mjh’s blog

Cold Lang Syne

The coyotes
celebrated New Years Eve
down by
the frozen lake.
Their singing
at midnight
woke us
from a deep sleep
snug in our tent
piled high with bags, blankets and clothes.
I've never heard
so devilish a song
so demented an
Auld Lang Syne.
Just when you feared
they might devour us,
the coyotes drove off
in their red minivan
with the bumpersticker that says
"Eat More Sheep"

mjh

Of course, there’s a story to go with this…..

Continue reading Cold Lang Syne…

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Wishing the World happy times in 2005! mjh

Google Press Center: Zeitgeist

2004 Year-End Google Zeitgeist
Search patterns, trends, and surprises

Bush is the first to present himself explicitly as the warrior hero

War and Peace: Campus engaged in great dichotomy - Words on war By Carolyn Gonzales

David Margolin, adjunct research assistant professor of linguistics in the College of Arts and Sciences, says that language tactics used by United States presidents during wartime have changed. “We have gone from Franklin D. Roosevelt’s ‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,’ to the current administration telling Americans, ‘Be afraid, be very afraid,’” Margolin said.

Merri Rudd’s Folk E-News

Check out (mi esposa) Merri Rudd’s website for Folk E-News, a monthly list of upcoming folk music and dance related events throughout New Mexico (and sometimes beyond). mjh

Merri Rudd, Dance Caller: Folk E-News

Cal Thomas is a selfish idiot

Cal Thomas

More than 40 million children have been killed legally in America since the Supreme Court imposed Roe vs. Wade on the nation 32 years ago next month. Democrats seem unconcerned that so many discarded members of the human family are not with us.

“Unconcerned”? Does Cal really mean Democrats are sub-human baby killers? Doesn’t he really think we delight in killing and crave more babies to quench our endless satanic appetites?

Idiot. Cal Thomas is a selfish idiot. No one wants abortion; no one likes abortion. What we want is freedom and control over our own lives. We want to decide for ourselves if and when we are ready to be parents. We don’t want our children born by accident. We don’t want our children born into dire poverty. We don’t want our children born into homes without a father or with an abusive mate. We don’t want children having children. We don’t want 50 year old women forced to bear children. We don’t want anyone forced to bear a child she isn’t able to love and care for. We don’t want our sisters, mothers, daughters, wives, girlfriends to die. We want the freedom to decide our own medical options. We don�t want old men who will never have to face this terrible choice deciding our fate.

Cal, it’s none of your goddamn business. I suggest you work to reduce poverty and to make sure everyone has access to birth control and the knowledge to use it. Then we will respect your “concern.”

Cal ends with: What would be wrong with laws that empower women through additional information, even while abortion remains legal?

What a disingenuous ass. Cal knows fully well that the Radical Right is working every day to deny information to women and to deny options. He is in no way interested in empowering or informing women. But, like the snake in the bible, he speaks pleasantly and reasonably. He says what he needs to say to advance his cause: the destruction of your freedom and rights. mjh

Get out and protect your rights:
January 22, 2005
2pm to 5pm
Albuquerque Civic Plaza
Read more….

Gracious Republicans

Rossi calls for another election By CHRIS McGANN

“A revote would be the best solution for the people of our state,” [Republican Dino] Rossi said at a news conference in Bellevue. “The people of Washington deserve to know if their governor was elected fair and square.” …

Rossi’s spokeswoman, Mary Lane: “I don’t think the voters in this state have an appetite for an illegitimate governor.”

Neither the state constitution nor state statutes provide for a second gubernatorial election. …

“There is a process in place and you can’t just willy-nilly set up new elections,” [Seattle University political science professor Erik] Olsen said.

Asked what advantages or pitfalls might await Rossi should he refuse to concede, Olsen said, “There is something to be said in a democratic political culture for being gracious when you lose — but I would not second-guess him if he has some legitimate legal challenges.”

However, Olsen said there is a danger that Rossi could be seen as a sore loser.

“There is a real risk for Dino Rossi if he contests this election too much — that he’s excessively partisan, excessively ambitious and that he doesn’t respect the process,” Olsen said.

So much for graciously accepting defeat, as Al Gore and John Kerry did. Republicans never stop fighting — and they think that’s a positive attribute. mjh

Christmas Luminarias in Albuquerque

Pika has a good photo essay of luminarias / farolitos in Albuquerque, New Mexico. mjh

Christmas Luminarias in Albuquerque: Making Holiday Luminarias

Am I Moral?

