- but have some very idiosyncratic ideas about their psychological health, Seinfeld and Bill Gates...
AP - Oprah Winfrey and her friend Gayle King want to be clear - they
are not gay.
In the August issue of O, the Oprah Magazine, the US talk-show host explains that some people misunderstand her close friendship with King.
"I understand why people think we're gay," she says.
"There isn't a definition in our culture for this kind of bond between women. So I get why people have to label it - how can you be this close without it being sexual?"
In a long article, Winfrey, 52, and King converse about their 30 years of friendship and "four-times-a-day phone calls."
The two friends say they would have no problem telling the public if
they were in a sexual relationship.
"The truth is, if we were gay, we would tell you, because there's nothing wrong with being gay," says King.
Says Winfrey: "Something about this relationship feels otherworldly to me, like it was designed by a power and a hand greater than my own.
"Whatever this friendship is, it's been a very fun ride."
UPDATE 2: Seeking further answers to this ancient mystery, I re-watched the 1976 original again on DVD. Purely for research, of course. It's not like I'm getting obsessive or anything. Two interesting pieces of trivia...
1. Bob Munger, a Hollywood producer credited as the film's "religious adviser", mentions in the DVD bonus material that he's a born-again Christian and he sold David Seltzer on the plot of The Omen as a way of getting the [W]ord out.
So maybe Omen does have more in common with Left Behind than I first thought; ie, Omen is to Left Behind as The Passion of the Christ is to The Jesus Video.
2. Originally the Thorns were called the "Thorpes", because Seltzer, an American, wanted to make the family a UK political dynasty and he said "There was this guy in the British Parliament at the time, named Jeremy Thorpe..." Indeed there was. He was also indirectly commemorated in "Dr Who", in one episode (screened while JT was leader of the UK Liberal Party) where someone refers to the UK Prime Minister as "Jeremy". Which makes two links between these two great British low-budget monster sagas.
Correction: Actually there are three links. Not counting "naff mid-Seventies tufts-over-the-ears hairstyles" and "waa-waa background music that's meant to be frightening".
UPDATE 1: O-o-o-ka-a-a-ay.... Sounds like The Omen might yet get pulled from cinemas, like other Liev Schreiber remakes:
"She talks about a prophecy," [defense attorney George] Parnham said. "These children of hers needed to die in order to be saved," he added, "because Andrea Yates was such a bad mother that she was causing these children to deteriorate and be doomed to the fires of eternal damnation". Parnham said that Yates believed she had the sign of the devil, 666, burned on her scalp, and she begged therapists to look at her head. What they found, Parnham said, was not the sign of the beast, but scabbing from where Yates had tried to pick away the numbers she thought were there...
-- Lisa Sweetingham, "Defense: Yates killed kids to save them", CourtTV (27 June 2006) Just saw The Omen (2006 remake) at the cinema. A few random thoughts... 1. Cinema foyer still festooned with posters for The Da Vinci Code. If I were the Pope, I'd be tempted (NPI) to take Dan Brown to a private screening of O-06 and then at the end quiz him: "So! Now you do want us to send out secret order of Darth-Maul-style assassin monks around Europe, no?" 2. The Pope is played by an actor named Bohumil. Which has got to be one of the funniest movie-credits ironies since Richard Marx performed the main song for a film about deposed Romanov tsarina Anastasia (1997) -- or since Frida Kahlo, an unrepentant Marxist, was played by the world’s second-most-famous Hayek. 3. Given the film's plot, it's more than a little disturbing that star Liev Schreiber's name is an anagram of " SHEER EVIL CRIB". And that no one else on the planet seems to have spotted that before me. 4. Also that writer David M Seltzer's name is an anagram of " DMZ DEVIL STARE". And that no one else has realised this either. 5. But Julia Stiles' name only anagrams to SAT JUL LIES. Ummm... okay... maybe one could link that to " Tues 6 Jun 2006" at a stretch. A big stretch. 6. And "Damien Thorn" is only an anagram of "MADE IN NORTH". Although given how (according to the original Omen III: The Final [sic] Conflict [1981]) ThornCorp plots to take over the world by controlling its food production, maybe this is a, you know, North/ South First World/ Third World thing. Okay... Enough with the anagrams, before I start plastering the walls and ceiling of my priest's hole with them. So dark the con of man... 7. In Omen I, Damien seems to know what he's doing. But in Omen II, he's [ SPOILER ALERT] shocked -- shocked! -- when Neff tells him his true origin and destiny. Soloviev handled this side much better, a century ago. 8. Ironies... Mia Farrow did play the mother of Satan's child in Rosemary's Baby, but this time [ SPOILER ALERT] there is no, uh, human mother. 9. Is this, like, international year of not using the most obvious Rolling Stones song for the movie theme? We at Father Mackenzie strongly endorse this, deeply opposed as we are to all cheap hijacking of Sixties/Seventies cultural icons. 10. David Seltzer was a lucky man in Hollywood. He was given that rarest of mercies, a second chance. An even better second chance than George Lucas had: Seltzer got to re-write and re-film his big mid-'70s 20th Century Fox hit on a fresh canvas, not merely tinker with CGI editing to insert images of dragon-like creatures and to clarify who fired the first gunshots. So what does Seltzer do with this chance? He still spells Damien's surname as THORN, with no E. Strewth, David, heaps of people spell it with an -E on the end. It's like "Clark/e". You can spell it either way. The problem is, if you spell it without an -E, the Antichrist's name "Damien Robert Thorn" is only 665, one short. (Hey, my names are also 665...). So Damien still misses the mark (so to speak), leaving Ronald Wilson Reagan as the leading contender. 11. Re Damien’s visit to the zoo. (1) Why is it that Talking Beasts in Narnia can’t recognise the Antichrist walking among them, but Dumb Beasts in England can? (2) Shouldn't Damien be off chatting with the Burmese (or Brazilian) python? (As well as thanking the huge, mysterious black dog for watching over him, and trying to hide his distinctive head scar under his thick hair?). 12. So are they now going to re-make Damien: Omen II and The Final Conflict as well? The final scene of O-06 [ SPOILER ALERT] may have eliminated the need for the second movie in the trilogy. The problem is, The Final Conflict just wasn't credible. I can suspend disbelief enough to allow magic daggers and jackal surrogate mothers; but the idea that a man can get to the White House despite a long string of mysterious and unresolved deaths of those around him is too fantastic.
