From Publishers Lunch Weekly...
FICTION
Debut:
Former Politico writer Karin Tanabe's THE CAPITOLIST, in which a 20-something journalist leaves a cushy NYC magazine job for DC's hottest (and most cut-throat) political rag, where she uncovers a juicy scandal involving a senator that could make or break her career, to Sarah Cantin at Atria, in a nice deal, by Bridget Wagner at Zachary Shuster Harmsworth Literary Agency (World).
Screenwriter Kathy Ebel cuts a wide comic swatch with FAST & SLOPPY, the story of a deeply flawed but unsinkable young woman whose misguided attempts at finding love and security in 1990s New York City include sleeping with her best friend's father, to Adrienne Brodeur at Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, at auction, by Betsy Lerner at Dunow, Carlson & Lerner (NA).
Thriller
International bestseller Karin Slaughter's next untitled book, to Jennifer Hershey and Libby McGuire for Delacorte Press, for publication in Summer 2013, by Victoria Sanders at Victoria Sanders & Associates (NA).
UK journalist Philip Robinson's USS ALCATRAZ, pitched in the Tom Clancy, "24," Day of the Jackal mold, the first in a trilogy, about a retrofitted nuclear submarine that has been turned into a secret US government prison, with no possibility of escape; the layers of corruption behind the prison ship go all the way to the top, to Andrew Bartlett at Thomas & Mercer, in a three-book deal, by Deborah Schneider at Gelfman Schneider (world).
General/Other
Helene Gremillon's THE CONFIDANT, about a woman in 1975 Paris who begins to receive, among sympathy cards from her mother's death, weekly letters from an unknown correspondent that recount the tale of two impossible loves and four broken destinies between 1939 and 1943 -- a story that has a direct bearing upon her own life, with Alison Anderson translating, to Julie Miesionczek at Penguin, for publication in Fall 2012, by Rebecca Byers at Plon-Perrin-Presses de la Renaissance (NA).
Australian and New Zealand rights to Penny Hueston at Text, by Rebecca Byers; to Jane Aitken at Gallic Books, by Sarah Lutyens at Lutyens & Rubinstein.
NONFICTION
Advice/Relationships
CEO of the Special Olympics Tim Shriver's book about the athletes who "have taught me more about how to live this life than anyone," presenting "really important lessons for a time and an age when people are really looking and seeking ways to find more fulfillment, more purpose, more peace ... in their lives," to Sarah Crichton at Sarah Crichton Books, by Rafe Sagalyn at The Sagalyn Agency (world).
Biography
KILLING LINCOLN authors Bill O'Reilly and Martin Dugard's KILLING KENNEDY: The End of Camelot, the second book in O'Reilly's presidential history series, promising "a dramatic work of history and a dynamic way to relive the presidency of John F. Kennedy's White House, the horrific assassination and the crucial hours that followed," again to Steve Rubin at Holt, with Gillian Blake editing, for publication in October 2012, plus LINCOLN'S LAST DAYS, an illustrated condensation of KILLING LINCOLN for readers ten and up, to Holt Children's, for publication in August 2012, by Eric Simonoff at William Morris Endeavor.
David Browne's EYES OF THE WORLD: The Lives and Times of the Grateful Dead, a sprawling musical and cultural chronicle of the biggest, most dominant cult band in rock history, to Ben Schafer at Da Capo, for publication in Fall 2015, by Erin Hosier at Dunow, Carlson & Lerner (World).
Business/Investing/Finance
Fortune Magazine journalist Carol Loomis' untitled book about Warren Buffett, drawing on her more than 40-year friendship with America's most successful investor, in which she collects and adds new commentary to six decades of articles in Fortune, to Adrian Zackheim at Portfolio, at auction, by Tracy Brown at Tracy Brown Literary Agency (world).
Humor
NYT bestselling author of GOD, NO! and larger half of magic act Penn & Teller, Penn Jillette's EVERY DAY IS AN ATHEIST HOLIDAY, a new collection of spiritual rants and humorous ravings, spanning the hidden horrors of Christmas carols, family celebrations, Fourth of July, Halloween and beyond, to Sarah Hochman at Blue Rider Press, for publication in November 2012, by Agency for the Performing Arts (World).
Memoir
Amanda Knox's "full and unflinching account of the events that led to her arrest in Perugia and her struggles with the complexities of the Italian judicial system," drawing on journals she kept during her imprisonment, and promising "never before-told details surrounding her case" and how she "coped with the most challenging time of her young life," with a collaborator to be named later, to Jonathan Burnham at Harper, with Claire Wachtel editing, at auction, for publication in 2013, by Robert Barnett at Williams & Connolly.
Shulem Deen's SHAYGETZ, the revealing account of a Skverer Hasid, subject to the most cloistered and patriarchal of all ultra-orthodox Jewish sects, who, in trying to find a more satisfying sense of intellectual girding for the extreme faith he's devoted his life to, makes instead one discovery after another that in the end send him fleeing from the constraints of that world -- which eventually causes him to lose touch with the five beloved children he and his wife had between their meeting at the age of 18 and their divorce at 26, to Katie Dublinski at Graywolf, in a pre-empt, in a nice deal, by Rob McQuilkin at Lippincott Massie McQuilkin (World).
Former journalist who now works in digital strategy and data analysis Amy Webb's DATA, A LOVE STORY, a humorous and instructive memoir about how Webb "gamed" the world of online dating and used her skills to figure out what sort of man she really wanted to date, then crunched the numbers to figure out how to successfully attract just the right one, including her eventual husband, to Jill Schwartzman at Dutton, at auction, by Erin Malone and Suzanne Gluck at William Morris Endeavor (NA).
Journalist Alexandra Heminsley's RUNNING LIKE A GIRL, an inspirational and practical memoir encouraging women who have never considered themselves athletes, and who may have always loathed running, to tie up their sneakers and discover its pleasures, pitched as aimed at the readers of THE HAPPINESS PROJECT as well as the readers of BORN TO RUN, to Alexis Gargagliano at Scribner and Alison Clark at Simon & Schuster Canada, at auction, by Zoe Pagnamenta at the Zoe Pagnamenta Agency, on behalf of Sarah Ballard at United Agents; to Jocasta Hamilton at Hutchinson in the U.K., at auction.
Narrative
Ray Walker with Rachel Holtzman's THE ROAD TO BURGUNDY, the story of his long, hard journey to realize his dream, chucking his California office job in favor of winemaking in Burgundy, starting with no money, no vineyard, no grapes, and no French, starting with a wife, a new baby, and more determination than anyone in his new village had ever seen before; the learning curve for the Walker family was steep, but from that hardly-promising start, he became the first non-Frenchman ever to make the hallowed grand cru Le Chambertin, and founded Maison Ilan, a wine that sold out its very first vintage, to Lucia Watson at Gotham, for publication in Summer 2013, by Sharon Bowers at Miller Bowers Griffin.
Fast Company, Slate, NPR, and NYT contributor Farhad Manjoo's MASTERS OF OUR UNIVERSE, an account of the war among today's major tech companies, primarily focused on Apple, Facebook, Google, and Amazon, as they expand beyond their traditional services and move aggressively into each other's territory, battling for dominance of our lives, to Jofie Ferrari-Adler at Simon & Schuster, at auction, by Larry Weissman at Larry Weissman Literary (NA).
Rights to Mike Jones at Simon & Schuster UK, at auction, by Judith Murray at Greene & Heaton (UK); Intrinseca, in a pre-empt, by Joao Paulo Riff at Riff Agency, in Brazil; and China Citic, in a pre-empt, by Sophia Yang at The Grayhawk Agency (Simplified Chinese).
Wrap...
Monday, February 27, 2012
Friday, February 24, 2012
Jabberwocky Story......................
Explaining the HAW HAW people
by
Keith Taylor
The headline read: YA GOTTA LAUGH TO KEEP FROM CRYING
You have to figure the guy who made up the ridiculous story knew it was jabberwocky but, that didn't matter. Considering his target audience, jabberwocky was just what was needed. Clear thinking is not an option for those who choose deliberate ignorance.
The story, "showed" how the president and vice president thought the term cattle guards (metal rails laid across fence openings to keep cows from roaming) referred to people whose job needed government protection.
It was summed up with
OH MY SOUL!
Passed on to you without further comment...
Now you do the same.
I CAN'T STOP LAUGHING - - - -
OH LORD HELP US!!!!
The story was created out of whole cloth of course. Inane stories created to be forwarded by nincompoops generally are, but that didn't matter. The piece of bullshit cast a poor light on the president and vice president, and that's enough to get the HAW HAW crowd going.
They are the ones who chortled, scratched their private parts at every utterance by LIMBAWWWWW. Otherwise they showed their ignorance by supporting and twice electing a doofus draft dodger. We ended up with a president who displayed his own deliberate ignorance by giggling as he pushed buttons to blow away people who represented no danger to ourselves.
In the minds of the HAW HAW people, Doofus earned their respect because he ceded the responsibility to God for his actions. I suspect the HAW HAWs felt "some people just need killing."
Now, in another election cycle, the attack in thinking continues by the time tested method of making utterly stupid claims about people who show intelligence.
The credulous will always be heard, but this is more than being heard. It's insidious because each vote from one who believes in bullshit is as effective as a vote from a person who chooses to think.
The HAW HAWS who vote, and most will, glom onto urban legends because "they might jes be true."
And Doofus himself has several worthy successors waiting in the wings. Each, of course, claims authority from god himself. All claim patriotism. One said he had an adulterous relationship with a woman because he was patriotic. Later, upon marrying his third wife, he became a Catholic, the church most strongly against birth control. Now he is against most of the laws he once voted for.
Another knows God wants him to help overpopulate a world now numbering seven billion and rising. He has fathered nine kids, one who he miscarried and who's lifeless fetus he showed to the others. He wants everybody else to exhibit their devotion to the have lots of them no matter what. He routinely confuses birth control with abortion and solves his dilemma by deeming all sex evil, except, one supposes, for the nine times he did it.
The third candidate vying for the job of commander in chief does have a bit of sense, but he started losing ground because of something to do with his underwear. Immediately his claims became more extreme right wing. He is now disavowing the state government health care program he was lauded for, and for which he once bragged about.
Tis a topsy turvy, run amok campaign we're looking at here, unless you are a HAW HAW then "its just what God wants."
I shudder to think turning over the country to a claque of fools who see god and his work in everything, ignore the science which give us graphic proof of climate change, and disparage people who think.
I worry for my country.
Wrap...
by
Keith Taylor
The headline read: YA GOTTA LAUGH TO KEEP FROM CRYING
You have to figure the guy who made up the ridiculous story knew it was jabberwocky but, that didn't matter. Considering his target audience, jabberwocky was just what was needed. Clear thinking is not an option for those who choose deliberate ignorance.
The story, "showed" how the president and vice president thought the term cattle guards (metal rails laid across fence openings to keep cows from roaming) referred to people whose job needed government protection.
It was summed up with
OH MY SOUL!
Passed on to you without further comment...
Now you do the same.
I CAN'T STOP LAUGHING - - - -
OH LORD HELP US!!!!
The story was created out of whole cloth of course. Inane stories created to be forwarded by nincompoops generally are, but that didn't matter. The piece of bullshit cast a poor light on the president and vice president, and that's enough to get the HAW HAW crowd going.
They are the ones who chortled, scratched their private parts at every utterance by LIMBAWWWWW. Otherwise they showed their ignorance by supporting and twice electing a doofus draft dodger. We ended up with a president who displayed his own deliberate ignorance by giggling as he pushed buttons to blow away people who represented no danger to ourselves.
In the minds of the HAW HAW people, Doofus earned their respect because he ceded the responsibility to God for his actions. I suspect the HAW HAWs felt "some people just need killing."
Now, in another election cycle, the attack in thinking continues by the time tested method of making utterly stupid claims about people who show intelligence.
The credulous will always be heard, but this is more than being heard. It's insidious because each vote from one who believes in bullshit is as effective as a vote from a person who chooses to think.
