Then and NOW

NOW, The National Organization for Women, WILL TODAY throw it's support to Obama's camp. I know it's a radio interview, but you should really listen to it-or wait a couple of hours for the AP to pick it up in print.

Surely this was a tough decision for NOW...I mean, they 'very, very rarely endorse a presidential candidate', right? Hmmm. Then why do they have a POLITICAL ACTION COMMITTEE? In fact, take a look at THIS. It's NOW's endorsement of Hillary Rodham Clinton for President. No surprise, right? Take a look at the date on the press release. March 28, 2007. Yes. That says 2007. That's pretty much immediately after Billary announced her presidential bid. Didn't take long for them to turn their back on their stated political neutrality.

And why did they support her? Well, look at their own words:

Gathered here today at the historic home of Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party, surrounded by great women of the past, we are celebrating this Women's History Month by both honoring the past and looking to the future. We truly are living in historic times, days our foremothers knew would come, as long as new generations of women's rights activists — and voters — carried on their work. And carry it on we have, with U.S. women enjoying freedoms and opportunities that our great grandmothers only dreamed of.

Today, the first woman speaker presides over the U.S. House of Representatives, and Harvard University has its first woman president. Firsts are important, because they open doors for those who follow — but our real goal is to have every first followed by seconds and thirds and fourths, until having women in leadership is so common that it isn't even remarkable any longer...

NOW PAC's "Make History With Hillary," campaign will organize and energize women's rights supporters across the country — urging women and men across this nation to stand up and say "I'm Ready" for a woman president.

I love this. This is the fallout from the Palin VP selection that I was waiting for. I've been waiting for the time when all of the feminist groups extolling the virtues of absolute equality, nay, sameness of gender, will have to decide whether they are promoting women or liberalism.

In its support of the Obamanation, NOW has firmly squared itself in the liberalism over women camp. Why? Because NOW is not about 'now'. It's about 'then'. Which 'then'? JANUARY 23, 1973, that's when. Palin is pro-woman. NOW is pro-abortion. If they were really about 'choice', then they'd have to respect Palin's intellectual 'choice' that abortion is murder. The only 'choice' NOW is really interested in is retaining the 'choice' for women (and more correctly, men) to live as promiscuously as they want, because they're always the 'choice' to eliminate the proof of those 'choices'. The reason they don't get that explicit is because if they did, they'd sound like A FREAKY CAMILLE PAGLIA, outwardly recognizing abortion as murder, and recognizing others have the right to opinions, but just flat out ignoring all reason publically.

All NOW is really interested in is promoting the pro-abort, anti-real woman agenda. And now they've been put into a position where this is painfully obvious. Well, to those of us listening.

The Front Fell Off

Prepare to laugh hysterically.

Yes! I'm Voting for Palin/McCain

I'm sorry. I've been swamped. I've been studying, working, fathering...oh wait- that doesn't work quite the same as a transitive verb. At any rate, I haven't had the chance to spout about Palin.

So without further ado, and doing something that I never, ever do (make rash decisions)...I love that chick. Well, I love the team that is Sarah Palin and her speechwriter. A few months ago I talked about how the Obamanation was a WIZARD WITH WORDS. Now, we clingers-to-religion-and-guns have our own master of oratory. Obama would like to think he doesn't Palin comparison, but he does.

Sure, we don't know a whole lot about her, about her policies, about her skills on the international stage, but frankly my dear, I don't give a damn. Vice-Presidents are boosters. They speak for the President when he can't be there. They speak for the President when he can't be forthcoming for diplomatic purposes. They are bulldogs that attack, and they attack with words.

There are two aspects that have made me read, reread, watch and rewatch (I'm not kidding, I've watched her speech 6 times-uh, I mean I've been fathering...) her speech: the substance and the delivery. Text and video at HUFFINGTON POST. Ha. Linking there because I can.

Her delivery was amazing. She knew her lines. She looked at the camera. Her lip quivered when it was supposed to and her smile warmed when needed. Even her daughter got in the act with a cute little moment.

But it was that speech. (I know, what follows may not mean much to most, but I bet Ray Gunner's on my side.) A rhetorician, like a carpenter, uses tools as he plies his trade. The rhetorician uses figures of speech like the carpenter uses hammers, saws, straightedges. And like the carpenter's tools, figures of speech have names to distinguish them. A carpenter doesn't want to waste his time saying 'Hey, Joe, hand me that metal blade with the serrated edge and wooden handle that is used for slicing wood into two halves.' The only difference is that figures of speech are unfortunately only named by Greek words generally unpronouncable to even Greek geeks.

