Clarification

In response to inquiry, I am not advocating that the government be able to dictate what newspapers print. When I said that I hoped Keller et al. got jail time I was thinking jail time a la Judith Miller, who didn't want to give up her source and for aiding and abetting the commission of a crime, that crime being leaking of national secrets.

The compromising of national security for no other reason than spite and self aggrandizement is a foul and traitorous thing to do and deserves punishment. Yes, I said traitorous I do not think thst it too harsh a word. I do not think that you can possibly equate exposing the SWIFT program with exposing the perfedies of Nixon or Clinton, no matter how ardently their shades are invoked. Bush is not investigating his political enemies, he is tracking down head lopping 11th century wanna-bes who hate Grandma getting her hair set at the beauty parlor, and my 3 year old singing "Jesus loves me" at the playground. So don't tell me I am overreacting.

Open Letter

Dear Mr. Keller, Mr. Lichtblau and Mr. Risen:

I do not consider myself and my fellow citizens idiots incapable of understanding basic facts.

Fact One: Terrorists have bank accounts, they do not carry all their funds in shiny metal briefcases.

Fact Two: "following the money" is a tried and true investigatorial tactic.

Fact Three: US Government already knows plenty about domestic transactions, we provide annual updates every April 15th.

Fact Four: The NY Times has been (mildly stated) unhappy with the Administration since it's inaugeration January 2001.

Fact Five: The NY Times has already had bad juju with compromising classified information.

Fact Six: "Loose Lips Sinks Ships" is an aphorism for a reason.

Now those are out of the way you need to ask yourself some questions:

1. - Are you a citizen of the United States?
2. - Do you believe that we are engaged in a war?
3. - Do you believe that the purpose of the Constitution, including the provision for a free press, was formed to safeguard US citizens?
4. - Do you believe it is the Government's duty to safeguard it's citizens?
5. - Do you believe your newspaper is read outside of US borders?
6. - Which is more threatening to the health, happiness, and welfare of US Citizenry: a well armed terrorist or a governmental flunky sifting through international fiscal transactions.

By your own article you conclude that the program was effective, legal, and properly oversighted to check abuse. You had no compelling reason to compromise my safety for your ego. I hope you all see jail time. To be pithy: Fuck you and the horse you rode in on. That is all.

T. Sinclair
Whidbey Island, Washington

************
See also Hugh Hewitt, Gateway Pundit and Humorists iowahawk, SeeDubya

Summer Reading

Island Passage is soliciting suggestions on a good annual summer read:

But the lapse of a year allows the ideas and themes of the novel to grow roots in your mind; and re-reading the novel allows new growth to experience of reading. . .And, that, I think is the key. The annual desire to reacquaint ourselves with books that changed how we viewed the world.

And my annual summer read?

*Sigh*

It used to be The Lord of the Rings, but I have set that aside for a while. I'm looking for the next big, complex narrative, loaded with the frieight of ideas and new viewpoints that will be worth re-reading.

Any suggestions?

For those that are unaquainted with my reading habits, I read alot. Every year though I reread 4 books that shaped alot of my thought processes and are sheerly enjoyable on top of that. They are: To Kill A Mockingbird, Till We Have Faces, Fahrenheit 451, and Have Spacesuit, Will Travel. A rather odd assortment of books, but then, I have a rather odd mind.

To Kill A Mockingbird is the best American novel ever written. There are many fine novels out there, many influential ones but TKAM does something wonderful: it preaches without being preachy. Racism, and especially racism typified by the Jim Crow American South, has become an epithet hurled into political arguement these days. I suggest that people who cry "racist" at the drop of a hat reread Mockingbird. Atticus is the embodiment of hope and the model Harper Lee sets up, not just for Scout and Jem, but for her readers and Americans as a whole. Atticus sets the standard but does not condemn his fellow townsfolk for not being as enlightened as he is. He treats everyone with unfailing courtesy and understands that change comes slowly. He does what he can, influences where he can and does not shirk from duty.

Till We Have Faces, by CS Lewis, is one of those novels that teaches something new each time it is read. The myth of Psyche and Eros it explores the nature of love, self-love, identity, forgiveness, and how all of those are affected by our relationship with God.

Fahrenheit 451 is a denunciation of the trivial. It is infatuation with the trivial which blinds Bradbury's society to the destruction of their heritage and their very existence. Books are only the medium Bradbury uses to convey the denunciation. Guy Montag thoughtless in trivial pursuits in the beginning becomes the steward of the Book of Ecclesiastes in the end.

Have Spacesuit, Will Travel seems, at first, to be an strange addition to this list. Bob Heinlein's perhaps fluffiest juvenilia it follows Kip and Peewee through space pirates and interstellar tribunals. It emphasises optimism, individualism, hard work and perserverance.

Solar Eclipse

The kids are mercifully quiet right now. This is like an eclipse, intellectually you know it happens but it is rare enough that you marvel at it when it does. More, none of them are napping-it's like a solar eclipse!

The Verbalist made about 5 contraptions all designed to knock things over. Long complicated ramps which zig-zagged, windup walking toys, rolling balls - all with the grand purpose of knocking something over. His former contraption designs (such as the Santa trap - the Aradaro) will be the culminations of his efforts.

The Muralist dug out a long abandoned coloring book and is coloring away. She is finally attempting to stay within the lines but not to the point of realism when shade and hue are important. She is coloring a bear red because it's mad and another bear pink because it's good. Each item on the page is assigned an emotion, even the grass (which is happy; fulfilling its unique grassy destiny I suppose).

The Screecher has pulled some wooden puzzles off the (low) shelf and is blissfully shoving random pieces at random holes. Her brow is furrowed in concentration.

The Dog is laying in the shade panting happily. She counts it a success that she "drove off" the trash collectors.

LATER

The kids are out riding bikes now. Round and around the bottom of the driveway they go. Occasionally one of them labors halfway up the slope to the road then takes their feet from the pedals and coasts, whooping, back to the flat. It is the kid equivalent to a rollercoaster. They pedal maniacally trying to ram each other. Rarely do they catch each other, they laugh like loons as they narrow the gap, the laughing saps concentration which in turn lengthens the gap again. At last puffing and out of breath they run to the front door and demand sustenance.

Sustenance in this case means Otter Pops (tropical mix). Hot day. Fast Bikes. Sugary Ice. Summertime Kidhood typified.

Pictures Worth 1000 Words

The President swung by Seattle and the protesters were out with their signs. While they are not as virulent as some of the San Francisco protesters, I did want to link to a few.

No drums, I beg of you.

I always knew Turtle Bay was it's own mad country.

Clever! Except it's 2006 and Bush is not a candidate.

Spoonerists Unite!

Remember, Angry Protest=Smiley Faced "U"s.

Eloquent, pursuasive. PIck A CAse.

Political Ideology Quiz

Via Hugh Hewitt comes this quiz on political ideology. Unsurprisingly, I fall out on the line between conservative and libertarian. I believe that private individuals can do most things better than our government does (see Katrina -FEMA & state agencies vs. Red Cross).

Losers and Sportsmanship

Eugene Volokh points out this AP article which reports:

Any Connecticut high school football coach who runs up the score in a game now runs the risk of being suspended.
The football committee of the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference, the state board that governs high school sports, has adopted a "score management" policy to keep teams from winning by more than 50 points.

Why?

The rout is considered an unsportsmanlike infraction and, beginning this fall, the head coach of the offending team will be disqualified from coaching the next game, said Tony Mosa, assistant executive director of the Cheshire-based CIAC.

Volokh says:

The problem, it seems to me, is quite real: It is indeed dispiriting and embarrassing to be so badly beaten. One possible solution (which the story describes, but which wasn't adopted) is to stop the game when the score gap gets too large. Another is to split the league into divisions in each of which the teams would be more closely matched, though that might not work well for a small league. There are other reasonable alternatives as well.

But the solution of requiring the winning team to essentially stop competing effectively strikes me as worse than the problem.

I don't think that playing well is unsportsmanlike. I don't think that it is right to penalize a talented team and an effective coach. Lord knows the highschool I attended had an mediocre football team at best and there were times we were soundly trounced by more than fifty points. I recall pep assemblies where we would cheer our team but were also encouraged to be good sports to maybe win the "Spirit Award", the award for neither being braggarts for winning or whiney gits for losing.

The story references a powerhouse school and coach that precipitated the rule:

Still, some around the state have dubbed it the "Jack Cochran rule," after the New London coach of the same name.

