There Is No Heresy

"There is no heresy or no philosophy which is so abhorrent to the church as a human being." —James Joyce

Been a Joyce fan for years, but somehow had never come across this little gem.

Your Song

Got a link to this from Debbie today. Sweet ritual. Sweet thing to send. Thanks, Debbie.

Choice cut:

When you recognize your own song, you have no desire or need to do anything that would hurt another. A friend is someone who knows your song and sings it to you when you have forgotten it. Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused.

Old Testament Follies

Been thinking about Job tonight. The whole Old Testament, actually. It dawned on me that crazy as most of those stories were, they helped illustrate the capriciousness and madness of life on this planet. The conclusions drawn in those books are nuts IMHO, but the experiences... timeless.

I don't recall precisely what got me thinking of Job. Eric and I were mulling the meaning of existence and how to live a better, more authentic life and I started riffing on the OT. Regardless, the story is infuriating. I don't how anyone can read it and then go back to the well for more. Here you have a guy who thinks he's doing everything right. Good father, good husband, good community member. Hell, he is doing everything right, even by yhwh's impossible standards.

Then Satan comes along and, for shits and giggles, makes a dollar bet with good old, it-which-can't-be-named. And based on that taunting bet, the good lord goes and fucks Job's life up beyond measure. Merely to see if Job remains loyal! That is remarkably fucked up.

Now, my Jewish friends will tell me that there are several levels on which to read and interpret that story. Fair enough. Even now, I can read my own metaphorical take into it. But there are people on this planet—lots of 'em—who take that story literally. And still they want to worship that god.

I can't believe we've come this far as a species.

Fire Away!

Finally, from Wired, some back story to the biggest-selling, most popular (and, frankly best) app in history.

Choice cut:

First they had to save a company in crisis: at the beginning of 2009, Rovio was close to bankruptcy. Then they had to create the perfect game, do every other little thing exactly right, and keep on doing it. The Heds had developed 51 titles before Angry Birds. Some of them had sold in the millions for third parties such as Namco and EA, so they decided to create their own, original intellectual property. "We thought we would need to do ten to 15 titles until we got the right one," says 30-year-old Niklas. One afternoon in late March, in their offices overlooking a courtyard in downtown Helsinki, Jaakko Iisalo, a games designer who had been at Rovio since 2006, showed them a screenshot. He had pitched hundreds in the two months before. This one showed a cartoon flock of round birds, trudging along the ground, moving towards a pile of colourful blocks. They looked cross. "People saw this picture and it was just magical," says Niklas. Eight months and thousands of changes later, after nearly abandoning the project, Niklas watched his mother burn a Christmas turkey, distracted by playing the finished game. "She doesn't play any games. I realised: this is it."

And frankly, I'm relieved and amused to learn that even Salman Rushdie succumbed to its charms, too. 

So Many To Choose From, But Here's…

One reason horoscopes don't matter.

And another.

You Didn't Burn The Beer

An amazing advertising time capsule.

A Gathering Storm Of BS

This is rich. In response to the recent batch of gay marriage victories, some silly anti-gay marriage group (National Organization for Marriage, formed by National Review's lovely Maggie Gallagher) puts out this cheesy-ass video:

As you can imagine, it's full of lies and distortions of the truth. Hell, they couldn't even find real people for the vid, deciding instead to use actors:

HRC responds with its own cheesy video:

Now, it's become clearer and clearer to mainstream America what us gay-lovin' folk have seen for years: GM foes simply don't have a rational, reasonable argument in their arsenal. Their arguments against GM have been aired and distilled down to two basic pieces: religious doctrine and/or personal ick factor (or bigotry, if you prefer)—the rest simply don't stand up under scrutiny.

All they've got left is fear-mongering lies.

Midwestern Medicine

The ground continues to shift.

A House Deserted?