UPDATE: Have you, like me, ever wondered what became of Vanilla Ice? Here's some clues...
* Appearing on some BritPop TV show ("Thooose jeans are pretty bahgggy... boot we all wont to knoo... whayre orr thoose parachoote trewsers?" "Ah burned em.")
* "In '94 I tried to kill myself by overdosing on heroin, cocaine, esctasy, and anything I could get my hands on. At one point, my friends were dumping buckets of cold water on me as I lay on my bathroom floor in convulsions. At that point I had over eighteen million dollars in the bank, and I still couldn't find happiness in being rich or famous..." Serious s.....tuff, dude. A million-dollar lawsuit against rapper Eminem was dismissed by a US judge who concluded her ruling with a rap verse. Sanitation engineer DeAngelo Bailey, who attended school with the star, alleged he was defamed as a bully in his song Brain Damage. In court, Judge Deborah Servitto rapped:
‘Mr Bailey complained his rep is trash, so he’s seeking compensation in the form of cash.
‘Bailey thinks he’s entitled to some monetary gain, because Eminem used his name in vain.
‘The lyrics are stories no one would take as fact, they’re an exaggeration of a childish act.
‘It is therefore this court’s ultimate position, that Eminem is entitled to summary disposition.’
While Mr Bailey is specifically named in the song, Eminem lawyer Peter Peacock told the court that previously he seemed to be ecstatic over his name being used in the CD and even told his friends about it. Judge Servitto, from Michigan, ruled the lyrics were covered by the ‘substantial truth doctrine’ or contained the distortion and hyperbole of satire. Both forms are protected by the US First Amendment.
- "Eminem ‘bully’ is rapped", This Is London (20 October 2003) Next: Judge Leonie Brinkema tells Zacarias Moussaoui "Stop! collaborator, and listen ..."
UPDATE 1: Sounds like the Commies didn't like heavy metal either:
"Heavy metal acts such as Black Sabbath, Nazareth, Iron Maiden and Judas Priest were blacklisted for supposed offences including religious obscurantism, violence, racism and anti-communism... 'Anyone who was religious in any way was guilty of "religious obscurantism". It didn't matter whether you believed in God or the devil or black magic or whatever. The only thing you were supposed to believe in was the party. They didn't like violent lyrics because they might disturb Soviet order.'
- Mark Howarth, "They were banned in the USSR", The Scotsman (25 June 2006) - link via Colby Cosh UPDATE 2: The Orthodox are on the warpath: Finland's ambassador to Greece... has had to defend [Finnish heavy-metal band Lordi, winner of the Eurovision song contest] from charges of Satanism leveled by the Greek Orthodox Archbishop Christodoulos. In his Sunday sermon, the day after Lordi's victory, the archbishop ... suggested that Finland's entry was attempting to convert souls to Satan.
- Andrew Ian Dodge, "Political Spinal Tap", Tech Central Station (25 May 2006) " Should the abuse continue, Butler said the council 'will defer the matter to Satan'." 'Protestant theologian Adolf von Härnack once described the Orthodox church as "in her entire structure alien to the Gospel and a perversion of the Christian religion, its reduction to the level of pagan antiquity"...'
- Quoted in "Why I'm Not Orthodox: An evangelical explores the ancient and alien world of the Eastern church," by Daniel B Clendenin, 4(1) Christianity Today (6 January 1997), pp 32-38.
'Eastern Orthodoxy loudly repudiates Plato only to embrace Plotinus, whose Neo-Platonic system has been openly cultivated into every aspect of Eastern Orthodox theology, from God’s degrees of being to human deification. Such paganism flies in the face of the first commandment.'
-- "Eastern Heterodoxy", by Douglas Jones, 6(5) Credenda/Agenda Pagan?! Us Eastern Orthodox?! We'll show you who's pagan! 'It has taken almost 2,000 years, but those who worship the 12 gods of ancient Greece have finally triumphed. An Athens court has ordered that the adulation of Zeus, Hera, Hermes, Athena and co is to be unbanned, paving the way for a comeback of pagans on Mount Olympus. The followers, who say they "defend the genuine traditions, religion and ethos" of the ancients by adhering to a pre-Christian polytheistic culture, are poised to take their battle to the temples of Greece. [...] About 98% of Greeks are Orthodox Christian, and all other religions except Judaism and Islam had been banned.'
