Religious Literacy

Lookee here! It hasn't been six months, only two! I told you I'd write more often. Who knows? Maybe there will even be another before we see the end of 2010!

I haven't gotten over the hurt written about in the previous post. Not sure I ever will. But I'm working on forgiving. Secret Agent Woman left a very true comment after my last post. Honestly, I don't think I'm ready forgive one of the members of the offending party. The other member (party of 2, you see) apologized and asked for my forgiveness up front, and I granted it. In the meantime, I'm following my therapist's advice and trying to reach out to person 1. I've deduced from the little response received, and prior conversations, that that person is relatively insecure. Which is sad. And which may be why person 1 cornered person 2 into deliberately hurting me. So, now I'm feeling sorry for Offending Person 1, and hoping that I can move to forgiving him/her through pity.

Besides, if so many in South Africa can forgive their vicious, violent oppressors (and yes, I know that's debatable en masse) then I can learn to forgive an insecure, immature offender who probably has no idea how much his/her action hurts me and those around him/her. That's all I'll write on that.

Onto more interesting things. (And I apologize for the lengthy vanity trip above.) This week, a study by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life was floating around on Facebook. It looked at elementary religious literacy of Americans, and their general knowledge of public expressions and public religious figures. I'll be honest, I didn't read the full story; I jumped straight to the 15-question quiz to see how I compared to most Americans. The average American falls around 50%; I got 100%. I took the full 32 question survey, and only missed one. (To the Learnin' Mobile, PK!) The thrust of the study, however, was that atheists and agnostics scored higher on the quiz, on average than those who self-identified any faith.

Online, my atheist friends - who also took the quiz - crowed a little bit (okay, so did I) and one of my clergy friends used it as a call for the church to do a better job with religious education. Perhaps not surprisingly, when I glanced at the results question for question in the study, most of the wrong answers on content were delivered by people outside their own religion. Atheists didn't know who Job was, for example, and Christian Evangelicals weren't sure what Ramadan was, etc. Those not identifying as anything - not atheist, not believers, not agnostics - seemed to do as well as anyone else, though again, weak on the content questions.

I don't really want to explore here what it means that there was a knowledge gap between non-believers and belivers. But it's worth noting that not all the questions were about Bible stories or Christian dogma, but about elementary aspects of many religions - including mythology and doctrine - as well as religious history in America and public expressions of religion. What I find interesting is that few people, regardless of how they identified, did well with the questions about religious history or public expression. Specifically, school prayer, Bible reading in school and spot the preacher from the First Great Awakening. Everyone basically got the last one wrong. I can understand why someone may get a doctrine question wrong in someone else's religion (heck, even in their own), but why the generic religion-in-society questions?

I suspect we don't really know how to talk about religion, religious heritage or items of faith or spiritual nourishment and exercise in our society. It makes us uneasy. What are generally regarded as the two taboo topics of conversation whenever you meet someone or are at a party? Religion and politics. Is there any wonder than that we're culturally ignorant? It's like religion (maybe politics, too) is the sex of the modern age. Because it's so personal, it's volatile and we don't discuss it. Or when we do, we just sneer at each other and reduce the other to withering stereotypes.

Despite this, I'm very grateful to the education I received growing up. Not just my religious education about my own religion's sacred stories and doctrine. But that my father and schoolteachers taught us about religious influence in public life.

For instance, when I was in high school, English Lit classes in Texas followed a certain path: 9th grade was focused on English (as in British) lit; 10th grade was general lit with heavier emphasis on poetry; 11th grade focused on American literary genres and movements - with heavier emphasis on the novel, I think; 12th grade ... I don't remember. (Who remembers their senior year?) In 11th grade, we covered the major movements from early colonial days up through WW2, I think. Maybe just the Harlem Renaissance. Included among those early colony movements were the essay, pamphlets and ... the sermon. I remember we learned about Cotton Mather and Jonathan Edwards. We read "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," not as prosetylization, but as an artifact of the period. We discussed how that sermon influenced the general thought of the day. Just like we read "Thanatopsis" and discussed the spiritualism trend in literature during the period. Just like we read Twain and discussed how his writing affected the public. Just because we were being exposed to writings of a religious nature, didn't mean that we were being "preached to."