The HAW HAWS who vote, and most will, glom onto urban legends because "they might jes be true."
And Doofus himself has several worthy successors waiting in the wings. Each, of course, claims authority from god himself. All claim patriotism. One said he had an adulterous relationship with a woman because he was patriotic. Later, upon marrying his third wife, he became a Catholic, the church most strongly against birth control. Now he is against most of the laws he once voted for.
Another knows God wants him to help overpopulate a world now numbering seven billion and rising. He has fathered nine kids, one who he miscarried and who's lifeless fetus he showed to the others. He wants everybody else to exhibit their devotion to the have lots of them no matter what. He routinely confuses birth control with abortion and solves his dilemma by deeming all sex evil, except, one supposes, for the nine times he did it.
The third candidate vying for the job of commander in chief does have a bit of sense, but he started losing ground because of something to do with his underwear. Immediately his claims became more extreme right wing. He is now disavowing the state government health care program he was lauded for, and for which he once bragged about.
Tis a topsy turvy, run amok campaign we're looking at here, unless you are a HAW HAW then "its just what God wants."
I shudder to think turning over the country to a claque of fools who see god and his work in everything, ignore the science which give us graphic proof of climate change, and disparage people who think.
I worry for my country.
Wrap...
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
On Santorum...
The following is from a very intelligent guy who has been a Maryland State Trooper and a Federal Air Marshall:
"I was discussing Santorum with two psychiatrists about his bringing his dead child home so his "other children can see they had a brother," and they unequivcably said he has a severe mental problem. I mean, they went off on him . . . not in a mean way, but in an eye-rolling, hands raised to the heavens, "this guy is sick" way. Both men have practised for decades, and I know them to be genuinely compassionate, and that was the thrust of their appraisal of Santorum . . . they truly feel he needs help.
And on a purely subjective note, it's been my experience that anyone who feels such a need to control other people's sex lives can only mean that while they might have procreative sex once in a while, they've truly missed the whole point of sex . . . it's friggin' fun! It can be playful, lustful, romantic . . . even naughty. But good cooking is that way, too."
Needless to say, I absolutely agree. So keep in mind that 3 States just voted for Santorum over Romney. And now comes Michigan. Are the people there any smarter? I certainly hope so.
Wrap...
"I was discussing Santorum with two psychiatrists about his bringing his dead child home so his "other children can see they had a brother," and they unequivcably said he has a severe mental problem. I mean, they went off on him . . . not in a mean way, but in an eye-rolling, hands raised to the heavens, "this guy is sick" way. Both men have practised for decades, and I know them to be genuinely compassionate, and that was the thrust of their appraisal of Santorum . . . they truly feel he needs help.
And on a purely subjective note, it's been my experience that anyone who feels such a need to control other people's sex lives can only mean that while they might have procreative sex once in a while, they've truly missed the whole point of sex . . . it's friggin' fun! It can be playful, lustful, romantic . . . even naughty. But good cooking is that way, too."
Needless to say, I absolutely agree. So keep in mind that 3 States just voted for Santorum over Romney. And now comes Michigan. Are the people there any smarter? I certainly hope so.
Wrap...
Thursday, February 09, 2012
Ah...Nothing Like Sex Ed.....
From Keith Taylor...
SEX EDUCATION, INDIANA STYLE
by
Keith Taylor
More than three-quarters of a century ago I got my elementary and high school education at tiny Beaver Dam school in northern Indiana. We were taught the ABC’s and the four R’s, reading, riting, arithmetic, and religion; but virtually nothing about sex.
That we learned the way God intended—from the older kids. What we didn’t learn from them we learned from direct observation. Our little, provincial school did nothing to prepare us for intimate contact with members of the opposite sex.
The teachers had absolutely no concept of how to handle the question. Take Mrs. Babcock. She was a frumpy, lumpy old lady with ill-fitting, clacking false teeth. Certainly no cuss words ever passed by them. I wonder how Mrs. Babcock would have handled sex education? It’s impossible to imagine her putting a condom on a banana—or on anything else for that matter.
As a matter of fact, the mere possession of a condom once caused trouble for my eldest brother, Arden. He was almost kicked out of school in his senior year simply because he put one of the things in a classmate’s book. Arden figured it would merely embarrass the young lady and that would be the end of it, but the girl didn’t know what it was. When she asked the teacher, there was hell to pay.
Mr. Silvus was our agriculture teacher. He did touch on the subject of sex, if not condoms. His lessons were limited to sex among animals, not people. The gestation periods of animals were important to ag students, and that, unfortunately, meant the teacher had to mention sex. He taught that us a mouse had a gestation period of 20 days, a pig 113, a horse 337, and an elephant 645.
The whole class snickered when Mr. Silva told us that cows and women both take nine months from conception to birth That’s one bit of information I never forgot and never found a use for.
Other than the snippets of sex we learned in agriculture, we were sheltered from the dreadful subject both by our parents and by our teachers. Mom, for example, loved to tell of how Arden got into trouble, but she sure hemmed and hawed when she tried to explain just what it was he put into the girl’s textbook.
Thus we were on our own. Ideas on the subject, many folklore, were passed from older kids to the younger ones. The same guys who taught us to put our jock straps on backwards were responsible for our sex education. What we didn’t learn from the older guys, we learned on the farms. Each barnyard was a laboratory with a new lesson to be learned practically every week or so.
Elmer’s super rat-killing dog, Skippy, provided Max and me with a few interesting lessons on sex. Skippy, unlike my own dog Jake, had two perfectly good testicles. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite understand how to use them. When he wasn’t catching rats, sleeping, or otherwise carrying out dog duties, he would try to mate with Uncle Elmer’s leg or one of the cats. Elmer didn’t like that one bit, but the cat thought it was swell.
She and skip even worked out a system. The cat would get on the first step of the stairs to the hayloft, curl her tail above her back and wait for ecstasy. It didn’t quite happen. Skip would stand astraddle her and punch big holes in the air, sort of like one of the hoochie coochie dancers at the Warsaw fair. They never connected, but we admired their efforts.
Skippy’s one big stab at romance ended not with a climax, but with an anticlimax. A female dog once ventured to Elmer’s place and fell victim to ol’ Skip’s charm. They did that sniffing and dancing around in circles that dogs do. Then Skip got her cornered and they went at it, Max and I cheering them on all the while.
I swear dogs have the ability to disassociate themselves from the what they are doing at that time. Even during the most exciting part both participants manage to do little more than pant and gawk at something across the barnyard as if they’re utterly disinterested in the act of procreation.
In the end, however, Skippy and his lady friend suffered the indignity of being unable to complete the act. They got stuck together! It looked as if they were indeed joined until death would do them part. I figured if they’d paid more attention to what they were doing it would have worked out better. But, somehow, they managed to twist themselves into something that looked like one of those a grotesque paintings on the walls of the pyramids. There they were, standing rear to rear—one facing east, one west. Still, the look on their faces was one of pure innocence as if they didn’t even know they were hooked together.
If our dog had been able to talk I would have asked him some questions:
“Hey Skippy what you doing?”
“Oh nothing, just standing here.:”
“What about that other dog, the female?”
“What other dog?”
Aunt Thel settled the whole thing by throwing a bucket of water on them. That put an end to Skippy’s only romance. She also gave Max and me a dirty look as if we had something to do with it.
If dogs are blasé, chickens make up for it. You just won’t believe how they do it. For a long time I thought they were fighting. I’m not sure the chickens even understood it very much themselves. At least they got more excited over the whole thing than most animals. It’s a good thing the chicken sex act doesn’t last long; the hen would be too tired to lay eggs.
Cows got pretty worked up over sex also. We had a bull I dubbed Ferdinand, old lucky Ferdinand. Elmer had lots of cows and he was the only guy in the bunch. That bull only did three things, eat, sleep and service the cows. He was so good at the last that he ate and slept the rest of the time. That may not have been enough for the cows though, quite often one of the cows would try to mount another. Maybe Elmer should have got an assistant for Ferdinand.
Pigs didn’t hurry so much. Perhaps for that reason they seemed to enjoy it most of all, especially Nonuts. Although his life was lived in mud and destined for the slaughter house, fortune turned its face to Nonuts for a brief moment. As I learned in agriculture, male piglets should be castrated within a couple weeks of their birth (I doubt that anybody consulted the pigs on that). Unfortunately Elmer didn’t always go by what Mr. Silva said. One year he put off the task until the pigs got so big we could hardly handle them. To complicate things further, the pigs didn’t cooperate with their mutilation one bit. Those fellows had grown so much it took both Max and I to hold each one down.
One frisky fellow kicked so hard he got loose and ran away with a little bit of cord still intact. That little bit of cord allowed the lucky pig to have a world of fun with all the young female pigs--about a hundred of them. He hopped on one after the other, all the time his pig smile spread from ear to pointed ear. Yes, pigs do smile at times like that. Other than the titillation nothing happened. Max and I were fascinated by his performance. Nonuts had a vasectomy years before the procedure was tried on humans. Elmer, was a pioneer. So was Nonuts I suppose.
When it was time for the pigs to go off to market, our favorite pig was underweight, almost emaciated. Still, he didn’t seem to want to stay behind. All his girl friends were going and he had to stay with his harem. He gladly climbed on board the train to make his scheduled appointment with the grim reaper in Chicago. I wondered if Nonuts still had a smile on his snout when he met his fate.
Sex didn’t seem to interest sheep much at all, not even the lack of it. Old Bill the Buck acted like he didn’t even want to do it. When he got started, he would just give it a couple of jabs and quit. The ewes always walked away from the act looking kinda disappointed. I remember once when ol’ Bent Julian was shearing the sheep. Bent used a pair of sharp, hand-held shears—no newfangled electric clippers for ol’ Bent. When he got to Big Bill, Elmer made what he thought was a passing comment: “I ought to get that fellow fixed.”
“You want it done?” Asked Bent.
“Well yeah,.”
Without another word, Bent snipped the bottom of the scrotum, down came Bill’s balls, another snip and Bill was no longer a buck. Alliteration aside, it was a sobering sight.
“Jesus!” said Elmer.
“Jesus!” I repeated. Once in a while cussing was appropriate. This seemed like one of those times. I was on the edge of puberty, and the act I’d just witnessed bothered hell out of me. Not for Big Bill though; his eyes got a little bigger for just a moment. Otherwise he didn’t act as if anything out of the ordinary had happened.
That didn’t seem right somehow, but I couldn’t ask anybody about it, not even Mr. Silva and certainly not Miss Babcock.
Wrap...
SEX EDUCATION, INDIANA STYLE
by
Keith Taylor
More than three-quarters of a century ago I got my elementary and high school education at tiny Beaver Dam school in northern Indiana. We were taught the ABC’s and the four R’s, reading, riting, arithmetic, and religion; but virtually nothing about sex.
That we learned the way God intended—from the older kids. What we didn’t learn from them we learned from direct observation. Our little, provincial school did nothing to prepare us for intimate contact with members of the opposite sex.
The teachers had absolutely no concept of how to handle the question. Take Mrs. Babcock. She was a frumpy, lumpy old lady with ill-fitting, clacking false teeth. Certainly no cuss words ever passed by them. I wonder how Mrs. Babcock would have handled sex education? It’s impossible to imagine her putting a condom on a banana—or on anything else for that matter.
As a matter of fact, the mere possession of a condom once caused trouble for my eldest brother, Arden. He was almost kicked out of school in his senior year simply because he put one of the things in a classmate’s book. Arden figured it would merely embarrass the young lady and that would be the end of it, but the girl didn’t know what it was. When she asked the teacher, there was hell to pay.
Mr. Silvus was our agriculture teacher. He did touch on the subject of sex, if not condoms. His lessons were limited to sex among animals, not people. The gestation periods of animals were important to ag students, and that, unfortunately, meant the teacher had to mention sex. He taught that us a mouse had a gestation period of 20 days, a pig 113, a horse 337, and an elephant 645.