-- "Greek gods prepare for comeback", by Helena Smith, The Guardian (Friday 5 May 2006) Sounds reasonable, hey? Live and let live? No so, apparently: 'Father Eustathios Kollas, who presides over the community of Greek priests, said: "They are a handful of miserable resuscitators of a degenerate dead religion who wish to return to the monstrous dark delusions of the past".' One can't really blame the Greek Orthodox for resenting the pagans, seeing how the latter persecuted Christian evangelists who tried to preach the Gospel, as recently as 2,000 years ago.
"Delegates of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) are to tackle whether to
adopt gender-inclusive language for worship of the divine Trinity along with the
traditional 'Father, Son and Holy Spirit,' " the Associated Press reports from
Birmingham, Ala.:
The divine Trinity--"Father, Son and Holy
Spirit''--could also be known as "Mother, Child and Womb'' or "Rock, Redeemer,
Friend'' at some Presbyterian . . . services under an action Monday by the
church's national assembly.
"Mother, Child and Womb"? That's even more
sexist than the old patriarchal Trinity. We suspect God will be quite angry at
the suggestion that she is no more than an Incubator. It ought to be "Woman,
Fetus and Body."
"Rock, Redeemer, Friend" is much better, and it's easy
to remember. Rock crushes Redeemer, Redeemer cuts Friend, Friend covers
Rock.
http://www.opinionjournal.com/best/?id=110008546
Former Australian Crawl lead guitarist Simon Binks, who suffered brain damage after a drunken car accident, has been awarded more than $330,000 after successfully suing North Sydney Council.
Mr Binks, 49, would have received close to a million dollars if the NSW Supreme Court had not ruled that he was 65 per cent responsible for the crash at Milsons Point shortly before 1am on July 20, 1995.
Mr Binks had a blood alcohol concentration of .133 when his Mercedes-Benz collided with a telegraph pole at the intersection of Alfred and Fitzroy streets where roadworks were being carried out...
-- Natasha Wallace, "Rocker gets $330,000 for drunken crash", Sydney Morning Herald (25 May 2006)
'HELLO, IS IT ME YOU'RE LOOKING FOR? The quagmire worsens: Iraq is now hopelessly split between Shia theocrats, Sunni insurgents, Kurdish separatists and Lionel Richie fans...'
- Mark Steyn, SteynOnline
'... Grown Iraqi men get misty-eyed by the mere mention of his name... Iraqis who do not understand a word of English can sing an entire Lionel Richie song. This is the same Lionel Richie who wrote “Say You, Say Me.” This is the same Lionel Richie who is the father of some young woman named Nicole. Yes, that Lionel Richie. Could he really be an Iraqi icon? I decided I had to investigate, and not just investigate, I decided I had to ask Lionel Richie himself. So I called him from Baghdad. Actually it was a formal interview. It was the first interview with Lionel Richie ever on the subject of Iraq and Iraqis. I asked Richie if he knows just how big he is here. He said, "The answer is, I’m huge, huge in the Arab world. The answer as to why is, I don’t have the slightest idea." He has performed in Morocco, Dubai, Qatar and Libya. There is obviously something up there. The more we talked, the more he theorized as to the reasons his music might be so popular here. He thinks it is because of the simple message in his music: Love. Richie says he was told Iraqis were playing "All Night Long," on the streets the night US tanks rolled into the country in 2003...'
- John Berman, "Baghdad’s Lionel Richie Obsession", ABC News (19 May 2006)
'We think we’ve created something really fun, even though our two co-stars are generally not speaking to each other... I think it’s probably easier to fix Iraq than it is to fix Paris and Nicole.'
– Producer Jon Murray on filming The Simple Life: Til Death Do Us Part with two feuding stars. Just as long as you don't roll a golden apple towards her... or introduce her to Geoffrey Rush's wife.
'... I'm not sure Jetta's target demo can be convinced to care about safety. But I'm thoroughly convinced that these ads will haunt their dreams and keep the Volkswagen brand at the front of their thoughts. That's half the battle....'
-- "Wham! Bam! Buy a VW, Ma'am! The violent new Jetta ads", by Seth Stevenson, Slate.com (posted Monday 8 May 2006). How about this one?
There are certain fine shades of meaning in English, particular phrases that may connote a meaning that the dictionary doesn't quite convey in their fullness. You have to be careful about unintended word associations and other Anglophonic assumptions.
Especially if you're a Scandinavian.
Photos of Suri are worth big money:
... the next "Top Gun" among celebrity photographers will be the one who snaps a picture of the infant daughter of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes. "This could go from anywhere from $3 [million] to $5 million, depending on the bidding war that ensues" ...
-- Buck Wolf [*], "Multimillion-Dollar Bounty on TomKat Baby Photo," ABC News (19 April 2006)
Okay then, here's a photo of Suri. Now gimme gimme gimme. [*] Buck Wolf? Wasn't he a commando in that Xbox game, you know, that one?
I have watched disc 1 of firefly and started to make my way through disc 2.
Some random observations:
1. I don't mind it, but I don't think I will ever be a "true fan". I was never a Buffy follower, nor Angel, so Josh Whedon mustn't "do it" for me.
2. I originally watched it in anticipation of some "hard" science fiction (Arthur C Clarke, Isaac Asimov), but realising it's "softness" (it's closer to Star Wars in more ways than one - elaboration later) I haven't decided to label it "cheese" and enjoy it as such.
3. First double episode was uninspiring - the battle scene was so stupid I laughed at all the clichés. Hasn't Josh seen "Saving Private Ryan" and the Omaha beach scene? That, IMHO, is the current benchmark for set piece gun battles. The best one so far was the third ("Bushwhacked"), worst so far was the one where Mal fights a duel "Shindig"- so lame a plot device, it's hardly imaginable anyone still uses it post-Hornblower.
