December 25, 2005
Merry Christmas!
As you can tell, I've been on sabbatical. Jim has probably drawn
another hundred comix, CDY has probably filled his new house with accessories,
and Seth has probably written enough insights to fill a Britannica volume.
I think my current blog absence started with my cat's rapid health decline and
death last week. She's been my pal for 15 years and has made it into half
a dozen poems so far. Three months ago, she was jumping straight up 4 feet
onto her favorite sleeping place (a warm computer monitor), slipping through the
cat door with some half-dead animal in her mouth, and laying full out in the sun
like a diver in flight. At about 18 years of life, something turned off.
Makes you think.
Every year, I think I've gotten this present-buying thing down. This year,
I started early, which has its own problems. I shopped online for business
and personal gifts, had them auto-gift-wrapped and UPS'd directly to recipients.
Then, I had second thoughts about my Christmas list: should I get X a
present and risk that X doesn't get me a present and feels bad about it and then
next year X gets me a present and I don't because I don't want them to feel bad
again, but I feel bad because they gave me a present and I didn't get them one?
You know, classic overthinking. I also succumbed to the
Stockings-Aren't-Full-Enough syndrome, whereby I pass my kid's giant stockings
and think maybe I should get a little something more for each of them: an
iPod gift card, a bag of Jelly Bellies, a Christmas-theme Pez dispenser.
Yesterday was wonderful though, in the way that the prospect of a hanging
concentrates the mind. Hey, only one more day and then I can stop
agonizing about this gift-giving thing. I was up early and into Whole
Foods at 7:30, eyeing rib roasts and watching the fish guys lay out the
line-caught tuna steaks. By 8 AM, I was walking through the mall in seemed
like post-Apocalyptic silence. All the stores were open and the overhead
speaker was paging "Silver Bells" and "Rudolph" — the
cute names that the Dillard's sales associates have to answer to during the
holidays. I bought some additional gifts for my workmates, a gift for my
ex, and a few emergency backup gifts. Then, I went home and watched the
2005 Poker World Championship, happy to be done. By the end of it, I was
convinced that I just had to buy the Poker World Championship game for
the kid's PS2, so we could play while the roast was cooking. Out I went
again, striking out at Game Stop and Game Spot and finally scoring at Electronic
Boutique, where they had that video game and the World Poker Tour game,
and should I get it for the PS2 or the XBox, and was it the old XBox or the XBox
360, and did I remember rightly which one the kids had, assuming that they
didn't have all of them. A quick call to Derek solved that problem, who
reminded me that his friend Matt was back from the Army and sharing Christmas
with us, and shouldn't I get him a little something, too? See what I mean?
Thank goodness the day came to a close, as did the stores, and I drove over to
Dima's house, gift in hand, of course, to share some good wine, home-made
piroshkis, and stories about Mother Russia.
BTW, I was wrong about the Many Mountains Moving
book contest closing at
the end of the year. The deadline is the end of January, so you still have
time to send in a manuscript, and judging from the quality of work I see on the
bloglist, a decent chance of winning or becoming a finalist (standard
disclosure: I will recuse myself from reading manuscripts from people I
know).
A veritable mountain of mail has arrived during my absence. I received my contributor's copy of Iowa Review, which is filled with very good work that I am proud to have beside my humble poem. Smithsonian reports that Australia will soon have its first transcontinental rail line. BusinessWeek mentions that companies are using Websense to ration online access to employees for personal surfing. Harper's provides a compelling case for why only Bill Clinton can save the U.N. by becoming its next Secretary-General. Wired discusses the massive amount of click fraud that costs merchants billions of dollars in fees each year (while contributing to Google's juggernaut growth). MIT Technology Review says "The Internet Is Broken" and only a complete new infrastructure will solve problems of viruses, phishing and email spam.
That's all for today. You all have a wonderful time in your various holiday activities.
