have come from that wonderful newsletter A Word a Day. Fond as I am of etymology, I sometimes wonder if I subscribe for the word of the day or the quotation that follows it!

Religions are not revealed: they are evolved. If a religion were revealed by God, that religion would be perfect in whole and in part, and would be as perfect at the first moment of its revelation as after ten thousand years of practice. There has never been a religion that which fulfills those conditions. -Robert Blatchford, author (1851-1943)

The people who burned witches at the stake never for one moment thought of their act as violence; rather they thought of it as an act of divinely mandated righteousness. The same can be said of most of the violence we humans have ever committed. -Gil Bailie, author and lecturer (b. 1944)

Who overcomes by force hath overcome but half his foe. -John Milton, poet (1608-1674)

War will exist until that distant day when the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today. -John F. Kennedy, 35th US president (1917-1963)

In politics, absurdity is not a handicap. -Napoleon Bonaparte, general and politician (1769-1821)

To be nobody but myself -- in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else -- means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight, and never stop fighting. -E.E. Cummings, poet (1894-1962)

Neither genius, fame, nor love show the greatness of the soul. Only kindness can do that. -Jean Baptiste Henri Lacordaire, preacher, journalist and activist (1802-1861)

All the arguments to prove man's superiority cannot shatter this hard fact: in suffering the animals are our equals. -Peter Singer, philosopher, professor of bioethics (b. 1946)

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? -Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948)

Not that I want to be a god or a hero. Just to change into a tree, grow for ages, not hurt anyone. -Czeslaw Milosz, poet and novelist (1911-2004)

It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do. -Jerome K. Jerome, humorist and playwright (1859-1927)

There is only one difference between a madman and me. The madman thinks he is sane. I know I am mad. -Salvador Dali, painter (1904-1989)

A Subject Line That Should Have Been Revised

This was in one of the inboxes this morning. I had not realized that the object was to make things more difficult.

Revolting Development

Wasted some perfectly good noon-hour time with the local rag, and saw fit to compound the waste by posting this comment to their article on the fair city's Teabagger event yesterday:

"Taxpayer revolt," eh? Balderdash! The teabaggers aren't protesting "federal spending." Their beloved George Bush took a budget surplus, burned through it, and then launched a trillion-dollar war based on phony "evidence" and nobody threw anything into the lake. When the economy started over the edge of the cliff and Bush began the so-called bailout plan, nobody threw anything into the lake. Now Obama proposes a plan that will REDUCE taxes for most of the middle class…and they protest?! Now the economy is showing some signs of recovery…and they protest?!

Either they have no sense at all, or the issue is really about something else--namely, their party having lost, overwhelmingly, in November. They’re out of power and out of ideas, so they resort to gainsaying, grandstanding, and hoping that the economic recovery will fail so they can say, "Told you so!"

It's not about taxes, or bailouts, or anything except the fact that they're out and they can't stand it.

It really is quite astounding to me how people who are, I presume, of reasonably average intelligence can so easily--and enthusiastically!--convince themselves that when a Republican president gives big tax breaks to multimillionaires, that's a wonderful thing for themselves...but when a Democratic president proposes tax cuts for middle-class Americans--like them!--they take up arms, and teabags, in protest! How dare that dirty dog cut my taxes! What is he, some kinda Socialist?! He should be cutting rich people's taxes instead!

One strives for optimism. But it seems a losing battle...

Protesting...What, Exactly?

Naturally, there was a "teabagging" event in the old hometown today. The report on a local station was kind of strange. Consider the lead:

Organizers estimate more than 3,000 people showed up for the Tax Day Tea Party in Sioux Falls. And those who surrounded Covell Lake hope politicians got an earful.

Seems to me that Rule Number One or Two should be, Don't Rely on Organizers' Estimates of Anything. But whatever.

I am still at a loss to quite get what it is these goofballs are protesting. What is it that they want "politicians" to get an "earful" of?

"We wanted to be here today to make our voices heard, to let people know we're not anti-government and we're certainly not anti-American. But we think our tax dollars need to be spent wisely," Heather Benson said.

Okay. What does "wisely" mean? Perhaps on a pointless war launched on manufactured "evidence" of Weapons of Mass Destruction pointed right at us? Is that spending "wisely?"

So then why weren't they throwing tea into the lake back then? Why were they silent?

Where were they when their beloved George W. Bush was--in a matter of weeks--burning through the budget surplus that he inherited from his Democratic predecessor, the hated Bill Clinton?

They seemed unconcerned about spending "wisely" back then.