In the election, 20% of voters indicated “moral values” (a very vague phrase) guided their choice. Though this is a small percentage, certainly smaller than the percentage that believe all people were created equal or that there should be a wall separating church and state, nonetheless, this small percentage has us all atwitter. My question to those with such certainty: am I moral?

I have never killed, robbed or beaten anyone. If I have been cruel, I hope it was a long time ago. Am I moral?

My moral superiors need no more time or information to judge me, but let me add something. I am a middle aged white straight male who has been loyal to his beloved wife for 23 years. I own a very small business. I vote and pay taxes. I am sometimes nice to strangers. Am I moral?

I don’t mean to exaggerate, but my small circle of friends includes people not exactly like me: women, gays, some people of color, Republicans, young and old, church goers, Jews and gentiles. Am I moral?

Finally, if there is still any doubt in anyone’s mind, let me stress: I don’t believe in god and the Bible guides me less than Aesop’s Fables. I joke that I’m an “antagnostic,” one who doubts there is a god but wouldn’t like him if there were one. For some of our fellow citizens, I might as well have just shown my cloven hooves and tail. And yet, without a church or spiritual leader, I’ve lead a moderate life that just doesn’t strike me as immoral or *not* guided by moral values. At least I am not working every day to compel others to think the same way I do or become second-class citizens. I’m not exploiting cultural divisions to consolidate power and warp this country into something the Founders would revolt against. THAT would be immoral. mjh

Happy Holidays!

Wishing you and yours a Christ-free Christmas!

Groups on Right Say Christmas Is Under Attack By Dana Milbank, Washington Post

Those on the other side of these battles say the Christian groups are wildly exaggerating the threats from a phantom enemy for the purpose of mobilizing evangelicals to contribute funds (some groups are explicitly using the Christmas issue to raise money) or to become politically active. On the Christmas fight, the American Civil Liberties Union, the group most often cited as the enemy of traditionalists, says it has not filed a single case blocking Christmas displays this year and cites half a dozen instances over the past year in which it has fought on the side of more religious expression.

“This is the winter equivalent of those summer stories about shark attacks being on the increase,” says Barry Lynn, who heads the liberal group Americans United for the Separation of Church and State. The conservative groups, he said, “think they can make Christians feel like a besieged majority. It creates a Christian solidarity against all those who would oppress them: secularists in this season, gay and lesbians next month, abortion the next month.”

Whether the threat is real or a straw man, conservatives have been aggressive this season in citing the danger to Christmas. This week, Jerry Falwell, a conservative leader, told supporters that “so-called civil libertarians attempt to purge all vestiges of faith from the American public square.” Also this week, Paul M. Weyrich, another conservative leader, proclaimed that “the campaign to eliminate Christmas from our society is well underway.” Several conservative commentators have echoed the charge on television and radio and in newspapers.

Torture FOIA Request

Records Released in Response to Torture FOIA Request

“I am responding to your request for feedback on aggressive treatment and improper interview techniques used on detainees at GTMO. I did observe treatment that was not only aggressive, but personally very upsetting, although I can’t say that this treatment was perpetrated by Bureau employees. It seemed that these techniques were being employed by the military, government contract employees and REDACTED.”
—–
Notes allegation of detainee at Abu Ghraib: “They tortured me and cuffed me in an act called the scorpion, and pouring cold water on me They tortured me from morning until the morning of the next day, and when I fell down from the severe torture I fell on the barbed wires, and then they dragged me from my feet and I was wounded and, and they punched me on my stomach.”

[via The Daily Aneurysm at jabartlett.com]

Bask

like nervous reptiles
skittering among the rocks
safe haven
but never secure
warmed from the outside
animated by a distant source
a shadow freezes and frightens us
we run for the light,
pause, bask,
before slipping into darkness 

mjh

24Feb97

The Reason For The Season

Solace of solstice by JOHN FOYSTON

Being merry in the depth of darkness is a darned sight easier knowing that the sun hasn’t gone away forever, and Tuesday’s winter solstice is when we turn the corner back toward the sun and light.

The winter solstice is the most hopeful of holidays, the one that requires utter faith in the great ticking clockwork of the heavens. It’s a day for the imaginative and the optimistic; the beginning of winter, yes, but also the day that promises that spring will come, and summer after that.