Posted by jbahr at 09:07 AM | Comments (7)
December 15, 2005
Reb Rules
Robert has posted a fascinating
discussion of ethics, Western paradigms, and the futility of bringing
democracy to Arab states. This echoes an article in The Atlantic
some months ago, which tried to explain (among other things) the degree to which
Yasser Arafat's management of the PLO's corruption was less a matter of
institutionalized greed than it was a venerable local social system. It
also brings to mind a story that my ex-wife Cath told me a while ago. Cath
is a Federal interpreter and translator and often interprets for attorneys whose
clients have violated Federal drug laws (usually transportation)
— often Latin Americans from rural
backgrounds with little education or exposure to American culture. Cath
has told me that attorneys often ask questions like "Are you a good father?" and
get a befuddled stare back, together with answers like "I have 5 children".
These individuals have a very different sense of self, a sense which is
significantly less self-centered (if I can use that word without meaning to drag
the usual baggage with it). I like Robert's characterization of
"separation" that many Americans exhibit in their beliefs and behavior. I
wonder, though, if western civilization is really so far along the ethical
curve. It hasn't been that long since most police forces had large numbers
of the force getting free drinks at bars or accepting a $10 bill in exchange for
overlooking a traffic violation. Political machines, patronage, and
municipal deals that would be labeled as "corrupt" were also prevalent for most
of American history. Perhaps education, opportunity and exposure to
unexpected ideas can eventually trump tribalism. In any event, I think
knowledgeable observers are right in believing that, even if Arab state citizens
can acclimate to western democratic principles, policies and laws, it's not
going to happen soon enough to take root in Iraq before we decide (or are
forced) to leave.
It's always been my
contention
that fully 50% of the slots in any Best American Poetry volume is
reserved for America's "best poets" (however you want to define that), and the
rest for America's best poetry (ditto). That leaves about 30 places to
fill from the thousands of poems in literary journals and online magazines.
What a wonderful surprise, then, that Reb's poem was chosen by Billy Collins for
the next issue. Congrats to
Reb for writing it,
Gabe for selecting it, and
Didi for publishing it.
This week is Time's Best Photos of 2005 issue, including some phenomenal
(and often gut-wrenching) photographs from the devastation caused by the Iraq
War, Katrina, the Indian Ocean tsunami, and the South Asian earthquake. Other
articles: The CIA is reviewing its tradecraft procedures to eliminate the
kinds of information that Amnesty International found from flight records that
allowed it to track Agency flights through European airspace. Both parties
in Congress are working hard to modify the Alternative Minimum Tax provisions of
the IRS Code, a "stealth tax increase" that is unadjusted for inflation, as 64%
of those with incomes over $100K will be hit with it by 2007.
Milestones synopsizes the lives of Richard Pryor and Eugene McCarthy.
Peter Feaver, a Duke University professor and new addition to the White House
advisor pool, has counseled that "the American public would be more tolerant of
the [Iraq War] carnage if victory, whatever that means, is the result", while
Republicans prepare television ads labeling Dean and Kerry as "retreat and
defeat" Democrats. Pundits expect Bush to replace a few mid-level
Administration members in coming months, but no major changes in the Cabinet.
12 years and many millions of dollars later, the Justice Department failed to
convince jurors that Sami al-Arian, a Palestinian computer science professor,
was guilty of terrorism-related charges. Intelligence officers believe
that "al-Zarqawi has replaced bin Laden as an inspirational figure for budding
jihadists". Egypt leads the way in experimentation with free elections,
with the result that Islam fundamentalists are gaining seats in the legislature
— not exactly the result envisioned by the NeoCons.
British laws are lengthening the hours that pubs can be open in hopes of
creating "a responsible drinking culture as in Italy or France". Activist
James Wilfong wants to see his home state of Maine shift it economic priorities
to businesses that bottle Maine's 25 trillion gallons of drinking water.