During halftime of New London's 60-0 rout of Tourtelotte/Ellis Tech last season, opposing coach Tim Panteleakos was arrested on breach of peace charges. With his team sitting on a huge lead, Cochran called a timeout just before the half, and that apparently riled Panteleakos.

He allegedly hit a New London security officer and tried to hit a New London assistant coach.

Cochran's teams logged four wins of more than 50 points last year.

"It's basically the Jack (Cochran) rule," Hyde Leadership-New Haven football coach John Acquavita told the New Haven Register. "For one guy, you're putting the stress on the entire state. It's the most asinine, insane thing I've ever heard of in my life."

The asinine thing is that these people have lost sight of what sports are about: teamwork, exercize, healthy competition and fun. Sure it's no fun to lose but golly it's always a possibility. Don't tell me the kids have no idea that they are going up against the powerhouse school. Instead of penalizing the coaches and students that do well, the coach that is punching someone should have swallowed the bitterness and modeled sportsman like behavior for his team. He should have encouraged them to have fun while they played and commended them for playing hard.

My dad always says if it's not fun then don't play the game. Sounds like this coach needs to walk away for a while. Part of being an adult and something that sportsmanship teaches is that sometimes you lose big no matter how hard you try. You either learn, move on and strive to be better or you change the rules and throw a pity party.

Gitmo...That's Guantanamo....I Knew That One

In today's NY Times, Mourad Benchellali, a French citizen and former Gitmo detainee, weighs in on the suicides of the inmates there. Before I delve into this much further let me share this little tidbit The US prison suicide average per year is:

Nationwide, the prison suicide rate is about 13 deaths per 100,000, compared with 11 deaths per 100,000 in the general community, said Hayes, a project director with the National Center on Institutions and Alternatives.

So in 4 or 5 years that enemy combatants have been held at Gitmo we have only had 3 suicides. Now obviously, there are only 465 detainees or so so the ratio of suicides to prisoners is a lot higher than the nation average, but if we really were torturing detainees hideously you'd think that suicide rates would be higher. Waterboarding and stress positions seem to be the worst things we've done to those guys, and while I am not going to make the call on whether or not they should be considered the legal definition of "torture" that's a world away from the rusty saws and rape rooms of the Taliban and Saddam Hussien. Anyway, let me get in to the meat of the op-ed.

Says Mourad:

In the early summer of 2001, when I was 19, I made the mistake of listening to my older brother and going to Afghanistan on what I thought was a dream vacation. His friends, he said, were going to look after me. They did — channeling me to what turned out to be a Qaeda training camp. For two months, I was there, trapped in the middle of the desert by fear and my own stupidity.

As soon as my time was up, I headed home. I was a few miles from the Pakistani border when I learned with horror about the attacks of 9/11. Days later, the border was sealed off, and the only way through to Pakistan and a plane to Europe was across the mountains of the Hindu Kush. I was with a group of people who were all going the same way. No one was armed; most of them, like me, had been lured to Afghanistan by a misguided and mistimed sense of adventure, and were simply trying to make their way home.

I was seized by the Pakistani Army while having tea at a mosque shortly after I managed to cross the border. A few days later I was delivered to the United States Army: although I didn't know it at the time, I was now labeled an "enemy combatant." It did not matter that I was no one's enemy and had never been on a battlefield, let alone fought or aimed a weapon at anyone.

Leaving aside the "dream vacation" spot that was Taliban controlled Afghanistan, where soccer stadiums were used to showcase beheadings and the punishment for wearing nail polish is the removal of fingers and fingernails, leaving that insanity aside let's assume that young Mourad is really that ignorant and take his story at face value. What do we know about young Mourad?

* He spent months training to be an Al-Qaeda terrorist (whether he planned to put the knowledge to use or not)

* He has close family ties to an Al-Qaeda recruiter

* He was traveling in a party with other men who trained to be Al Qaeda terrorists, a portion of whom knew what they were getting themselves into

From his own words we know that there is reasonable grounds for assuming that he would be a terrorist. As for his words:

It did not matter that I was no one's enemy and had never been on a battlefield, let alone fought or aimed a weapon at anyone.

Would you have believed him? If a young American man went through Basic Training, whose brother ran a Army recruiting post (store? facility?), and who was travelling with other Army guys in a foriegn country would you believe him if he said he wasn't in the Army because he had never actually seen action? Unlike the Army though, these guys don't wear uniforms, they will kill anyone who gets in their way, and they do not distinguish between 4 year olds and 24 year old Marines.

Still, give him the benefit of the doubt, he's a stupid kid caught up by circumstances:

You repeat yourself over and over again to interrogators from the military intelligence, the F.B.I., the C.I.A. The first time you hear "Your case is being processed," your heart, seizing on the hopeful possibilities in those words, skips a beat. After months of disappointment, you try to develop an immunity to hope, but hope is an incurable disease.

I remember once an interrogator warming me up during several sessions for a polygraph test I was going to take, that was, according to him, infallible. After I took the test, I was left alone in the interrogation room; an hour later, the interrogator returned. "Congratulations," he said grimly. "You have passed the test." And he gave me a box of candy.

In the outside world, I thought, the difference between telling the truth and lying, between committing a crime and not committing it, is the difference between being in jail and being free. In Guantánamo, it is a box of candy.

I was eventually released and I will go on trial next month in Paris to face charges that I've never denied, that I spent two months in the Qaeda camp.

They were assorted cremes and he wanted nuts damn it! Goodness gracious, what if they were Danish chocolates offensive to Mohammed! So here's a stupid kid who managed to weave his way through government beauracracy in 2 and a half years (lightning quick in government circles - just ask Brent Kavanaugh who was sitting waiting to be confirmed to an appellate court for 6 or is it 8 years?). Never mind that he has potentially extremely valuable information about who he was with in that training camp, or who his brother's associates might be - those 2 years were horrible because they couldn't believe he was that stupid.

Can we look at another story of Gitmo detainees? Three Afghanistan boys who say:

The boys never spoke to Guantanamo's other prisoners - "lots of Arabs and Afghans," according Naqibullah.

Meanwhile, their own interrogation became a predictable affair. "I said, 'Look, I don't anything about the Taliban'," said Asadullah. "But anyway, the Taliban were the government so lots of people worked with them. Just because you were Taliban it doesn't mean you're a criminal."

Hmm. Not a criminal eh? How about their inhumane time at Gitmo?

Naqibullah's first 10 days in Guantanamo were the worst of his life, he said. He was put in a tiny cell with a single slit-window as his interrogation continued. Then everything changed. "I was taken to an American general who said, 'We will educate you and soon you will go home'. And my situation improved."

Naqibullah, Asadullah and Mohammed Ismail were moved into one large room, which was never locked. They were taught Pashto (their own language), English, Arabic, maths, science, art and, for two months, Islam. "The American soldiers ate pork but they said we must never do that because we were Muslim," said Naqibullah. "They were very strict about Islam."

The boys played football every day, and sometimes basketball and volleyball with their guards. Asadullah said his particular friends were called Special Sergeant M and Private O - their real names were kept from him. Officially, he was called Prisoner 912. "But my friends called me Asadullah, which made me happy."

After five months, Naqibullah wrote home for the first time. Taking this first letter, written on Red Cross notepaper, from his pocket, he now reads it aloud. "My greetings to beloved family, to my beloved father, to my beloved uncles, to my beloved cousins, to my beloved brothers. I am in good health and happy. I am in Cuba, in a special room, but it is not like a jail. Don't worry about me. I am learning English, Pashto and Arabic." The next two lines of the letter were scrubbed out by the Guantanamo censor. Asadullah said he couldn't for the life of him remember what they said.

No Powerpoint though

The Verbalist runs into the room when I call him.

"Put on clothes," say I. It is 10 am, his cousin is visiting and everyone else is dressed.

"I can't, Mom. I'm late for my staff meeting - I have a presentation." He runs off and I am speechless. Staff meeting? I detect father emulation.

Drifting in from the other room comes the Muralist's dulcet tones:

"Make a space: I brought doughnuts." Ahhh, my kind of staff meeting.

Murphy's Law

I start big changes on the blog and my hard drive dies. Sorry folks.

While Dad's Away

Dear Husband is out of state attending a memorial service for his granddad, Curt. His granddad was one of those big personalities; he filled the room. Those are the kind of people you can't conceive of as not being there or sickening. When I last saw him, I felt a strange disconnect. He had been spiraling downhill in health, everytime I saw him he was progressively worse, but I still experienced that jolting shock anew. My mental picture of him always reverted back to the loud, bluff man from my early memories and erased the failing octegenarian. Anyway, it's weird that he is gone.