The whole class snickered when Mr. Silva told us that cows and women both take nine months from conception to birth That’s one bit of information I never forgot and never found a use for.
Other than the snippets of sex we learned in agriculture, we were sheltered from the dreadful subject both by our parents and by our teachers. Mom, for example, loved to tell of how Arden got into trouble, but she sure hemmed and hawed when she tried to explain just what it was he put into the girl’s textbook.
Thus we were on our own. Ideas on the subject, many folklore, were passed from older kids to the younger ones. The same guys who taught us to put our jock straps on backwards were responsible for our sex education. What we didn’t learn from the older guys, we learned on the farms. Each barnyard was a laboratory with a new lesson to be learned practically every week or so.
Elmer’s super rat-killing dog, Skippy, provided Max and me with a few interesting lessons on sex. Skippy, unlike my own dog Jake, had two perfectly good testicles. Unfortunately, he didn’t quite understand how to use them. When he wasn’t catching rats, sleeping, or otherwise carrying out dog duties, he would try to mate with Uncle Elmer’s leg or one of the cats. Elmer didn’t like that one bit, but the cat thought it was swell.
She and skip even worked out a system. The cat would get on the first step of the stairs to the hayloft, curl her tail above her back and wait for ecstasy. It didn’t quite happen. Skip would stand astraddle her and punch big holes in the air, sort of like one of the hoochie coochie dancers at the Warsaw fair. They never connected, but we admired their efforts.
Skippy’s one big stab at romance ended not with a climax, but with an anticlimax. A female dog once ventured to Elmer’s place and fell victim to ol’ Skip’s charm. They did that sniffing and dancing around in circles that dogs do. Then Skip got her cornered and they went at it, Max and I cheering them on all the while.
I swear dogs have the ability to disassociate themselves from the what they are doing at that time. Even during the most exciting part both participants manage to do little more than pant and gawk at something across the barnyard as if they’re utterly disinterested in the act of procreation.
In the end, however, Skippy and his lady friend suffered the indignity of being unable to complete the act. They got stuck together! It looked as if they were indeed joined until death would do them part. I figured if they’d paid more attention to what they were doing it would have worked out better. But, somehow, they managed to twist themselves into something that looked like one of those a grotesque paintings on the walls of the pyramids. There they were, standing rear to rear—one facing east, one west. Still, the look on their faces was one of pure innocence as if they didn’t even know they were hooked together.
If our dog had been able to talk I would have asked him some questions:
“Hey Skippy what you doing?”
“Oh nothing, just standing here.:”
“What about that other dog, the female?”
“What other dog?”
Aunt Thel settled the whole thing by throwing a bucket of water on them. That put an end to Skippy’s only romance. She also gave Max and me a dirty look as if we had something to do with it.
If dogs are blasé, chickens make up for it. You just won’t believe how they do it. For a long time I thought they were fighting. I’m not sure the chickens even understood it very much themselves. At least they got more excited over the whole thing than most animals. It’s a good thing the chicken sex act doesn’t last long; the hen would be too tired to lay eggs.
Cows got pretty worked up over sex also. We had a bull I dubbed Ferdinand, old lucky Ferdinand. Elmer had lots of cows and he was the only guy in the bunch. That bull only did three things, eat, sleep and service the cows. He was so good at the last that he ate and slept the rest of the time. That may not have been enough for the cows though, quite often one of the cows would try to mount another. Maybe Elmer should have got an assistant for Ferdinand.
Pigs didn’t hurry so much. Perhaps for that reason they seemed to enjoy it most of all, especially Nonuts. Although his life was lived in mud and destined for the slaughter house, fortune turned its face to Nonuts for a brief moment. As I learned in agriculture, male piglets should be castrated within a couple weeks of their birth (I doubt that anybody consulted the pigs on that). Unfortunately Elmer didn’t always go by what Mr. Silva said. One year he put off the task until the pigs got so big we could hardly handle them. To complicate things further, the pigs didn’t cooperate with their mutilation one bit. Those fellows had grown so much it took both Max and I to hold each one down.
One frisky fellow kicked so hard he got loose and ran away with a little bit of cord still intact. That little bit of cord allowed the lucky pig to have a world of fun with all the young female pigs--about a hundred of them. He hopped on one after the other, all the time his pig smile spread from ear to pointed ear. Yes, pigs do smile at times like that. Other than the titillation nothing happened. Max and I were fascinated by his performance. Nonuts had a vasectomy years before the procedure was tried on humans. Elmer, was a pioneer. So was Nonuts I suppose.
When it was time for the pigs to go off to market, our favorite pig was underweight, almost emaciated. Still, he didn’t seem to want to stay behind. All his girl friends were going and he had to stay with his harem. He gladly climbed on board the train to make his scheduled appointment with the grim reaper in Chicago. I wondered if Nonuts still had a smile on his snout when he met his fate.
Sex didn’t seem to interest sheep much at all, not even the lack of it. Old Bill the Buck acted like he didn’t even want to do it. When he got started, he would just give it a couple of jabs and quit. The ewes always walked away from the act looking kinda disappointed. I remember once when ol’ Bent Julian was shearing the sheep. Bent used a pair of sharp, hand-held shears—no newfangled electric clippers for ol’ Bent. When he got to Big Bill, Elmer made what he thought was a passing comment: “I ought to get that fellow fixed.”
“You want it done?” Asked Bent.
“Well yeah,.”
Without another word, Bent snipped the bottom of the scrotum, down came Bill’s balls, another snip and Bill was no longer a buck. Alliteration aside, it was a sobering sight.
“Jesus!” said Elmer.
“Jesus!” I repeated. Once in a while cussing was appropriate. This seemed like one of those times. I was on the edge of puberty, and the act I’d just witnessed bothered hell out of me. Not for Big Bill though; his eyes got a little bigger for just a moment. Otherwise he didn’t act as if anything out of the ordinary had happened.
That didn’t seem right somehow, but I couldn’t ask anybody about it, not even Mr. Silva and certainly not Miss Babcock.
Wrap...
Wednesday, February 08, 2012
Navy SEALs. Never Seals. UGH!
I'm horrified that this error occurs in professional writing:
It is NEVER Navy Seals.
Their proper name is...Navy SEALS!!! That's SEAL in capitol letters. And that is because SEAL is an acronym.
SEAL stands for: SEa...Air...Land. SEAL.
They can and do attack from SEa, Air, or Land...SEAL. Thus their name.
And they don't like being called seals...mammals...one damned bit.
Wrap...
It is NEVER Navy Seals.
Their proper name is...Navy SEALS!!! That's SEAL in capitol letters. And that is because SEAL is an acronym.
SEAL stands for: SEa...Air...Land. SEAL.
They can and do attack from SEa, Air, or Land...SEAL. Thus their name.
And they don't like being called seals...mammals...one damned bit.
Wrap...
Keep Your Eyes Off & Mouth Shut....
From Secrecy News....
LEAKS, NATIONAL SECURITY AND FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
A new book-length study of leaks of classified information published by the Defense Intelligence Agency's National Intelligence University contends that "the tension between maintaining national security secrets and the public's right to know cannot be 'solved', but can be better understood and more intelligently managed."
"Who Watches the Watchmen?" by Gary Ross explores the phenomenon of leaks from multiple angles, including their history, their prevalence and their consequences. Most interestingly, he considers the diverse motivations of leakers and of the reporters who solicit, receive and publish their disclosures. Some of these he finds defensible, and others not.
In the end, he advises that government officials should engage members of the media in a constructive dialog in order to avert the worst consequences of leaks.
"Proactively engaging with the media to examine the costs and benefits associated with unauthorized disclosures represents the greatest potential for reducing the perceived harm to national security," Mr. Ross writes.
By contrast, "Maintaining the status quo or attempting to legislate a solution both have proven to be ineffective methods for resolving the dilemma. True change can only occur if the Executive Branch is willing to invest the time and resources necessary to implement an approach focused on engagement with the media."
This is a congenial conclusion, which implies that punitive new legislation can be avoided and that remaining differences between reporters and government officials can be fruitfully discussed.
But it arguably misapprehends the harsh new policy landscape in the wake of the WikiLeaks episode (which is also discussed in the book). The status quo has been transformed in response to WikiLeaks in two ways that are unfavorable to leakers, justified or unjustified.
First, the threat of unauthorized disclosures has been elevated in the view of government officials to one of "the most menacing foreign intelligence threats in the next two to three years." In January 31 testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee, DNI James R. Clapper said that unauthorized disclosures of classified information had "caused significant damage to US interests." Further, he said, "We assess that trusted insiders using their access for malicious intent represent one of today's primary threats to US classified networks." "Engagement with the media" will not be the main response to such threats.
And second, WikiLeaks, which targeted legitimate and illegitimate secrets with equal vigor, has inspired and accelerated the development of new forensic tools and methods to identify the sources of unauthorized disclosures. Internal surveillance of classified networks is set to grow, with new mechanisms for tracking and auditing online activity by government employees. Whatever else might be true, the status quo of a few years ago has been left behind.
Wrap...
LEAKS, NATIONAL SECURITY AND FREEDOM OF THE PRESS
A new book-length study of leaks of classified information published by the Defense Intelligence Agency's National Intelligence University contends that "the tension between maintaining national security secrets and the public's right to know cannot be 'solved', but can be better understood and more intelligently managed."
"Who Watches the Watchmen?" by Gary Ross explores the phenomenon of leaks from multiple angles, including their history, their prevalence and their consequences. Most interestingly, he considers the diverse motivations of leakers and of the reporters who solicit, receive and publish their disclosures. Some of these he finds defensible, and others not.
In the end, he advises that government officials should engage members of the media in a constructive dialog in order to avert the worst consequences of leaks.
"Proactively engaging with the media to examine the costs and benefits associated with unauthorized disclosures represents the greatest potential for reducing the perceived harm to national security," Mr. Ross writes.
By contrast, "Maintaining the status quo or attempting to legislate a solution both have proven to be ineffective methods for resolving the dilemma. True change can only occur if the Executive Branch is willing to invest the time and resources necessary to implement an approach focused on engagement with the media."
This is a congenial conclusion, which implies that punitive new legislation can be avoided and that remaining differences between reporters and government officials can be fruitfully discussed.
But it arguably misapprehends the harsh new policy landscape in the wake of the WikiLeaks episode (which is also discussed in the book). The status quo has been transformed in response to WikiLeaks in two ways that are unfavorable to leakers, justified or unjustified.
First, the threat of unauthorized disclosures has been elevated in the view of government officials to one of "the most menacing foreign intelligence threats in the next two to three years." In January 31 testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee, DNI James R. Clapper said that unauthorized disclosures of classified information had "caused significant damage to US interests." Further, he said, "We assess that trusted insiders using their access for malicious intent represent one of today's primary threats to US classified networks." "Engagement with the media" will not be the main response to such threats.
And second, WikiLeaks, which targeted legitimate and illegitimate secrets with equal vigor, has inspired and accelerated the development of new forensic tools and methods to identify the sources of unauthorized disclosures. Internal surveillance of classified networks is set to grow, with new mechanisms for tracking and auditing online activity by government employees. Whatever else might be true, the status quo of a few years ago has been left behind.
Wrap...
Tuesday, February 07, 2012
And the World Rolls On...
Three times a day, I read and recommend blog posts from a group with 400 plus bloggers, but most of that group doesn't post or seldom post. About 30, plus or minus, do. Fascinating group. Males and females from all over the nation. Some are in DC or damned close to it, so they definitely know what's going on there. Dem political blogs. The Pro Blog Research Center. Ralph, the guy who began it, lives in New Jersey. From there, the posts fly over the internet to near San Francisco where Lana puts them in order and posts them to me. I read and recommend the 11AMs, 3PMs, and 7PMs. Lana puts them up every four hours, 24 hours a day.
http://www.drlaniac.com/feeds/search.asp?mode=recent is the URL if anyone would like to take a look.