In fact, they seemed unconcerned about spending "wisely" when the Republican-controlled White House and Republican-controlled Congress were spending the country into the red--when their revered Dick Cheney insisted that "deficits don't matter."

They weren't dressing up as patriots and throwing tea into the lake (talk about wasteful spending!) when their do-nothing president allowed the economy to fall into ruin on the theory that less regulation would free "the market" to magically correct any little problems that might pop up. And they seem to have forgotten, with their customarily convenient memories, that it was in fact that same Republican administration which, belatedly, seeing that the economy was headed over a cliff, began the so-called bailout program which the current administration is now continuing in the hope of undoing the hideous mess that it was handed in January.

They haven't seemed very concerned about spending "wisely" all these years. So what's the deal now.

Hmm, let's see, let's see...

Oh, wait--I know: They lost the 2008 election.

Big time.

As in landslide.

And that is what they're protesting. Losing. Banishment. Impotence.

Having no new ideas, no positive suggestions for undoing the mess their "leadership" made, they resort instead to impotent, frothing stunts. Protests of nothing in particular, except they can't stand the fact that they lost the election, and through their own staggering ineptness.

You think not?

"We're tired of it. We're not taking it anymore and in 2010, when the next election comes around, it's going to change. And it's going to change even bigger in 2012," said [Linda] Melin.

Um, tired of what? They keep saying stuff like that, and they're thrilled to death that so many people showed up for their vague grandstanding, but they never tell us what they're "tired" of, what the "message" is they want to send to whoever they think they're sending it to...so one can only conclude that they're just pissed off because they're out of power and--90 days into the Obama administration--they can't stand it anymore!

So they will continue their pointless (literally, no discernible point to them) protests of not much in particular.

And the people on Pennsylvania Avenue who, unlike the previous tenants, are actually interested in governing instead of just wielding power will continue to do their darnedest to save the country.

And the people who have demonstrated themselves to be fresh out of positive ideas will continue to throw rocks. And teabags.

And the majority of Americans will continue to approve of the efforts Obama and company are making to rescue the United States.

And the teabaggers (unfortunate choice of name, that, but also fitting) will continue to fuss and fume.

For it may well be that they are not anti-Government and "certainly" not anti-American. But they don't seem to be pro anything.

Except power.

Unlike the statements of the "tea party's" organizers, this one by Paul Krugman is crystal clear:

One way to get a good sense of the current state of the G.O.P., and also to see how little has really changed, is to look at the "tea parties" that have been held in a number of places already, and will be held across the country on Wednesday. These parties — antitaxation demonstrations that are supposed to evoke the memory of the Boston Tea Party and the American Revolution — have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so.

But everything that critics mock about these parties has long been standard practice within the Republican Party.

Thus, President Obama is being called a "socialist" who seeks to destroy capitalism. Why? Because he wants to raise the tax rate on the highest-income Americans back to, um, about 10 percentage points less than it was for most of the Reagan administration. Bizarre.

Indeed. Bizarre.

Lenten Observance

I like very much this op-ed piece from yesterday's New York Times:

Finding Our Way Back to Lent
By JAMES CARROLL

Published: April 10, 2009

MOST American Catholics were well acquainted with poverty even before the stock market crash of 1929. My mother quit school after eighth grade to add a wage to the family income. Later, she supported my father as he went to night school. Like millions of Catholics, their faith was a source of meaning and dignity at a time when both were in short supply.

The Depression stamped them for life. Born into the aftermath, I was shaped by those years as well. During these past weeks, I’ve worried that we might be facing an unexpected replay of our parents’ and grandparents’ economic distress. But I’ve also been remembering more vividly the Lenten seasons of my midcentury childhood, when I most sharply felt the pull of Catholicism.

I came along well after the Depression, but I understand what Carroll means by "the pull of Catholicism." I feel that strongly during Lent--more so than Easter itself, more so than Christmas (which, it must be said, feels sort of "generically Christian" to me anymore--not secular, just not specifically described by any given component of Christianity). And we all know that I'm not the most observant of Catholics, do we not?

The Catholic theology of damnation was mitigated, if not eliminated, by the reforms of the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s. The dread of Hell evaporated as Catholics embraced a far more positive, all-merciful God. Those wallet cards disappeared overnight, and we started eating meat on Fridays. The sadomasochist in the sky, divine zapper, was gone, along with the gatekeeping role of the clergy.