4. Style, design etc - I think Josh should go back to the "Ridley Scott" school of filmmaking - witness the excellent approach to Alien, Gladiator, Black Hawk Down (but must excuse Kingdom of Heaven - Ridley is losing his touch). The lighting, grittiness, tension etc is all there - and needs to be in Firefly. They're all just much too squeaky clean - like 1950's cowboys. The "Alliance" are also dressed in "Starship trooper" costumes with SA 80 rifles (current British issue). You'd think they could have done a bit better in the props department. I mean, it's not THAT low budget, is it? The obligatory barroom brawls and gunfights are too boring to be even bothered fast-forwarding through.
5. Lines missing from Firefly, Season 1 and 2:
a. Mal Solo: "You mean you've never heard of the 'Serenity'? It's the ship that made the Kessel run in les than 5 parsecs" blah blah blah etc etc
b. Wide eyed settler who has booked a passage to Persephone*: "What a piece of junk!"
Mal Solo: "She'll make point 5 past light speed"
* A name posited for the "Average American's Dream Car" before the design was handed over to one Homer J Simpson.
c. "Ambassador", looking at "Serenity": "You came here in this? You're braver than I thought!"
That is, "Firefly" needs to be changed to "the continuing prequel adventures of Han Solo"
6. Fictional historical context - good, but could have done much better. i.e. "Independents" are modelled closely on Confederates, the "Alliance" are close to the Union in Civil War USA, and there's hints of slavery etc (but none seen as yet). The "Browncoats" idea is borrowed from the War of Independence. But the actualisation of this is terrible, The "Alliance" are badly dressed unmilitary bureaucrats. If there is going to be super-charged authority figures, at least let them be ruthlessly efficient rather than bland pen pushers with bad haircuts. It's like being boarded by accountants (shades of Monty Python, perhaps?)
7. My biggest beef. Characters. C'mon? "Western" stereotypes aplenty. Boring tropes that are in heavy need of revision.
The functionally useless preacher who acts as a "social conscience"
The hooker with a heart of gold (somewhat interesting to have this character of high social status but this is lost in the conversation in the "shindig" episode where mal asserts that what he does is illegal but honest, whereas hers is legal but "dishonest" (i.e. it involves pretence, and the greatest value is authenticity, even to be authentically corrupt). She is also an "empath" - Deanna Troi alert! And note when the "Shepherd" is having a moral crisis about falling in with a wretched hive of scum and villainy, the prostitute can provide moral support. What an inversion of values!
The dumb lug heavy who loves knives and guns, who is comic relief - he's the "sidekick character" but you should have guessed that.
The 'naive' doctor (if he's so smart, why can't he figure out basic social skills?)
The "Reavers" - if these aren't "Apache Indians" by any other name, I don't think there is a whiff of western in this postmodern mishmash.
Plus some more (not necessarlity Western but..)
The bland inter-racial couple (made from, of course, the domestically 'incompetent' husband and the switched on wife (Fred and Wilma, Homer and Marge, Ray and Debra, etc etc). This may have been radical in the 60's when Kirk kisses Uhura but now - yawn!
The chick mechanic - straight out of the Herbie movies. the "Tom-Boy" character.
[What did Josh Whedon do, sit around and pick the top 10 most stereotypical characters and jam them into a space drama with a Western theme? Surely a recipe for comedy, not "serious" sci-fi?]
... and my unfavourite
Mal.
I remember a friend explaining to me once the difference between "modernist" heroes and "postmodern" heroes (really, anti-heroes) with reference to an episode of "Babylon 5", where the main characters let a baddy go back to his homeworld with a secretly ingested bomb (unbeknownst), so that he would destroy all of his compatriots on return. This was considered hilarious fun.. The same mean spirit is exhibited by the cast of "Firefly"
- kills a law-enforcement agent and throws him out the hatch (Mal)
- laughing at the doctor when they told him his patient had died (Episode 1) (Mal, Lug and husband and wife all have a jolly old chortle together)
-tricking the doctor into wearing a spacesuit when they knew a) he was afraid b) it was unnecessary c) he didn't know how to put it on properly (Lug's initiative, Mal's laugh)
- killing an enemy prisoner who refuses to co-operate and vows everlasting revenge (Mal)
- stabbing his defeated opponent repeatedly ("Shindig" episode), deliberately wounding him, for his own amusement (Mal)
All of the other stuff about hiding fugitives from the "Alliance" (they may come in useful later), allowing time for a "Shepherd" to say words for dead colonists (there is a booby trap connect our ships and we need time to defuse it), etc etc are just further examples of what is essentially an ugly, amoral, utilitarianist character. The only exception I can think of is when they decide to return stolen medicines for sick babies, in that Mal puts himself and his crew in peril for the advantage of others.
8. I could write more - especially about shoddy plots, "deus ex machina" style e.g.
Co-viewer: "I thought it was over"
Me: "Give it a few more minutes"
(some more minutes pass, credits roll) ,
Me: "Was that it?"
Co-viewer: "I told you we should have turned it off then."
and so on. But I’ll leave it there. I will continue to enjoy "Firefly", but definitely not seriously. Cheese it is. Discs 3 and 4 will tell if the cheese is good.