Now for some happier news…

The coming evangelical collapse
ONEIDA, KY. - We are on the verge – within 10 years – of a major collapse of evangelical Christianity. This breakdown will follow the deterioration of the mainline Protestant world and it will fundamentally alter the religious and cultural environment in the West.

Within two generations, evangelicalism will be a house deserted of half its occupants. (Between 25 and 35 percent of Americans today are Evangelicals.) In the "Protestant" 20th century, Evangelicals flourished. But they will soon be living in a very secular and religiously antagonistic 21st century.

This collapse will herald the arrival of an anti-Christian chapter of the post-Christian West. Intolerance of Christianity will rise to levels many of us have not believed possible in our lifetimes, and public policy will become hostile toward evangelical Christianity, seeing it as the opponent of the common good.

Millions of Evangelicals will quit. Thousands of ministries will end. Christian media will be reduced, if not eliminated. Many Christian schools will go into rapid decline. I'm convinced the grace and mission of God will reach to the ends of the earth. But the end of evangelicalism as we know it is close.

Dude, stop whispering sweet nothings in my ear. You're making me all weak in the knees.

Welcome To The Depression

Time to start a new series, this one chronicling the nascent depression.

Here is the link and video I've already posted on Facebook:

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

And a cheerful post from The Moderate Voice.

Choice cut:

Longtime readers know that I have long thought a depression was inevitable for the US and the world in general because of the enormity of our debt.
…
Meanwhile, the country is seeing record home vacancies. “More than 14 million housing units are vacant. That number does not include an estimated 4.8 million seasonal or vacation homes, most of which are occupied part of the year.” This is completely insane.

And the financial system? It’s still as close to complete collapse as ever for the United States, and in worse shape in developing countries and Europe. I would be very surprised if we didn’t see sovereign bankruptcies (even Ireland and Spain are increasingly at risk) of rather important countries in the next year, bankruptcies that could potentially lock up the European and hence global financial system to the extent it was for a few days last fall — but this time for much longer. I have a feeling the tent cities are going to get a lot larger.

A little something from The UK's Daily Mail:

With America's economy in freefall and its housing market in crisis, California's state capital has become home to a tented city for the dispossessed.

Those who have lost their jobs and homes and have nowhere else to go are constructing makeshift shelters on the site, which covers several acres.
As many as 50 people a week are turning up and the authorities estimate that the tent city is now home to more than 1,200 people.
…
Foreclosure rates last year rocketed by 327 per cent, with up to 500 people a day losing their home.

And a slideshow from MSNBC.

Strap yourselves in, folks, it's going to be a bumpy-ass ride.

Good News?

The whole Kellogg's/Phelps fiasco has spawned new slang. 

Best News Of The Day

Kelloggs is feeling some pain from their inane, venal punishment of Michael Phelps.

Kelloggs Suffers
Good news, everyone! In an admittedly algorithmic-driven survey of positive and negative stories about the company, their handling of the Phelps issue did the brand some damage:

Out of the 5,600 company reputations Vanno monitors, Kellogg ranked ninth before it booted Phelps. Now it's ranked 83. Not even an industry-wide peanut scare inflicted as much damage on the food company's reputation.

The peanut scare was much less toxic for them. One step at a time ...

Anyone else smell an opening for General Foods or Post? 

Holy Shit!

I knew this was coming, but still, now that it's here...damn!

1.5 million books in your pocket
One of the great things about an iPhone or Android phone is being able to play Pacman while stuck in line at the post office. Sometimes though, we yearn for something more than just playing games or watching videos.

What if you could also access literature's greatest works, such as Emma and The Jungle Book, right from your phone? Or, some of the more obscure gems such as Mark Twain's hilarious travelogue, Roughing It? Today we are excited to announce the launch of a mobile version of Google Book Search, opening up over 1.5 million … public domain books in the US (and over half a million outside the US) for you to browse while buying your postage.

Wow.