Lent remains an important part of the Catholic calendar, but self-denial now, more suggested than required, aims less at penitence than at compassionate identification with, as Pope Benedict wrote at the beginning of this year’s Lent, the impoverished “situation in which so many of our brothers and sisters live.” Like Lent, today’s economic crisis can help stir that overdue empathy.

I grew up in that golden glow of Vatican II--all but faded now, I regret to report. We were always encouraged to "give up" something for Lent, and to fast and abstain (in those meatless Friday times, the latter seemed a little pointless). I was pretty peeved a few years ago when a local priest, from the pulpit, in talking up the idea of "giving up" something for Lent saw fit to ridicule the notion of "taking on" for Lent instead. I first stumbled upon that notion--that I will purposely do something for Lent, I will take on a task, whether it be committing to a prayer or worship regimen, or working at the soup kitchen, or being more helpful to Mom and Dad--at college. A Catholic university, I might add, and it was that university's priests who promoted the idea! (It was especially annoying, this more recent priest's ridiculing of what I consider still to be a worthy idea, in that he chose to lace it with a comment along the lines of, "If you're like me, you could afford to lose a little weight anyway." Very true--for both him and me--but I'm quite certain that that is not the point of Lenten fasting, abstinence, or sacrifice. If it is...well, then you can keep the whole thing.)

These days, I try to give up a little something, usually the coffee-break snack, and to avoid meat on Fridays. Honesty compels me to note that I have not been 100% successful with either of those. Which, in a way, is the point, is it not? Certainly God doesn't care if I eat a cookie, or eat between meals, or eat a bologna sandwich on a given day of the week. The point of the endeavor, to me, is to make myself stop and think, to reflect on the greater sacrifice that we Christians believe that God made on our behalf. It's not the cookie, it's the stopping to think about the cookie, and what that stopping to think in turn causes me to contemplate.

I tried to explain that some years ago to a pastor (non-Catholic) of my acquaintance who saw fit to ridicule me for passing on the cookies, or coffee cake, or whatever office snack was circulating that morning. With a sneer he informed me that my small sacrifice wasn't "necessary." I informed him that it certainly was...to me.

Lent offers one answer to today’s new reality. The season begins with the word “Remember,” uttered as a blot of ashes is smudged on the forehead. Remembering the transience of life — ashes to ashes, dust to dust — remains the essence of the observance. This year, I received my ashes at the Catholic church across the street from Harvard University, where the basilica was surprisingly overflowing with hundreds of undergraduates — a privileged elite attending to what every person has in common, and wants ordinarily to deny.

The fact that it is so easy for me to suddenly remember, post-cookie, that it's Lent and I had promised myself to give up such things during these 40 days--that is, the fact that I fail to keep my own promise to myself, and fail so quickly and easily--says something to me. Mostly it says that it's important to keep reminding myself. Just as it's easy to forget and eat the cookie, or the bologna sandwich, it's also easy to forget the original sacrifice that begat the Lenten observance in the first place.

The End of the Local Rag?

South Dakota Watch has this item today:

Argus Leader: RIP, December 2009?

Apparently the rumor going around the Sioux Falls Argus Leader is that unless they get things turned around, the Argus will be a passed paper by the end of the year.

Who will we bloggers be able to mock and ridicule if this sad day comes? Busting KDLT's small balls just isn't the same fun.

And as my wife said this weekend as she picked up the new, slimmer, less content-ladened Argus, "What is this, a high school newspaper?!"

As I commented there, the arrival of every invoice from the local rag (for I have no interest in letting them into my bank account, thanks all the same) prompts either me or my wife to wonder aloud if this is the time we just let it go.

One of these times we're apt to just pull the plug. Unless they beat us to it.

Oh Well, They're Only Facts

So my eye is caught by the headline

Victor Spinetti tells how he saved Ringo Starr from drowning

and off I go to WalesOnline to read a fluffy bit of an article in which the actor Victor Spinetti is quoted reminiscing about his encounters with the Beatles. All very nice and whatnot, until I encounter this:

...the only actor to star in all four of the band’s legendary films.

Really?

For one thing, if you stretch a bit, you come up with five films. The stretch is Magical Mystery Tour, which was made for television, but we'll be generous. That gives you:

A Hard Day's Night
Help!
Magical Mystery Tour
Yellow Submarine
Let it Be

(You might argue that Yellow Submarine shouldn't be on the list, since the band's involvement was minimal. But there it is anyway. If I let in Magical Mystery Tour, you have to let in Yellow Submarine.)

