tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-50811220546917361882011-10-10T17:12:43.348-07:00Men bow down to the lord of bread first and foremost. dh lawrenceStormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.comBlogger1531100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-29156768492204624442011-07-02T05:03:00.000-07:002011-07-02T05:03:10.161-07:00

Perhaps this is the only real virtue of the human: restraint. I think I've used this from Conrad before but it's worth it. From Heart of Darkness (which as you may recall describes the abuses of colonial expansion, ie, lack of restraint by the White Europeans). Recall it's the uncivilized cannibals who are displaying restraint. But, to hammer the fine points...the humans in charge of global

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-71874609372614307772011-07-01T09:13:00.000-07:002011-07-01T09:13:06.972-07:00

Imagine that we are always and only contextual. It's easy enough to talk about ourselves as beings who often have good and bad things happen to us as organic creatures. An illness that may kill us is bad; apparent health is good. Certain bacteria promote healthy operations within the system that is our body; others promote disease, death, decay. This seems "bad". However, these are simply

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-17577718774533670582011-04-05T10:00:00.000-07:002011-04-05T10:00:42.677-07:00

But it’s generally true that abroad they have more interesting taste in American poetry than in the U.S. French anthologies of American poetry are better than the American ones. When I talk to Brazilian or Danish poets, they ask me about Michael Palmer or Rosmarie Waldrop or Robert Creeley. They’ve never heard of Stephen Dunn or Mary Oliver or Alan Dugan or some prizewinner. In countries where

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-52722538725610658532011-04-05T06:47:00.000-07:002011-04-05T06:47:04.707-07:00

I think I've posted this somewhere before. I would encourage you to spend an hour with Robert Harrison (whose books are fantastic mini-libraries, so full of ideas) and Rush Rehm, a Classical Scholar, actor and director (of classical works). I have listened to this at least 4 times in full and more even still in pieces. You will have to be patient, but if you don't have a full hour start in at

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-39855559226052133902011-04-04T05:26:00.000-07:002011-04-04T05:26:56.960-07:00

Okay, here's something that makes sense to me...what about you? All forms of government beyond the city level--beyond the very local--are corrupt. (Likely they are also corrupt locally, but there is a real face-to-face opportunity to call this out and make changes.) They are corrupt in any number of ways...the systems themselves have been "re-engineered" to serve a different purpose than what

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-27399408176353496562011-03-31T07:01:00.000-07:002011-03-31T07:01:29.378-07:00

I am almost utterly against violence...I say almost because I know there are potential circumstances wherein I would react with violence. But my strong sense is that this violence would be "momentous" and personally consequential to my vitality and I would extend this to others in proximity to me who are meaningful to me. For me, violence must be essentially "of the moment". To be clear--I

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-1121754660238104412011-03-23T06:42:00.000-07:002011-03-23T06:43:31.899-07:00

Please just take some time to think about how these definitions work in the compass of this same word. Garnishment: –noun 1. Law. a. a warning, served on a third party to hold, subject to the court's direction, money or property belonging to a debtor who is being sued by a creditor. b. a summons to a third party to appear in litigation pending between a creditor and debtor. 2. adornment or

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-11924266634767628962011-03-19T05:28:00.000-07:002011-03-19T05:28:07.909-07:00

Lawrence, I would admit, at least in many of the essays I've read, has a totalitarian mind; he seems to believe that humanity needs authority. This is not an odd idea of course. And in truth, the democracy of the USA is authoritarian. Perhaps only Athenian democracy--while not inclusive of the whole, no votes for women for example--really was truly a type of "lottery" government of the people

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-71966661603498707932011-03-18T12:08:00.000-07:002011-03-18T12:08:59.890-07:00

Emerson asks, in 1844, in his essay "Experience", "Where do we find ourselves?" In a series of which we do not know the extremes, and believe that it has none. We wake and find ourselves on a stair; there are stairs below us, which we seem to have ascended; there are stairs above us, many a one, which go upward and out of sight. But the Genius which, according to the old belief, stands at the

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-66489121264727799412011-03-17T08:59:00.000-07:002011-03-17T08:59:50.427-07:00

I used this quote at the beginning of the month...but it fits nicely with the credit sequence on offer in The Other Guys. When the ordinary American hears of cases of injustice he begins to pooh-pooh and minimize and tone down the thing, and breed excuses from his general fund of optimism and respect for expediency. "It's understandable from the point of view of the parties interested"--but

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-73882424350109894242011-03-16T06:07:00.000-07:002011-03-16T06:07:03.477-07:00

A friend, after reading the post on The Greatest Love, wondered if it was comparable in "philosophy" to Sinatra's "My Way" (written by Paul Anka, and recording by him as well almost immediately after Sinatra recorded it). It's one of my least favorite songs ever and so I can hardly muster the energy to say anything about it. Recorded in 1969, written in 1968, and according to the Wikipedia page

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-85119042585632207312011-03-15T08:51:00.000-07:002011-03-15T08:51:00.563-07:00

A friend shared this on the FB...spend the 10 minutes on it and return here. These are my facebook comments--sue me for recycling: In the end it's a VERY TALL order for change as it requires a dissociation from the idea of education to a purpose like work. One can say it has a purpose and if you were in ancient Greece you'd call it happiness (but not in a facile sense)--eudaimonia --which is