Time looks at Joseph (Jesus's dad) in his various roles of Chaste Caretaker,
Alienated Cuckold, and Adoring Protector. Time calls USC's Reggie Bush
possibly "the most thrilling [football] player in history". CEOs at Whole
Foods, Cypress Semiconductor, and Nike appear serious about environmental and
societal concerns. Equal Exchange
pays twice as much to Latin American farmers for their beans, and has grown to
80 employees. Socially responsible mutual funds only earn a half percent
less return, on average, than other mutual funds.
Posted by jbahr at 01:20 PM | Comments (8)
December 13, 2005
Big Food
After a nice drive, Junie and I arrived in Sauk City and took Mom out to
lunch at the Dorf Haus in nearby
Roxbury. It looked like a big chalet with Hanoverian overtones, and was
packed with people, including a reception in the bar-cum-banquet-area where most
of the men wore tuxes over sashes that made them look like diplomats from the
19th century. The two big normal dining room were filled with folks like
us (but larger), including Mr. and Mrs Claus, replete in red felt getups, calmly
having the fried walleye pike, I think. The menu was so German retro, I
wanted to hug the waitress, but thought better of it and just ordered the Fumé
from the local Wollsenheim winery. Everything on the menu was Big Food,
and judging from what was on the plates of the other diners, authentic in its
ethnicity (German) and scope (every table had little plates of everything
everywhere). Junie ordered the sauerbraten and Mom the wiener schnitzel.
I really wanted to try the rouladen (spiced beef rolled in pickles and onions),
which I haven't had since I lived in Germany, but settled on the house special
which was fried chicken, ham, potatoes and cole slaw. The salad bar had
most of the usual under-the-sneeze-guard stuff they always do, but also some
kind of liverwurst and boiled giblets. Everything was outstanding.
The sauerbraten was moist, tangy and fall-apart-at-a-touch roasted. The
weiner schnitzel was lightly breaded veal, perfectly cooked. The fried
chicken was flour-coated with a hint of paprika and baked until golden.
The mashed potatoes were perfect. The cole slaw was perfect. The hot
popovers with real butter were perfect. If I lived in this town and ate
here every night, I would dial in at 300 pounds, which was what about
one-quarter of the diners weighed. This was I love about Wisconsin — no
foofoo food, even Butterburgers pass for a mid-day snack.
Worth starts off with a subdued ad for the Rolls Royce Phantom, a 19-foot
long luxury car with exotic wood interior that can do 0 to 60 in 5.7 seconds
(nicely equipped for $325K, and hurry, they only make 1,000 each year).
The Ukraine's Orange Revolution appears to be back on track after a year of
suffering now-ousted prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko's penchant for privatizing
to the benefit of a few oligarchs. Aspen's Hotel Jerome is offering a
"gift package" that includes travel via LearJet, an "1889" party for 100
friends, ski lessons with legendary Klaus Obermeyer, lifetime membership in the
local golf and ski clubs, and a private fashion show at Chanel, all for $2.5
million. While carriers reduce or eliminate domestic first and
business-class seats to complete with discount airlines without them, they are
beefing up their international premium-class seats, where there is still plenty
of demand. The business school at New York University is offering a course
on luxury retailing. Christie's and Sotheby's hold auctions next month in
the areas of American Indian Art, American Furniture, Vintage Motor Cars, Old
Masters, and Chinese Export Porcelain. The large number of private
security companies (PSC's) supplanting military and police in the US and abroad
worries some observers because of lack of accountability and transparency.
In Attention-Deficit Democracy, two professors argue that legislators either
ignore problems or over-react to them, often with quick-fix prepackaged
solutions provided by vested interests. Large public funds are
increasingly asking companies in which they invest to provide details on global
warming impacts. Unlike Mel Fisher, whose discovery of the Atoch
yielded $500 million in gold and artifacts, most modern-day treasure hunters
barely break even. This month's alternative investment are champion
sporting dogs and rare comic books (the first Superman and Batman issues' value
now exceeds $500K).
Junie gave me an early Christmas present of Lucie Brock-Broido's recently
reissued Hunger. It's an interesting book of lyrical anecdote and
historical episode, with LBB's trademark notes at the end explaining the
background for many of the pieces. The poetry is engaging, but subdued,
lacking the attractive strangeness of her recent work.