Unfortunately, rhetoric, as an art, is dying except for the very few samples that fly around. The Palin speech, however, was so full of figures of speech that I'm still finding them after a full week. Chiasmus. Anaphora. Diacope. Conduplicatio. There is nary a paragraph, a line, a clause without a figure. Alive and well is Rhetoric in Palin's speech, just as rhetoric is alive and well in Obama's.

I don't support Palin because she's experienced. She's not. I don't support Palin because she's got the right policies, even though she does. I don't support Palin because she's a token woman. She's not. I don't support Palin because she can de-liver a moose as well as she can a speech, even though she does.

I support her because of those figures. Not merely because I happen to love figures of speech, but because it's through the correct use of those tools that opinions are swayed, emotions are induced or quelled. Their use is how people are convinced and how congresses are convened. And these are the things that qualified Vice Presidents do.

I'm juiced about Palin because she delivered. Her delivery was perfect when she was asked to deliver a speech, and will be perfect when asked to deliver again. Vice Presidents are boosters. Let her be one.

I think she's got it. I think she's not merely a pawn of the Republican machine, being manipulated and hand fed her lines and unable to think on her own. All the same, God speed to the debates, when we find out whether she's for real or just a puppet regurgitating well-written speeches.

But isn't Obama a puppet to the whims of change?

What is Art?

Oh, that's a loaded title. Tolstoy tried it. And failed. So will I, if I even attempt some sort of scholarly endeavor.

But this is "Paronomasial Pensees", after all. So, I'll just jot down some thoughts, and perhaps sneak in a few wordplays. Perhaps I'll just figure out what I think art isn't. That's fine, too.

There are several ways to interpret the question "What is art?". The first would be: what disciplines are considered 'art' or perhaps 'fine art'? The answer to that contains some clearly defined areas, and some fairly complex, less agreed upon ones as well. What makes the cut as 'art'? Surely painting does, as does sculpture. Music is in there, and poetry. Dance and playwriting? OK. I'll agree. What about architecture? I think you know I would proudly include the best of architecture in 'fine art', but in all honesty, I shouldn't.

A second interpretation to the question would be: "What is art for?". This is to say, what is the purpose of art? This is an intriguing question. An interesting quality of art is that it acts as a barometer of the society in which it is produced, either because it represents the state of affairs of said society, or it intends to lead said society to another place than it is currently in. I suppose you could say that art either re-presents the created world, or re-creates the present world. Art takes us somewhere we normally cannot go, shouldn't go, or wouldn't go. Reading Homer brings us to the brink of war in our living room. Seeing Othello self-destruct helps us examine our own virtues and vices before it is too late. Contemplating before Fra Angelico's 'Crucifixion' brings us before the scene of all scenes, the act of all acts. It is for these reasons, and not merely to decorate our living rooms, that art is.

A third interpretation to the question would go something like: "What among the disciplines is to be considered art, and what is to be considered crap?". This is the question least often asked by arteests and never by artists, but most often by philosophers with no artistic talent to temper their tempestuous tempers. Actually, the distinction that is most often overlooked is the difference between 'art' and 'craft'. A crafty person puts materials together in new, and often spectacular ways. They create shiny objects that enthrall the intellectually inert. Most often accompanied by the reaction 'Wow! Thats really neat!', craft is never looked at for more than 15 seconds. Art, on the other hand, demands a high level of craft, but is not sufficiently determined by it. Art can be revisited every day for 20 years and still produce new and exciting emotions, thoughts, feelings, even physiological reactions. Splashes of paint in random order might take great understanding of color theory, and great skill with the material qualities of paint, but until it is arranged into a pattern that says something to the audience, it is not art. And I might add that merely saying anything is not enough. One must say big things. One must approach great truths. It must be beautiful. Art is beautiful, craft is splendiferous.

Art is the great mix between theory and practice. Without theory, the artist has nothing to say, no reason to act in his medium. Without practice, he has no means to say his great thought, and it is wasted.

Up Next: Pelosi Explains Humanae Vitae

How do these people honestly hold their head up?
Above his payscale? The Church is not aware of the point at which life begins and therefore that's not what matters?