So DH has been gone and the kids have been playing the "when dad gets home" card. When dad gets home....I'm going to have ice cream. When dad gets home....we are going to stay up past bed time and play legos. When dad gets home....we are going to charm him into breaking the rules that mean old mom puts down.

Ah yes, the rules, those harsh cruel ones like: dinner before desert, don't run up and down grocery store aisles shreiking like banshees, put you bikes under the breezeway. Say please and thank you, let seniors go through the door first, DON'T POKE THE BABY. My goodness - don't poke the baby.

Incidentally, Glenn and Helen interview James Lileks (author of Mommy Knows Worst: Highlights from the Golden Age of Bad Parenting Advice) and Cathy Seipp on child rearing. It's well worth listening to. One of the questions they ask is why are large families less obsessive about safety than small families? Cathy thinks it's because large families see the different stages of ability and it's easier to give the elder's autonomy. My answer: the more kids you have, the more wisely you pick your parenting battles. As a parent you only have so much energy to funnel into things. I tend to funnel my energy into things I think are essential rather than battle my strong willed kids over convenience issues. Ultimately, it doesn't really matter if the Muralist wears a garish pink tutu over her jeans and yodels "A Dream is a Wish your Heart Makes" at the top of her lungs going down Highway 20.

Technicalities

From the Washington Times:

The long-fought Senate immigration bill that opponents say grants amnesty to 10 million illegal aliens is unconstitutional and appears headed for certain demise, Senate Republicans now say.
A key feature of the Senate bill is that it would make illegals pay back taxes before applying for citizenship, a requirement that supporters say will raise billions of dollars in the next decade.
There's just one problem: The U.S. Constitution specifically prohibits revenue-raising legislation from originating in the Senate.
"All bills for raising revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives," according to the "origination clause" in Article I, Section 7.
Republicans -- including the bill's supporters -- say this will kill the bill, and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist says he's offered a simple solution. He wants to attach the immigration bill to a tax bill that has already passed the House. It would then proceed as planned to a "conference committee," where negotiators from the House and Senate hammer out differences between the two chambers' immigration bills.
"This is a procedural issue that we could overcome," said Carolyn Weyforth, spokeswoman for Mr. Frist.
But Minority Leader Harry Reid won't go along with that fix. His office said yesterday that the concerns raised by Mr. Frist and House Republicans are "technical in nature" and can be ignored.

You know the US Constitution is so pesky about those details. Not that I epect much better from the Senate, they spat out the egregious McCain/Feingold Act which kills political speech inspite of the First Amendment "technicality".

To skirt the ban, Republicans say, the Senate easily could agree to attach the immigration bill to the House-approved tax legislation. They see Mr. Reid's refusal to fix the problem as an attempt to scuttle the bill, and thus deny the Republican Congress a "victory" for passing immigration reform before this fall's elections.
"We can solve this constitutional issue if Harry Reid would drop his obstructionism and allow the comprehensive immigration legislation to move past the Senate," Ms. Weyforth said.

Now I don't like Harry "Love the Fights" Reid much, but I am glad to see this bill scuttled. It's a bad law that the majority of citizens oppose. I know "Tickets are not a Bribe" Reed is not doing this for any other reason than political grandstanding but I am glad it is happening.

U of O, Diversity, and a Silly Abstract

Mike Adams takes a stick and pokes at the University of Oregon's new 46 page "diversity plan". Now Dear Husband attended U of O as have many of his family members, so this particular article caught my attention when a story highlighting Yale might not. Mike's column is formatted as an open letter to President Frohnmeyer and questions the assumptions and muddy thinking that pervade the "diversity plan" - including it's inability to articulate what "diversity" is.

But, of course, all of this discussion of diversity is moot unless UO can decide just what diversity really means. The following footnote in your report suggests that no one can be certain what anyone is really talking about when the subject of diversity is broached:

We recognize the difficulty of using a term like diversity that is subject to multiple interpretations. We intend to be inclusive when we use this term. The risk of listing examples of diversity is that no list can be all inclusive. In defining diversity for use in this document, we do not intend to leave out any group. In this document when we discuss persons "of diverse backgrounds or experiences" we mean by that description to refer to the broad range of diversity intended by our definition here. Further, when we discuss "underrepresented groups" we intend to refer again to the broad definition of diversity.

UO ought to be embarrassed by that definition. And any taxpayer reading your report should demand that you de-fund all of your diversity initiatives until you decide exactly what “diversity” really is. I don’t have a good definition of “diversity fund” but I do have a synonym. It is called “slush fund.”

I immediately thought of that little jingle: "one of these things is not like the other...." Diverse according to Merriam-Webster is simply unalike. How a person identifies themself often falls outside of the neat little catagories that the staff at U of O have decided are diverse. So the U of O has decided that some elements of identity are more important than others but declines to call it a value judgement. As a woman I am under represented, as a white I am not. As a woman I am valued by U of O as a descendant of European immigrants I am not. Says the U of O:

Programs such as Ethnic Studies and Women's and Gender Studies provide courses, opportunities for advanced study, and scholarly work of interest to students and faculty from underrepresented groups. Strengthening these and other programs that focus scholarship and teaching on issues of diversity will serve to strengthen diversity at the University.

Oh please. Gender and ethnicity define parts of identity but are not what make me unalike. It doesn't matter what facet of identity is thrown into the equation, defining the value of individuals by a single characteristic is like saying all equations with irrational numbers in them are better than others. For a silly example:

What makes me unalike, diverse, is that I am a clarinet player. The ratio of clarinet players to the rest of the campus are diminishingly small and if you think clarinet players are never discriminated against just ask yourself- why is it that oboes always get the privilege of tuning the orchestra? No one is going to defer to me for being a clarinet player, though you probably don't think of yourself as being a clarinetist bigot. Let me ask you some questions:

Have you ever made a disparaging remark about clarinets?
Have you ever felt uncomfortable in a room with someone who plays the clarinet?
Have you ever shown a preference for another orchestral instrument?
If the first clarinetist got up to lead the orchestra would you think, "hey! that's the first violin's job?"
Would you deny your discomfort has anything to do with that person's clarinetist affiliations?
Would you rather I not make a big deal about my clarinet playing?

At this point some of my readers are shaking their heads and saying, "Stop being idiotic, no one has ever killed a clarinetist for being a clarinetist."

Au contraire, say I, they did in Mao's China.

Says the U of O:

Cultural competence is an active and ongoing process of self reflection, learning, skill development, and adaptation, practiced individually and collectively, that enables us to engage effectively a culturally diverse community and world. Cultural competence allows us to recognize that our statements, convictions, and reactions are conditioned by the culture in which we live.

Persecuting clarinetists isn't a moral wrong, it's only cultural conditioning according to the U of O, if you follow it's logic to a Swiftian conclusion.

Engineering

Yesterday the Verbalist, Muralist, the Screecher and I were shopping and picked up MouseTrap, the boardgame where you build a Rube Goldberg machine to trap other people's game pieces. It won the immediate approbation of the Verbalist, whom you might recall drew up plans for trapping Santa Claus last Christmas.

The Muralist was more concerned with collecting pieces of cheese than construction of the trap, but she was suitably wary when it was completed. The Verbalist could hardly keep from running the partially completed contraption as we hopped along the board. His hand kept sneaking out to turn the gear crank.

Game one ended when I captured both Verbalist and Muralist pieces in one go. Game two ended after the Verbalist captured me and the Muralist captured him in turn. He had a brief gloating session before, unwary, his sister turned the crank on him.

He has decided to build a full size sister trap and is drawing up plans.

Suspect Zero

This week's movie is Suspect Zero (2004). A mostly sidelined crime/horror thriller, Suspect Zero stars Ben Kingsley as a serial killer who kills other serial killers and Aaron Eckart as the FBI agent trying to catch him. Watching it I was struck by it's similarity to Se7en (1995). The main killer, O'Ryan (Kingsley), communicates with Mackelway (Eckert) making him integral to the puzzle and solution of how to catch him.

Kingsley gives as creepy and compelling a performance as Kevin Spacey did in Se7en but manages to invest a shade of empathy for him that makes you more uncomfortable than the unvarnished evil of Spacey's John Doe.

In Se7en, Brad Pitt seemed to move in slow motion, pacing himself to Morgan Freeman's measured narration. Eckert exudes tension and fatigue all through Suspect Zero, making his emotional collapses believable. By the time the final scenes roll around you wonder if Mackelway will fall victim to the manipulations of O'Ryan.