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-60072919486166029912011-03-12T05:20:00.000-08:002011-03-12T05:20:52.338-08:00

I am very serious about this. And maybe all those damn liberal institutions are right to study pop culture...BUT they should study it not as a kind of entertainment but rather as a diagnostic for prognoses; it should be studied in political and moral philosophy courses because, let's face it, there is not philosopher that rules our world nor even one that informs our world leaders (unless we

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-13020792122923501312011-03-11T05:15:00.000-08:002011-03-11T05:15:45.483-08:00

Here's the thing. A gun is regressive. And belief that guns are essential and offer you recourse to real protection is erroneous. I will not convince you of this. A gun is a tool of death and as such stands against hope which I believe is what "progress" (as defined as "betterment") represents. A common defense: guns don't kill people, people kill people. This is specious of course and has

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-82502734510936005802011-03-10T12:51:00.000-08:002011-03-10T12:51:27.035-08:00

So, I was thinking, and have been thinking for some time, that the eyes are the true tyrants of our minds and really of our worldly conceptions. I thought, the blind cannot see color and so there is no difference but that which we discover by other senses. Are the other senses more liberal? I thought then of that parable of the blind man and the elephant and realized that blindness is

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-51679998933398105812011-03-09T13:45:00.000-08:002011-03-09T13:45:48.046-08:00

People doing people things top of the food chain things lacking meaning things making meaning (predator where now your prey) signifying cant in- significant caged flesh cornered marrowless vigorous taming things

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-72409163538747394252011-03-09T04:48:00.000-08:002011-03-09T04:55:04.547-08:00

Two from A.R. Ammons that might work to focus our thinking after yesterday's post: the first "World", seems a thumbnail ecology (yet inclusive of all); the second, "Peak", diagnoses our dilemma as human mind within that ecology of "actual trees" and "high tides"--humans desire a place/time "beyond" the world in the poem "World" and the result...well, the final two lines could not be a more

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-287407805300295992011-03-08T09:20:00.000-08:002011-03-08T09:20:55.675-08:00

I can't think out of this particular box...ready? Part IThe (human) Self (Mind and Representation) is outside of biology while being contained by biology. The Self is a creation of mind as receptive organ. The Self is an individual in space and time--local and family "geography". The Self as Ego requires defining characteristics. The "I am" is not enough. The "what" is necessary. The Self

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-166246475529531612011-03-06T06:01:00.000-08:002011-03-06T06:01:32.149-08:00

Dennis Hartley reviews movies at Hullabaloo on Saturday Nights. This time he's opined on The Adjustment Bureau--the latest adaptation of a Philip K. Dick story (did that guy know how much movies would use him? Likely.)--starring Jason Bourne. He opens by classifying this as "a post-film noir, contemporary film subgenre that I like to call Guys with Fedoras. A Guys with Fedoras film is usually

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-84885152992104110662011-03-05T04:02:00.000-08:002011-03-05T04:02:24.373-08:00

PFC Manning was forced to strip naked in his cell again last night. As with the previous evening, Quantico Brig guards required him to surrender all of his clothing. PFC Manning then walked back to his bed, and spent the next seven hours in humiliation. The decision to require him to be stripped of all clothing was made by the Brig commander, Chief Warrant Officer-2 Denise Barnes ["Barnes

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-13317587493914853582011-03-04T12:05:00.000-08:002011-03-04T12:05:50.725-08:00

Musician Gould: To me the ideal audience-to-artist relationship... is a one-to-zero relationship. That's the moral objection. Interviewer Gould: Run that by me again? MG: First l'm not at all happy with words like "public" and "artist"... or the hierarchical implications of that kind of terminology. The artist should be granted anonymity. He should be permitted to operate in secret as it were.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-26912906577544652312011-03-04T06:59:00.000-08:002011-03-04T06:59:40.291-08:00

The Leaders of the Crowd They must to keep their certainty accuse All that are different of a base intent; Pull down established honour; hawk for news Whatever their loose fantasy invent And murmur it with bated breath, as though The abounding gutter had been Helicon Or calumny a song. How can they know Truth flourishes where the student's lamp has shone, And there alone, that have no Solitude?

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-79711310935744248142011-03-03T13:30:00.000-08:002011-03-03T15:56:28.616-08:00

"Perchance, when, in the course of ages, American liberty has become a fiction of the past,--as it is to some extent a fiction of the present,--the poets of the world will be inspired by American mythology." HDT"And in this country one sees that there is always margin enough in the statute for a liberal judge to read one way and a servile judge another." RWE[I'll admit to a slight grin as I

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-35801186315038712202011-03-03T10:03:00.000-08:002011-03-03T10:13:07.473-08:00

Here is the "Coda" to Auden's "Archaeology"--I hope you can find the time to read it all.From Archaeologyone moral, at least, may be drawn,to wit, that allour school text-books lie.What they call Historyis nothing to vaunt of,being made, as it is,by the criminal in us:goodness is timeless.But perhaps this too is just as applicable (and better known) from "September 1, 1939"I and the public

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-13105823711267779592011-03-03T03:56:00.000-08:002011-03-03T06:22:11.798-08:00

This is funny, but deadly serious.Here is the Atlantic piece he referenced: The Rise of the New Global Elite.Here's a truth, early in the piece, as to how we managed to "turn the other cheek" as poor folk to allow the rich to "do their thing."Before the recession, it was relatively easy to ignore this concentration of wealth among an elite few. The wondrous inventions of the modern economy—Google