I find them fascinating. If something is going on, one or more of them will have it and say plainly what they think about it. The Fire Dog Lake group posts something daily, for instance. And there are two former Marines...Alternate Brain...who just tickle me. And even an actor who talks about what he's doing.
I expect they'll have something to say about Santorum finally winning a state's votes tonight.
Wrap...
http://www.drlaniac.com/feeds/search.asp?mode=recent is the URL if anyone would like to take a look.
I find them fascinating. If something is going on, one or more of them will have it and say plainly what they think about it. The Fire Dog Lake group posts something daily, for instance. And there are two former Marines...Alternate Brain...who just tickle me. And even an actor who talks about what he's doing.
I expect they'll have something to say about Santorum finally winning a state's votes tonight.
Wrap...
Wednesday, February 01, 2012
Special Ops ....
From Secrecy News...
AN OVERVIEW OF SPECIAL OPERATIONS FORCES, AND MORE FROM CRS
Over the past decade, the number of U.S. special operations forces (SOF) personnel has nearly doubled, while budgets for special operations have nearly tripled, and overseas deployments have quadrupled, according to a newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service.
"Special Operations Forces are elite military units with special training and equipment that can infiltrate into hostile territory through land, sea, or air to conduct a variety of operations, many of them classified," the CRS report explains. "SOF personnel undergo rigorous selection and lengthy specialized training. The U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) oversees the training, doctrine, and equipping of all U.S. SOF units."
Following an overview of the structure of U.S. special operations forces, the CRS report discusses the implications for special operations of recent legislation including the 2012 defense authorization act. See U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF): Background and Issues for Congress, January 11, 2012.
A copy of the new U.S. Special Operations Command Fact Book 2012, prepared by USSOCOM Public Affairs, is available here.
Other noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made readily available to the public include the following:
Arms Sales: Congressional Review Process, February 1, 2012
The Nunn-McCurdy Act: Background, Analysis, and Issues for Congress, January 31, 2011
Immigration-Related Detention: Current Legislative Issues, January 12, 2012
Wrap...
AN OVERVIEW OF SPECIAL OPERATIONS FORCES, AND MORE FROM CRS
Over the past decade, the number of U.S. special operations forces (SOF) personnel has nearly doubled, while budgets for special operations have nearly tripled, and overseas deployments have quadrupled, according to a newly updated report from the Congressional Research Service.
"Special Operations Forces are elite military units with special training and equipment that can infiltrate into hostile territory through land, sea, or air to conduct a variety of operations, many of them classified," the CRS report explains. "SOF personnel undergo rigorous selection and lengthy specialized training. The U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) oversees the training, doctrine, and equipping of all U.S. SOF units."
Following an overview of the structure of U.S. special operations forces, the CRS report discusses the implications for special operations of recent legislation including the 2012 defense authorization act. See U.S. Special Operations Forces (SOF): Background and Issues for Congress, January 11, 2012.
A copy of the new U.S. Special Operations Command Fact Book 2012, prepared by USSOCOM Public Affairs, is available here.
Other noteworthy new reports from the Congressional Research Service that have not been made readily available to the public include the following:
Arms Sales: Congressional Review Process, February 1, 2012
The Nunn-McCurdy Act: Background, Analysis, and Issues for Congress, January 31, 2011
Immigration-Related Detention: Current Legislative Issues, January 12, 2012
Wrap...
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
Man Made.....
This was written in 2000. The references to events of that time may be anachronistic
MAN MADE GOD
by
Keith Taylor
Modern science has shown us an unbelievably immense universe. It’s so overwhelming we can merely guess at it’s origins or its future. How much easier it is to make up an answer, declare it to be true, and refuse to question that declaration.
I postulate that’s why man made god, thousands of gods as a matter of fact. All were powerful; most were omnipotent. All were wise; most were omniscient. All were much better than humans; most were perfect.
Then after each god was created he was recreated. Like an auto or a home appliance, a new, improved version of the omnipotent, omniscient, perfect god has been trotted out about every year or so. The illogical idea that such a god would even need to change is shunted aside by the explanation that he gave us new revelations or that man had discerned a new understanding of an immutable truth. Some of the new revelations are a sharp departure from the earlier understanding, but god is mysterious. That solves that.
An old story has it that a preacher underlines certain parts of his sermon. The argument for those parts is so weak the preacher needs to shout to cover up the weakness. How similar that is to the evangelical idea that we all must share, or at least claim we share, the prevailing religious beliefs.
That zeal leads Americans to place symbols of god on our mountain tops, often in defiance of the law. They acknowledge him on our currency, our buildings, our most important patriotic statements, and the end zone after a touchdown.
Belief in god, no matter how credulous, is not merely acceptable, it’s required for those who want to enjoy the benefits of mainstream America. Many, perhaps most, civic or fraternal organizations require a positive affirmation of him for membership. Most importantly it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe in something. You can even make up your own god.
One organization that demands a belief is the Boy Scouts of America. They took a case to the California Supreme Court to exclude two aspiring Eagle Scouts. The naive young men thought the BSA really meant that part about being honest. Thus, they refused to acknowledge a belief they didn’t have.
It needn’t have been a problem. Neither the scouts nor any other organization will admit it officially, but every doubter has been told that all a person has to do is say he believes. The aspiring Eagle Scouts could have made up a god and it would have worked just fine for the BSA--if not for their own sense of honor.
Alcoholics, who often see things that aren’t there, are encouraged by Alcoholics Anonymous to fight their delusions except when it comes to a god. Seen or unseen, he must be used to help them battle something they are told they are otherwise helpless to fight. If an alcoholic doesn’t have a god he can make one up on the spot. Nobody would question it. AA even uses a euphemism, “higher power,” to make it easy.
What about those who lead our country? They all have a god, or say they do. You’ll not find an admitted atheist among the 435 members of the house, 100 members of the senate, or nine members of the Supreme Court. Of course some don’t appear very religious. Given the eager acceptance of even an ill defined god, it’s easy to make one up. Rep. Sam Rayburn, long time house majority leader from Texas, could have been thinking of religion when he said “To get along, go along.”
And the big guys themselves, how about them? Just this past year, both of our presidential candidates wooed the electorate with repeated expressions of their own piety. Al Gore claimed to follow the faddish mantra of today’s pious youth with “What Would Jesus Do?” The nice thing about a religious mantra is that unlike his purported statement that he had created the Internet, WWJD wasn’t questioned. When ya proclaim a belief in god you need prove nothing! That makes it easy to get along and go along.
Did Al Gore make up his own god? Nobody asked the fellow who is sometimes called one of the most scientifically astute politicians of our time. It would have seemed such a natural question too.
Turned out though that Gore, and possibly Jesus, didn’t do well in the election. He either came in second or close enough so that they gave it to the other guy. For some reason he didn’t ask Jesus to share responsibility for his defeat. God is blameless no matter what. He was made that way.
George Bush, the other guy, goes even further. He conquered alcohol, temptation, and possibly some drugs he won’t mention, all with the help of god. He never misses an opportunity to tell us of his devotion to the god (or son of god, representative of god, lamb of god: take your pick) he once called a great philosopher.
Bush once checked with the guru of his predecessors, Billy Graham, on whether Jews could go to heaven. Graham decided he couldn’t answer for god--this after a lifetime’s preaching that the only way to salvation was through Christ. We can not only invent god, we can reinvent him in a moment of political correctness. At least we can if we have the stature of a religious guru of presidents.
In any case our new president’s popularity will not suffer because of his faith in the almighty. Faith is expected throughout the land, demanded in some places. Bush’s springboard to the highest office in the land was the governor’s mansion in Texas, the state whose constitution opens with: “Humbly invoking the blessings of Almighty God, the people of the state of Texas do ordain and establish this Constitution.”
After acknowledging his existence in the preamble, the document insists its employees and officers do the same. Article I Sec 4 says, “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust in this State; nor shall anyone be excluded from holding office on account of his religious sentiments, provided he acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being” (emphasis mine).
In Texas, the state that holds with rugged individualism, ya can believe in anything folks, but it darn tooting better be something. If ya don’t have a god you’d better make one up or forget about any job with the state. Texas doesn’t fool around with no varmint atheists.
Nor is the Lone Star State alone. An aspiring office holder or public servant also must acknowledge a belief in god in North Carolina, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Maryland and, Tennessee.
Of course that flies in the face of the establishment clause of the US Constitution but it’s right there in the Constitutions of those states. Furthermore it’s tacitly required in the other forty-three. If you don’t believe it, run for office in your own local state and describe yourself as a dreaded nonbeliever. On the other hand one can just say he believes in something and folks won’t fuss a bit. What would be the outcry if those constitutions excluded any one religion?
One who wants to make up his own religions has all sorts of examples to choose from. According to Michael Shermer in his book How We Believe, some ten thousand religions, each with its own idea of god, have been recorded since the dawn of history. In addition many other ad hoc gods have been created then discarded as soon as a problem was solved, or when it just went away.
The histories of all cultures are replete with references to God. The Sumerians of Mesopotamia were the among the first to give us a written record of their history. They had many gods. One was Ninkasi, a goddess of brewing. Her name meant “you who fill my mouth so full.” I like Ninkasi even though she was a minor goddess. If I were to make up my own god or goddess it would be one like her.
Surely she and the other Sumerian gods and goddesses were made up. Otherwise, where did they go? The nature of a god is to be eternal.
Some of the gods of other early civilizations weren’t as benign as my favorite, Ninkasi. Take the Aztec god with the wowser name of Xiuhtecutli. He was the god of fire. They appeased him by placing sacrificial victims on burning coals, after their hearts were cut out. The once immortal Xiuhtecutli is gone now, replaced by the one true god of the European conquerors. The European’s true god in turn was replaced by other true gods of folks who believed differently.
The god we Americans of today are faced with is the god of the Bible. The Bible is considered his holy word. It is often quoted, albeit selectively, to prove this point or that point. Some of the parts do seem a bit difficult to comprehend in light of today’s knowledge of the universe. For example Genesis 1:6 17, 7:11, 8:2 tells of a firmament that can be opened or closed to allow rain to drop on us. It must have been easy to imagine a god who simply made it that way. Those parts of the Bible aren’t quoted very often nowadays.
Neither is Matthew 19:12 which seems to laud eunuchs as being especially worthy of heaven. That would include those “which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake.” Christians with strong libidos hardly ever mention Matthew 19:12. I suspect most avoid thinking about it.
Not that thinking is all that important. Without a lick of proof, folks can simply pick and choose whatever suits their purposes. Take the Southern Baptists. The Baptist religion routinely splits along the lines of politics, geography, and race since it, itself, split from the Congregationalists around the middle of the 18th century.
The biggest rift came in 1845. Southerners wanted sanction for slavery. Northerners did not. The Southern Baptists emerged and used their version of god to justify one man’s owning another man. Because their own made-up god approved, the Southern Baptists didn’t have to offer a lick of proof to justify slavery.
Certainly proof is in short supply in another church, the one that not only uses the Bible, but gave us a whole new scripture. According to Trouble Enough, a history of Joseph Smith and the early Mormon Church, Smith claimed The Book of Mormon was given to him by divine revelation. He used a couple magic peepholes and, alone, read golden plates to a friend who recorded them. Then on June 14, 1828 the friend lost the first 114 pages.
Surely this could not be a problem. With divine revelation those lost pages could simply be recorded again. But what if the original turned up again and it didn’t agree with the second reading? Neither an immutable god nor his special messengers should be capable of making a mistake. Still all wasn’t lost on the imaginative Smith. He simply translated the new, improved version with the caveat : “. . . and being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord their God by altering the words . . . ”
Who could doubt that? There is every bit as much evidence for satan as there is for god. Otherwise the Mormon Church has been a microcosm we can study for the ever changing ideas of god. Some of the main characters of the Book of Mormon, the tribe of Lamanites were said to be so sinful and warlike that god gave them red skin. That bit of lore disappeared in the face of 20th century political correctness. The idea that blacks were not worthy of the highest level of sainthood also disappeared due to political correctness and possibly because BYU needed some faster running backs. Polygamy disappeared in order for Utah to become a state.
