Vile popery

Well, today seems to be quote day - this one from the esteemed Richard Dawkins:

Ratzinger is the perfect pope

"Should Pope Benedict XVI be held responsible for the escalating scandals over clerical sexual abuse in Europe?"
Yes he should, and it's going to escalate a lot further, as more and more victims break through the guilt of their childhood indoctrination and come forward.
"Should he be investigated for how cases of abuse were handled under his watch as archbishop of Munich or as the Vatican's chief doctrinal enforcer?"
Yes, of course he should. This former head of the Inquisition should be arrested the moment he dares to set foot outside his tinpot fiefdom of the Vatican, and he should be tried in an appropriate civil - not ecclesiastical - court. That's what should happen. Sadly, we all know our faith-befuddled governments will be too craven to do it.
"Should the pope resign?"
No. As the College of Cardinals must have recognized when they elected him, he is perfectly - ideally - qualified to lead the Roman Catholic Church. A leering old villain in a frock, who spent decades conspiring behind closed doors for the position he now holds; a man who believes he is infallible and acts the part; a man whose preaching of scientific falsehood is responsible for the deaths of countless AIDS victims in Africa; a man whose first instinct when his priests are caught with their pants down is to cover up the scandal and damn the young victims to silence: in short, exactly the right man for the job. He should not resign, moreover, because he is perfectly positioned to accelerate the downfall of the evil, corrupt organization whose character he fits like a glove, and of which he is the absolute and historically appropriate monarch.
No, Pope Ratzinger should not resign. He should remain in charge of the whole rotten edifice - the whole profiteering, woman-fearing, guilt-gorging, truth-hating, child-raping institution - while it tumbles, amid a stench of incense and a rain of tourist-kitsch sacred hearts and preposterously crowned virgins, about his ears

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bold emphasis added by me, for the savoring of a perfect, and perfectly fitting, turn of phrase.

It's not what you know

From the New York Times:

In 1994, Philip Bowring, a contributor to the International Herald Tribune’s op-ed page, agreed as part of an undertaking with the leaders of the government of Singapore that he would not say or imply that Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong had attained his position through nepotism practiced by his father Lee Kuan Yew. In a February 15, 2010, article, Mr. Bowring nonetheless included these two men in a list of Asian political dynasties, which may have been understood by readers to infer that the younger Mr. Lee did not achieve his position through merit. We wish to state clearly that this inference was not intended. We apologize to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong, Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew and former Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong for any distress or embarrassment caused by any breach of the undertaking and the article.

Gee, imagine that - accusing Lee Kuan Yew's son of being nepotistically rewarded with the Prime Ministerial office, purely because he's the incompetent son of a ruthless father? How could they be so blatantly biased?

Visitors

We were fortunate enough to have visitors from London last week - Dawn & Teresa came to stay with us for 4 days, then Cat drove them to Memphis & spent the evening with them there (I wasn't feeling up to the journey or I would have gone along).

It was marvellous to see them both again - Dawn is one of the most engaging, ebullient people I've ever met: she and Cat met while working together at Metropolis 5 or 6 years ago. She has since struck out alone as an independant consultant & contractor, doing floral design primarily for weddings and events. This must be a bit precarious at times, but she has a (well-deserved) stunning reputation, and seems to be steadily busy.

Teresa is a senior detective in the Met: she was head of the homicide squad for the west half of London when we first met her, and has moved on since then to handling the child abuse squad. She is quite hard-headed and (unsurprisingly) acute and inquisitive, but also one of the most warmhearted people I've ever met. She's also an exquisite cook and we had the fortune to have her offer (well, insist) on cooking us dinner on Thursday night, which lived up to her high standards.

We didn't really do much except go out for dinners & brunches, hang out and talk a lot, although Cat took them to look at various stores, mostly to show off the size of them I think: and we did all go to see the President Clinton Library, which was quite interesting - although I found it a bit depressing as a reminder of opportunities squandered, and the incredible damage done by the simple inability to keep his trousers zipped.

Altogether, just a wonderful time to see such dear friends, and to relax and talk heart to heart.

Pops

Wandering around the many many useless channels on TV one night recently, I stumbled across a biography of the wonderful Louis Armstrong and found it fascinating. I've never forgotten the epitaph one of his contemporaries gave him - "He was born dirt poor, he died rich and famous, and he never made an enemy" - and while I'm not sure that's entirely true, he was an amazingly generous, loving and kind man, as well as being a breathtaking genius. Of course, that he spent pretty much all of every day stoned on marijuana doubtless helped the relaxed and open manner, but still.