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-75767168306295062862011-03-02T13:17:00.001-08:002011-03-02T13:32:22.609-08:00

I spent a few minutes (or more) with this little bit from Gertrude Stein and I think it's apropos to our robber baron culture. We lionize the Greed of Wall Street cuz goddam if I had the opportunity I'd keep those billions too...and you'd shittin' hate me for it but holy jesus want to be in my place.Anyway, not too far from my writing desk, geographically speaking, is a museum dedicated to John

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-36940745341183381722011-03-02T04:30:00.000-08:002011-03-02T05:41:24.368-08:00

The following is excerpted from a review by Douglas Crase of James Schuyler's Collected Poems. I thought it pertinent to our recent discussions about the inferiority complex fostered by Facebook as well as the "informational thuggery" of our "news" and entertainment (the melding of the two skewered nicely by Jon Stewart recently), and, well, just the irreality of our digital life. When Jimmy

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-64088026191903864162011-03-01T11:28:00.000-08:002011-03-01T12:02:00.228-08:00

Charles Koch spouting nonsense in the WSJ today:Years of tremendous overspending by federal, state and local governments have brought us face-to-face with an economic crisis. Federal spending will total at least $3.8 trillion this year—double what it was 10 years ago. And unlike in 2001, when there was a small federal surplus, this year's projected budget deficit is more than $1.6 trillion. I'm

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-62702865094045538732011-03-01T10:50:00.001-08:002011-03-01T10:57:09.231-08:00

A little something to go with the James quote yesterday about our national disease--a description of a symptom:Tom Tomorrow

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-56871969324000119162011-03-01T09:09:00.000-08:002011-03-01T09:24:30.133-08:00

Life is a selection, no more. The work of the gardener is simply to destroy this weed, or that shrub, or that tree, & leave this other to grow. The library is gradually made inestimable by taking out from the superabounding mass of books all but the best. The palace is a selection of materials; its architecture, a selection of the best effects. Things collect very fast of themselves; the

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-43581988557530813902011-02-28T16:56:00.000-08:002011-02-28T19:07:24.779-08:00

When the ordinary American hears of cases of injustice he begins to pooh-pooh and minimize and tone down the thing, and breed excuses from his general fund of optimism and respect for expediency. "It's understandable from the point of view of the parties interested"--but understandable in onlooking citizens only as a symptom of the moral flabbiness born of the exclusive worship of the

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-2714643018414858862011-02-28T06:46:00.000-08:002011-02-28T08:48:56.914-08:00

Then Advent of PanurgeThere coming over Charaton BridgeLook do you see the man who is poor but rich.What do you wish; and where do you go;Who are you; where are you from:will you tell me your name?Rest awhile; call me your friend.Please stay with me I'd like to help.Then he said,How can I speak when I'm dry and mythroat is burning. So bring me aidand I'll answer your doubts.Friend in need I'd

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-79236555463346377542011-02-28T03:56:00.000-08:002011-02-28T04:07:44.655-08:00

Greenwald posts on the coordinated attack on the Hastings article in Rolling Stone about the military "considering" the use of psy-op techniques on congressional delegations "in country" to encourage continued support and funding. Basically the military and the compliant lapdogs in our national media are attacking the author, Michael Hastings, Rolling Stone, and the officer who "blew the whistle

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-38991895701257856122011-02-27T10:58:00.000-08:002011-02-27T11:31:35.137-08:00

Congratulations, you poor!God's domain belongs to you.Congratulations, you hungry!You will have a feast.Congratulations, you who weep now!You will laugh.(Jesus Seminar, "verifiable" beatitudes)After seeing the "Facebook Movie" (I like to call it this as I assume the actual title, The Social Network, was chosen more for legal reasons than the verisimilar or aesthetic) I have decided that the meek

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-56588467004275270152011-02-25T18:13:00.000-08:002011-02-25T18:19:42.293-08:00

Fragments Of A Lost Gnostic Poem Of The Twelfth CenturyFound a family, build a state,The pledged event is still the same:Matter in end will never abateHis ancient brutal claim.Indolence is heaven’s ally here,And energy the child of hell:The Good Man pouring from his pitcher clearBut brims the poisoned well.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-73025046690538054142011-02-25T03:39:00.000-08:002011-02-25T09:39:59.159-08:00

I am continually disturbed by the human world as it has evolved a kind of systematic concatenation of ever and ever more abusive and rapacious ideologies in which the Powerful can now easily and readily marshal and inject sophisticated (and not so sophisticated) strategies of persuasion into every part of our daily living: from industrial food and religious brotherhood to military invasion and

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-13046445554231565302011-02-23T12:51:00.000-08:002011-02-23T13:09:04.490-08:00

From Paul Zweig's The Heresy of Self-Love:The Pax Romana had made the Empire into what Gibbon described as a vast prison, with no escape for those who resisted its authority. It was a prison as vast as the world; and this is recognized in the religious terminology of the Neoplatonists, the Christians, and especially the Gnostics, for whom "this world" was literally a prison, enclosing each

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-44484021161557887212011-02-23T10:54:00.000-08:002011-02-23T11:20:42.400-08:00

A little more bouncing off the Krugman piece. But first, perhaps you'll recall this from a piece by Simon Johnson in the Atlantic back in May of 2009 called The Quiet Coup (he was on Moyers too--worth it):But inevitably, emerging-market oligarchs get carried away; they waste money and build massive business empires on a mountain of debt. Local banks, sometimes pressured by the government, become

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-66996468953949589492011-02-23T09:55:00.000-08:002011-02-23T10:41:08.482-08:00

Krugman today on Wisconsin:In principle, every American citizen has an equal say in our political process. In practice, of course, some of us are more equal than others. Billionaires can field armies of lobbyists; they can finance think tanks that put the desired spin on policy issues; they can funnel cash to politicians with sympathetic views (as the Koch brothers did in the case of Mr. Walker).