I immediately recalled Spinetti from the first two, and assumed he must have had a part in the third--an almost completely forgettable bit of nonsense with none of the charm or wit of the two feature films that preceded it (and I say that as a big fan of the Beatles)...an assumption that I verified with the Internet Movie Database. But what of the fourth film in the "all four" assertion? Well, certainly he wasn't in Let it Be. Did he supply a voice for Yellow Submarine? Doesn't show up in his IMDB listing.

I think we must conclude that Spinetti appeared not in "all four of the band’s legendary films" but in fact in three of the band's five movies...and one of them not exactly deserving of "legendary" status, either.

But it's so hard to keep things straight! The article's author seems unable to keep the films in order, and unwilling to take a moment to consult, say, IMDB to avoid making stupid mistakes such as appears in this section:

“I recall in Help! having to say the line, ‘With this ring, I could rule the world,’ and the four of them lying on the floor beside me screaming with laughter and stoned out of their minds.

“So they had to quickly put the camera close up on me to keep the film going. But that’s ok. That’s what I was there for.”

His skill for keeping a straight face was something that also came in handy on later Fab Four films like Hard Day’s Night, where he played a nervous TV producer.

Um, what? A Hard Day's Night is the Beatles' first film, from 1964. Help! is their second, from 1965. Whence comes this "later films like Hard Day's Night"? (The writer also can't be bothered with indefinite articles, even when they're part of the film's title.)

Although we're fortunate that Spinetti saved Ringo from drowning on the set of Help!, but it's too bad he couldn't save the Wales On Sunday writer from making careless, amateur mistakes. Oh well, they're only facts.

Something New from the Spamming World!

Just when you think you've seen it all...

I have oft complained here of the appalling lack of imagination being shown by modern spammers, spoofers, and phishers. A child could see through their clumsy attempts to perpetrate whatever it is they hope to perpetrate--money-extraction, usually, but not always--and increasingly one concludes that they're simply not trying.

And then one comes upon something like this in his inbox, as I did but moments ago:

!! Puppies Available For Adoption !!!

Ah! Puppies! Everyone loves puppies! This is going to be good!

And, indeed, early signs are positive. The e-mail purports to come from one "Alex Moore," and, upon opening the message, the innards jibe with that. (How often do we see e-mail whose sender is ostensibly "Joe Doakes" but whose message begins, "My name is Jane Doe..." As indicated above, some of these people aren't trying anymore.) The return address alleges to be from "googlemail.com," which, to my knowledge, doesn't exist (a search for same merely takes one to GMail), so I have to dock a couple of points for that, but so far so good. The actual message:

Hello,

My name is Alex Moore, I came across your email address through am email surfing Affiliated with the US chamber of Commerce, and My late Grandma was a puppy breeder, She died about 4 months ago and she left 2 Female English Bulldog, before she die, one of the Female puppy recently had a litter 4 puppies, They are so adorable, Due to my job as a Marketer, My job do not allow me to take good care of these babies, I would have love to take care of them myself but due to the nature of my job i does hardly have time for myself, So i want to find them caring & loving parent who will take good care of them and willing to adopt,if you interested in having them, please contact me immediately ,for more details and information.

Hope to read from you soon.

Thanks.
Alex

Okay, some considerable slippage here. Alex's apparently arm's-length relationship with the English language tends to undermine his or her credibility. To claim to be a capital-m "Marketer" is over-reaching--unless Alex means he or she owns a market, I would hope that a real-live marketer would know, say, the difference between a comma and a period. ("They are so adorable, Due to my job as a Marketer, My job do not allow me to take good care of these babies," etc.) I know that the students in Marketing classes I've taught over the years would be failed students of Marketing were they to turn in anything resembling the message above.

Here's my advice, Alex: Take over Grandma's puppy mill. "Marketering" isn't gonna work out so well for you.

So, in the end, not as much fun as I'd hoped. Points for originality, however: In more than 15 years online, I have never--never, not once--received a solicitation to buy puppies via the interwebs.

Of course, I have no way of knowing what "Alex's" real game is. It seems pretty unlikely to be puppies, but in this economy, who knows--maybe even the puppy mills are having a tough time of it. I suspect that, were I to follow up (and isn't it refreshing that there are no clickable links in the message itself? To follow up would be to hit "reply"...how charming!), it would develop that the puppies are all gone but that "Alex" has some other fantabulous opportunity for me.

Or it may just be some spammer's or phisher's way to find valid e-mail addresses: You send out the "adorable puppies" message, someone replies, and bingo! you have a valid address for whatever your nefarious real purpose is.