Such disingenuous ideas haven’t hurt the church a whit. It is one of the strongest and richest religions in the world. It’s also one of the most politically active. Not long ago the Arizona Republic reported that not one single law in Utah had passed if the church disapproved. Furthermore Mormonism is growing faster than almost any other. You can believe in anything as long as you believe in something, and as long as you control the surroundings.
Similar contradictions can be found in every religion. Some four hundred years ago the Catholic Church threatened Galileo with the rack for his heretical ideas. Recently the church that claims to be the sole earthly authority for god decided those ideas weren’t heretical after all. They now recognize that the earth isn’t the center of the universe. Even more recently they accepted evolution. Sometimes it’s hard to defend an immutable god.
Man made god. That is obvious. All of recorded history, including two thousand years of Christianity, has given us countless conflicting wild stories of him. There is not a bit of proof for any one. Such a belief was understandable when man couldn’t see beyond the range of his naked eye. We ought to know better today. It is important we challenge the credulous ideas that have allowed mankind to justify slavery, wars, inquisitions, cruelty, and ignorance.
Richard Dawkins said it best with “Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.”
//Keith Taylor is a retired Navy officer and general trouble maker in Chula Vista, Ca He can be reached at KRTaylorxyz@aol.com
Wrap...
MAN MADE GOD
by
Keith Taylor
Modern science has shown us an unbelievably immense universe. It’s so overwhelming we can merely guess at it’s origins or its future. How much easier it is to make up an answer, declare it to be true, and refuse to question that declaration.
I postulate that’s why man made god, thousands of gods as a matter of fact. All were powerful; most were omnipotent. All were wise; most were omniscient. All were much better than humans; most were perfect.
Then after each god was created he was recreated. Like an auto or a home appliance, a new, improved version of the omnipotent, omniscient, perfect god has been trotted out about every year or so. The illogical idea that such a god would even need to change is shunted aside by the explanation that he gave us new revelations or that man had discerned a new understanding of an immutable truth. Some of the new revelations are a sharp departure from the earlier understanding, but god is mysterious. That solves that.
An old story has it that a preacher underlines certain parts of his sermon. The argument for those parts is so weak the preacher needs to shout to cover up the weakness. How similar that is to the evangelical idea that we all must share, or at least claim we share, the prevailing religious beliefs.
That zeal leads Americans to place symbols of god on our mountain tops, often in defiance of the law. They acknowledge him on our currency, our buildings, our most important patriotic statements, and the end zone after a touchdown.
Belief in god, no matter how credulous, is not merely acceptable, it’s required for those who want to enjoy the benefits of mainstream America. Many, perhaps most, civic or fraternal organizations require a positive affirmation of him for membership. Most importantly it doesn’t matter what you believe as long as you believe in something. You can even make up your own god.
One organization that demands a belief is the Boy Scouts of America. They took a case to the California Supreme Court to exclude two aspiring Eagle Scouts. The naive young men thought the BSA really meant that part about being honest. Thus, they refused to acknowledge a belief they didn’t have.
It needn’t have been a problem. Neither the scouts nor any other organization will admit it officially, but every doubter has been told that all a person has to do is say he believes. The aspiring Eagle Scouts could have made up a god and it would have worked just fine for the BSA--if not for their own sense of honor.
Alcoholics, who often see things that aren’t there, are encouraged by Alcoholics Anonymous to fight their delusions except when it comes to a god. Seen or unseen, he must be used to help them battle something they are told they are otherwise helpless to fight. If an alcoholic doesn’t have a god he can make one up on the spot. Nobody would question it. AA even uses a euphemism, “higher power,” to make it easy.
What about those who lead our country? They all have a god, or say they do. You’ll not find an admitted atheist among the 435 members of the house, 100 members of the senate, or nine members of the Supreme Court. Of course some don’t appear very religious. Given the eager acceptance of even an ill defined god, it’s easy to make one up. Rep. Sam Rayburn, long time house majority leader from Texas, could have been thinking of religion when he said “To get along, go along.”
And the big guys themselves, how about them? Just this past year, both of our presidential candidates wooed the electorate with repeated expressions of their own piety. Al Gore claimed to follow the faddish mantra of today’s pious youth with “What Would Jesus Do?” The nice thing about a religious mantra is that unlike his purported statement that he had created the Internet, WWJD wasn’t questioned. When ya proclaim a belief in god you need prove nothing! That makes it easy to get along and go along.
Did Al Gore make up his own god? Nobody asked the fellow who is sometimes called one of the most scientifically astute politicians of our time. It would have seemed such a natural question too.
Turned out though that Gore, and possibly Jesus, didn’t do well in the election. He either came in second or close enough so that they gave it to the other guy. For some reason he didn’t ask Jesus to share responsibility for his defeat. God is blameless no matter what. He was made that way.
George Bush, the other guy, goes even further. He conquered alcohol, temptation, and possibly some drugs he won’t mention, all with the help of god. He never misses an opportunity to tell us of his devotion to the god (or son of god, representative of god, lamb of god: take your pick) he once called a great philosopher.
Bush once checked with the guru of his predecessors, Billy Graham, on whether Jews could go to heaven. Graham decided he couldn’t answer for god--this after a lifetime’s preaching that the only way to salvation was through Christ. We can not only invent god, we can reinvent him in a moment of political correctness. At least we can if we have the stature of a religious guru of presidents.
In any case our new president’s popularity will not suffer because of his faith in the almighty. Faith is expected throughout the land, demanded in some places. Bush’s springboard to the highest office in the land was the governor’s mansion in Texas, the state whose constitution opens with: “Humbly invoking the blessings of Almighty God, the people of the state of Texas do ordain and establish this Constitution.”
After acknowledging his existence in the preamble, the document insists its employees and officers do the same. Article I Sec 4 says, “No religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office, or public trust in this State; nor shall anyone be excluded from holding office on account of his religious sentiments, provided he acknowledge the existence of a Supreme Being” (emphasis mine).
In Texas, the state that holds with rugged individualism, ya can believe in anything folks, but it darn tooting better be something. If ya don’t have a god you’d better make one up or forget about any job with the state. Texas doesn’t fool around with no varmint atheists.
Nor is the Lone Star State alone. An aspiring office holder or public servant also must acknowledge a belief in god in North Carolina, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Arkansas, Maryland and, Tennessee.
Of course that flies in the face of the establishment clause of the US Constitution but it’s right there in the Constitutions of those states. Furthermore it’s tacitly required in the other forty-three. If you don’t believe it, run for office in your own local state and describe yourself as a dreaded nonbeliever. On the other hand one can just say he believes in something and folks won’t fuss a bit. What would be the outcry if those constitutions excluded any one religion?
One who wants to make up his own religions has all sorts of examples to choose from. According to Michael Shermer in his book How We Believe, some ten thousand religions, each with its own idea of god, have been recorded since the dawn of history. In addition many other ad hoc gods have been created then discarded as soon as a problem was solved, or when it just went away.
The histories of all cultures are replete with references to God. The Sumerians of Mesopotamia were the among the first to give us a written record of their history. They had many gods. One was Ninkasi, a goddess of brewing. Her name meant “you who fill my mouth so full.” I like Ninkasi even though she was a minor goddess. If I were to make up my own god or goddess it would be one like her.
Surely she and the other Sumerian gods and goddesses were made up. Otherwise, where did they go? The nature of a god is to be eternal.
Some of the gods of other early civilizations weren’t as benign as my favorite, Ninkasi. Take the Aztec god with the wowser name of Xiuhtecutli. He was the god of fire. They appeased him by placing sacrificial victims on burning coals, after their hearts were cut out. The once immortal Xiuhtecutli is gone now, replaced by the one true god of the European conquerors. The European’s true god in turn was replaced by other true gods of folks who believed differently.
The god we Americans of today are faced with is the god of the Bible. The Bible is considered his holy word. It is often quoted, albeit selectively, to prove this point or that point. Some of the parts do seem a bit difficult to comprehend in light of today’s knowledge of the universe. For example Genesis 1:6 17, 7:11, 8:2 tells of a firmament that can be opened or closed to allow rain to drop on us. It must have been easy to imagine a god who simply made it that way. Those parts of the Bible aren’t quoted very often nowadays.
Neither is Matthew 19:12 which seems to laud eunuchs as being especially worthy of heaven. That would include those “which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven’s sake.” Christians with strong libidos hardly ever mention Matthew 19:12. I suspect most avoid thinking about it.
Not that thinking is all that important. Without a lick of proof, folks can simply pick and choose whatever suits their purposes. Take the Southern Baptists. The Baptist religion routinely splits along the lines of politics, geography, and race since it, itself, split from the Congregationalists around the middle of the 18th century.
The biggest rift came in 1845. Southerners wanted sanction for slavery. Northerners did not. The Southern Baptists emerged and used their version of god to justify one man’s owning another man. Because their own made-up god approved, the Southern Baptists didn’t have to offer a lick of proof to justify slavery.
Certainly proof is in short supply in another church, the one that not only uses the Bible, but gave us a whole new scripture. According to Trouble Enough, a history of Joseph Smith and the early Mormon Church, Smith claimed The Book of Mormon was given to him by divine revelation. He used a couple magic peepholes and, alone, read golden plates to a friend who recorded them. Then on June 14, 1828 the friend lost the first 114 pages.
Surely this could not be a problem. With divine revelation those lost pages could simply be recorded again. But what if the original turned up again and it didn’t agree with the second reading? Neither an immutable god nor his special messengers should be capable of making a mistake. Still all wasn’t lost on the imaginative Smith. He simply translated the new, improved version with the caveat : “. . . and being commanded of the Lord that I should not translate the same over again, for Satan had put it into their hearts to tempt the Lord their God by altering the words . . . ”
Who could doubt that? There is every bit as much evidence for satan as there is for god. Otherwise the Mormon Church has been a microcosm we can study for the ever changing ideas of god. Some of the main characters of the Book of Mormon, the tribe of Lamanites were said to be so sinful and warlike that god gave them red skin. That bit of lore disappeared in the face of 20th century political correctness. The idea that blacks were not worthy of the highest level of sainthood also disappeared due to political correctness and possibly because BYU needed some faster running backs. Polygamy disappeared in order for Utah to become a state.
Such disingenuous ideas haven’t hurt the church a whit. It is one of the strongest and richest religions in the world. It’s also one of the most politically active. Not long ago the Arizona Republic reported that not one single law in Utah had passed if the church disapproved. Furthermore Mormonism is growing faster than almost any other. You can believe in anything as long as you believe in something, and as long as you control the surroundings.
Similar contradictions can be found in every religion. Some four hundred years ago the Catholic Church threatened Galileo with the rack for his heretical ideas. Recently the church that claims to be the sole earthly authority for god decided those ideas weren’t heretical after all. They now recognize that the earth isn’t the center of the universe. Even more recently they accepted evolution. Sometimes it’s hard to defend an immutable god.
Man made god. That is obvious. All of recorded history, including two thousand years of Christianity, has given us countless conflicting wild stories of him. There is not a bit of proof for any one. Such a belief was understandable when man couldn’t see beyond the range of his naked eye. We ought to know better today. It is important we challenge the credulous ideas that have allowed mankind to justify slavery, wars, inquisitions, cruelty, and ignorance.
Richard Dawkins said it best with “Faith is the great cop-out, the great excuse to evade the need to think and evaluate evidence. Faith is belief in spite of, even perhaps because of, the lack of evidence.”
//Keith Taylor is a retired Navy officer and general trouble maker in Chula Vista, Ca He can be reached at KRTaylorxyz@aol.com
Wrap...
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
Switch Vote? It Ain't Easy...
As some of you know, I decided to vote for Repub Jon Huntsman for Prez awhile ago. Haven't changed my mind. So after breakfast at Acapulco this morning, off I went to find out what I needed to do to do that.