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-66121868763999171822011-02-23T07:06:00.000-08:002011-02-23T07:48:10.306-08:00

Last year I called attention to a hate-video (that has been removed from the Youtubes) made by members of the Westboro Baptist Church of Topeka, KS.Now, it looks like they might have drawn too much attention to their hate--or at least one can hope. Open Letter to Westboro Baptist ChurchAN OPEN LETTER FROM ANONYMOUSFebruary 16, 2011TO THE CONGREGANTS OF WESTBORO BAPTIST CHURCH: We, the

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-38046703189402032412011-02-22T12:56:00.000-08:002011-02-22T15:25:38.985-08:00

Ehem...I am probably too easily bugged by things like this. But, hey...that's what a blog is for, right? To be petty when one gets the urge--to purge the bile that builds whenever one encounters occasional pieces in our notable newspapers, journals and magazines: pieces of writing, often fluff, but sometimes "serious" opinion calls attention to the author of the piece rather than what is being

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-20779986116168693632011-02-20T05:00:00.001-08:002011-02-20T05:36:20.447-08:00

From a Facebook post on a Friend's wall (a degree of digital separation) that I vampirically sucked out to offer here, via this digital medium.I am in a English/linguistics class right now about slang, and one of our textbooks, written by the professor, is about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It's called Slayer Slang: A Buffy the Vampire Slayer Lexicon. I thought about you and your birthday party one

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-42499903719013447212011-02-17T06:38:00.000-08:002011-02-17T06:44:31.527-08:00

I know my friends Meredith and Dimitri are missing the Melville fix!From Chapter 118, The Quadrant, Ahab examining a piece of technology:Then gazing at his quadrant, and handling, one after the other, itsnumerous cabalistical contrivances, he pondered again, and muttered:"Foolish toy! babies'plaything of haughty Admirals, and Commodores,and Captains; the world brags of thee, of thy cunning and

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-23523898367547249252011-02-17T03:48:00.000-08:002011-02-17T05:14:03.696-08:00

Besides being a pretty good Al Pacino movie, the post title, as you know, comes from the "Pledge of Allegiance". Isn't it funny how you grow up with these things and have no real idea of their inculcating symbolic intention...a flag and allegiance to it. Odd, right, pledging loyalty to an abstraction. That's not the point though: with the "democratic" challenges to ruling authority in Egypt

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-84023164326917563902011-02-14T12:55:00.000-08:002011-02-15T04:01:11.959-08:00

I'm going to have to admit that I never really understood the phrase "to play fast and loose". I mean I understood it as a phrase and not in its parts. It means to be deceitful, primarily, or unreliable. But I simply thought one played "fast" in a manner akin to "fast cars and loose..." well, you know (hey, what do you want from a guy who thought ELO sang about "space magic" rather than "

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-14067285988498352602011-02-13T04:44:00.000-08:002011-02-13T08:11:45.344-08:00

The community is inhuman, and less than human. It becomes at last the most dangerous because bloodless and insentient tyrant. for a long time, even a democracy like the American or the Swiss will answer to the call of a hero, who is somewhat of a true aristocrat: like Lincoln: so strong is the aristocratic instinct in man. But he willingness to give the response to the heroic, the true

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-55302551015772664702011-02-12T03:37:00.000-08:002011-02-12T04:24:39.653-08:00

Perhaps this is why I return to certain books over and over and have given up on many others. Now a book lives as long as it's unfathomed. Once it is fathomed it dies at once...once it is known, and its meaning fixed or established it is dead. A book only lives while it has power to move us, and move us differently; so long as we find it different every time we read it. Owing to the flood of

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-35849021331981515472011-02-11T05:18:00.001-08:002011-02-11T05:29:15.729-08:00

Apparently I have been channeling D. H. Lawrence (could be worse, I guess)....Americans refuse everything explicit and always put up a sort of double meaning. they revel in subterfuge. They prefer their truth safely swaddled in an ark of bulrushes, and deposited among he reeds until some friendly Egyptian princess comes to rescue the babe...Now listen to me, don't listen to him. He'll tell you

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-88328006773575660582011-02-10T04:03:00.000-08:002011-02-10T15:13:15.437-08:00

Stories are entertainment to us, almost invariably ONLY entertainment. Our books--published in enormous numbers as only America (and England, our mother) can--have little depth and significance...they are, after all, now written by folks who have been raised with television and video games which seems to have predicated the resurgence of the comic book in "long form" (perhaps a separate post is

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-47952301596794752622011-02-08T16:27:00.000-08:002011-02-08T16:40:44.677-08:00