The winter solstice has been celebrated far back into the mists of history and beyond. Calculating the exact day of the sun’s return inspired some of humanity’s earliest technological feats, still visible in sites such as England’s Stonehenge, the Yucatan Peninsula’s Chichen Itza, Chaco Canyon in the American Southwest, the temple at Karnak in Egypt and a score more around the world.

At Newgrange in County Meath, Ireland, which was built about 5,000 years ago, the rising sun on the winter solstice sends a beam of light down a long passage to illuminate — for 14 minutes — a chamber that is dark the rest of the year. …

This time of year has been celebrated in many ways by many cultures. There’s the Norse Yule, which lends us our traditions of decorated evergreens, holly and mistletoe; in Pharonic Egypt, the god/man Osiris died and was entombed on the solstice; and ancient Greece had a solstice festival called Lenaea.

The Romans probably were the solstice champs with festivals such as Saturnalia and many others, which were consolidated by Emperor Aurelian in the third century into dies natalis solis invicti, the Birthday of the Unconquered Sun, which was celebrated on Dec. 25. Christmas eventually supplanted that celebration, but during a period of centuries spanning the fourth to the 10th centuries.

The point being that the solstice has been a cause for celebration for millennia. Here’s a brief primer on what actually happens on this day…. [entire article]

The Writer’s Almanac - DECEMBER 20 - 26, 2004

In the northern hemisphere, today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year and the longest night. It’s officially the first day of winter and one of the oldest known holidays in human history. Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations go back at least 30,000 years, before humans even began farming on a large scale.

To His Coy Mistress, by Andrew Marvell

…Now, therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on thy skin like morning dew,
And while thy willing soul transpires
At every pore with instant fires,
Now let us sport us while we may,
And now, like amorous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour
Than languish in his slow-chapped power.
Let us roll all our strength and all
Our sweetness up into one ball,
And tear our pleasures with rough strife
Through the iron gates of life:
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.

All Payne, No Brain

So, Greg Payne has joined the blovisphere (see bloviate) — these really are the times that try men’s souls.

The aptly named Payne insists he’s never been called boring — just wait a couple more days. In a week’s time he’s fallen from calling the Journal “ruffians” to posting about Zoolander. His well will run dry soon. Will his Alibi column become a rehash of blog entries?

Like most in celebrity-obsessed America, where notoriety equals importance, Payne loves his role on our small stage. He plays the bad-boy Republican, tough enough to throw coke cans at cops, smooth enough to talk the panties off Pika (he thinks). The kinda guy Zell Miller calls a wimp.

It’s not just that “witty Right Winger” is an oxymoron, it’s that wit is despised by his ilk. The Red-faced Right takes everything seriously here at the End-of-Days.

Thank Payne for warning us that the Radical Right will have its revenge for Bernie Kerik at the next opportunity. It’s good to see another Republican for adultery and misrepresentation. Nevermind that Kerik was so feckless.

Anyone who thinks Zell Miller is right about Payne should note how harshly Payne puts down fellow Republican Brad Winter for his “frustrating middle-of-the-road style.” Yeah, I hate moderation in Republicans — not that I’ve seen it in 20 years.

Payne, an outsider whose ancestors have been here fewer than 150 of the last 13,000 years, writes about the humilation he suffered at the hands of a ‘weird, weaselly, funny-looking lawyer from NEW YORK‘ (gasp!). Huh. GP doesn’t mean “Jew,” does he?

Clearly, the “unfiltered” Payne is as good for the community as untreated sewage. But, then, why treat the blogosphere any differently than the biosphere? God gave it to us to poison as we like.

Turns out reading is just too much work for his audience — it’s easier to listen to Lush Limbaugh all day and stare at Pravda, er, Fox News, all night. Someone should start a pool as to when he quits. mjh

‘Santa and Jesus are side-by-side’

The Daily Aneurysm at jabartlett.com

Even though I am a liberal (and thus, as we’ve been told all month, an enemy of Christmas) and not religious (which makes me an enemy of America), I celebrate Christmas without cognitive dissonance and no feeling of hypocrisy. Christmas was long ago transformed from a religious holiday into an event so thoroughly secular that the wingnuts’ efforts to force it back to its religious roots, annoying though they are, represent closing the barn door long after the horse is gone. Santa and Jesus are side-by-side elbowing for space under trees from coast to coast, and I daresay in most households, they co-exist peacefully, making no demands on one another.