I've always been a registered Dem. Did I need to change my registration to Repub to vote for Huntsman?
Went off to find out. It took awhile, but finally found this huge building on Ruffin Rd..the Voters' Registration place. Yes. I'll have to change my registration to Repub to vote for Huntsman. There's no other way.
So got this big form to fill out to do that. It must arrive back there 15 days before voting day.
This business really torques me. After voting, I'll wait awhile and then have to change my registration back to Dem. Wonder whose big idea that was...to make it hard as possible to vote for whoever you want to without going thru actually changing your registration. Guess they really don't want a change. Gonna be something for folks who think they'll just be able to go vote for whomever they please on voting day and then find out they can't.
Wrap...
I've always been a registered Dem. Did I need to change my registration to Repub to vote for Huntsman?
Went off to find out. It took awhile, but finally found this huge building on Ruffin Rd..the Voters' Registration place. Yes. I'll have to change my registration to Repub to vote for Huntsman. There's no other way.
So got this big form to fill out to do that. It must arrive back there 15 days before voting day.
This business really torques me. After voting, I'll wait awhile and then have to change my registration back to Dem. Wonder whose big idea that was...to make it hard as possible to vote for whoever you want to without going thru actually changing your registration. Guess they really don't want a change. Gonna be something for folks who think they'll just be able to go vote for whomever they please on voting day and then find out they can't.
Wrap...
Monday, January 09, 2012
It's Monday...so Seaport Village...
I go walkin' down at Seaport Village every Mon, Wed, Fri. From the parking lot, I stroll thru the village to the boardwalk. I'm heading toward the sidewalk that leads out on N. Embarcadero Island in San Diego's harbor. On the way, I stop to chat with the guy who stacks rocks. Balances them atop one another, using their pointed ends. He's just amazing. Talk about steady hands. I couldn't do that with a gun at my head...and I doubt many of the other folks who have stopped to watch could either.
Walk a bit further and stop to chat with Jerry, the artist. He immediately tells me who he's drawn so far that day. When it's very quiet, he'll get up and stand on some of the rocks along the water and chant, or blow his flute. I think it's a flute anyway. May be another name for it. Who knows?
After Jerry, I hang a right and start the trip out on the island. The sidewalk used to be bordered with thick bushes, but they cut them all down, so now the view of the harbor is unimpeded. Can look across the water to the North Island Naval Base, and until yesterday, the big nuclear aircraft carrier, #76, the Ronald Reagan, was anchored over there. They'd planned to sail out and head for Washington State a couple of evenings ago, but heavy fog moved in and so the ship stayed put until yesterday morn or the morn before. I forget which. Seems strange to look over and see no ship there.
In any case, once I get back to Seaport's boardwalk, I turn left and stroll down the boardwalk until a right turn brings me to the Seaport Deli. Take the brick sidewalk around it's side, mount 3 steps and into the deli for a sandwich and coffee. Then back out that same back door to the table against the wall in the corner. There's half a tree there where up on a branch sits Big Bird. And he really is. A black crowned heron about the size of a big fat chicken. Sits on a branch and casts a dead level look straight out at the harbor. Meanest look I've ever seen on a bird. He has a long, very sharp black beak and round black eyes that are about as cold as I've ever seen anywhere. He is some bird. And arrogant as can be.
So there at the corner table I sit and watch the folks in the food court...the plaza...just below the porch and on the other side of the sidewalk and hedge. On the far side of the plaza is a stage and behind the stage is the carousel. Ringing the plaza are other little food shops and the fudge factory...which is almost NEVER empty. Huge big tree in the center of the plaza and surrounded with at least a dozen round concrete tables with curved, backless benches around them.
When the plaza is full of people, it's quite a sight. They come from countries all over the world, speaking all kinds of languages, wearing everything from strapless dresses to jeans to shorts...you name it, the men, women and kids are wearing it. So funny...most of the San Diegans, if the breeze over the harbor is even a little chilly, are bundled up...while all those other folks are stripped down.
And so I head for home at about 4PM. Back to peace and quiet. Seaport is quite a place.
Wrap...
Walk a bit further and stop to chat with Jerry, the artist. He immediately tells me who he's drawn so far that day. When it's very quiet, he'll get up and stand on some of the rocks along the water and chant, or blow his flute. I think it's a flute anyway. May be another name for it. Who knows?
After Jerry, I hang a right and start the trip out on the island. The sidewalk used to be bordered with thick bushes, but they cut them all down, so now the view of the harbor is unimpeded. Can look across the water to the North Island Naval Base, and until yesterday, the big nuclear aircraft carrier, #76, the Ronald Reagan, was anchored over there. They'd planned to sail out and head for Washington State a couple of evenings ago, but heavy fog moved in and so the ship stayed put until yesterday morn or the morn before. I forget which. Seems strange to look over and see no ship there.
In any case, once I get back to Seaport's boardwalk, I turn left and stroll down the boardwalk until a right turn brings me to the Seaport Deli. Take the brick sidewalk around it's side, mount 3 steps and into the deli for a sandwich and coffee. Then back out that same back door to the table against the wall in the corner. There's half a tree there where up on a branch sits Big Bird. And he really is. A black crowned heron about the size of a big fat chicken. Sits on a branch and casts a dead level look straight out at the harbor. Meanest look I've ever seen on a bird. He has a long, very sharp black beak and round black eyes that are about as cold as I've ever seen anywhere. He is some bird. And arrogant as can be.
So there at the corner table I sit and watch the folks in the food court...the plaza...just below the porch and on the other side of the sidewalk and hedge. On the far side of the plaza is a stage and behind the stage is the carousel. Ringing the plaza are other little food shops and the fudge factory...which is almost NEVER empty. Huge big tree in the center of the plaza and surrounded with at least a dozen round concrete tables with curved, backless benches around them.
When the plaza is full of people, it's quite a sight. They come from countries all over the world, speaking all kinds of languages, wearing everything from strapless dresses to jeans to shorts...you name it, the men, women and kids are wearing it. So funny...most of the San Diegans, if the breeze over the harbor is even a little chilly, are bundled up...while all those other folks are stripped down.
And so I head for home at about 4PM. Back to peace and quiet. Seaport is quite a place.
Wrap...
Thursday, January 05, 2012
National Intel Cut Jobs....
From Secrecy News...
DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE CUT JOBS AND SECRETS IN 2011
In a portent of spending cuts that are still to come, the number of employees at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) dropped significantly over the past year.
Interestingly, one of the first visible signs of the reduction in the workforce was a decline in the level of ODNI classification activity, which dropped by 17.3% from the year before.
"The decrease in total [classification] decisions was largely driven by a 12.9% decrease in population size from last year," wrote ODNI Information Management chief John F. Hackett in a November 7, 2011 report to the Information Security Oversight Office. A copy was obtained by Secrecy News under the Freedom of Information Act.
A spokesman for ODNI public affairs said he could not immediately comment on the report, which may reflect a drop in staff as well as contractor personnel, both of which are authorized to generate classified information at ODNI.
A former ODNI official told Secrecy News that "hundreds" of ODNI jobs had been eliminated. He said that the size of the ODNI workforce was on the order of 2000 people, and that the loss of hundreds of positions was consistent with the reported 12.9% "decrease in population size."
Wrap...
DIRECTOR OF NATIONAL INTELLIGENCE CUT JOBS AND SECRETS IN 2011
In a portent of spending cuts that are still to come, the number of employees at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) dropped significantly over the past year.
Interestingly, one of the first visible signs of the reduction in the workforce was a decline in the level of ODNI classification activity, which dropped by 17.3% from the year before.
"The decrease in total [classification] decisions was largely driven by a 12.9% decrease in population size from last year," wrote ODNI Information Management chief John F. Hackett in a November 7, 2011 report to the Information Security Oversight Office. A copy was obtained by Secrecy News under the Freedom of Information Act.
A spokesman for ODNI public affairs said he could not immediately comment on the report, which may reflect a drop in staff as well as contractor personnel, both of which are authorized to generate classified information at ODNI.
A former ODNI official told Secrecy News that "hundreds" of ODNI jobs had been eliminated. He said that the size of the ODNI workforce was on the order of 2000 people, and that the loss of hundreds of positions was consistent with the reported 12.9% "decrease in population size."
Wrap...
Monday, January 02, 2012
Happy 2012,,,I Hope...
Been so immersed in the political goings-on that when I did decide to post, found out that absence had caused me not to be able to write a damned word on this blog. Have just now been able to access it for the first time since Keith had me post his article.
Major problem getting back on here was in discovering a password from the past. Of course I'd completely forgotten what it was. Taken two days to find it, and I still don't know what it was. Doin' good, huh? But accidents happen and so, at last, I can access this blog. Sheesh! Talk about a complicated procedure to do that tho.
Never mind. We're off and running in 2012. Should be a hell of a year, what with all those Repubs running. Problem is, I'm mad as hell at Obama. Let it be known far and wide that I flat do not approve of the military being able to grab a U.S.A. someone and disappear them with the total absence of normal legal proceedings. That's a criminal act from my perspective. Obama is becoming a dictator if he already isn't one in fact.
Gonna change my registration to Independent. So far as the Repubs are concerned, the only honest and decent one that I can see is Jon Huntsman, who is really working hard in New Hampshire to be at least noticed by the voters. Guess he figured campaigning in Iowa was a lost cause going in.
So we'll wait to see the Iowa results. Until then...
Wrap...
Major problem getting back on here was in discovering a password from the past. Of course I'd completely forgotten what it was. Taken two days to find it, and I still don't know what it was. Doin' good, huh? But accidents happen and so, at last, I can access this blog. Sheesh! Talk about a complicated procedure to do that tho.
Never mind. We're off and running in 2012. Should be a hell of a year, what with all those Repubs running. Problem is, I'm mad as hell at Obama. Let it be known far and wide that I flat do not approve of the military being able to grab a U.S.A. someone and disappear them with the total absence of normal legal proceedings. That's a criminal act from my perspective. Obama is becoming a dictator if he already isn't one in fact.
Gonna change my registration to Independent. So far as the Repubs are concerned, the only honest and decent one that I can see is Jon Huntsman, who is really working hard in New Hampshire to be at least noticed by the voters. Guess he figured campaigning in Iowa was a lost cause going in.
So we'll wait to see the Iowa results. Until then...
Wrap...
Friday, December 16, 2011
No Moral Qualities!!!
Hut, Hut, Holy Moly!
by
Keith Taylor
You're more likely to see a miracle at a football game than at Lourdes. Take the recent string of miracles taking place around the second-year quarterback playing for the Broncos. His "miracle" doesn't change much from game to game.
It goes something like this: A burly center looks back through his legs, then hikes the ball straight to a guy named Tebow who runs with it willy-nilly. Several linemen hit their opponents from the other side hard, knocking them silly. Silly knocking is a plus in football. The referee decides a blocker holding a defensive pass rusher by the shirt isn't a violation. The quarterback slips through an opening and makes a touchdown.
Then Tebow gets on his knees and thanks God.
That's worth a chuckle, but I dare not laugh. Hell . . . uh, heck, I better not even frown. Tebow is busy talking with God. This is a moment for piety, a time for me to recapture that pious look I used to effect at the alter rail at communion.
Most football fans, and all politicians, think football is so important the creator of a universe -- huge beyond description -- has a personal interest in it. They don't want no making fun of the deity, or his herald angels like guys named Tebow.
In America any dissenters from claims of our most favored religion are called heretics. That includes me. Naively I think believing in unsubstantiated claims is imprudent, but my thinking doesn't sway many people. Dissent in things religious is discouraged. In fact if I grumble about it too much I'll become a pariah, and Boy Scouts won't have me.
Tebow, of course, does not have those problems. Belief in things supernatural needs no verification. In fact asking for it is blasphemous, and woe unto the blasphemers.
And providence does indeed seem to be shining down on the young quarterback. He looks All-American, even ecumenical. Although he's a Baptist, his name sounds as if it emanated from Salt Lake City. It is on a par with Moab, Deseret, Lamanite, or Nephi.