CDY is serializing his long
poem, "Tryptich at the Edge of Sight" on his blog.
Eileen recommends the review
of Art
Since 1900: Modernism, Antimodernism, Postmodernism.
Peter
on disjunction.
Henry opines: "A happy
childhood forecasts the doom of the world".
Jasper likes semicolons.
Posted by jbahr at 07:21 AM | Comments (0)
December 11, 2005
Lemon Meringue
It's so hard to keep up with blog-posting during the holidays, and I see that
Kasey isn't even trying, so I feel
less guilty. Kelli gave me an excuse to start off with a bit of silliness.
According to the Pie Meme results:
| You Are Lemon Meringue Pie |
 Those who like you have well refined tastes |
Not too surprising, I suppose. It's surprisingly mild, here in Eau
Claire, which in December means anything higher than zero. Today, it's
about 20 with little wind, and Junie and I are driving down to Sauk Prairie to
see her mom. Sauk Prairie is one of those towns that seems to be
in the complete middle of nowhere, but is actually only 40 minutes from
Madison. Aside from its quaint, Laura Ingalls Wilder moniker, it's also
where the Culver's restaurant chain began —
Culver's, home of the Butterburger, and where else but Wisconsin?
Actually, Junie informed me that it's not Sauk Prairie, that's just the
name of the high school that serves Prairie du Sac and Sauk City. It's
just down the road from Baraboo, where the HoChunk Tribe Casino squats on the
edge of town. Considering how mangled Native American names get over
time (Chippewa, Ojibwa, ...), don't you think the HoChunks could have come up
with a name with a little better marketing appeal? Junie and I will be
doing a puzzle from a big book of old Atlantic Puzzlers, drinking tea and
coffee (respectively), and sampling from a bag of Panera's breakfast goodies
(I love that place so much, I even own stock).
The cover of Time this month features Spielberg and his "secret
masterpiece", the upcoming movie Munich, which deals with the
hostage-taking of Israelis by Black September terrorists at the '72 Olympic
Games, and Mossad's subsequent pursuit and assassination of them (and possibly
non-involved terrorist suspects, as well). 10 Questions for Hispanic
Democratic New Mexico governor Bill Richardson (I know, odd name for an
Hispanic, but then the president of Mexico is a Fox), who compares the
unsavory personal habits of famous men he has known (e.g., Castro's famous
dandruff problem). Even with low ratings, President Bush continues to
raise large sums of money for candidates by showing up, a total of $31 million
in the last 13 events. Skype, the (substantially free) Internet-based
global phone service, has 66 million users and is signing up 100,000 more
people every day. A growing split between Sunni insurgents and foreign
al-Qaeda operatives is having some positive effect in co-opting the former
into non-violent political solutions. The Air Force is increasingly
relying on unmanned attack, surveillance and ground-support aircraft, many of
them controlled by pilots as far as 7,000 miles away. Higher energy
costs and weak job growth hasn't yet dampened the holiday buying spirit, and
retailers are looking for a very good season. Melting arctic ice could
eventually reduce Atlantic water salinity to the point of damaging the Gulf
Stream circuit, throwing Europe into an ice age. China is undergoing a
sexual revolution that would shock the conservative totalitarian policies of
leadership just 30 years ago. Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, known for
its large Amish community, is also increasingly criticized by animal rights
groups for its large number of largely unregulated "puppy mills". Large
retailers are fed up with return-merchandise abusers, and are starting to ask
for ID and tracking customers who repeatedly bring back gifts without
receipts. Peace in our time: Letterman and Oprah are buds again.
Posted by jbahr at 06:20 PM | Comments (0)
December 08, 2005
Mona and Mallory
There is blogging inertia and blogging momentum, and I have been residing in
the former state for days. Contributing to the malaise is the unseasonably
cold weather here. Everybody seems to think that it's cold in Colorado,
but there are days in some Decembers when you can wear a T-shirt outside.