Just saw V For Vendetta and am now keenly aware of the violence in'erent inna system of Mawgrit Fatcher's Bri'ain. Sounds like the Poms need to kick out the Conservatives, quick, and elect a Labour Government so it can keep them out of "America's wars."
Two things puzzled me, though. I don't mind the Rolling Stones' Street Fighting Man, but -- as music for the closing credits of V4V?
(1) Mick Jagger is a multimillionaire, who on several occasions has endorsed a vote for the British Tory Party. (I wonder how many voters tried to find the "Conserthatithe" candidate on the ballot that Mick was referring to?) Keith Richards is a devoted family man and devout churchgoer. Whose signature is on the form assigning the Wachowski broth-... err, siblings the rights to use the song? Brian Jones'?
(2) My immediate thought was "Wouldn't The Procreative Pistols' Anarchy in the UK be more appropriate?" Well, sounds like thousands of others - about 25,200, according to God - had the exact same thought. Who said voluntarist decentralised social systems can't be self-coordinating?
UPDATE [1]: That was a week ago. Now, as of 9 pm Sunday 10 April, the count is down to a mere 16,900. Someone's killing them off one by one!
Bummer of a week if you're a prosecution lawyer named "Carla".
All that work down the drain...
Nice news if you can get it new. However, this little gem has been floating around for some time. Catholic News reports it as of 4 January 2002, sourcing it from LifeSite dated 2 January 2002. however, of note is the reported downplaying of the warnings in the North American Media (The New York Times coverage by Melinda Henneberger which was carried in Canada's National Post, the San Francisco Chronicle and on Yahoo Daily News) left out all the bad stuff below. Quite a reliable source, then The Sun. Only the SMH's use of it is FOUR YEARS OUT OF DATE. What's the news here? The fact that the Sun is also just as out of date as the SMH? Or that the SMH is as out of touch as the Sun? (By the way, a five year archival search of the Sun's UK database yielded zero results).
Perhaps the Sun referred to is the SMH's stablemate, the Sun-Herald? It's identified as "The online edition of Sydney's Sunday newspaper with magazine sections on entertainment, health, lifestyle, plus the weekends news and sports." Are we quoting ourselves now, as authoritive sources? What happened to journalistic integrity?
Vatican exorcist warns of Harry Potter
By Jano Gibson
March 3, 2006 - 5:15PM
The Vatican's chief exorcist has warned that reading Harry Potter could lead young people towards Satanism.
JK Rowling's blockbuster fiction series about a young magician has been deemed dangerous by Father Gabriele Amorth, The Sun reported.
"By reading Harry Potter a young child will be drawn into magic and from there it is a simple step to Satanism and the Devil," he was quoted as saying.
"You start with Harry Potter, who comes across as a likeable wizard, but you end up with the Devil.
"There is no doubt that the signature of the Prince of Darkness is clearly within these books."
In 2003 Cardinal Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict XVI) reportedly wrote two letters to a critic of the Harry Potter series.
"It is good, that you enlighten people about Harry Potter, because those are subtle seductions, which act unnoticed and by this deeply distort Christianity in the soul, before it can grow properly," he wrote.
Update [3]: Gene M Bridges at Triablogue wonders "what it means for a Jehovah's Witness to convert to Islam?"
Update [2]: Apparently there has been some rapprochment between at least one famous Jehovah's Witness and the Vatican.
Update [1]: Speaking of Watchtower mindslaves, this piece of fatuousness in the Weekend Australian IKEA catalogue colour magazine (11 September 2004, p 8), commenting on a photo of Jacko (flanked by sisters LaToya and Jackson, and all wearing white suits) turning up for his pre-trial hearing at the Santa Maria courthouse:
"Note the use of the [T]rinity, a holy Christian symbol," says Jasmin Martin, body language expert. "Michael is flanked by his two sisters..." NOT THE SAME JAY-DUB AS THE PLAINTIFF IN PRINCE v MASSACHUSETTS ... Catholic blogger Sean Gallagher links to an interesting news item; that Prince -- yes, The Artist Formerly Known As, the "Purple Rain" guy -- has converted to Jehovah's Witness-ism, taking it seriously enough to have gone out doorknocking for the cause. Larry Graham, former bass player for Sly and the Family Stone, goes with him. Just was is it with African-American pop stars and the Watchtower Bible & Tract Society? There's also Michael Jackson and George Benson. (And in the Trinitarian camp of those who believe that Jesus Christ and the Archangel Michael are the same, Little Richard is now an ordained Seventh-Day Adventist minister.) One intriguing sideline is that a Jewish couple complained because they let Prince and Graham inside, thinking they wanted to use their home as a video set, but then the ditheistic duo "start[ed] on this Jehovah's Witness stuff." Contrary to the Jay-Dubs' much-repeated belief that the Trinity is the biggest stumbling block against Jewish and Muslim acceptance of Christianity -- they like to [mis]quote Catholic theologian Hans Küng's statement that "Even well-informed Muslims simply cannot follow, as the Jews thus far have likewise failed to grasp, the idea of the Trinity" ( from Christianity and the World Religions, quoted in Should You Believe the Trinity?, Watchtower publication) -- there is, it seems, no love lost among the small-U unitarian branches of Abrahamic monotheism: * '... Eduardo Campos, a 62-year-old Uruguayan immigrant married to an Israeli, whom ultra-Orthodox Jews tried to get fired from his job at the Vita food company [in Israel] merely because he is a Jehovah's Witness ...' -- Daniel Lazare, "The One-State Solution", The Nation (3 November 2003). * 'The death by beheading of two Jehovah's Witnesses captured by bandits connected with the Abu Sayyaf Muslim separatists is part of a "jihad" against Christians in the southern Philippines, the military believes. ... A letter was found from one of the heads warning that those who do not believe in Allah will suffer the same fate. They said what they did was jihad," said Brigadier-General Romeo Tolentino.' -- Kimina Lyall, "Beheading of Christians 'a jihad'", , The Australian (23 August 2002).