The Pequod has killed a whale and is setting about the business of taking strips of blubber from around the carcass (something akin to peeling around an orange). Qeequeg is the harpooneer to whom Ishmael is referring:But in very many cases, circumstances require that the harpooneer shall remain on the whale till the whole tensing or stripping operation is concluded. The whale, be it observed,

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-88125822613848393652011-02-08T07:43:00.000-08:002011-02-08T10:13:12.981-08:00

There's a most doleful and most mocking funeral! The sea-vultures all in pious mourning, the air-sharks all punctiliously in black or speckled. In life but few of them would have helped the whale, I ween, if peradventure he had needed it; but upon the banquet of his funeral they most piously do pounce. Oh, horrible vulturism of earth! from which not the mightiest whale is free.Nor is this the end

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-30099314531613684532011-02-07T06:11:00.000-08:002011-02-07T06:25:34.168-08:00

Again: as the profound calm which only apparently precedes and prophesies of the storm, is perhaps more awful than the storm itself; for, indeed, the calm is but the wrapper and envelope of the storm; and contains it in itself, as the seemingly harmless rifle holds the fatal powder, and the ball, and the explosion; so the graceful repose of the line, as it silently serpentines about the oarsmen

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-87188044469278949192011-02-04T13:25:00.000-08:002011-02-05T03:43:00.255-08:00

It is a complex weave. The founding and history of this White Xtian land.Often the only question that seems to matter to me is "why"--but I tend to disbelieve the narrative on offer if there seems an evasion of the motivating spleen.The more I read about our Puritan heritage the more I am struck by a severe and revealing continuity of motivation evident in our current White Xtian land.Obviously

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-20884355029845279582011-02-04T06:42:00.000-08:002011-02-04T08:43:02.557-08:00

Found this today while looking for something else. Seems to me to be glimpse into our small-minded denizens of this world. Yesterday I posted on FB a blog article about HR3, a bill that "is actually an attempt to shut down abortion coverage through all private insurance, including employer-provided insurance, which means that it’s beyond even the dreadful Stupak-Pitts amendment/executive order.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-41273790091622674152011-01-31T08:17:00.000-08:002011-01-31T17:24:06.869-08:00

The world is wrapped up tight within us. And yet towards externalities are we driven--do we drive ourselves. Imagination sets us moving; ambition paves the way; we set our sites and embark.Imagination is thinking is seeing. Seeing is believing (though Thomas, wisely, doubts). Doubting is seeing something else.If so, what is the imagined self?Melville's Ishmael, in the chapter Nightgown: "

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-37282892519688293032011-01-29T04:06:00.000-08:002011-01-29T05:09:26.677-08:00

My friend Marc over at Disquiet reviewed Doug Rushkoff's recent book about technology, Program or Be Programmed: Ten Commands for a Digital Age, while proscribing its dictates into a "guide" for musicians in the technological age. That review is linked below.Rushkoff's product page (link below) says this:The debate over whether the Net is good or bad for us fills the airwaves and the blogosphere

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-11768910088760870432011-01-28T07:59:00.000-08:002011-01-28T16:56:49.433-08:00

The post yesterday asked you to sit down and spend an hour with Chris Hedges. This is asking a lot, an hour is not cheap in this world and Hedges can make one sad.But I hope you did it. Anyway, aside from the fact that one comes away feeling betrayed by this country's leaders, pretty much all of them, I think there were two very important lessons for me.1. Propaganda is our daily discourse.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-25382267204915914932011-01-27T08:10:00.001-08:002011-01-27T12:56:08.363-08:00

**Update--An Affirming FlameChris Hedges speaking at the University of Toronto--The Death of the Liberal Class. This is not about our "divisive" politics and about Left and Right...it's about our current despair--we are judged only on our monetary value (we are all commodities). "A mafia economic system." Exploiting both human beings and the natural world until exhaustion and collapse..."I

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-55784649145942640012011-01-26T11:32:00.000-08:002011-01-26T11:36:05.495-08:00

Punctuating my earlier post Unquiet Desperation is this from an FB friend's post today:Indoor playground + 5 kids + French fries + wifi = everyone happy :) — This with some kind of locator "app" indicating "at Burger King".Lord knows I've been there, but as Gertie said, there is no there there.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-735764515819141692011-01-26T06:31:00.000-08:002011-01-26T07:18:04.855-08:00

Inveighing against this modern conception of "world" must be my calling (as a digital friend might say of me...)But see the world around you...what has your attention? What has your interest? What do you spend your money on outside your necessities? I'll leave you to that for the moment but ask you to come back to it on your own.We propose to be expansionist thinkers--we extend our eyesight as

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-75079490064699027082011-01-26T04:00:00.000-08:002011-01-26T04:21:49.985-08:00

Okay, over at the Partially Examined Life there's a little back and forth about the role of "technology" in creating "less work" and how we can reduce work without reducing our current capacities to enjoy the fruits of our technological lives. You can imagine my response to this. There's a comment string there that's fairly long and I had just written a book to post as a reply but I decided to

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-20466019270225199512011-01-25T15:12:00.000-08:002011-01-25T15:18:36.575-08:00

From Charles Olson's "Call Me Ishmael":"Americans still fancy themselves such democrats. But their triumphs are of the machine. It is the only master of space the average person ever knows, oxwheel to piston, muscle to jet. It gives trajectory.To Melville it was not the will to be free but the will to overwhelm nature that lies at the bottom of us as individuals and as a people."