Likewise, in 10th grade world history class, we had a section about world religions. I don't remember how long we spent on the world's 5 most popular religions, but I do remember that we learned about the Vedas, the Bagavad Ghita and different big movements in Buddhism. For the quiz about the world religion segment, we had to list 5 of the 10 commandments, 4 of the 8 noble truths, maybe all 5 tenets of Islam, or maybe 3 (I can't recall). I think we had to list some of the books of the Torah, too. That sounds familiar. And I don't remember what core principles we were supposed to know about Christianity and Hinduism. Maybe the resurrection for Christianity and the cycle of life and death for Hinduism? Sure. We'll say that. None of this was delivered with any hint of favoritism or bias, even though I'd put money on it that every one of the students in the classroom, and the teacher too, were either Christian in practice or personal history. I don't know how that compares to the general American public high school education. However, my husband, who attended a much larger, much wealthier school that produces plenty of white collar, college-bound grads (as opposed to my school which produces a lot of blue collar workers and straight-to-military), doesn't recall any such exposure in school.

Because of Dad's great admiration for the First Amendment as well as for free expression of religion, I got what I think is a clearer picture of religious freedom rights in America. I was grateful that teacher-led school prayer had been struck down, but not fearful of my teacher ever uttering the word "god" in any context other than a swear word.

Theologian Elaine Pagels believes we should teach religion in America's public schools. Not as proselytization, but as academic study. She may be right. We don't do it now, and how has it helped us? So many Americans are ignorant about other religions. (Hell, their own, as well.) I thank God and my forebears for our secular government; the separation of church and state is probably my favorite amendment. But would talking about religion violate the establishment clause? I don't know that teaching religion would ever occur in the U.S. There is a lot of mistrust that floats around. Who decides on how each religion is represented?

I guess my big question is this: Who does it benefit for us to be ignorant of others' religions, our own religions and the influence of those religions? The current tsunami of Islamophobia clearly benefits no one. It weakens our country in so many ways. The apparently misguided notion that a public school teacher is legally disallowed to read from the Bible as a piece of literature serves to strengthen those who believe that Christianity is under attack. If you don't know Martin Luther from Martin Luther King, then you miss massive catalysts for revolution in western history.

Religion matters. Just like sex matters. If we can learn to talk more openly about sex, while still respecting the personal importance it carries, why can't we learn to do the same about religious matters?

Inauguration and Expectation

I was there. ...though I didn't get a t-shirt touting the fact.

There are moments in history we collectively witness and a few people witness those moments up front. Many - if not most - of these moments are largely unanticipated, or their broader cultural effect are unanticipated: the eruption of Mount Saint Helens, JFK's assassination or Woodstock, for instance. We like to say where we were "when we heard," because it's a shared experience, but when we come across someone who was on the ground when it happened, we listen more intently. "You were at Dealey Plaza? You were at Pearl Harbor? You were at Watergate that night? What did you see? How did you react?" As a first-person witness to the most rattling tragic event in recent national history, I have discovered what a bizarre, morbid privilege it is to have "been there." Witnesses shape memory.

Because there are so few moments when we'll get to be a witness to historical moments that are planned and anticipated, it seems a crying shame not to witness them up-close, if we have the resources to. Life is too short to pass up moments of greatness (and happiness) if it's within driving distance. With that in mind, Honey and I woke at 0-dark-hundred and made our way to DC to see the swearing in of our 44th President. (Hopefully, you've figured that out by the photos above.)

It was freezing. Very freezing. At one point, I began to worry that I may actually develop frostbite. We bought little heating packs to place in our gloves - a purchase I was concerned would be a rip-off from the vendor, but ended up being the best $5 I spent that day. We made it to the Mall a little before 8AM and people slowly filtered in for the next several hours. After hearing some reports - particularly of the Purple Tunnel of Doom, crowd-averse, clausterphobic Molly's nightmare scenario - I consider us lucky. People, though, were in amazingly good spirits; laughing, singing and dancing along with Sunday's concert that was being re-played on the jumbotrons.

When Barack Obama completed his oath, the cheer that went up was extraordinary. It was official: he is our president, now. The shackles had fallen, the windows had been thrown open, the baby had been born, the muzzled voice liberated, the well had been tapped, the geode had been shattered open. The cry was a delirious, elated catharsis after both surviving the last eight years of miserable, selfish leadership and after generations of warring the behemoth of institutionalized and tacit racial injustice. It felt like people cheered for a solid 60 seconds. I cried. I cried several times that day. I'm tearing up, now. People around us danced. I couldn't help but laugh, as well. Honey whooped and hollered when I really only expected him to cheer. That was really fun! It was a fantastic moment that I fervently hope time will never take from me.

Our nephew, Dave, came with us. He's almost 16. He likes Obama, but I think it's more because he's a popular icon and because Dave lives in a mostly-liberal area. He's at an age where he's very concerned about being caught up in the latest fad and maintaining popularity. I don't know that he understands the influence of ideology and politics. I don't think he quite understands the weight of our nation having elected our first black president, either. How much of that is generational, I don't know. And maybe, that Dave is unimpressed by the fact that our country elected a black man is more a testament to how far we've come since my parents were 16, and even I was 16, than it is that we've elected him.