WASHINGTON, DC—In an attempt to gain support among idle and sleepless Americans, the Bush Administration made its case for the continuing war in Iraq in a one-hour paid program that premiered early Tuesday morning.
(snip)
The infomercial was interspersed with glowing pretaped testimonials from coalition partners, American soldiers, and Iraqi business leaders. Australian Prime Minister John Howard was particularly kinetic in his endorsement of the Iraq war plan.
"Don and Linda, I'm here to let you in on the world's best-kept secret," said a wide-eyed, floral-shirted Howard from the beautiful Dunk Island resort off the coast of Cairns, Australia. "The strategy for victory in Iraq is working! Last January, Iraqis went to the polls and elected leaders for a transitional government and drafted a working constitution establishing unheard-of rights for the people of Iraq! And in December, they elected representatives to the National Assembly!"
"Amazing!" Howard added, arms outstretched.
According to Obi-L,
“...the mujahideen, by the grace of Allah, have been able to penetrate time after time all the security procedures undertaken by the oppressive countries of the alliance as evidence by what you have seen, in terms of bombings in the capital of the most important European states.”
Representatives fom Germany and France reject the implication that their capitals are not as important as those capitals that have already suffered attacks from al-Qaida, and look forward to attention from the international terrorist mastermind soon.
Madrid and London have no comment.
[UPDATE 2:
'The Web site of Ms Magazine – yes, it still exists – is calling on readers to sign a petition: “I have had an abortion. I publicly join the millions of women in the United States who have had an abortion in demanding a repeal of laws that restrict women’s reproductive freedom." Well, so much for the right to privacy. If Ms readers hadn’t had so many abortions, there might be more Ms readers...'
- Julia Gorin, "Petitioning for Life," Wall Street Journal (17 August 2006)
UPDATE 1: It appears that some religious groups, but not others, are permitted to have a view on the morality of abortion.
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'Lyn Allison was 18 when she found out she was pregnant. Living in Fairfield, Victoria, in the 1960s, the idea of being an unmarried mother was a burden too great for her family to bear. As the Democrats leader revealed in the Senate last night: "An estimated one in three women have had an abortion, and I am one of them." [...] Senator Allison explained her decision to the [Sydney Morning] Herald: "I came from a very conservative family and for them the shame of having a child out of wedlock was unacceptable... I lived near an unmarried mothers' home and they were out of sight in what was effectively an institution. That was never going to be a prospect for me." Her family knew, and her GP referred her, an act that would have been illegal at the time. Having a child at 18 would have changed her life in ways she was not prepared to contemplate. "I probably wouldn't be here [in the Senate]," she said...'
-- Stephanie Peatling, "Revelation adds to emotional debate", Sydney Morning Herald (9 February 2006) Perhaps not, Senator. On the other hand, there might be one more 40[?]-year-old Democrat voter alive today, to help your party stave off its impending electoral extinction. Unfortunately for the pro-aborts, in a political system based (assuming that Australia can continue to stave off the imposition of a Bill of Rights) on universal adult suffrage, there's no way around the brute mathematics of "I'm pro-life and I vote... and so do all my kids", no matter how often they repeat the chanted mantra of "Not the Church/ not the state/ Let the Woman/ decide her fate". It is not necessary for the pro-life side to chant back "Children's lives don't/ belong to others/ Not their fathers/ Not their mothers". We just have to be the ones who have children. (With the caveat that you don't of course, have like, fifteen or sixteen kids so they grow up unfed and unclothed and get so pissed off with their deprived "pro-life" upbringing that they turn your society into another Italy, France, Ireland or Quebec in a single generation.) Having had much experience in my youth with student politicians, I always simply assume that at least half of our MPs at any given time have either aborted a child (if female) or have sired an aborted child (if male). This cuts across Left-Right lines, since the logic of easy abortion is as highly appealing to the Party of Lust as it is to the Party of Greed. Perhaps we can have similarly rational and impartial debates about the merits of other controversial social policies? Hmmm... "When I was 18, I called an effeminate schoolmate of mine a 'faggot'. The Bill before this House today, by outlawing vilification on the grounds of sexual orientation, would have made me -- and thousands of others like me -- a criminal! A law-breaker! But I'm a law-abiding citizen! Therefore, if what I did would conflict with the law, then the law must be wrong!..." And of course, society is still locking up young unmarried mothers, in what is effectively an institution, just like in Lyn Allison's youth, to brutally punish them for having sex out of wedlock. I don't really expect much more than this from the Democrats (although I do hope Natasha Stott-Despoja took care to turn down the TV sound in case her baby son [1] hears her telling the world "Mummy might have had you chopped up by the doctor if you'd been inconvenient for her lifestyle"), or from Julia Gillard. But Fiona Nash? One of the few redeeming traits of the Nationals used to be their much-trumpeted attachment to Christian values. If they want to become the party of selfishness on children's rights, as well as tariffs, subsidies and taxes, then to hell with them. Having said that, the pro-life side seems to be putting a lot of energy into a battle over an essentially short-term and symbolic question: whether it is the Health Minister, or an appointed govt board, that can give final approval to the abortion pill. Even if they win, it could well turn out a pyrrhic victory: Tony Abbott (who seems, given his views on abortion and the monarchy, to be undecided as to whether a person's chances in life should