Uncut Travesty

Despite his better judgement, some jackass writing in The Daily Beast accedes to circumsizing his newborn son…because his wife is grossed out by uncut cocks. Then he's stupid enough to write about it. 

When my wife insisted we circumcise our son, I wondered why the little guy couldn’t just look like me. Then I began to re-evaluate our entire relationship with half the self-esteem and twice the paranoia.

I am an uncircumcised man.

This has never bothered my wife, Nicole. Or so I thought. “It’s like your penis is wearing a turtleneck,” she’d sometimes say, seemingly benignly.
As such, there was never any doubt in my mind that, should my wife and I ever produce a miniature me, he would also go uncircumcised. We would leave his little thing alone. No snip-snip, just like daddy.

Until, that is, the late-September day when we brought our newborn son home from the hospital. It was chilly, and the tightly wrapped baked potato of a boy felt warm in the crook of my arm.

“We’re getting Dalton circumcised,” my wife said as she fastened the potato into his car seat.

“What?” I said. “Since when does he need that?”

“Ever since uncircumcised penises are weird.”

She paused before adding, a little backpedally, “Except yours, of course. Yours is OK.”

This is how I learned my wife’s true feelings about the type of penis I have—by comparing it to our infant son’s. She thinks—has always thought—“OK.” I knew what “OK” meant, of course. “OK” meant weird, just like she’d said.

The author continues to paint a picture of two exceedingly superficial dolts who really had no business breeding. Sadly, their boy has  already paid his price for entry into their house. 

I tell you, in my perfect world, that couple would be frog marched down to the local mohel for a taste of their own medicine. Both of them. 

I Have A Dream Today

It's nearly impossible to be unmoved by this almost unbearably eloquent speech.

A sampling of the lesser known passages:

Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.
…
Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.
…
With this faith, we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith, we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

And, of course, the climax:

And when this happens, when we allow freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual:

Free at last! Free at last!

Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!

Making Racists Squirm

Contra the spirit of unity which is pulsing through the country in anticipation of tomorrow's swearing in, I offer this little vignette courtesy of Ta-Nehisi and his wife. Enjoy the schadenfreude: 

From the annals of Ultra-Racial America
When I was kid, I always thought it was weird how much white racism, basically, revolved around keeping white women from having sex with black men. I'd be reading some book on black history, where people would be devoting [sic], say, the right of black people to vote. And, inevitably, some white segregationists would say something like "If we let them vote, they'll be marrying your daughters!!! And they'll take over the country!!!" And I think, "Whaaa??" Talk about your non-sequitur.

But then I was talking about this with Kenyatta this morning, and it all suddenly made sense. She nodded to Barack Obama and laughingly noted, "They were right."

Goodbye, Tara

We're two days away from the big day—the finest transfer of power in our lifetimes. In all likelihood, it's an event on the magnitude of Buchanan-to-Lincoln or Hoover-to-FDR. (Even as I read that last sentence I find myself torn between my sense of excitement and possibility and my wariness of grandiose pronouncements. And yet I leave it there because this is, by any objective measure, a big historical moment.) But before the celebrations end and the heavy lifting begins I thought I'd take some time to share a few thoughts about what's happening from my narrow historical perspective. 

We're about to be led as a nation by a man who is, among other things:

• African American (yes, we can stop right here, but I'll go on)

• an intellectual / constitutional scholar

• rooted in the liberal political tradition (albeit with a moderate/conservative temperament)

• a writer

• an urban dweller (the first non-"rural" president in nearly a century)

• isn't not afraid to speak extemporaneously and in complete sentences

• is politically shrewd 

• is emotionally intelligent

• is from the midwest / is not from the South/West

Think about that for a second. Just let it sink in. 

Now, all of that is great enough. And I don't want to take anything away from Obama and his/our victory. But we've had a smart, kinda liberal guy in the White House before. And we remember how that went. (In fairness, Clinton probably did the best he could given we were still in the thick of a conservative political era—not to mention his lack of discipline and sabotage-inducing appetites.)