Not today, however, as it's presently 1 degree (-15 wind chill), with
expectations of hitting 30 by the afternoon. 30 degrees is T-shirt
weather in Eau Claire, where I'm going this weekend to be with Junie.
I've gotten a lot of email about Kitty's viagra mixup. I'm also tempted to
post the autobiographical meme that Ginger,
CDY,
Reb and others have
composed, but that seems too much like work. Besides, anything I write
would pale in comparison to Seth's
entry, which is approximately the length of The Two Towers. OK,
here's yesterday: Rebuilt the refrigerator vegetable crisper with my son,
Derek; noted that it was Pearl Harbor Day, but did nothing to celebrate; finished a Carol
O'Connell "Mallory" mystery; developed and documented an S-record to DSP
binary routine; tried to entice Kitty to eat with 6 different flavors of
Fancy Feast and a bowl of "Cat Milk"; watched Chappelle Show and that South Park
episode where Cartman finds an anal alien antenna for a second time, and the
kids talk the intergalactic network execs out of cancelling the series "Earth".
I'm hoping my sister gets me Cook's Illustrated again this year for
Christmas. This month's issue features illustrations of Italian cheeses on
the back cover, all of which I'm familiar with except Taleggio. News
flashes include: you can use soy milk for most recipes in place of milk,
with the notable exception of béchamel sauce;
egg whites can be frozen in an ice-cube tray for later use; fully-cooked
bacon sucks. Quick Tips include: olives and capers are most
easily extracted from the jar with a small melon baller; save clementine
boxes to store your onions and potatoes in; nuts are easily chopped with a
pastry blender in a wooden bowl; before putting pepperoni on homemade
pizza, first microwave them between paper towels for 30 seconds to eliminate
excess grease. Recipes this month include Skillet Chicken Pot Pie (all
cooked in one pan), Huevos Rancheros (roast the tomatoes, toast the tortillas,
poach the eggs, and skip the restaurant-y avocados and other glop),
Oven-Barbequed Ribs (with dry rub and homemade indoor smoker), Hot and Sour Soup
At Home (adding a little cornstarch to the drizzled egg straightens out the
proteins), Simplified Potatoes Lyonnaise (7 ingredients, 20 minutes), The Best
Lemon Bundt Cake, Chocolate Mousse Perfected, and The Mystery of Meat Loaf
(Monterey Jack and gelatin as binders). The best non-stick grill pan is
the inexpensive Simply Calphalon Nonstick 13" Round Grill Pan.
My AWP Writer's Chronicle has been sitting on my desk for a week.
The lead article is by Mark Jarman on the Extended Metaphor in the Poetry of
Mona Van Duyn, who wrote some pretty terrific (and strange) verse.
There's an interview with David St. John, who directs the PhD program in
creative writing and lit at USC, my alma mater (well, one of them). He's
about my age and has 9 books of poetry. I often wonder if anybody really
has 9 books of poetry in them, except John Ashbery, who has a couple of hundred
books in him, apparently. Gbanabom Hallowell discusses African
Poets Writing in the "Wasteland". There is a long list of poets who
will read for $600 and expense, including Mark Doty, Denise Duhamel, Jane Mead
and William Logan. There are the usual ads and job classifieds, and
articles on fiction about which I am famously indifferent.
~~~
It occurs to me that I've ended a lot of sentences with prepositions, which
always reminds me of the story about Winston Churchill who responded to an
editor's corrections by saying “This is the sort of English up with which I will
not put.”
Posted by jbahr at 07:25 AM | Comments (4)
December 03, 2005
MMM Book Contest
Junie called me and reminded me that it wasn't Viagra that was
prescribed for Kitty, it was Valium. I don't even want to think
about the Freudian possibilities.
How many "top Al Qaida leaders" have to be
killed before there aren't any more of them?
~~~
Many Mountains Moving has extended its book contest to the end of the
year. Submissions details are available
here.