He gets superstar type press coverage even though his "miracles" are merely average by NFL standards. Since becoming starting quarterback he has won six and lost one. Only in places like Buffalo would that be considered supernatural.
Claims of his heroism are protected by the true believers. Sean Hannity on Fox news went bonkers over the disrespect for a man who's setting such a good example for the youth of our country. Hannity, of course, loves to juxtapose the saintly demeanor of the shining knight in a Broncos helmet with the sinfulness of bad guys -- dopers and adulterers.
Reid Cherner in the Huffington Post quotes a football fan from Alabama (where else?) , as saying, "We are a nation founded upon religious freedom and expression. We're a melting pot. But instead of respecting and embracing our differences we're becoming more and more intolerant. To me, that's more egregious than anything Tim Tebow has done or will do. It's sad, really."
Could it be more egregious than having my a vice president once say an atheist could not be a citizen or patriotic. Or how about knowing that the majority of citizens would not vote for a dreaded non-believer no matter what their qualifications. Albert Einstein and Mark Twain wouldn't have a chance.
And as for intolerance, the Boy Scouts would only accept me if I claimed a belief in God. Otherwise little kids would be told I didn't have the moral qualities to be a scout.
Amen
Wrap...
by
Keith Taylor
You're more likely to see a miracle at a football game than at Lourdes. Take the recent string of miracles taking place around the second-year quarterback playing for the Broncos. His "miracle" doesn't change much from game to game.
It goes something like this: A burly center looks back through his legs, then hikes the ball straight to a guy named Tebow who runs with it willy-nilly. Several linemen hit their opponents from the other side hard, knocking them silly. Silly knocking is a plus in football. The referee decides a blocker holding a defensive pass rusher by the shirt isn't a violation. The quarterback slips through an opening and makes a touchdown.
Then Tebow gets on his knees and thanks God.
That's worth a chuckle, but I dare not laugh. Hell . . . uh, heck, I better not even frown. Tebow is busy talking with God. This is a moment for piety, a time for me to recapture that pious look I used to effect at the alter rail at communion.
Most football fans, and all politicians, think football is so important the creator of a universe -- huge beyond description -- has a personal interest in it. They don't want no making fun of the deity, or his herald angels like guys named Tebow.
In America any dissenters from claims of our most favored religion are called heretics. That includes me. Naively I think believing in unsubstantiated claims is imprudent, but my thinking doesn't sway many people. Dissent in things religious is discouraged. In fact if I grumble about it too much I'll become a pariah, and Boy Scouts won't have me.
Tebow, of course, does not have those problems. Belief in things supernatural needs no verification. In fact asking for it is blasphemous, and woe unto the blasphemers.
And providence does indeed seem to be shining down on the young quarterback. He looks All-American, even ecumenical. Although he's a Baptist, his name sounds as if it emanated from Salt Lake City. It is on a par with Moab, Deseret, Lamanite, or Nephi.
He gets superstar type press coverage even though his "miracles" are merely average by NFL standards. Since becoming starting quarterback he has won six and lost one. Only in places like Buffalo would that be considered supernatural.
Claims of his heroism are protected by the true believers. Sean Hannity on Fox news went bonkers over the disrespect for a man who's setting such a good example for the youth of our country. Hannity, of course, loves to juxtapose the saintly demeanor of the shining knight in a Broncos helmet with the sinfulness of bad guys -- dopers and adulterers.
Reid Cherner in the Huffington Post quotes a football fan from Alabama (where else?) , as saying, "We are a nation founded upon religious freedom and expression. We're a melting pot. But instead of respecting and embracing our differences we're becoming more and more intolerant. To me, that's more egregious than anything Tim Tebow has done or will do. It's sad, really."
Could it be more egregious than having my a vice president once say an atheist could not be a citizen or patriotic. Or how about knowing that the majority of citizens would not vote for a dreaded non-believer no matter what their qualifications. Albert Einstein and Mark Twain wouldn't have a chance.
And as for intolerance, the Boy Scouts would only accept me if I claimed a belief in God. Otherwise little kids would be told I didn't have the moral qualities to be a scout.
Amen
Wrap...
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
CIA & Open Source Intel...
From Secrecy News...
December 12, 2011
Secrecy News Blog: http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/
** CHARTER OF OPEN SOURCE ORG IS CLASSIFIED, CIA SAYS
** A SURVEY OF FEDERAL LAWS RELATED TO CYBERSECURITY
CHARTER OF OPEN SOURCE ORG IS CLASSIFIED, CIA SAYS
Open Source Works, which is the CIA's in-house open source analysis component, is devoted to intelligence analysis of unclassified, open source information. Oddly, however, the directive that established Open Source Works is classified, as is the charter of the organization. In fact, CIA says the very existence of any such records is a classified fact.
"The CIA can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to your request," wrote Susan Viscuso, CIA Information and Privacy Coordinator, in a November 29 response to a Freedom of Information Act request from Jeffrey Richelson of the National Security Archive for the Open Source Works directive and charter.
"The fact of the existence or nonexistence of requested records is currently and properly classified and is intelligence sources and methods information that is protected from disclosure," Dr. Viscuso wrote.
This is a surprising development since Open Source Works -- by definition -- does not engage in clandestine collection of intelligence. Rather, it performs analysis based on unclassified, open source materials.
Thus, according to a November 2010 CIA report, Open Source Works "was charged by the [CIA] Director for Intelligence with drawing on language-trained analysts to mine open-source information for new or alternative insights on intelligence issues. Open Source Works' products, based only on open source information, do not represent the coordinated views of the Central Intelligence Agency."
As such, there is no basis for treating Open Source Works as a covert, unacknowledged intelligence organization. It isn't one.
(Even if Open Source Works were engaged in classified intelligence analysis, the idea that its charter must necessarily be classified is a non-sequitur. Illustrating the contrary proposition, the Department of Defense last week issued a new Instruction on "Geospatial Intelligence (GEOINT)," setting forth the policies governing that largely classified intelligence domain.)
Beyond that, it is an interesting question "why the CIA felt the need to establish such a unit given the existence of the DNI Open Source Center," said Dr. Richelson. The Open Source Center, the successor to the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, is the U.S. Government's principal open source agency. It is, naturally, a publicly acknowledged organization.
"An even more interesting question," he added, is "why would the CIA, whose DI [Directorate of Intelligence] organization structure is published on its website, feel it necessary to refuse to confirm or deny the existence of this new open source component?"
The CIA's extreme approach to classification policy is timely in one sense: It provides a convenient benchmark for evaluating current progress in combating overclassification.
If the charter of CIA's Open Source Works remains classified six months from now, when the Obama Administration's Fundamental Classification Guidance Review will have completed its first cycle, that will be a decisive indication that the Review failed to eliminate even the most blatant examples of overclassification.
A SURVEY OF FEDERAL LAWS RELATED TO CYBERSECURITY
There are more than 50 federal statutes that pertain to some aspect of cybersecurity, according to the Congressional Research Service. Those statutes, and the potential impact on them of several pending legislative proposals, are described in a new CRS report. See "Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions," December 7, 2011.
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the Federation of American Scientists.
Wrap...
December 12, 2011
Secrecy News Blog: http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/
** CHARTER OF OPEN SOURCE ORG IS CLASSIFIED, CIA SAYS
** A SURVEY OF FEDERAL LAWS RELATED TO CYBERSECURITY
CHARTER OF OPEN SOURCE ORG IS CLASSIFIED, CIA SAYS
Open Source Works, which is the CIA's in-house open source analysis component, is devoted to intelligence analysis of unclassified, open source information. Oddly, however, the directive that established Open Source Works is classified, as is the charter of the organization. In fact, CIA says the very existence of any such records is a classified fact.
"The CIA can neither confirm nor deny the existence or nonexistence of records responsive to your request," wrote Susan Viscuso, CIA Information and Privacy Coordinator, in a November 29 response to a Freedom of Information Act request from Jeffrey Richelson of the National Security Archive for the Open Source Works directive and charter.
"The fact of the existence or nonexistence of requested records is currently and properly classified and is intelligence sources and methods information that is protected from disclosure," Dr. Viscuso wrote.
This is a surprising development since Open Source Works -- by definition -- does not engage in clandestine collection of intelligence. Rather, it performs analysis based on unclassified, open source materials.
Thus, according to a November 2010 CIA report, Open Source Works "was charged by the [CIA] Director for Intelligence with drawing on language-trained analysts to mine open-source information for new or alternative insights on intelligence issues. Open Source Works' products, based only on open source information, do not represent the coordinated views of the Central Intelligence Agency."
As such, there is no basis for treating Open Source Works as a covert, unacknowledged intelligence organization. It isn't one.
(Even if Open Source Works were engaged in classified intelligence analysis, the idea that its charter must necessarily be classified is a non-sequitur. Illustrating the contrary proposition, the Department of Defense last week issued a new Instruction on "Geospatial Intelligence (GEOINT)," setting forth the policies governing that largely classified intelligence domain.)
Beyond that, it is an interesting question "why the CIA felt the need to establish such a unit given the existence of the DNI Open Source Center," said Dr. Richelson. The Open Source Center, the successor to the Foreign Broadcast Information Service, is the U.S. Government's principal open source agency. It is, naturally, a publicly acknowledged organization.
"An even more interesting question," he added, is "why would the CIA, whose DI [Directorate of Intelligence] organization structure is published on its website, feel it necessary to refuse to confirm or deny the existence of this new open source component?"
The CIA's extreme approach to classification policy is timely in one sense: It provides a convenient benchmark for evaluating current progress in combating overclassification.
If the charter of CIA's Open Source Works remains classified six months from now, when the Obama Administration's Fundamental Classification Guidance Review will have completed its first cycle, that will be a decisive indication that the Review failed to eliminate even the most blatant examples of overclassification.
A SURVEY OF FEDERAL LAWS RELATED TO CYBERSECURITY
There are more than 50 federal statutes that pertain to some aspect of cybersecurity, according to the Congressional Research Service. Those statutes, and the potential impact on them of several pending legislative proposals, are described in a new CRS report. See "Federal Laws Relating to Cybersecurity: Discussion of Proposed Revisions," December 7, 2011.
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the Federation of American Scientists.
Wrap...
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Civil Liberties...
From Secrecy News...
CIVIL LIBERTIES OVERSIGHT BOARD STILL DORMANT
The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board that was supposed to provide independent oversight of U.S. counterterrorism policies remains dormant and out of service because its members have still not been named and confirmed.
In a report that was newly updated this month, the Congressional Research Service traced the origins of the Board from a recommendation by the 9/11 Commission through its initial establishment as a White House agency to its reconstitution as an independent agency chartered by statute in 2007.
The Board was assigned two overriding missions: It was supposed to "analyze and review actions the executive branch takes to protect the Nation from terrorism, ensuring that the need for such actions is balanced with the need to protect privacy and civil liberties"; and to "ensure that liberty concerns are appropriately considered in the development and implementation of laws, regulations, and policies related to efforts to protect the Nation against terrorism."
So had the Board been functional, it might have been a valuable participant in current deliberations over military detention authority, for example. It might also have conducted investigative oversight into any number of other counterterrorism policies, as mandated by law. But for all practical purposes, there is no Board.
Last January, President Obama named Elizabeth C. Cook and James X. Dempsey to serve on the Board. The Senate has not acted on their nomination. Even if they had been confirmed, however, they would not have constituted a quorum. Thus, the Board's activation is still dependent on presidential nomination of additional Board members. See "Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board: New Independent Agency Status," November 14, 2011.
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the Federation of American Scientists.
The Secrecy News Blog is at:
http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/
Wrap...
CIVIL LIBERTIES OVERSIGHT BOARD STILL DORMANT
The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board that was supposed to provide independent oversight of U.S. counterterrorism policies remains dormant and out of service because its members have still not been named and confirmed.