Carrie Anne Moss portrays Mackelway's partner, Fran Kulok. I know from Memento (2000) that Carrie-Anne Moss is capable of being something other than wooden on the screen, unfortunately there is only one scene where she emotes at all in Suspect Zero. Mackelway is convinced he knows O'Ryan's motives and goes to Kulok's hotel room looking for a sense of support - an understanding that he is not moving in the direction of insanity. Kulok declines to accompany Mackelway back to the office and urges him to come into her room. Moss manages to convey helplessness and concern over her partner's slide into intuitive leaps and obsessing. Other than those 2 minutes, Kulok is a two dimentional cypher.

Bottom line: Suspect Zero needed Morgan Freeman. Freeman brings depth to whatever project he is working on and Aaron Eckert and Ben Kingsley's performances were better than Pitt and Spacey's. Plus, Suspect Zero didn't have the gratuitous nastiness that was in Se7en.

Summer Reading and the American Novel

Powerline has created a "Greatest American Novel" poll:

We've selected 21 contenders for the title of all-time best American novel. The list will no doubt provoke disagreement; it is, pretty much by definition, arbitrary and capricious. We tried to select candidates based on literary merit. Politics and sociology were ignored. Here is the list:

Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter
Melville, Moby-Dick
Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin
James, Portrait of a Lady
Twain, Huckleberry Finn
Cather, My Antonia
Wharton, The Age of Innocence
Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby
Hemingway, A Farewell to Arms
Faulkner, The Sound and the Fury
Warren, All the King's Men
Bellow, The Adventures of Augie March
Ellison, Invisible Man
Chandler, The Long Goodbye
Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451
Updike, Rabbit, Run
Barth, The Sot-Weed Factor
Heller, Catch-22
Lee, To Kill A Mockingbird
Nabokov, Pale Fire
Roth, The Great American Novel

I don't see any glaring omissions, although a reader of their's chastised them for neglecting Steinbeck's Grapes of Wrath. I think I would have included some James Fenimore Cooper (despite Twain's distain) likely The Prairie or Last of the Mohicans. Cooper's flowery and rambling prose are no worse than Melville or Dickens and he touches important themes: individaulism, conservation, and competing cultures while celebrating the beauty of the continent.

Still, Cooper can not compete with To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. Fahrenheit 451 and The Long Goodbye ultimately are hindered by their genres although they are as finely written as Mockingbird. I enjoy both hard boiled crime noirs and speculative/science fiction but many people don't and would find it as difficult to read past the conventions of either as they would the snowstorm of words in Moby Dick or Age of Innocence.

Lost Season Finale

I don't watch 24, Jack Bauer holds no allure. I stopped watching American Idol when allegations of vote counting scandals surfaced in season 2. No thanks, Washington State has it's fill of that in regular politics; besides, Simon Cowell wins every year anyway. Lost is the tv show for me and boy, was it a slam bang season finale last night.

Lost provides a valuable public service - it keeps alot of people obsessing over conspiracy theories they know are fake. Can you imagine if these folks obsessed over Rove in Democratic Underground or Vince Foster's murder elsewhere? No, it's best that they go off chasing the Hanso Foundation.

What happened to the denizens of Oceanic Flight 815 last night? Well, we found out that the man purporting to be Henry Gale (Fenry) pulled a Verbal Kint. We found out that the numbers do mean something. Michael and Walt were reunited and got away. The Skipper killed Maryanne to persuade the natives to give him a fishing boat and a map to Hawaii so he and Gilligan could get away - holey moley.

Damon Lindeloff has thrown down the alien gauntlet to the obsessive fans in the form of a four toed statue. Two people died and no less than nine main characters lives are now in jeopardy. After all, do you believe Fenry's claim to be the "good guys"? Me neither.

New Blog Look

This will change. I especially hate comments right now.

Blogiversary

My one year blogiversary is this month. Hoorah! I have had 13,000 visitors on average of 50 people a day.

Breaking News: French are Rude

So a bunch of Brits say the French are rude and the French say they are just "moody". Poe-tay-toe/Pa-tah-toe - I know what my Dear Husband means when he says "moody" nice person code for "b*tchy".

A decisive 46 percent of the 6,000 people surveyed by travellers' website Where Are You Now (WAYN) said the French were the most unfriendly nation people on the planet, British newspapers reported.

The Germans have no to reason to celebrate the damning verdict. They came second on all three counts.

WAYN's French founder, Jerome Touze, told the papers he had been stunned by the thumping condemnation of his compatriots and sought to blame it on Gallic love-struck sulking.

"I had no idea that the French would emerge as such an unfriendly country," he said.

"I think our romantic 'moodiness' is misunderstood and I will be sure to pass on the message to my family and friends back in France to be a bit more cheerful to tourists in the future."

My favorite bit:

Italy was voted the world's most cultured nation with the best cuisine, while the United States was named the most unstylish with the worst food.

Yeah, Hollywood so unglamorous. Plus, are the Brit's anyone to be criticizing about bad food?? These are the producers of blanc-mange and blood pudding. I will back a greasy burger anytime against blanc-mange.

Chicken n' Dumplings

Let me state a couple of things right off: when I heard the catagory for recipes this week was crockpot comfort food this is the recipe that sprang to mind. Second, as a kid I hated this food and ate it under protest, my mother is now laughing her head off in schadenfruede. This is her recipe from my kidhood. I am aware that it does not actually contain chicken.


Chicken n' Dumplings

In crockpot combine:

2 turkey drums
1 bay leaf
one small onion, chopped coarse
1 stock celery (leaves on) chopped
1 tsp parsley
2 tsp salt
1 tsp sage

Cover with water and cook on medium until meat falls off the bone. Remove meat/bone to cool. Add to crockpot:

3-4 yukon gold or red potatoes diced, skin on
3-4 carrots coined, skin on
2 tbsp butter
1/2 cup of milk or cream

When veggies are tender add in the meat, being sure to pick the bones clean. Add 1/2 cup green peas. Then thicken broth with cornstarch or flour, about 2 Tbsp. Turn heat down to low and stir occasionally until thick. Add dumplings to stew in spoonfuls and cook 10 minutes covered and 5 minutes uncovered. Dumplings should be fluffy and have a skin on top.

Dumpling dough:

2 cups biscuit mix (Bisquick in singled out in mom's recipe)
1 tsp parsley
and milk enough to form very soft dough.

Enjoy!

Feh! Prepare for pogroms

I know it is considered bad form to invoke Nazi comparisons, but what are you going to do?(ht: NRO)

Human rights groups are raising alarms over a new law passed by the Iranian parliament that would require the country's Jews and Christians to wear coloured badges to identify them and other religious minorities as non-Muslims.

"This is reminiscent of the Holocaust," said Rabbi Marvin Hier, the dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles. "Iran is moving closer and closer to the ideology of the Nazis."

Iranian expatriates living in Canada yesterday confirmed reports that the Iranian parliament, called the Islamic Majlis, passed a law this week setting a dress code for all Iranians, requiring them to wear almost identical "standard Islamic garments."

The law, which must still be approved by Iran's "Supreme Guide" Ali Khamenehi before being put into effect, also establishes special insignia to be worn by non-Muslims.

Iran's roughly 25,000 Jews would have to sew a yellow strip of cloth on the front of their clothes, while Christians would wear red badges and Zoroastrians would be forced to wear blue cloth.

I am surprised there is no mandate for gays to wear pink - oh that's right, they hang them.
Update: The story is unconfirmed and looks like false. That's good.

Excavations

I am standing folding laundry and watching Last of the Mohicans (1992) the Michael Mann extravagana that manages to be better than the original source material. As Nathanial (Daniel Day Lewis) passionately tells Cora (Madeline Stowe) that he will find her no matter how long or far, I begin to sniffle anticipating the final scenes. For those of you who have never seen the movie or read Cooper's book; I stress Last of the Mohicans, and not last in line for an ice cream cone either.

A shreak of fear breaks my emotional movie wallow and a tearful Muralist races into the room. Her finger seems to have stuck up her nose. As she babbles somewhat incoherantly, I realize it is not her finger which is stuck up her nose but something else entirely. The finger it seems has pushed the object so far up her nose it can not dig the item out - hence the fear and panic. I dislodge the finger and pull her into a beam of sunshine. Tilting her head back, I look up. Nope, the light is not good enough to see.