I must admit, while there is quite a bit of his music I like or love, there's also quite a lot of it that leaves me pretty much cold, especially the early stuff from the 20s - I can admire it, but it doesn't grab me and compel me, and its' technical virtuosity (or such of it as I can grasp, which probably isnt that much), doesn't make up for a strained melody*

While he may not have invented Jazz exactly, he certainly was the source for most of it, from the earliest days onward, and far more than anyone else can be acclaimed as the father of Jazz. But I hadn't appreciated the breadth of his genius, or how widely his influence spread - they had a quote from Glenn Miller, of an interviewer asking where his music came from, and his flat reply - "Oh that's all Pops", and two or three other of the Big Band era band-leaders citing Armstrong as the inspiration for the Swing era.

Not really going anywhere with this, just a tribute to a genius


*On a moment's reflection, this may well just be a reflection of the poor recording quality of what is available now, not about the music he played at all.

Blowing in the wind

Well, that was exciting.

Last night, as I was finishing cooking dinner, the sirens started sounding off! I thought, huh, late shift at the factory I guess (duh), but Cat came from the bedroom and told me thats the tornado warning sirens. We grabbed cats, chairs (and dinner!) and retreated to the central corridor in the house, closing all the doors, as the best protection available (no basement, alas).

We were there about an hour, I guess, listening to the TV (which I turned to the local station and cranked the volume before we retreated). It sounds like the nearest tornado passed about half a mile away, to the north of us. Haven't gone to look & see what sort of damage it caused, but the reports all said that there were no reports of injury to anyone, so Little Rock may have gotten off lightly - north of us are densely-settled valleys, interspersed with relatively lightly settled ridgelines, and of course the Arkansas river.

All a bit sobering, though.

The tornadoes were spawned/followed by a heavy lightning storm, that passed off after another hour or so.

Not Working

Sometimes this place seems crazy.

To get a law passed, you need to submit a bill to the House of Representatives, and get 218 (half plus 1) votes for it, submit a -separate- bill to the Senate and get 51 (out of 100) votes for it, reconcile any conflicts between the 2 bills, get them voted on a 2nd time in both parts, then get it signed by the President - if he vetoes it, you then need (I think) 290 votes in the House to overcome this. That all more or less makes sense, in a cumbersome eighteenth century horse&buggy sort of approximation to sense. It certainly ensures there will be no hasty Muldoonian legislation rammed through in an eyeblink.

However, it turns out, that 41 Senators can 'filibuster' - i.e. indefinitely block - any bill,without a final vote, so effectively you need 60 votes in the Senate, to get any bill passed.

That's pretty Rube Goldberg, but I can sort of see some point in terms of giving a large minority protection against a majority ... at least in principle. It seems to have worked fairly well in less ideologically fanatical times, up until, oh, about 1994: and since then, as party discipline has become less lax, it has been working progressively less well. But, fair enough.

What's absolutely crazy - I mean, totally beyond comprehension, just drug-sniffingly hallucinatorily mad - is that a single Senator has the power to 'hold' or block anything by withholding his consent for a vote, but this appears to be the case. We had an instance of this a couple of weeks ago, when a vile slimeball called Shelby put a hold on 30 or more appointments to various government positions (which apparently need ratification by the Senate), because he wanted some government contracts to be directed to his state, rather to a different part of the USA where the contracts could be more cheaply & efficiently completed. Well, that's pretty naked greed, but I guess you have to expect a certain amount of that from politicians, who fairly universally favor naked self-interest* over ... anything, really.

And now there is another crazy delusional fool, by name of Bunning, who is blocking a bill permitting the payment of unemployment benefits to the unemployed (and also various government infrastructure projects, such as highway and bridge repairs) on the basis of (a) they are just lazy and not looking for jobs, and (b) the government is paying for it with deficit financing (something he apparently had absolutely no objection to when Bush was crippling the country with deficits for the last eight years).

And apparently nothing can be done about this, unless they find some sort of bribe to shift him. This, when his own state (Kentucky) has 10% unemployment and the whole country is grinding through a terrible economic constraction, seems beyond just vicious, cruel and spiteful - it seems utterly, incomprehensibly savage and insane.

*not to mention egos so bloated as to obscure any flicker of intelligence thoroughly.

As soon as your born they make you feel small,
By giving you no time instead of it all,
Till the pain is so big you feel nothing at all,
A working class hero is something to be,

They hurt you at home and they hit you at school,
They hate you if you're clever and they despise a fool,
Till you're so fucking crazy you can't follow their rules,
A working class hero is something to be,

When they've tortured and scared you for twenty odd years,
Then they expect you to pick a career,
When you can't really function you're so full of fear,
A working class hero is something to be,

Keep you doped with religion and sex and TV,
And you think you're so clever and classless and free,
But you're still fucking peasents as far as I can see,
A working class hero is something to be,

There's room at the top they are telling you still,
But first you must learn how to smile as you kill,
If you want to be like the folks on the hill,
A working class hero is something to be.

Thank you, John