Or it could be puppies. We'll never know.

As Seen on the Weather Channel

This must be a new definition of the word is, with which I am unfamiliar.

The Weather Channel this morning, in the "Local on the 8s" forecast, informs me in the narration that "a weather advisory is in effect for our area." Emphasis mine. But the screen tells me that there's a "winter weather advisory in effect from 4 a.m. to 7 p.m. CDT Tuesday." Which is tomorrow. So to say that an advisory is in effect some 22 hours before it actually goes into effect is to utilize the verb is in a new an unexpected way, no?

A Good Idea. Probably.

It's hardly the first notice I've seen--try watching the Weather Channel for three minutes without seeing it announced--but today's e-mail update from My Fair City got me to thinking about Earth Hour this coming Saturday. The announcement, in part:

On Saturday, March 28, 2009, at 8:30 p.m., the City of Sioux Falls and some Sioux Falls businesses will be taking part in Earth Hour, sponsored by the World Wildlife Fund. We’ll be joining tens of millions of concerned citizens and corporations worldwide in calling for action to save our planet for future generations.

To participate, simply turn off the lights in your home or business from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m. on Saturday, March 28. This is an opportunity to slow down, use candlelight, and make a statement about the fight against climate change.

Well, yeah. In principle, I agree. I try to be green, or at least greenish. I'm replacing incandescent bulbs with CF bulbs as they burn out. (Doesn't seem "green" to me to send working bulbs to the landfill prematurely.) I turn off the lights when I leave the room. We turn down the thermostat at night and when we leave the house. We recycle, and compost, and try with limited success to gang up our errands in an effort to burn less gasoline. But to turn off the lights on a Saturday night from 8:30 to 9:30. I dunno. Too bad it's not the following Saturday. We won't be home. Indeed, the lights will be turned off from 8:30 till much later than 9:30, I'm afraid. And I'm not wild about the city's offhanded tone. "Simply turn off the lights in your home or business." Really? Is that all? And how many city offices will be open at 8:30 on Saturday night? A few, sure--the police and fire departments, the water-treatment plant, stuff like that--but it's a pretty safe guess to say that most of them will already be closed and dark, so it's a little declasse to suggest we "simply" turn off the lights for an hour. Ditto businesses. I daresay that the ones that are closed on a Saturday night will happily (and simply!) turn off the lights. And I likewise daresay that the ones that are open will not care to turn off the lights for an hour, no matter how much that helps Planet Earth or shoplifters. After a couple of paragraphs' worth of background about Earth Hour, and the promise that this year's hour will be bigger than ever, the city flings this bit of oddness at me:

We all have a vote, and every single vote counts. Together, we can take control of the future of our planet for future generations.

I have nothing to quibble about there...except what the hell are they talking about? We all have a vote? What are we voting on? Am I supposed to gather the family together for an Australian ballot to see if we can get a majority to support shutting off the lights? We're a family of four, so the possibility of a deadlock is quite real. I went back and reread the silly thing, there's nothing in there about voting. It's as if some other message elbowed its way into this one. Well, probably come 8:30 Saturday we'll turn off some of the lights, maybe even most of them. perhaps the one or two we leave on will be CF bulbs. It's not necessarily a bad idea. It's just that I think it would work better if we all agreed to turn off the lights between 1:00 and 2:00 a.m.

The Most Despised Minority in America?

I happened upon an interesting blog post by Jonathan Lockwood Huie a little while back, "The Most Despised Minority in America." It's an intriguing thought, no? As Huie leads off,

This is America, and we aren't supposed to hate anyone because they are a minority, are we? Actually, we have been getting better lately with regard to many minorities - but not all. Electing Barack Obama President of our United States is evidence that being black has become a respectable distinction for a significant majority of Americans. 8% of the Members of Congress are Black compared with 13% of the population - getting closer. Having one woman as a vice-presidential candidate and another as a serious presidential contender affirms that being a woman is also considered acceptable, even though only 16% of Congress is female.

He continues in that vein. Hispanics? Five percent of Congress representing 15% of the population, he says. "Being Jewish has actually become distinguished," Huie writes, "as 7% of Congress represents the 1% of the population who are Jewish. A Gallup Poll reports that only 4% of Americans have a negative view of Jews compared with 23% who have a negative view of Evangelical Christians."

What about gay people? Despite their position being "grim," Huie indicates that things may be looking up somewhat.

So then who is the most despised group in America?