The Dear Husband has a Mag-lite that doubles as a club for intruders and it was this gargantuan number which aided in locating and identifying the foriegn object. It was little and yellow. It was organic in nature. It was an old-maid, popcorn kernal and boy howdy it was a big one. I got a tissue, held it and commanded child to blow. It failed. It was lodged too tightly.

"What ever possessed you to stick something up your nose?" I questioned in exasperation as I scrounged for tweezers through the bathroom drawer.

The Muralist considered the question with considerable gravity. "Becaauuussseee," she replied, drawing the syllables as long as possible, "it was stuck in my feet."

For a moment I was utterly floored. I had no words. Putting aside the fact that I have no idea where the popcorn originated, who, who, WHO? puts something stuck in their feet up their nose? My delicate bloom.

"Why?" I asked bemusedly, tweezers cradled, temporarily forgotten, in my hand.

"It made sense when I did it." was her calm reply. The calmness evaporated when she saw the tweezers. After a brief struggle and then promise of an Oreo, we managed to extract the kernal with the Verbalist holding the light and armchair coaching the whole while.

Three year olds, an adventure everyday.

Fridge Magnets for Freedom

I have, for a while, been part of the Iowahawk Legion of Dumb. The Legion has been handed a task that I pass to you my faithful readers:

Now Doc is over in the Big Sandy (Iraq - translation me) making life miserable for Zarkman (Zarqawi - me again), so I'd like to return the favor. Doc writes:

...I need lots of refrigerator magnets to envelop my Humvee with. Naturally you will get the picture of the completed project. I must not let the evil Cavalry types get ahead of me on this one. Perhaps your readers would like to take part with a secret PSYOP decoder ring going to the best magnet.

This is exactly the type of surreal absurdist activity the LOD was founded to support. Thus you are hereby commanded: Send your weirdest refrigerator magnets immediately to

Dr. Lee

TPT 1634 1-33 CAV

3rd BCT 101 ABN DIV

APO AE 09390

And while your at it, you can support our other servicemen and women by supporting Operation Gratitude which is aiming to get 40,000 care packages together by the 4th of July.

Who knows? Perhaps my readers consist of those poor souls whose 'fridges are solely adorned by a magnet for the local pizza takeout, perhaps a monochromatic plastic strawberry; somehow I think better of my readers. So send Dr. Lee a magnet and strike a blow (though glancing to be sure) for freedom.

More on Illegal Immigration

President Bush will be giving a speech in prime-time about illegal immigration, a subject which is bleeding conservative support away from the GOP. The upshot is it's likely to do no good. Why? Baldly put, it's because no one trusts him to secure the border any more than no one expects a Democrat to cut taxes. Putting 10,000 National Guards on the border will not fix the problem. The only way to fix the problem is to enforce the law and to reform and stream line legal immigration.

UPDATE:
From what I am seeing and reading it is as bad as I feared. Get this from quintessential party man Hugh Hewitt:

My interview with Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security Julie Myers staggered me, undoing in a handful of minutes my confidence in the president's commitment to border security first. Either the president's team had not communicated effectively with sub-cabinet appointees about the fence, or the president doesn't really believe in the fence, because Assistant Secretary Myers is clearly not a proponent of the fence.

John Hawkins:

Amended grade: D-. At least he didn't use the, "jobs Americans won't do," line. So, he did deserve a small boost for that.

End Update

In related illegal immigration news I ran across this story in the Seattle Times:

PENDLETON, Ore. — Out of ideas and low on cash one cold morning, the man with the biggest badge in town put his meaty fingers on a keyboard and tapped out a letter to the leader of Mexico.

"Dear Precidente [sic] Fox," it began.

"My name is John Trumbo. I am Sheriff of Umatilla County in northeastern Oregon, United States of America." Illegal immigrants "from your country" who committed crimes here, the letter said, cost Americans lots of money.

Last year, more than 360 of "your citizens" spent time in jail "at a cost of $63 a day which equates to a request for payment of $318,843," the letter concluded. "At this time, you will not be billed for medical, dental and transportation costs. Your prompt attention to this request will be very much appreciated."

Trumbo goes on to explain about the very real cost to citizens in monetary and non-monetary fashions:

To anyone who asked, Trumbo explained:

The county has a daily jail capacity of 252 inmates but can afford staff and services for only 135 inmates. The sheriff's office should have a minimum of 27 patrol officers but can fund only nine. Between 2 a.m. and 8 a.m. each day, no patrol officer is on duty.

"When people call the police, they expect to see the police," Trumbo says. "They see it on TV all the time. But there are times when I can't send anybody, because I don't have anybody, because I don't have the money."

One reason, he says: The department spends much of its $6.5 million annual budget on apprehending and jailing illegal immigrants.

***

In the past 16 years, the Hispanic population in 20 of Oregon's 36 counties has as much as tripled. The Pew Hispanic Center estimates the number of illegal immigrants in the state has jumped to as many as 175,000, compared with 25,000 in 1990.

The population increase has led to a corresponding rise in the number of undocumented immigrants who commit crimes. Trumbo says between nine and 15 of his jail beds are occupied each day by illegal immigrants from Mexico.

The Mexican Consul eneral for Oregon says Trumbo is racist. From the article:

The Mexican consul general for Oregon, Fernando Sanchez Ugarte, who received a copy of the letter, says he doesn't know whether Fox will respond. Ugarte says he personally dismissed the letter as political posturing, not to mention racist. The sheriff, he says, "is pinpointing one ethnic group," and he's not sending letters to the presidents of all the other countries in the world.

"If a visitor from Switzerland does something wrong while visiting Umatilla County," Ugarte says, "will Mr. Trumbo send a bill to the leader of Switzerland? I don't think so."

This is what we call in my house, bargin price baloney. If 9 to 15 beds a day of Trumbo's jail were filled by crime committing Swiss, and regular governmental channels were not doing anything about it, I imagine he would be writing to the Swiss government. The Swiss are not and the Mexicans are, race discrimination has nothing to do with it - or at the most very little.

Playing the race card, when hard facts do not support you, will lose you support you might otherwise enjoy. Case in point from Don Surber:

Mexican President Vicente Fox is allowed to sound worried about militarizing the border without being held accountable for his own actions. The Mexican government has sent instructions, given fake IDs to use in the US and otherwise encouraged citizens to break American law.

Baker wrote, "The president's plan could increase the strain with Fox, who has grown disenchanted with Bush's failure to ease immigration rules as promised. Fox for years has pressured Bush to help the 11 million illegal immigrants now in the United States, many of them from Mexico, with little to show for it."

Little to show for it? How many billions do these illegal aliens send back to prop up the economy of Foix's racketeer-influence, corrupt nation?

Senor Fox has been especially incompetent in running his country. Mexico cannot make a go of it even with NAFTA? That is Jimmy Carter-level incompetence.

A few weeks ago, I was Mr. Open Borders. But after that May Day fiasco, I see this is just another socialist plan to undermine America in the name of Illegal Alien Rights.

And now...

I have the flu...

You Don't Say....

I sat poking food into the gaping maw of the Infant and chatting with Sis-I-L. The two elder children were (supposedly) eating dinner and enjoying the edifying music of Schoolhouse Rock in the other room. Our chat was interrupted with a shriek of rage and a crash. Before an adult could leap to investigate, the Verbalist ran into the room.


"Mom! She threw the toaster at me!" Blissfully this is a toy toaster, but still throwing things is Not Acceptable Behavior. The Verbalist leans close and whispers in my ear stotto voce: "That's not a good idea!"

Ears and Viruses

The Dear Husband went to the hospital 3 times this last week due to a nasty virus. Then the Infant and the Verbalist developed ear infections - a first for both. So it has been a bit, hmm, crazy around here. In a fit of end of rope-dness, I called in reinforcements my Sister-in-law. The amazing helpfulness of an extra pair of hands and a sympathetic ear can not be overrated.

Hiatus

I am on a short hiatus until May 7th unless I manage to carve out more time than I think I'll have. See you then.

O for a Muse of Fire?

Oh for a muse of toddlers,
That can ascend the brightest heaven of invention,
Princesses act,
Momarch's behold the swelling scene.

Then should the war-like Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars
and at his heels, leashed in like hounds,
do Panda, Helen and Hope crouch for employment.

Oh, I could mangle the Swan of Avon for the entire soliloquy but I'll not. Instead the unexpurgated dialogue of the morning:


"Har, har! Arrgghhh," the Verbalist cried jumping into the room where his sisters are quietly eating cereal. "You've got pirate eye now. You see things my way and do as I say."