In a report that was newly updated this month, the Congressional Research Service traced the origins of the Board from a recommendation by the 9/11 Commission through its initial establishment as a White House agency to its reconstitution as an independent agency chartered by statute in 2007.
The Board was assigned two overriding missions: It was supposed to "analyze and review actions the executive branch takes to protect the Nation from terrorism, ensuring that the need for such actions is balanced with the need to protect privacy and civil liberties"; and to "ensure that liberty concerns are appropriately considered in the development and implementation of laws, regulations, and policies related to efforts to protect the Nation against terrorism."
So had the Board been functional, it might have been a valuable participant in current deliberations over military detention authority, for example. It might also have conducted investigative oversight into any number of other counterterrorism policies, as mandated by law. But for all practical purposes, there is no Board.
Last January, President Obama named Elizabeth C. Cook and James X. Dempsey to serve on the Board. The Senate has not acted on their nomination. Even if they had been confirmed, however, they would not have constituted a quorum. Thus, the Board's activation is still dependent on presidential nomination of additional Board members. See "Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board: New Independent Agency Status," November 14, 2011.
_______________________________________________
Secrecy News is written by Steven Aftergood and published by the Federation of American Scientists.
The Secrecy News Blog is at:
http://www.fas.org/blog/secrecy/
Wrap...
Monday, November 21, 2011
You Think? You Believe?
Believing doesn't always mean thinking
by
Keith Taylor
Here we go again. A small group of veterans erected a cross at Camp Pendleton to commemorate Major Zembiec, Major Mendoza, Lance Corporal Austin, and Lance Corporal Zurheide. All were once stationed at the huge base, and all were killed in action.
And once again we see protesters. And the argument is underway. The question they will be asked is do they have a moral right to protest a sacred symbol erected to commemorate fallen heroes.
The first to raise a voice in protest was Jason Torpey, himself a veteran. Jason is a graduate of West Point. He served in both Kuwait and Iraq, and he is an atheist. Jason knows what it is for any nonbeliever to serve in an institution as resolutely religious are our Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force.
Jason is now president of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers, an outfit started by an old friend of mine, Kathleen Johnson, now a retired Army sergeant.
Jason was quoted by the North County Times as saying, "No cross or statue of Jesus represents military service. Military service is being exploited to secure unconstitutional Christian privilege. His arguments were echoed by Debbie Allen, head of the San Diego Coalition of Reason, a partnership of fifteen local secular organizations. "We must be faithful to the first amendment to the US Constitution . . . after all, all soldiers take an oath to defend it."
I'm with these folks, both sentimentially and as a member of both their groups. I am a Navy Veteran who served his country in uniform for nearly twenty-three years. Of course, I mourn the loss of all my fallen veterans. Although I'm no longer religious I can understand the comfort those who are get from symbols of their own religion.
But does it hurt that somone wants to use a symbol of religion to honor their buddies? With so many crosses, all around the county. What does one more matter. A single cross can't hurt much. Neither could the posting of the Ten Commandments in public school. Neither could opening a school session with a prayer invoked over the loud speaker. Our money spends quite as well with our national motto emblazoned with "In God We Trust."
The constitutions of Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas and Tennessee forbid any non believer from holding office of any sort, but I don't live in any of those states. So why should I worry about it?
All these things are defended by "oh what does it hurt?" And they don't, not if they are taken separately.
But taken as a whole, we hear the incorrect and dangerous words "we are a Christian nation." Many Supreme Court Decisions have determined that to be untrue. The Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, signed by President John Adams and approved by the Congress affirmed it.
It is dangerous because nations basing laws, treaties, and wars on religion rather than on facts lead almost always has led to irrational acts, acts which cannot be challenged by facts or any sort of rational thinking. A glance at history shows us crusades, inquisitions, book burning, and countless wars done in the name of one god or another.
And it continues to this day. Despite the outrageous claims of many, those guys who flew airplanes into buildings were not atheists.
Neither was the man who ordered the retaliation against the act of 9/11 who once claimed his told him to bomb Baghdad.
Some religious based laws would forbid acts which would save women's lives in order to keep a fetus alive.
When religion holds sway we see laws, treaties, foreign policy decisions all made on religion. Take embryonic stem cells. The religious belief that a soul was put in each stem cell stymied support for this research on them for years. This despite the fact that only research could discover treatment, perhaps cures, for our some of our most dreaded diseases.
Or how about the actions of a recent administration that aid to some countries would be denied if they even thought of abortion, even to save a woman's life.
The solution to our many problems isn't simple, but our attempt to find it should not be acceptance of dogma. .
Wrap...
// Keith Taylor is a retired Navy officer living in Chula Vista. He can be reached at krtaylorxyz@aol.com //
by
Keith Taylor
Here we go again. A small group of veterans erected a cross at Camp Pendleton to commemorate Major Zembiec, Major Mendoza, Lance Corporal Austin, and Lance Corporal Zurheide. All were once stationed at the huge base, and all were killed in action.
And once again we see protesters. And the argument is underway. The question they will be asked is do they have a moral right to protest a sacred symbol erected to commemorate fallen heroes.
The first to raise a voice in protest was Jason Torpey, himself a veteran. Jason is a graduate of West Point. He served in both Kuwait and Iraq, and he is an atheist. Jason knows what it is for any nonbeliever to serve in an institution as resolutely religious are our Army, Navy, Marine Corps, and Air Force.
Jason is now president of the Military Association of Atheists and Freethinkers, an outfit started by an old friend of mine, Kathleen Johnson, now a retired Army sergeant.
Jason was quoted by the North County Times as saying, "No cross or statue of Jesus represents military service. Military service is being exploited to secure unconstitutional Christian privilege. His arguments were echoed by Debbie Allen, head of the San Diego Coalition of Reason, a partnership of fifteen local secular organizations. "We must be faithful to the first amendment to the US Constitution . . . after all, all soldiers take an oath to defend it."
I'm with these folks, both sentimentially and as a member of both their groups. I am a Navy Veteran who served his country in uniform for nearly twenty-three years. Of course, I mourn the loss of all my fallen veterans. Although I'm no longer religious I can understand the comfort those who are get from symbols of their own religion.
But does it hurt that somone wants to use a symbol of religion to honor their buddies? With so many crosses, all around the county. What does one more matter. A single cross can't hurt much. Neither could the posting of the Ten Commandments in public school. Neither could opening a school session with a prayer invoked over the loud speaker. Our money spends quite as well with our national motto emblazoned with "In God We Trust."
The constitutions of Arkansas, Maryland, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas and Tennessee forbid any non believer from holding office of any sort, but I don't live in any of those states. So why should I worry about it?
All these things are defended by "oh what does it hurt?" And they don't, not if they are taken separately.
But taken as a whole, we hear the incorrect and dangerous words "we are a Christian nation." Many Supreme Court Decisions have determined that to be untrue. The Treaty of Tripoli in 1796, signed by President John Adams and approved by the Congress affirmed it.
It is dangerous because nations basing laws, treaties, and wars on religion rather than on facts lead almost always has led to irrational acts, acts which cannot be challenged by facts or any sort of rational thinking. A glance at history shows us crusades, inquisitions, book burning, and countless wars done in the name of one god or another.
And it continues to this day. Despite the outrageous claims of many, those guys who flew airplanes into buildings were not atheists.
Neither was the man who ordered the retaliation against the act of 9/11 who once claimed his told him to bomb Baghdad.
Some religious based laws would forbid acts which would save women's lives in order to keep a fetus alive.
When religion holds sway we see laws, treaties, foreign policy decisions all made on religion. Take embryonic stem cells. The religious belief that a soul was put in each stem cell stymied support for this research on them for years. This despite the fact that only research could discover treatment, perhaps cures, for our some of our most dreaded diseases.
Or how about the actions of a recent administration that aid to some countries would be denied if they even thought of abortion, even to save a woman's life.
The solution to our many problems isn't simple, but our attempt to find it should not be acceptance of dogma. .
Wrap...
// Keith Taylor is a retired Navy officer living in Chula Vista. He can be reached at krtaylorxyz@aol.com //
Sunday, November 06, 2011
I Am Voting For...
I am not happy. It's raining in Sunny San Diego. Thank heavens it's gonna quit that and be sunny tomorrow.
I'm fascinated with politics. Definitely gonna vote for Jon Huntsman. Don't care if he is a Repub and I'm a registered Dem. A good man is hard to find...for the office of President of the USA, but I do believe Huntsman is far and away the best we have. In case someone doesn't know, he's been Gov of Utah twice and did a great job...and he's been a diplomat sent off to China and did a great job there as well. He's married and has 7 kids. Three of them are campaigning for "their Dad". A very decent and honorable man is Jon Huntsman.
Problem is, he's a rather quiet guy. Not someone like Cain, for sure. Or any of the others. He went campaigning in New Hampshire. Went all over the State, but did not do any fund-raising. Never asked for money. No matter. Some of the folks contributed. He ended up with $1000.00 anyway. Reason he didn't ask for money? He's a millionaire, so pays his way with his own money. I don't believe he has more than one campaign ad out...and he just tells who he is, what he's done, what he believes and that's it.
And, like Romney, he is a Morman. I don't see that as a problem for either of the men.
So I'm determined to have my say and vote for the man.
Wrap...
I'm fascinated with politics. Definitely gonna vote for Jon Huntsman. Don't care if he is a Repub and I'm a registered Dem. A good man is hard to find...for the office of President of the USA, but I do believe Huntsman is far and away the best we have. In case someone doesn't know, he's been Gov of Utah twice and did a great job...and he's been a diplomat sent off to China and did a great job there as well. He's married and has 7 kids. Three of them are campaigning for "their Dad". A very decent and honorable man is Jon Huntsman.
Problem is, he's a rather quiet guy. Not someone like Cain, for sure. Or any of the others. He went campaigning in New Hampshire. Went all over the State, but did not do any fund-raising. Never asked for money. No matter. Some of the folks contributed. He ended up with $1000.00 anyway. Reason he didn't ask for money? He's a millionaire, so pays his way with his own money. I don't believe he has more than one campaign ad out...and he just tells who he is, what he's done, what he believes and that's it.
And, like Romney, he is a Morman. I don't see that as a problem for either of the men.
So I'm determined to have my say and vote for the man.
Wrap...
Saturday, October 29, 2011
SHANGHIED!!!!
SHANGHIED. Okay. Pay attention! Go immediately to Amazon.com and buy this book. I kid you not...this is the best book I think I've ever read...and my office is full of books. More I've written a book myself.
SHANGHIED is not a novel. The guy who wrote it, lived it. He was indeed shanghied..on to a huge cargo ship. He was 15 years old.
Trust me...you'll never look at a cargo ship the same way again.
Wrap...
SHANGHIED is not a novel. The guy who wrote it, lived it. He was indeed shanghied..on to a huge cargo ship. He was 15 years old.
Trust me...you'll never look at a cargo ship the same way again.
Wrap...
Thursday, October 27, 2011
War Casualties...
From Secrecy News...
AFGHANISTAN WAR CASUALTIES, AND MORE FROM CRS
Between January and June 2011, the United Nations documented 1,462 civilian deaths in Afghanistan, which was a 15% increase over the same six months the year before. Anti-government forces, e.g. the Taliban, were responsible for 77% of the casualties and pro-government forces were responsible for 12%. (The remainder were indeterminate.) These and other casualty figures were compiled from published sources by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) in "Afghanistan Casualties: Military Forces and Civilians," September 30, 2011.
Wrap...
AFGHANISTAN WAR CASUALTIES, AND MORE FROM CRS
Between January and June 2011, the United Nations documented 1,462 civilian deaths in Afghanistan, which was a 15% increase over the same six months the year before. Anti-government forces, e.g. the Taliban, were responsible for 77% of the casualties and pro-government forces were responsible for 12%. (The remainder were indeterminate.) These and other casualty figures were compiled from published sources by the Congressional Research Service (CRS) in "Afghanistan Casualties: Military Forces and Civilians," September 30, 2011.
Wrap...
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