Huie theorizes that it might well be

Atheists, Agnostics, Humanists, and the others who comprise the group unfortunately termed "non-believers." While "non-believer," in this case, refers to a "non-belief" in a super-human deity, it, like other negative terms, automatically carries a stigma, as would "non-white," "non-male," or "non-Christian."

As indicated above, interesting. If Huie is right--and so far I can think of no evidence to refute him--it seems only to reinforce that which I perceive so often, viz., we cannot stand the thought of someone who doesn't believe as we believe, who doesn't carry the same convictions we carry, who doesn't profess or witness or worship in the same way.

There is irony, in a country that so many citizens insist is a "Christian nation" in the notion that those who disagree, or who question, or doubt--those who will admit to such a thing--must be silenced if they can't be persuaded. Why irony? Because Christianity itself was once such a contrarian, unacceptable notion.

How soon we forget!

Make that "Certain" Catholics!

There are today any number of news items and blog posts that all follow this line, from Alison Go's "The Paper Trail" at USNews.com:

Obama's Planned Notre Dame Commencement Speech Riles Catholics

Go writes:

Barack Obama will give commencement speeches at the U.S. Naval Academy, Arizona State, and the University of Notre Dame this year. The Naval Academy has received the news with, and Arizona State actually moved its ceremony to accommodate the president.

But when the president isn't sticking it to a certain Naval Academy graduate and Arizona senator, he's riling the Catholic community at Notre Dame. Critics say that Obama's honorary degree is an affront to the school's Catholic teachings, citing the president's stances on abortion, gay rights, and embryonic stem cell research. Groups like the Cardinal Newman Society and the Pro-Life Action League have encouraged all Catholics to flood the university with phone calls and to sign online petitions (which have tens of thousands of signatures already).

And so on. Read it all here.

In posting Go's item to Digg.com, I had to add this comment:

I would prefer it had she said "extremist Catholics" or "wacky-doodle wild-eye right-wing Catholics," for clearly not ALL Catholics are dismayed by this possibility, but so it goes. Meanwhile, as a Catholic and an alum of another Catholic university, I plan to drop a note of support to the president of Notre Dame.

Whence comes this absurd notion that we must listen only and forever to those with whom we agree on every subject?

And where do we find such people?

And how do we grow in our own opinions, beliefs, faith, etc., if we fear to test their weight against those of others?

And what does it say about our opinions, beliefs, faith, etc., if we fear to test them?

What does it say about ourselves?

What does it say about our attitude toward higher education when thousands of noisy people insist that the University of Notre Dame invite to its commencement only people who will parrot the party line--as understood and espoused by the noisy thousands, for they are always certain of their rightness in any matter (just ask them)--and who offer nothing that might challenge their preconceptions or shake what must be their very wobbly "convictions"?

What does it say about our attitude toward America and American democracy that such people would insult the leader of the free world because he holds some opinions that are contrary to our own?

What does it say about the bottomless hypocrisy of right-wing fanatics that they will spew and froth about an invitation extended by Notre Dame to the President of the United States, ostensibly because he is pro-choice, when they were notably silent on the subject when another Catholic institution, Boston College, heard from then-Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice...who also is pro-choice? (See Andrew Sullivan's post, "The Double Standards Of Theocons," in today's Daily Dish.)

Well, it says there's a lot of two-facedness, a lot of silliness, a lot of headline grabbing (I know: I'm not helping), and not a whole lot of Christianity obvious in the anti-choice movement.

To his credit, the president of Notre Dame, Father John Jenkins, has yet to capitulate to the noisy, frothing ones. According to an item in The Observer Online:

University President Fr. John Jenkins responded to criticism regarding the announcement of President Barack Obama as the 2009 Commencement speaker by clearly making a distinction between honoring the president and supporting his political views.

Jenkins made it clear in an interview with The Observer Sunday the University does not "foresee circumstances" that would cause Notre Dame to rescind the president's invitation.

"We have invited the president and he's honored us by accepting," he said.

The article further says:

"We are not ignoring the critical issue of the protection of life. On the contrary, we invited him because we care so much about those issues, and we hope for this to be the basis of an engagement with him," Jenkins said.

"You cannot change the world if you shun the people you want to persuade, and if you cannot persuade them show respect for them and listen to them," he said.

Quite a far cry from the wild-eyed crowd, whose red-faced response to contrary opinions seems always to damn, to decry, and to shun.

Especially if those opinions are held by a member of the Democratic Party. President of the United States or not.

I like Sullivan's conclusion to the nonsense:

Seriously who do these people think they're persuading any more?