"NO!" bellows the Muralist jumping down from her chair. "ZAP! ZAP! My ray gun shoots and now everyone has," here she pauses for dramatic effect, "princess eyes." She finishes with a flutter of eyelashes and a syrupy sweet tone in her voice. Climbing back up to the table, calmly goes back to her cereal bowl.

School

I registered the Verbalist to begin his scholastic career today. He has been quite talkative about entering Kindegarten for about a year and a half now, jibber-jabber. He knew that one of our stops today was to register him and he went on a long winded tear about all the things he was going to do and all the things he was going to tell his teacher.

As we drove he kept up a steady stream of words, he spoke of coloring, reading, playing, drawing, building, computers, games and last but not least telling everyone else how to color, read, play, draw, build, and compute. his words came faster and higher as we pulled in and parked. He bounced in his seat and jumped out on to the sidewalk witha giant bound. As I got his sisters from ther carseats he ran in place. Holding hands we walked to the elementary school office and still the words flowed unceasing.

The words abruptly stopped when we passed through the school doors. Maybe it was the lon echoing hallway, perhaps it was the school office a clearly "grown-up" sort of place, I looked down and the Verbalist had assumed a solemn aspect to his face. His eyes were big and round as bowling balls. He pursed his lips and raised his eyebrows and looked around. I picked up the papers and the Verbalist said in a stage whisper: "When's recess?"

Yup, he's ready for school.

Taming of the Shrew

Everybody and their gawking tourist brothers are here on island. It's sunny weekend approaching 70 and the classic cars are also on the road - lookin good and cruisin' at a smoking 35 miles per hour. However, I can roll down the windows and blast my music at the cars waiting at the town stoplight. Yes, I am playing Beethoven's Symphony number 6 or as it is also known, the Pastoral Symphony. It caused at least three young men pounding out foul mouthed lyrics to look at me funny then roll up their windows. Ha! Watch out or I might get all crazy and Wagner on you. Do you really want a little economy car full of small children bearing down on you with Wagner coming from the windows? I didn't think so (or worse Liszt, the unlistenable Hungarian).

I started watching perhaps the best Elizabeth Taylor movie last night, Taming of the Shrew (1967). This one of those perfect adaptations. Directed by Franco Zefferelli it is as exuberant as his Romeo and Juliet, just a year later, was poignant. Richard Burton plays Petruchio to Taylor's Kate and it is the perfect role for him - swaggering and lustful. The sparks fly and Taylor is at once sympathetic and bitchy. The hidden gem here is Natasha Pyne as Bianca, Kate's dutiful quiet sister. All through the performace she simpers, flutters and blushes and manages to convey Kate's temper just under better wraps. By the final scene, Petruchio's infamous wager to the other newly wedded husbands, it comes as no surprise that Bianca has co-opted the britches in that marriage and Lucentio (Michael York) has many years of haplessness before him.

Catch Up

Sorry, I know I have fallen down on the job these last couple of weeks. It isn't that I haven't anything to blog about, it's just that I have been swamped. When we are not at swim class, aikido or church, I am watching my neice, plus the Infant is teething and extra cranky.

Let's see, the Verbalist received a lightweight basketball hoop with suction cups and a nerf ball. Within about 5 seconds of putting it up, he and the Muralist assumed the aspect of the Trailblazers (forever and always my home team no matter where I move). They trash-talked (you'll never get it ha-ha). They jostled for position with flying elbows and shoving shoulders, and in one notable instance The Verbalist began to goal tend - ah, my delicate blooms.

Got the jungle beat back a bit. I mowed the first 6th of the property - weeny it sounds but we're on a pretty parcel of yard. I figure in front of the house is one, the side of the house where the fruit trees are is two. The back yard to the swingset is three while the barn yard is 4,5, and 6 on its sides.

Finally caught up on my news reading and finished writing some fiction and edited another. I just got my hands on a copy of Charles Murray's In Our Hands which looks intriguing. Just finished John Ringo's series beginning with There Will Be Dragons. It is typically Ringo, which is to say seasoned military lion mentors his young protege while everything goes to hell in a handbasket about them. The end was dissatisfying though. I go the feeling that he needed to end it in a hurry and slapped together the end. Maybe there is another book forthcoming but I doubt it.

New post up at Etiquette

Etiquette on responding to Iranian intentions.

A Twix is not a Sprinkle

Saturday morning we got up early. It had been raining for a couple of days and I anticipated standing in the pouring rain while the kids ran around finding chocolate filled eggs. But Lo! The sun came out and instead of rain I stood in weak April sunshine. The wind kicked up from Penn Cove and all the parents huddled with hands around coffee cups waiting for the Soroptomists to give the go sign.

I juggled coffee and camera, switching whenever the camera hand went numb to the radiant heat of the paper cup. At last they released the hounds, so to speak, and dozens of kids plunged into carefully cordoned areas. The Muralist confident that she could find "princess" eggs grabbed a couple, examined them and put them back.

"No, honey!" I cried, "Get as many as you can." That seemed to snap her out of it and she began to pounce on them.

The Verbalist ran around making whooshing sound effects. "Dum dum dum DA!" he cried everytime he grabbed one. When there were no more eggs to be found, we hustled out way out of the crowd and headed home. After a quick lunch the Muralsit and I headed off to a birthday party.

It was a sea of gigling girls dressed as princesses and brides, with wildly rocketing prams and one little boy desperate to hold his own against the tide of his sister's friends. As the birthday girl sat surrounded by her court opening gifts, the Muralist tried to boss. "Open this one, now this, now the one with the Big Ribbon."

They all oohed and aahed over Polly Pockets and Cinderellas and elbow length gloves. Cake was served and the Muralist started to take candies and push them into her frosting. Looking around at a close, if giggly, chum she said, "It needs sprinkles." Her solemn pronouncement recalled to mind and exchange between Homer Simpson and Apu:

"A Twix is not a sprinkle, a Twizzler is not a sprinkle, you can't put candy on there and call it a sprinkle..."

Swimmin' Class II

Swimsuits? 30 dollers

Towels? on sale, 8 dollars

Tuition? two children, 80 dollars

The Verbalist learning it is difficult to talk underwater? Priceless.

Which is mean to laugh at but I did. The kids were learning about jumping in to the pool and being caught by the instructor. The Verbalist talked the whole time, and from where I was sitting in the bleachers I could see his mouth jabbering as he came up. I figure the reason he didn't choke coming up is becase he so rarely pauses for a breath when he talks.

I am waiting though, for when the rubber meets the road, that is when he tries to tell the swim instructors how to do their jobs. The Verbalist is a dictator given his head. Because he is smart, out going and likes to organize things, he thinks he knows how to do everything and everyone will benefit from his wisdom.

Swimming Class

So the Verbalist, Muralist and Niece went to their first swimming class today. They liked it -all except the showers. Niece had to be carried into the shower and cried that the tepid water "Burns! Burns!" Mine looked on like worried Precious Moments moppets but managed to brave the showers without too much demur.

"Are there SPIDERS in there?" rasps the Muralist in a stage whisper.

"No," I assure her. She has instituted Spider Watch ever since we found one in the bathtub before a bath 2 months ago. She was unsettled by the catch and release program, convinced that the spider lurks in any bathing chamber she might enter. It doesn't help that the "Itsy Bitsy Spider" walks up a water spout which she has translated to mean faucet.

The Verbalist thinks he knows how to swim already (Panda taught him) and flied through all the water acclimation exercizes no sweat. The Muralist, a bit disappointed that she could not bring her Ariel the mermaid doll with her in the pool, splashed and had alot of fun but refused to float on her back. She would dunk herself and blow bubbles, but did not like the floating sensation.

Niece was scared and Sis, prepared, went into the pool with her. My kids, always game for a fresh audience talked the whole time to the instructor.

"Can you put your face in the water and blow bubbles?" she asked.

Naturally both of my kids obliged by putting their faces in the water and talking - the byproduct seemed to be sufficient bubbles to please the instructor. They are eager to go back, actually so am I.

Wedding Registry

A extended family member is getting married soon. This is a good thing, he's a real sweet guy, good looking and an over achiever. I asked my sources where they were registered and went and surfed around the gift registry. Now I don't think I am all that different than most folks, so I hope you are all nodding when I say, when I registered for wedding gifts I asked for things I never thought I'd get. What the hey, I'll only ever do it once, and who knows what people will shell out for? In my wildest imaginings, even I never thought people would be willing to spend 6 bucks for a measuring spoon, singular.