Here's Pelosi's (and Obama's) actual comments:




Perhaps if Pelosi doesn't want to read actual Church documents, she could include this reading in her 'extensive study on the issue': "Abortion: The Development of the Roman Catholic Perspective" by Fr. John Connery:

"The Christian tradition from the earliest days reveals a firm antiabortion attitude . . . The condemnation of abortion did not depend on and was not limited in any way by theories regarding the time of fetal animation. Even during the many centuries when Church penal and penitential practice was based on the theory of delayed animation, the condemnation of abortion was never affected by it. Whatever one would want to hold about the time of animation, or when the fetus became a human being in the strict sense of the term abortion from the time of conception was considered wrong, and the time of animation was never looked on as a moral dividing line between permissible and impermissible abortion."
Or to put it in the blunter words of the great Lutheran pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer:
"Destruction of the embryo in the mother's womb is a violation of the right to live which God has bestowed on this nascent life. To raise the question whether we are here concerned already with a human being or not is merely to confuse the issue. The simple fact is that God certainly intended to create a human being and that this nascent human being has been deliberately deprived of his life. And that is nothing but murder."

I really need to stop following politics, because it's leading me to some pretty hateful thoughts. Although, I did really enjoy seeing both Pelosi and Obama get drymouth while making up their responses on the spot. They were both clearly nervous. This is a good thing, as even the most ardent murderers are now showing weakness in their confidence in falsehood. There's hope...

Beastly is only sin deep

THIS KIND OF CRAP is why I'm so serious all the time.

...'And for the talent competition, Sister Rufina will be making rosaries in a dazzling habit of black and white sequins to the music of Neil Young's "Natural Beauty"'.

I used to think Fellini's 'ecclesiastical fashion show' in his movie "Roma" was satire, but I guess it was actually prophecy.

Here's the clip in case you haven't wasted 2 hours of your life to see the rest of the movie:

At Least She Was Still Born

I don't know which is the more astounding fact involved in THIS STORY: that the baby survived 5 hours in a refrigerator, that the hospital was unable to determine if she was alive, or that she only weighed 1 pound 5oz. All are amazing.

On a related note, if you are at all interested in A) bioethics and the questions dealing with defining life and death, B) great literature, or C) reasons to like George W., I highly recommend reading "Being Human: Core Readings in the Humanities", edited by Leon Kass and put out by the President's Council on Bioethics. After a year or two of being out of print and around $80, you can now get the reprint for around $15-$20, but it was easily worth more than the $80.

The Economy is Stalin

Actually, it's Lenin'. Lending way too much money into the system. We keep producing and producing and producing new money. This is a great problem, and Lenin himself knew it. He (supposedly) said:

"The best way to destroy a Capitalistic System is to debase the currency."

How do you debase a currency? By dropping more units of currency into circulation-- more money without increasing value. And what are we doing now? Printing more money, coining more money. Over the last fifteen years we've dropped exponentially more money into the system (an internal boost) than ever before. This drops the value per unit; and in our case this is magnified by the fact that our dollar value is not only not increasing, but it's dropping by itself.

This is similar to a body trying to find nutrition from within it's own system--sure, for a time there might be some fat to burn, but burning more and more fat to create energy has serious long term effects. Pretty soon muscle is eaten away. Then selective organs fail, then death. What is needed for the growth and perpetuation of any organic system is to add energy from external sources, not internal. What do you do when you get sick? Take medicine. You don't sit around waiting for your own body to produce it! This is what would create more value in the dollar as well.

How can we so flippantly do this? Because after 1965 our dollar was no longer based on gold or silver. It's made of and based on non-precious metals and paper. Thus, we could just say: Poof! There's more money!- and no one would be the wiser. To the common guy, he had his 'legal tender'. He didn't care whether it was based on gold or seashells or tulips or cow dung. So long as he could buy his stuff, it didn't matter. Oh, but it does. And we're going to start seeing this really soon. Why do you think that gold always shoots up in times like this? Because it (and silver) are the two things that have always retained value and stably stood the fluctuations of political change. And gold is reaching the stratosphere as investors realize the dollar is, at the least for now, and at the worst for a long time, collapsing.

And now they're going to print even more to 'help' get out of THIS.

Brace yourselves, people. If any of you, or your families, have more than $100,000 in any one bank, move the excess to another bank. Get every penny of your deposit FDIC insured. Do it now.

That Smell Rings A Bell

Sorry, I've been ultra busy lately, with no end in sight. So, just like you were hoping for, less words and more humor are in your future. (Click on the image to enlarge for reading)

German Speedbump Technology

No words necessary.