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-84772116686330053222011-01-24T08:54:00.000-08:002011-01-24T11:38:41.396-08:00

Believe it or not, while reading the piece discussed below on "Situationalism" and Virtue Ethics I thought of that abominable recent flick The Green Hornet (avoid at all costs). I'll explain why...in due course.In the Summer 2009 (link below) issue of Daedalus (unearthed happenstantially out of a box recently-unpacked in search of a Spore computer game disc) is an essay by Kwame Appiah

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-8280770486000748282011-01-23T05:59:00.000-08:002011-01-23T06:29:00.079-08:00

The Mind's Limitations Are Its FreedomWilliam BronkThe mind has a power which is unusablewhich is its real power. What else but the mindsenses the final uselessness of the mind?How foolish we were, how smaller than what we are, were we to believe what the mind makes of what it meets. Whatever the mind makes is not.You know there are always messages we find--in bed, on the street or anywhere,

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-15690521862596743442011-01-22T03:49:00.000-08:002011-01-22T04:02:09.418-08:00

This is an interesting way to think about the sciences/technology, from The Tragic Sense of Life (available at Project Gutenberg), as "fundamentally a matter of economics":"And, though they concern us so greatly, and are, indeed, indispensablefor our life and thought, the sciences are in a certain sense moreforeign to us than philosophy. They fulfil a more objective end--that isto say, an end

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-57029222021690455252011-01-21T11:24:00.000-08:002011-01-21T11:27:10.309-08:00

From Miguel de Unamuno's Tragic Sense of Life: "It is not usually our ideas that make us optimists or pessimists, but it is our optimism or our pessimism, of physiological or perhaps pathological origin, as much the one as the other, that makes our ideas. Man is said to be a reasoning animal. I do not know why he has not been defined as an affective or feeling animal. Perhaps that which

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-38789632028393721812011-01-20T05:42:00.000-08:002011-01-20T06:32:00.613-08:00

In the wake of violence; in the wake of violent rhetoric; in the wake of endless senseless inanities debating the "tenor" of that very debate; in the wake of damaging political posturing; in the wake of calls for sectarianism and special dispensations for true believers...we cast our minds to history to find we've been diagnosed and given direction long ago. "...it is the corruptors of religion

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-23356475759405782832011-01-19T04:50:00.000-08:002011-01-19T05:15:15.640-08:00

A friend posted this news item on a speech given by the Gov of Alabama on his inauguration day which was also the day of our national recognition of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s life and work.This is something he said in the speech:So anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I’m telling you, you’re not my brother and you’re not my sister, and I want to be your

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-11423120913969240222011-01-18T06:43:00.000-08:002011-01-18T07:32:41.499-08:00

**Update BelowThis will likely make me no friends, and especially not at Rick Perlstein's FB page. But, here is what was posted this morning and what I posted in response...I welcome any assistance in clarifying my own thinking and King's as I just don't know enough about it except for speeches that indeed are inspirational...but I'm not sure what else they are.So, Perlstein posts this:Realizing

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-62189096143344803662011-01-18T04:43:00.000-08:002011-01-18T04:53:13.394-08:00

I'm sure this is no surprise to you. I'm fairly convinced that though nearly 400 years have passed since the real founding of America (not the United States thereof) we have really not come very far from our "origins". In any event, a kind of placeholder thought from Soren K. in his Journals:Even now, in 1848, it certainly looks as though politics were everything; but it will be seen that the

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-90296764699875393532011-01-16T04:36:00.000-08:002011-01-16T11:37:05.877-08:00

Update Below**I, like every other person lately, have been talking about violence, guns, hate speech, religious, racial and political tribalism; these are things I stand in opposition to. And I know that makes me different than many folks out there. If you want a gun, use guns, own guns you also then condone, encourage, and likely propagate violence. Violence is violence, be it against humans

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-70486283940483527362011-01-15T04:45:00.000-08:002011-01-15T05:08:20.397-08:00

I think that if the Bible is the template to much of humanity's thinking regarding morality and philosophy then we will never get out of the duality (Good and Evil) and tribalism ("my people", children of Abraham) found there. It's interesting that a book "founded" on a creation myth for ALL creatures with "man" being Yahweh's most beloved work devolved so quickly into a story of "one" family.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-73348721866603051522011-01-14T10:28:00.000-08:002011-01-14T10:34:19.146-08:00

You know, regarding the previous post, I thought of the choice to vote for someone of your race, ideology, party as a statement of "positive" choice (not meaning "good"); but really I think, though we understand the the equation that choosing one thing leaves out other things, that in American we vote in negative terms...AGAINST things.From our true founder, Emerson:"Here's for the plain old Adam

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-364348204894971562011-01-14T09:07:00.000-08:002011-01-14T09:36:11.301-08:00

Just now at Hullabaloo.In my email this morning: A very good question? How come Jews can vote for Jews, Blacks can vote for Blacks, Latinos can vote for Latinos and Muslims can vote for Muslims, but if a White Christian votes for a White Christian, this person is Anti-Semitic or Racists? Well, Why? WAKE-UP!!!!So, can we answer this question in a way that makes sense to the questioner

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-25273712255577296332011-01-14T05:03:00.001-08:002011-01-14T07:25:09.367-08:00