Does that mean I'm cheap? Yeah, probably. Somethings are worth spending over inflated sums on, measuring spoons are not it - especially when you can go to Stuff-mart and buy measuring spoons, measuring cups, and a mixing bowl for six bucks. Knives are a different story. A good knife can make a big difference in a meal, but a six dollar teaspoon? Nah.

Palm Sunday

Happy Palm Sunday! Easter-lite as I fondly think of it. A marked increase in church attendence, the Sunday School projects have a Resurrection theme, and the beginning of a sword and sandal movie fest lasting throughout the week, culminating in The Ten Commandments (1956) Easter night. They had the sense to balance Charleton Heston with Yul Breynner, although there is a sense that the overbundance of personality on set would have overwhelmed anything but a Cecil B. DeMille epic. Quick trivia links DeMille also produced 1927's King of King's which starred H.B. Warner as Jesus. Warner later starred as Amminidab in DeMille's second version of The Ten Commandments.

Anyway. I am starting out the viewings with the definative Jesus pic of my Kidhood, Jesus of Nazareth (1977) which I filched from my folks house in anticipation of this week's marathon. Starring Robert Powell as Jesus, Olivia Hussey as Mary, mother of Jesus, and a whole cornucopia of names (Stacey Keach as Barabbas!), Zefferelli's movie completely covered my mental imagery of scripture to the point where I picture Olivia Hussey when I read about Mary - or at least the young Mary. I have got to admit, Maia Morgenstern has wrenched away the older Mary in my mental landscape. Robert Powell was never my picture of Jesus, a blue eyed Savior always jarred me, but he did portray a slightly spooky, immeasurable calm that was a wonder. I could go on and on about the beauty of some of the scenes (Mary visiting Elizabeth comes to mind) but I won't.

Next up is Prince of Egypt the animated retelling of Moses and the Flight from Egypt. Aside from the comic disconnect of Steve Martin and Martin Short as Egyptian priests/magicians, this movie does a great job of portraying a brotherly relationship between Moses and Rameses. It also deserves a viewing if only for they opening song "Deliver Us".

Mid-week is Ben-Hur which I have blogged before and will not go into here.

Friday I'll watch The Passion of the Christ along with about 8 tissue boxes. Jim Caviezel was, and here I hesitate trying to find the right word, compelling as Jesus. Alot of to-do was made over the blood and brutality portrayed but really, to me the hardest parts of the movie were the flashes of his mother, Mary, remembering Jesus as a child or young man.

Saturday will consiste of egg hunts and a last minute birthday party, so I may have to forego Howard Keel (Adam Pontipee himself) as The Big Fisherman (1959), but I will try and fit it in earlier in the week. Sunday concludes with Heston and Breynner trying to outstrut each other.

Hot Cross Buns

Growing up as an Evangelical I have a sneaking admiration for a lot of Catholic traditions that we never practiced. Formost among them all is the Catholic celebrations of Easter, Lent especially. I have practiced a Lentan fast for years now. OK, not a Real Lentan fast, a meal a day and a favored item not always food. Giving up something is good for you, makes you appreciate it. One thing I was never introduced to by my Catholic friends was hot crossed buns. How could they have kept them from me? I knew they existed. I knew from like, 4 years old, from the nursery rhyme.

I first experienced hot crossed buns as an adult working in a bakery. The owners, a Irish man from Boston and his thin, chain smoking, Spanish wife, were lapsed Catholics who were struggling to rediscover the church after family crises. I think they were a bit bemused by an Evangelical thrown into their eclectic crew. I worked part time in the evenings and weekends and later early, early in the morning. On Good Friday they started to churn out pans and pans of hot crossed buns. They sold them hot-from oven to bakery box and sold them as fast as they made them. I wondered that there were so many Catholics in that little town, but then I tasted one and realized there was more than Catholics turning out for these lovlies.

This is not their recipe, but I good one none the less.

Hot Cross Buns

• 1¼ cups of warm water
• ½ cup of soft brown sugar
• 4 teaspoons of dry active yeast
• 4 cups of flour
• 2 tablespoons of milk powder
• 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
• A pinch of ground cloves
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• ½ cup of dried currants
• ¼ cup of lemon zest
  
• 2 oz of butter
• 1 egg

In warm bowl combine water, sugar and yeast, stir gently then set aside until yeast activates and froths. Melt butter and set aside. In electric mixer (with dough hook) sift in flour, spices, milk, dried fruit and salt. Add yeast mixture then melted butter. Mix 8 minutes at a low speed until smooth and elastic. Cover and set aside until doubled in size. While rising, grease two cake pans. Cut 14 buns and place in pans then brush with egg wash. Let rise for another 40 minutes. Then bake at 400 for twenty minutes. While still warm cross with icing.

For the icing I am borrowing Alton Brown's.
Royal Icing

3 ounces pasteurized egg whites
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 cups confectioners' sugar
In large bowl of stand mixer combine the egg whites and vanilla and beat until frothy. Add confectioners' sugar gradually and mix on low speed until sugar is incorporated and mixture is shiny. Turn speed up to high and beat until mixture forms stiff, glossy peaks. This should take approximately 5 to 7 minutes. Add food coloring, if desired. For immediate use, transfer icing to pastry bag or heavy duty storage bag and pipe as desired. If using storage bag, clip corner. Store in airtight container in refrigerator for up to 3 days.

Manners

Theodore Dalrymple has a wonderful little essay on manners in the American Conservative. (ht: Jeff Goldstien) In Minding Our Manners he first elicudates through anecdote two schools of thought about the instillation of manners.

My parents had conflicting views about the nature and origin of good manners. My father took the Romantic view that they were the expression of man’s natural goodness of heart and that they therefore emerged spontaneously—that is, if they emerged at all. If they didn’t, it was because of the social injustice that inhibited or destroyed natural goodness. My mother took the classical view that good manners were a matter of discipline, training, and habit and that goodness of heart would, at least to an extent, follow in their wake.

I, like the author, am most firmly in his mother's camp. I love my children and they have some wonderful qualities, but they are also stubborn and rude if not trained in the most basic of courtesies. Mr. Dalrymple continues:

My father, who was left-wing in everything except his life, believed that manners in my mother’s sense were but etiquette and that in turn etiquette was but a code by which the elite distinguished itself from hoi polloi in order to maintain its economic and cultural dominance. An elaborate code of conduct with arbitrary rules was a mask for sectional self-interest.

No doubt there is sometimes an element of truth in this. My mother taught me that when a gentleman accompanied a lady in the street—and he was to treat all women as ladies—he was always to walk on her outside, nearer the curb. There once was a time when this would have protected her from the splashes created by vehicles passing hurriedly by on muddy roads or perhaps even from the slops that householders emptied from their windows above. But this rationale had long since ceased to be the reason for a gentleman to walk on the outside of a lady.

To this day, I beg my (often exasperated) husband's pardon for eating in front of him if he is not eating. Even though I know he does not mind, that he would encourage me to eat, there is the undeniable force of training that reminds me it is rude to eat in front of someone else without offering a bite and asking their permission. Manners are not as Mr. Dalrymple's father suggests a means of "showing off", although they may certainly be used that way. Rather, a mannerly person is to use manners to make another comfortable, to show courtesy, and to keep discourse in the public square from decending into a barbaric free for all.

The argument goes something like this: formality is etiquette, and etiquette is a manifestation of an unjust, class-ridden, patriarchal society. The rejection of etiquette and the formality it entails is therefore a sign that one is on the side of the angels, that is to say, of the egalitarians. Modern egalitarians, at least in Britain, do not content themselves with the kind of abstract or formal equality before the law that allows any amount of difference in wealth, status, taste, and sensibility; they demand some progress towards equalization of everything, including manners.

...This excess of informality is very undignified and unattractive and results in a society constantly on edge, even in the smallest of interactions.

It is the want of manners that has brought societal discourse to it's present low. Not that manners produce goodness per se. You may be perfectly polite and harbor hatred, but if you are ingrained to think of others before yourself, you might bring about the fruits of charity (by charity I mean benevolent goodwill or love towards others) before the emotion.

This is the same type of habit pattern we are to develop in other areas as Christians. Will Vaus paraphrases CS Lewis' thought in Mere Christianity thus:

The Law (God's law) exists to be transcended, but it can not be transcended until I admit it's claims upon me. Until I reach perfection, the Law is there as a tutor to lead me to Christ. I must try to act as a Christian today whether I feel like it or not. One day, I will always feel like acting as a Christian should.
Christ is the one who helps us transcend the Law. We must in a sense pretend to love God and our neighbor. While we are pretending, Christ comes alongside of us and turns our pretense into a reality.