What makes this moment doubly exciting is what else has gone on. This most recent conservative era that we've lived through—suffered under—has clearly come to an end and we're on the cusp of a new era in American politics (a period Michael Lind posits will be a Fourth Republic). 

In addition to being exciting for its own sake as a large historical event, it's amazing to me as a) a liberal, b) a coastal dweller from the midwest, c) a sane person. For the first time since I was a zygote, this country will not be dominated by Jacksonian, Southern culture and its retrograde mores. For the past 40 years or so Jacksonian politicians have controlled the levers of federal power and dominated the political playing field (even as they lost ground in popular culture, thank you, Hollywood*). Delay, Gingrich, Bush, Cheney, et al were merely the apotheosis (nadir?) of this virulent political strain. It's as if they took the old confederate mantra "the South will rise again" as a prime directive. 

And rise it did. But instead of a civil war they got elected (or not) and waged a culture war. We've lived with the repercussions since. 

And it has finally, finally played out. Ding, dong. The goddamn witch is dead.

****

All of which isn't to say we're entering a golden era of butterflies and rainbows and kumbaya. It's merely an opportunity. An opportunity to remake the country according to our highest visions, instead of complaining about the injustices caused by the other guys. Whether the opportunity is squandered or utilized remains to be seen.

Because power will be fought over as it always is. Nasty, evil shit will still happen in the country and the world. New factions and new divisions will form. Liberals will have to hold Obama's feet to the fire, lest countervailing pressures push him backwards. There will be failures alongside the wins.

We don't know what this new era will be called or what it will bring. But the emphasis and overall direction is shifting—has already shifted. And all of the energy and momentum right now is with progressive ideas and proposals. This is our moment. Let's enjoy it.

* Never thought I'd write those words.

Pot Meet Kettle. Kettle, Pot.

This is rich: Disney accused by Catholic cleric of corrupting children's minds

Ahem.

Back To The Future

A funny and serious encomium to our First Lady-to-be's booty.

First Lady Got Back

But what really thrills me, what really feels liberating in a very personal way, is the official new prominence of Michelle Obama. Barack's better half not only has stature but is statuesque. She has coruscating intelligence, beauty, style and -- drumroll, please -- a butt. (Yes, you read that right: I'm going to talk about the first lady's butt.)
…
As America fretted about Obama's exoticism and he sought to calm the waters with speeches about unity and common experience, Michelle's body was sending a different message: To hell with biracialism! Compromise, bipartisanship? Don't think so. Here was one clear signifier of blackness that couldn't be tamed, muted or otherwise made invisible. It emerged right before our eyes, in the midst of our growing uncertainty about everything, and we were too bogged down in the daily campaign madness to notice. The one clear predictor of success that the pundits, despite all their fancy maps, charts and holograms, missed completely? Michelle's butt.

Lord knows, it's time the butt got some respect. Ever since slavery, it's been both vilified and fetishized as the most singular of all black female features, more unsettling than dark skin and full lips, the thing that marked black women as uncouth and not quite ready for civilization (of course, it also made them mighty attractive to white men, which further stoked fears of miscegenation that lay at the heart of legal and social segregation). In modern times, the butt has demarcated class and stature among black society itself. Emphasizing it or not separates dignified black women from ho's, party girls from professionals, hip-hop from serious. (Black women are not the only ones with protruding behinds, by the way, but they're certainly considered its source. How many gluteally endowed nonblack women have been derided for having a black ass? Well, Hillary, for one.)

But Michelle is bringing those two falsely divided minds together in a single presentation -- finally, unity for the real world! Talk about a power base. Thanks to Michelle, looking professional and provocative in a distinctly black way will become not only acceptable but also part of a whole presidential look that's more, well, inclusive.

P.S. Bonus points killer use of coruscating.

Life

Google has archived Life magazine pics from the 1860s onward. Enjoy. 

h/t: Daily Dish