Okay, um...this is one of the top Right Wing blogs and this is the "mainstream" conservative "voice" in blogging (according to the "Dear Leader": RedState is my full time job. It is the largest right of center blogging community on the internet. It's also the most widely read right of center blog on Capitol Hill and most quoted right of center blog in the media.This fella believes there are crazy

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-58035463468834219912011-01-13T03:43:00.000-08:002011-01-13T09:22:46.616-08:00

**Update belowIt's too easy to argue with so much intensity about this object and not really think much about it. Or rather be open to thinking about it without a knee-jerk "political" response or "defensive" response. I think I mean defensive there in both ways.For some reason I've begun to think that really, everyone, EVERYONE, feels that a gun is an error of the human imagination. Many

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-50425002878257093272011-01-12T06:36:00.000-08:002011-01-12T07:03:32.794-08:00

In this world where work is meaningless and where we try to infuse our being with such by posting things on blogs and the twit-face the Me-tube in order to (for this seeking soul, at least) connect and in that connection "make" meaning "between us" I continue to encounter situations that confuse my understanding.Greenwald today offers an example of the "for-hire" corporate spokesman. (You can

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-81370334850173065822011-01-11T07:39:00.000-08:002011-01-11T08:10:53.387-08:00

On the heels of my previous post it seems important to connect the dissipation of care and civility and the benefits of a small life with the horrifying act in Tucson. It's worth wondering if these kinds of acts happen "only" on the larger stage of careless passions; emotions with no anchor and no outlet.I think very simply we are lost because we are "big" as a nation, as states and in cities...

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-47875219961158001432011-01-11T03:56:00.000-08:002011-01-11T05:01:31.705-08:00

My Friend Easy, who has an Onion-esque blog, commented on my post about testing and politics/elections saying that it was the "representative" part of our government that is getting in the way (please correct anything I attribute to you that is wrong, Easy) and that direct democracy might serve us better.I don't think so and I responded as much in the comments section. Elitist (Founding Father)

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-81018992274674542402011-01-10T10:13:00.000-08:002011-01-10T10:36:13.541-08:00

Sorry about the title and h/t to Elf for it...but this is the start of a thought and in no way even a very considered one.This is about killing and eating animals. Vegans and Animal Abolitionists contend that this is a moral absolute--no moral being would kill or eat an animal. I have to assume that these folks WOULD do so if they had no choice but die of this prohibition. The contention is,

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-36301572503936001402011-01-07T07:38:00.000-08:002011-01-07T07:59:16.836-08:00

From Uncle Henry:Conscience is instinct bred in the house,Feeling and Thinking propagate the sinBy an unnatural breeding in and in. This poem, on the whole, is fairly silly, but I think fairly sums up Thoreau's stance on the "busy" world. These first lines though are a perfect thought and you gotta love all the play in here. Human "thinking/feeling" propagates the SIN of Conscience (which is a

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-9347816005034365312011-01-06T11:55:00.000-08:002011-01-06T12:00:07.375-08:00

So, as a friend tells me that Justin Bieber is popular among tweens (girls and boys?) I thought I'd give it a go. I ask the magic Googles for a "most popular tune" and it gave me this one:One TimeAye aye aye aye aye aye aye ayeMe plus you (I'ma tell you one time) [x3]When I met you girl my heart went knock knockNow them butterflies in my stomach wont stop stopAnd even though its a struggle love

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-41108578315670927242011-01-06T10:30:00.001-08:002011-01-06T10:42:58.807-08:00

You know, "to get more stupider"!Okay, because I'm "elitist" and think I'm at least as smart as MOST of you out there (I know we all think this) I would like to propose this:If we're going to making testing in our educational settings more and more necessary/required in order to find a provable standard level of learning then why not push this into all aspects of life that require real

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-84850732984959692552011-01-06T03:51:00.000-08:002011-01-06T04:32:40.541-08:00

Should we parse our pop songs for their "meaning"? Is this even a real question? With the Loverboy exegesis I was utterly convinced that it said something about US all. About our loss of, well, self, I guess. A loss of the ways in which we understand our significance (and this is a sense of value). I guess first we might wonder at what point significance started to matter to us. I don't

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-36289328617081336582011-01-05T13:40:00.000-08:002011-01-05T13:47:33.449-08:00

Eliot Weinberger reviews W's Decision Points in the London Review of Books. Blistering.Some excerpts near the end of the review I'd like to share:a Connecticut blueblood who pretended to be a Texas cowboy, though he couldn’t ride a horse and lived on a ‘ranch’ with no cattle. He was, and is, happiest when surrounded by professionals in the three areas in which he was a notable failure: athletics

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-71602211027821880112011-01-05T08:04:00.000-08:002011-01-05T08:46:46.413-08:00

Earlier today Sarah said she was excited for the weekend (it is hump-day, after all) and I, being the Wildean Wit that I am, commented, "everybody's workin' for the weekend" (which, though intended as a "party" anthem comment could be read in a somewhat dismissive way as "you and the rest of the world of working schmucks"--says vocationless man).Now, you will note re: the title of this post that

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-28958323176145563942011-01-04T14:01:00.000-08:002011-01-05T05:27:39.834-08:00

Update: Links below are to previous posts on relevant topicsOkay, so, well, um...this hasn't been my most awesome year in many respects (losing my job of nearly a decade way back last January being the major, and really, only drawback) but much that I've enjoyed and will enjoy has evolved because of it.But what has remained consistent is my inability to forge a lasting achievement of any