So the Law of God tells us to not lie, covet, murder or steal from our neighbors. Jesus tells us to love our neighbors as ourselves. Jesus tells us to transcend the Law. So we know what we should be doing, loving our neighbors. Love does not miraculously appear in my heart towards my neighbors, it is striven for and cultivated. One of the ways is to be mannerly. It is perhaps the least part of developing charity towards others, costing little but my own self importance. Manners may cost us little but make a disproportionate impact on who we are well mannered to.

Quotes

Who said these? (MWebster daily puzzle):

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty.

JFK, Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, James Madison

I would remind you that extremeism in defense of liberty is no vice! And let me also remind you moderation in pursuit of justice is no virtue!

JFK, Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, James Madison

I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences of attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.

JFK, Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, James Madison

The Government is like a baby's ailementary canal, with a healthy appitite on one end and no reponsibility at the other.

JFK, Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, James Madison

As a man is said to have a right to his property, he may equally be said to have a property in his rights.

JFK, Ronald Reagan, Barry Goldwater, Thomas Jefferson, Bill Clinton, James Madison

Answer in comments.

Not Here Yet

I have a brand new lawn mower. It's so shiny and new I am scared to touch it. Oh I whipped out the owner's manual and read through it right away. I got it out of the box and assembled it. I even poured oil in the engine, but I didn't put on any of the attatchments. I may have mentioned before my phobia about engines springing to life and throwing out blades like a maniacal Ninja, not this year you say?, well now I've said it this year.

The day is a sunny 64 degrees Fahrenheit (ha! spelled right the first time, neener neener) and the children have been released from their sickbeds for the first time in days. Zoom, running around the yard that will soon be whipped into submission. Up the hill, down the hill. The Dog is herding them. The Muralist rediscovers the acoustical excellence of our front porch - loudly.

The Verbalist trots to the breezeway and grabs a shovel. He jauntily swings it up onto his shoulder (a dead ringer for the Dear Husband) and announces he is off on a hunt for buried treasure. I steer him to the garden plot which is over run with weeds and instruct him to dig there but he soon grows bored with it.

The Verbalist, Muralist and Infant get on bike, trike and scooty-scoot and ride around the driveway. Or, in the case of Infant, rock in place and let out shrill shrieks of impotent rage at the lack of velocity. The Muralist honks her horn everytime she rides by, infuriating the hornless Verbalist. Then they pounce off of bike and run in circles some more, cherry to pear to pine to hydrangea. The Infant is put down on a nap. I hear the water turn on and the dog resumes barking.

As if sensing a disturbance in the force the Muralist carols, "We're just giving the flowers a drink!" Sure they are. Stark Nekkid. Spring sunshine gleaming off blinding white winter skin. I walk, to the faucet. There is no need to run the damage is done, two soaking children and a soaking Dog, smiling her insane doggie smile. I herd children inside and run a hot bath and they are currently warming their bones in melon scented bubbles. The Dog laughing silently lays in the sunshine and soaks in the rays. Summer is not here yet but they are ready for it.

Immigration

There have been alot of scathing rhetoric flying around about immigration with the new bills in Congress. I myself have been quite ambivalent on the issue, on one hand we need to secure our borders and enforce our nations laws, on the other immigration is a cornerstone of this country and it seems wrong to say you can't come here if you are willing to work hard.

The arguements against amnesty make an intellecutal sense -we should not reward illegal behavior and Mexican illegals should not get a free ride simply because they are our nearest neighbor-but they lack emotional sense. Some of the suggestions to stem illegal immigration, criminalizing aid to illegals, such as prenatal care, will be the death of any enforcement bill. I can not think of a single Christian I know who would not defy that law if an illegal with a genuine need were put in their orbit. Aid them then call INS, sure, but not deny aid.

So I read some more and thought some more and then ran across two pieces of information that made me come down against amnesty. First, was in John Hawkins FAQ about illegal immigrants:

11) Is there a crime problem related to illegal immigrants? Absolutely, and in areas where illegals congregate heavily, crimewaves tend to follow. For example, illegals are responsible for much of the serious crime in Los Angeles. Here's Heather Mac Donald on that topic from back in mid-2004:

In Los Angeles, 95% of all outstanding warrants for homicide target illegal aliens, and over 60% of all outstanding felony warrants. Illegal aliens, and immigrants generally, are a major, and unacknowledged, driver of gang crime.

Moreover, according to Jim Kouri, the vice-president of the National Association of Chiefs of Police:

"It's widely been reported that illegal aliens comprise upwards of 27 percent of the US prison and jail population."

Make no mistake about it: illegal aliens are responsible for a very significant percentage of the rape, murder, robbery, and mayhem that occurs in the United States.

That is a stunning figure. The second is an op-ed piece in the Richmond Times-Dispatch which quotes an email from La Raza the self styled, largest national Latino civil rights and advocacy organization in the United States.

The e-mail refers to congressional legislation that would, among other things, (a) provide grants to immigrants taking English classes, (b) permit those who gain English proficiency to apply for citizenship one year early, and (c) provide grants to groups offering instruction in U.S. civics and American history. These ideas hardly seem provocative; learning English and American civics used to be something immigrants did enthusiastically.

The e-mail about the bill, however, warns that "while it doesn't overtly mention assimilation, it is very strong on the patriotism and traditional American values language in a way which is potentially dangerous to our communities."

La Raza should explain why patriotism and American values might be dangerous to people coming to America presumably to partake of America's blessings. And protesters bearing the flags of other nations in demonstrations demanding their right to stay here should explain why -- if their former country is so wonderful -- they ever left.

This op-ed is also clever enough to make the distinction between Saint Paddy's day flag waving and the sort that went on at the rallies this last week.

This might be worth no more notice or con- cern than the kilts and bagpipes in St. Patrick's Day parades, were it not for the qualitative difference involved. Modern American St. Patrick's Day celebrations have as much to do with Irish nationalism as the Easter Bunny has to do with the resurrection. What's more, the participants are not -- unlike recent immigrant rallies hotly demanding special dispensation to break U.S. laws.

Now, I have been known to attend in the local Highland Games and I can tell you that nothing rouses the sentiment of the auld country than the authentic Scottish gyros sandwiches they sell there. One thing you also find is what Island Passage calls "full throated love of country".

There Is No Butter In Hell

"You know what it's like when you burn your hand, taking a cake out of the oven, or lighting one of them godless cigarettes? And it stings with a fearful pain, aye? And you run to clap a bit of butter on it to take the pain away, aye? Well, I'll tell ye, there'll be no butter in hell," warns Amos Starkadder (Sir Ian McKellan) in Cold Comfort Farm (1995). Actually that's the end of a long and hilarious tirade about the evils of the world leading to damnation. How can that possibly be funny? Because by the time you reach the tirade you are so immersed in the over the top satire it is icing on the cake. Cold Comfort Farm is our movie of the week.

Kate Beckinsale stars as Flora Poste (Robert Poste's child as she is alternately addressed) an orphan from London who is left with an income of 100 pounds a year. Necessity drives Flora to live with distant relatives a la Dickens and Oh! what a morbid Dickensian house she falls into. From preacher Amos to demanding recluse (an family matriarch) Ada Doom to dimwitted eye-candy Seth (Rufus Sewell) Flora plows headlong into cliche. Flora is far from the wilting, accepting heroine that is so particularly irksome from the Brontes. Instead, Flora is the embodiment of Austen's practicality meeting PG Wodehouse's comic eccentrics.

Flora is very aware of her Austen like leanings and the Dickensian surroundings. She points at it all the while and is in fact an aspiring writer. Her horrible descriptions (it was winter. The grimmest hour of the darkest day of the year. The Golden Orb had almost disappeared behind the interlacing fingers of the hawthorn.), a intentionally provacative of the worst Victorian lingual excesses. She is a charming snob who is invariably correct, in the end Flora is triumphant.

Spring Colds

The Verbalist has been suffering from a combination allergy and spring cold onset. I have been suffering from the Verbalist. The Muralist brushed through it sniffles one day, 16 oz of apple juice spiked with cold medicine contributing to an 18 hour sleep and she was fine. The Verbalist is a morning kid. He awakes at 6 am and WILL NOT sleep longer. So he suffers and then I do.

In a stab of self preservation I abandoned him to his father today and went shopping with the Muralist. A cliche I know, but it worked. Well, that and Chinese food therapy. More tommorrow.