~~~
BusinessWeek's cover article is (yawn) on Google again. I know they
have a market cap of $120 million and $8 billion in cash, but we used to say the
same things about Xerox and Kodak and Yahoo and eBay once upon a time.
Google is a dandy company filled with very smart people, but their business
depends upon advertising revenue driven by their search engine and
co-advertising. Their P/E is close to 100, and missing an earnings
prediction would send the stock Way South. What prevents another company
from creeping up on them in the next half-decade? Other articles:
Microsoft loses almost $200 on every Xbox 360 they ship, but they're trying to
make it up on game sales. N'Orleans will attempt a scaled-down Mardi Gras
this year, and is looking for major corporate sponsorships. Demand for
iPods is white-hot, and sales this quarter are expected to top 10 million units.
The latest thing is counterfeit gift cards. The U.S. economy is humming
along at 4% GDP growth, but a lot of jobs are at risk if new housing
construction continues to slow. Great article on "The Great Rebate
Runaround" (40% of all rebate coupons go unredeemed). Krispy Kreme is not
bouncing back, even with its new "turnaround specialist" CEO. Warren
Buffet ("the wizard of Omaha") is buying stocks again (Walmart and
Anheuser-Busch, for starters). A UK businessman is now running Oxford and
plans to "reinvent the university" to stop funding shortfalls and rebuild the
infrastructure. Rupert Murdoch's DirectTV is losing market share to cable
and phone-company suppliers who have introduced new services such as high-speed
fiber delivery, video on demand, and web access. Hallmark is "Keeping the
Whimsy® Coming" with sassy new card lines.
Pharmaceutical companies are announcing new drugs that raise only the "good"
cholesterol (HDL's). Colored gemstones are hot.
Posted by jbahr at 03:21 PM | Comments (1)
December 02, 2005
A to Z
I'm nearly finished with The End of Faith. A necessarily brief and
inadequate synopsis:
- All major religions are supported by texts that contain explicit demands on behavior that are anachronistic and barbaric in a humanist world.
- The vast majority of moderate followers of the major faiths actually exacerbate the negative consequences of religion by providing life-support for their most horrific aspects.
- Moral and philosophical relativism ignores the "obvious" superiority of pragmatism.
- Islam is the most explicitly bankrupt of major religions, and the faith most directly bolstered by the hundreds of direct calls for conquest and intolerance.
- We are ultimately doomed as a global society until we eradicate the irrationality of organized religions, which are intrinsically hostile to one another.
As wonderful as the writing is, I don't find the arguments ultimately
compelling. The hundreds of footnotes are entertaining, but no more compelling
than Harris's prose. The similar number of references seem relatively
comprehensive to a novice, but seem at times too conveniently picked to point
out the bone-headedness of the authors. I've also caught some factual
errors and misspellings (such as Arundhati Roy, whom Harris names Anundhati)
that gave me pause. Still, I'd recommend reading it if you get a chance.
~~~
Time reviews The Year in Medicine with dozens of short descriptions of
medical findings from A to Z (Aspirin, Asthma, Autism, ...). Other
articles and short pieces: Ariel "The Bulldozer" Sharon quits the
conservative Likud party he built to govern closer to the center. Towns
around the nation are renaming themselves (Viagra, OK; Half.Com, OR; Dish, TX)
in exchange for money, goods and services from sponsors. Jose Padilla has
finally been indicted, but not for any offense that the Justice Department
originally claimed (can somebody (Seth, Scoplaw?) explain to me how
habeas corpus was legally suspended for this U.S. citizen?). 13,000 free
passes to see the "adorable" panda cub, Tai Shan, were snapped up in 2 hours.