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-42243265720362293662011-01-03T05:34:00.000-08:002011-01-03T08:04:33.166-08:00

Some "unconnected" thinking:A friend posted on the FB to ask if others had rules/policies for laptop use for their kids and made the claim that she'd applaud and encourage her child's becoming engrossed for hours in a book or encyclopedia but it just felt wrong to allow this on the laptop (engrossment). [She may let us know if I mischaracterized her position.]My dad sent me (unemployed son) a

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-23243421134606065262010-12-23T10:14:00.000-08:002010-12-24T08:15:41.647-08:00

So further with the tower...Really this is a fascinating bit of literary history and you could do worse than to spend your time unpacking the borrowings/layerings in this very brief passage.My initial post and my gut response to this has always been somewhat incredulous as I imagined someone considering this as a "real" event. It's hard to pull oneself out of that visceral response of "what 21st

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-35776256423265919502010-12-23T06:02:00.000-08:002010-12-23T06:28:53.506-08:00

This is probably my favorite Bible story, from Genesis 11:1-91 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech. 2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there. 3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for mortar. 4 And

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-41719796693831997602010-12-18T06:02:00.001-08:002010-12-18T06:32:59.894-08:00

I'm continually, oddly, surprised that our government officials even bother talking at all. If all they're going to do is lie or maybe tell the truth then call that a lie and tell a lie to replace that truth...you know what I'm saying...then why bother at all.It's a very strange disconnect to me that via the immediate media access we now have one can easily display the "doublethink" at work.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-75653529555476645222010-12-17T09:41:00.000-08:002010-12-17T11:11:38.621-08:00

I'll be honest, I know very little of what I assume is a Freudian (or Freudian elaboration) formulation called the Death Drive: that all organisms seek after their demise. There's a link below to the Wikipedia entry if you feel like reading it.Perhaps that in itself is an errant formulation but I think it serves. I'm sure someone can clear it up for me if they want to.Anyway...the last post

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-62864403202484743242010-12-14T04:04:00.000-08:002010-12-14T04:46:13.398-08:00

Or, the Bionic yearns to be extra-Biotic.I've been having a bit of back and forth with some folks on FB about the "nature" of the human and our destructive and manipulative ways. I am empathetic to the Vegan way of being but I think it's unlikely that humans will stop eating and using animals unless of course we create ways to not need them to sustain our current way of being anymore (that would

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-23245608621706218892010-12-13T13:18:00.001-08:002010-12-13T13:27:46.879-08:00

In using Auden's In Memory of W. B. Yeats for the earlier blog post I of course had to read it...two things struck me that are utterly irrelevant and uninteresting to you, likely, but because I've decided I like what I think I will note them.1. This line reminded me of Mark Strand's poems:By mourning tonguesThe death of the poet was kept from his poems.And then I thought, maybe all Mark Strand is

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-631295686668451942010-12-13T10:06:00.000-08:002010-12-13T10:30:14.746-08:00

I was listening today to a podcast interview with Bruce Springsteen--Edward Norton was asking the questions (they're friends apparently) and he did a good job--and Bruce was asked quite a bit about ambition and if he wanted to really "say something" with his music and at one point near the end of the interview he simply said, "We wanted to be important." In other words, he wanted what he said/

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-78164418623644172412010-12-12T15:34:00.000-08:002010-12-12T15:46:03.540-08:00

We just watched a movie with some friends called Make Way for Tomorrow. Released in 1937 it is the story of an older couple, married 50 years, who have lost their home to the bank and will have no where to live. They have 5 grown children all about mid-40s and no one will take in both parents--just one. So the parents are forced to split up and live separately for what will likely be the end

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-79079290561363079662010-12-10T08:22:00.000-08:002010-12-10T08:32:00.361-08:00

Or, Against the Philosophy of the Daily ShowI'm going to have to come down on the side of seriousness here and this should not be a surprise as more than one has asked me why I can't post anything that is "happy". I will own up to a love for much that is ridiculous; I tend to laugh out loud and explosively at a brilliant piece of physical comedy--the more contextually ridiculous the better.

Stormhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11176778911355352751noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5081122054691736188.post-41652577698579126052010-12-09T14:50:00.000-08:002010-12-09T14:52:44.630-08:00

Women in the courts of the T’ang Dynasty, between 618 and 907, painted their eyebrows green; the standard of beauty was to have brows as delicately curved as the antennae of moths. Foreheads were powdered yellow with massicot, a lead oxide, for yellow was the color of vitality. Plumpness, as in many societies where the masses are hungry, was the ideal and useful, men claimed, in winter: in the

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Utterly fascinating...In 1206 a Mongol of obscure birth, Temujin...Within a few decades he [Ghengas Khan--"universal ruler"] and his successors controlled an empire that stretched from Korea to Poland. They destroyed dynasties that had governed for centuries...Samarkand and Bukhara never recovered their glory; in the Silk Road city of Merv, perhaps the largest in the world, a million and a half

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This is the opening paragraph of an essay by Eliot Weinberger (you really should read his work) in the NYRB concerning "The World of Khubilai Khan: Chinese Art in the Yuan Dynasty." I just wanted to share it as I found it immensely evocative and very well-written (unexceptional for Weinberger).The Mongols inhabited a vast, featureless grass plain where the soil was too thin for crops. They

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