depend on whether they're lucky to be conceived in the right womb) won't be Health Minister forever. As Jackie Kelly noted during the debate, "if you don't like our [current] Health Minister, look in three years' time you can get [Labor's] Julia Gillard as Health Minister." Moreover, I disagree with the anti-RU486 tack of framing opposition in terms of concern for the woman's health. Not because I want women to bleed to death as punishment for procuring at-home abortions, but because they have voluntarily assumed the risk. Pro-aborts frequently depict anti-aborts as paternalistic chauvinists who don't think adult women can be trusted to make decisions in their own interests; this anti-RU486 argument plays right into the hands of those who peddle this stereotype. Me, I have no doubt that on balance women are as good as men are at making decisions to promote their own interests,[2] at least in the short-term;[3] what I don't buy is the creative Cannoldian line that, if your mother decides to abort you, that's in your interests too. (I am not making that up. Cannold is an ethics lecturer, believe it or not. But then, so is Peter Singer.) [1] Yes, I know Natty's kid is already out of the womb. But you show me what part of Lyn Allison's Oprahfest limits the logic of her claimed "right to choose" to only children in utero; and a screaming three-year-old would represent a much bigger obstacle to Allison's precious Senate career than would a first-trimester bump, even with morning sickness. The real reason is not logic or justice, but sentiment, which is the basis of most pro-choice convictions and (coincidentally?) of most Australian Democrat policies. The pro-aborts don't have the guts to say "No, you can't, that would be killing a child" to a pregnant woman. On the other hand, they don't have the guts to actually do the killing themselves, mano a mano (hence the popularity of a pill that does it for you, and the hysteria with which pro-aborts react whenever someone actually publishes a photo of what an aborted foetus looks like). If they had any principles, the pro-aborts would follow (as, to his partial credit, Prof Singer does partly follow) GK Chesterton's suggestion: "Let all babies be born. Then let us drown the ones we do not like." [2] Except, of course, when women vote for John Howard. Then they're naive dupes of the ruling class, the media and dog-whistle politics. [3] Avoiding for yourself the costs of bearing any children, or more than one designer child or a pigeon pair, is entirely rational in your own self-interest, even if it depletes your political tribe's electoral clout over the next two or three decades. PS: Valid comment from John: There are a number of types of behaviour which are perceived as 'wrong' largely because they carry a risk of self-harm. Quite a number of these are banned by law.... Furthermore, the law intervenes to force people in some limited and usually extreme circumstances to do things they don't want to for their own protection. I suppose the difference with "Don't have an abortion, it's not safe for you" is that, unlike John's examples, it's seen as "paternalistic" in the most gendered sense: ie, men telling women how to best look after themselves.
"... the Daily Kos, the Mos Eisley of the Angry Left..."
-- James Taranto, "Best of the Web", Wall Street Journal (15 February 2006)
Vote Conan!
(No, not Schwarzenegger):
Continuing the blog's policy of exposing the vast, secret conspiracy to clone red-dogs and infitrate them into positions of power and influence, we note without further comment the following news story: US chat show host Conan O'Brien is endorsing the re-election of Finnish President Tarja Halonen on the ground that she looks uncannily like him.
It started as a joke and ended up as a shot heard round the Internet, with the joker losing his job and Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia, suffering a blow to its credibility.
A man in Nashville has admitted that, in trying to shock a colleague with a joke, he put false information into a Wikipedia entry about John Seigenthaler Sr, a former editor of The Tennessean in Nashville.
Brian Chase, 38, who until Friday was an operations manager at a small delivery company, told Mr. Seigenthaler on Friday that he had written the material suggesting that Mr. Seigenthaler had been involved in the assassinations of John and Robert Kennedy. Wikipedia, a nonprofit venture that is the world's biggest encyclopedia, is written and edited by thousands of volunteers... - Katharine Q Seelye, " A Little Sleuthing Unmasks Writer of Wikipedia Prank", New York Times (11 December 2005) Telling reporters and critics to "stick to the issues that matter," Republican presidential candidate George W. Bush declined to answer questions Monday concerning his alleged involvement in a 1984 Brownsville, TX, mass murder, in which 17 people were ritualistically murdered and skinned.
"I will not stoop to discussing that," said Bush during a campaign stop at a Bay Area software-packaging plant. "We've got people across this country without health care, a broken educational system, taxes that are way too high, and all you want to talk about is something that may or may not have happened 16 years ago? I'm sorry, but I find that offensive."
The Bush campaign has found itself increasingly dogged by what is being dubbed "The Mass-Murder Issue." On April 3, 1984, 17 members of Children Of The Fold, a fringe religious group, were found brutally murdered in the basement of the Brownsville apartment building they used as their temple. The bodies were badly mutilated, many with skin removed, and numerous severed legs were nailed to a wall in the configuration of a seven-pointed star, the cult's symbol. Many of the victims' hearts and brains were cut out.
Bush, who lived in the same neighborhood as the sect and reportedly attended several of its meetings, disappeared the night of the slayings and resurfaced three days later, saying that he had "taken a trip to clear his head." A pen from Bush's oil company was found to have been used as a gouging tool in a victim's eye socket, and bloody footprints at the scene were found to match a pair of Bush's shoes. The future governor of Texas was never formally charged, and in October 1984, after a six-month investigation, the case was ruled a mass suicide...