Bush is "playing both sides of the fence" in trying to appease Republican
industry backers by proposing a guest worker plan, while attempting to sound
tough for his conservative audience. The GOP is very worried that
testimony by Michael Scanlon, Tom Delay's ex-press secretary, will widen the
charge of corruption to dozens of Republican legislators. India's beauty
salons are doing tens of thousands of "skin lightening" procedures to enhance
women's chances at marriage. GM will slip into bankruptcy unless it
figures out how to manage legacy pension and health care costs that amounts to
$2,000 per automobile. Two British engineers have invented a "building in
a bag" that inflates and hardens 12 hours after adding water to provide 172
square feet of floor space. Time rates movies against the original books
(Memoirs of a Geisha, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, The Chronicles of
Narnia, The Ice Harvest, Pride and Prejudice, Brokeback Mountain) with
interesting results. Museums are increasingly exhibiting classic comic
strips. YouTopTheCake.com creates custom wedding cake couples (or trios or
quaduplets, mixed or same-sex couples, ...) from your pictures. A new
online service can sort and annotate your pictures by recognizing the
people in them.
~~~
I had this impulse yesterday to call
Jim at the phone number posted on his blog. Then, it dawned on my that
I had nothing to say and nothing to ask him, since he seems to writing a dandy
blog and living an interesting life. Funny
bit at
Kell's place. Mike's the
featured poet at The HyperTexts.
~~~
I just picked up a prescription of Viagra for Kitty, a tiny amount of which is
supposed to stimulate her eating, and reverse a liver problem that is the
result of her diminished appetite. No, I haven't had the desire or opportunity to pop one myself yet.
Posted by jbahr at 11:10 AM | Comments (2)
December 01, 2005
Keep The Faith
I had to smile at Jordan's
observation that he blogs every day so that others may be inspired by his
example. I've been in awe for some time at his ability to plunk something
down every day, if only a nice photo. Another of his observations is that
Ryan G. Van Cleave is everywhere. My poet buddies have long
considered Simon Perchik, Virgil Suárez and RGVC (and to a somewhat lesser
extent, Lyn Lifshin) the Kilroys of poetry. They pop up everywhere across
a wide spectrum of published poetry, and seem to have an educated nose for new
publications, often appearing in the first issue of damned near everything.
I admit to a time when I used to send out 20 submissions a week to any litmag
that had a pulse, buying large sheets of 60-cent stamps, boxes and boxes of
envelopes. It was fun to get something in the mail almost every day
(usually a rejection), if perhaps a little irritating to the recipient
publications (Barrow Street once pleaded with me to give it a rest for a few
months).
~~~
I'm reading The End of Faith by Sam Harris. I had expected it to be
a book bemoaning the end of faith, but it appears he's advocating it:
... [a] genuinely frightening book about terrorism, and the central role played
by religion in justifying and rewarding it. Others blame “extremists” who
“distort” the “true” message of religion. Harris goes to the root of the
problem: religion itself. Even moderate religion is a menace, because it leads
us to respect and “cherish the idea that certain fantastic propositions can be
believed without evidence”. Why do men like Bin Laden commit their hideous
cruelties? The answer is that they “actually believe what they say they
believe”.
So far, Harris has catalogued the horrors of the Inquisition, witch-trials, and
the Holocaust and I'm about the start the chapter on Islamic terrorism. He
also summarizes what is known about belief systems (epistemologically,
historically, neuro-scientifically, ...). As convincing and eloquent as he
is (and he's a damned good prose writer), and as much as a rationalist agnostic
as I am, I'm still left with the feeling that he confuses human power structures
(e.g., organized religion) with the mythology that often surrounds them.
More on that when I get further along ...
~~~
TT allows how the next
Fascicle will be fives times as big as
the last one. Tim dreams up
some new names for literary journals. Check out
Greg's art. Many
discuss the best way to read poetry, but I think
Brian may have the answer.
Scoplaw defends Steve against Foetry's
latest barrage. LeeAnn
describes her T-Day (i.e, the Extreme Suckitude and Crass Glorification and
Whitewashing of Colonization). Kasey
contemplates murder. Ahhh, to have to the time and money to make it to
Poetry-At-Sea.
Jonathan eats the Un-Chip.
Posted by jbahr at 08:08 AM | Comments (1)