According to political pundits, Bush's dodging of the mass-murder question has damaged his campaign.
"When Bush refuses to answer one way or the other, he comes off as a shady politician who cannot be trusted," said Robert Novak of CNN's The Capital Gang. "He also comes off as an insane mass murderer who kills lots of people and eats them"... - " Bush 'Refuses To Dignify' Mass-Murder Allegations: 'That's Not What This Election Is About,' He Says" 36(8) The Onion (8 March 2000) UPDATE: From " Cheney shoots man on Texas quail hunting trip: Man wounded in accidental shooting said to be ‘alert and doing fine’," The Associated Press (12 February 2006): WASHINGTON - Vice President Dick Cheney accidentally shot and wounded a companion during a weekend quail hunting trip in Texas, spraying the fellow hunter in the face and chest with shotgun pellets. Harry Whittington, a millionaire attorney from Austin, was “alert and doing fine” in a Corpus Christi hospital Sunday after he was shot by Cheney on a ranch in south Texas, said Katharine Armstrong, the property’s owner... Didn't King Ludwig of Bavaria used to engage in similar activities? Further comments: "What? It was DAMN QUAIL you were telling me to shoot at?" -- Cheney to Lloyd Bentsen. "Next time, have the courtesy to invite him to a family dinner before you shoot him." -- Saddam Hussein "We can certify quite categorically that the Vice-President of the United States had no involvement whatsoever in this shooting" -- Earl Warren "No more Brokeback Mountain jokes, smart alec. This was a bona fide hunting trip." -- Mary Cheney "Whittington was Cuban?" -- Teddy Roosevelt "That's one-all for the Vice-Presidency now." -- Aaron Burr. "I can't remember anything clearly... it's a blur... I heard Harry say 'Shoot that bush over there' and the next thing I know, I was screaming 'You damned Manchurian Candidate traitor!" -- Cheney "Ach, Rishchka, for head-shot, duck gun is useless, no? Glock will do job much faster, yes, more humane." -- Vladimir Putin "You can't spell 'Corpus Christi' without a 'corpse'..." -- Captain Kirk"Only an idiot would go duck- hunting with Cheney" -- Antonin Scalia
Latest news is that Sony has decided to discontinue production of its niche-market robotic toy dog the Aibo. As reported in Forbes, the obligatory Sony spokesperson asserts:
"Aibo has been a very popular product, but we've decided to focus on our core businesses of electronics, games and entertainment, and on profitability and strategic growth."
Hmm, yes. Like opening up a website - thedavincichallenge.com - to allow Christian apologists and critics to publicly air their views on the soon-to-be-released movie of the Da Vinci Code, addressing its theological and historical claims about Christianity.
Not a bad idea considering another well-known religious group's responses to another media outlet's treatment of their founder.
As one of the anti-Da Vinci Code essayists writes, "Heresy rightfully gets Christians upset, and responding is necessary."
But I don't think we'll see any Sony products being destroyed by rioting Christians. Except, perhaps, the end-of line Aibo. More likely we''ll get some responses sympathetic with how these Japanese consumers felt about the trashing of their favourite non-pet:
"Aibo is so symbolic of Sony quality I'm starting to lose faith in Sony's audiovisual products."
and
"I feel the decision to withdraw from a product that's so representative of Sony heralds an end for Sony as a global leader."
"BRUSSELS, Belgium - A sculpture of a tied-up Saddam Hussein floating in a water tank was banned by the mayor of a western Belgian town because it was deemed too controversial, an official said Monday.
The sculpture, by Czech artist David Cerny, was to be displayed in the coastal town of Middelkerke during the Beaufort 2006 arts festival starting April 1.
But Middelkerke Mayor Michel Landuyt banned the sculpture from being displayed, fearing the possible reaction [...]. The sculpture depicts Saddam Hussein in underpants with his hands tied behind his back in a shark-like pose, in reference to a famous object by the British artist Damien Hirst, whose tiger shark in a glass tank of formaldehyde was nominated in 1991 for the Turner Prize, one of the most prestigious awards for the visual arts in Europe. [...]"
- "Belgian mayor bans Saddam sculpture: Work of art deemed too ‘controversial, potentially explosive’," Associated Press(6 February 2006)
"WASHINGTON DC — Attendees at the Independence Ball, one of nine officially sanctioned galas celebrating President George W Bush's second inauguration Thursday, will be treated to a viewing of a caged Saddam Hussein, White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan said Monday. [...]"
- "Caged Saddam To Be Highlight Of Inaugural Ball", 41(3) The Onion (19 January 2005)
... much as it might read like one:
KENYANS reacting to an offer from New Zealand of dog food to save hungry children have said that they would rather eat dog food than starve to death. “It is better to eat dog’s meat than succumb to death,” said Thomas Oddo, who recently lost a child due to starvation. His comment followed an offer from New Zealand dog food manufacturer Christine Drummond who wants to send food to hungry children on Rusinga Island in Lake Victoria. Parents of some of the children said leaders opposed to the offer were only after satisfying their personal egos at the expense of starving millions in the country. “That dogs’ food would save the lives of the malnourished children,” said James Ochieng, speaking on behalf of the parents on Rusinga Island....
- "Starving Kenyans back dog food plan", Daily Telegraph (2 February 2006)
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