But I'm still shocked and awed. I did presume I would live to see the day. I'm just surprised it would come this early in my life. And I presumed he'd be a Republican. Or, as Honey presumed, that we'd see a black vice president before we saw a black president. I also presumed we'd see a woman first. I'm still waiting for that one; confident that I will see that in my lifetime, now. (I couldn't get behind Hillary. I felt it was too soon; I'm not a fan of dynasty's in a land of democracy and didn't want a Bush/Clinton/Bush/Clinton sandwich. Also, watching her for several years, I wanted a little more daylight between her and W. Particularly on the war, from the beginning.)

Obama's popularity is currently really, really high. Hopes for him are stratospheric. The marketing and media frenzy that's surrounded Obama can really only hurt people's expectations, though. There's only so much even the most effective president can do. He's governing 300 million people, a little less than half of whom elected him and probably a quarter of whom boldly despise him and he'll need the support, or at least patience, from each of them to begin to make a dent in the flaming pile of shit that W left him. I do not envy any president the office, but I really don't envy the administration that has to tackle the uglies we face now. I will be pleased with good enough. All I really want for our incoming president is to restore our reputation around the world and make every effort to help "the least of these" in our county. Economy, Iraq, Healthcare - those are my biggies. If he can break a few of those juggernauts' legs, I'll be happy.

Yes We Can! Yes We Did! Yes We Will!

I've been running a mile a minute since election night, so I haven't had time yet to post since the United States made history Tuesday night. I am out of town, currently and will be returning within the hour, so I have to make this post brief, which is unfortunate, as I have so many thoughts and emotions. However, I will say this: I spent a large portion of yesterday grinning like a goofball and another portion of yesterday crying. Particularly since it seemed every song on the radio was speaking to my hope. ("Imagine" started the instant I turned on my car to drive home; cue the waterworks!) Not incidentally, Honey and I began listening to the Audacity of Hope in the car, yesterday, making me even more confident that we made the right choice and we've elected a man who chooses to build bridges.

So, instead of writing a well thought-out post expressing my joy and hope, I figure I'll just cut and paste from emails and direct you to other blogs. When I have time later this week (tomorrow night or Saturday), I'll sit down collect and go at it. Just suffice it to say: I am thrilled and proud of my country and hopeful for the man who will lead us for at least the next 4 years.

I emailed a bunch of friends and family yesterday expressing my joy and hope. Here are some (or portions thereof) of their responses - all misspellings, etc, theirs:

It is a great day! I also thought that I would be glad that anybody other than GW would be a breath of fresh air, but seeing Obama win gave me more confidence in our country and in our future than I ever could have imagined. It is a great thing that happened historically because of his race, but it is also a great thing that happened because he knows that people are going to help change this country and he can get us reved up to do so.
- from a cherished cousin in Texas

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My vote was based on Scarlett Johansen's endorsement of Obama. She is an avid Obama supporter and her shit don't stink. Serioulsy though, it was based on the belief that we needed a change. We needed someone (anyone) who could give us a different face to the world. As romantic as it seems to say "we don't care what the rest of the world thinks about us, we Americans!" As bold and patriotic as it sounds to say "stay the course". As proud as is sounds to say "we don't need their approval" it simply isn't the case. we live in this world, we use more of it's oil than anybody else, we owe trillions of dollars to other countries, we affect its finanical market as they affect ours. it is time for us to have a slice of humble pie and say "okay what can we do to be part of the solution?" There are some epiphanies you have that change the way you think for the rest of your life (I guess that's why it's called an epiphany). But I recall listening to NPR several years ago just after Arnold was elected as the Governor of California when I had an epiphany. I remember listening to a speech he made about "terminating high taxes" and getting the "girlymen out of the Senate". I laughed and thought very realistically that every citizen of California was an idiot for electing him. I had never been to California at the time, but all the stereotypes of how "hollywood" and "soft" they were came to fruition in my mind. Then a ton of bricks hit me and I realized "Holy Shit! that is what the rest of the world thinks of us when they hear Bush speak." Then it got even worse when I thought "Hoy Shit! that is what people think of Texans when they hear Bush speak." I went out and got a Natalie Maines tattoo that afternoon.

I will take a Jr. Senator from Illinois over the Governor of the greatest State in the Union who doesn't know his ass from a whole in the ground any day of the week.
- Bro

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Aside from the potty mouth, I am delighted that both my kids are thinkers with their heads on straight and their hearts in the right place. We do not really know what coming years hold or what President Obama can or will do to correct our course, but, like both of you, I am very hopeful - and very encouraged that this generation has made a powerful statement against apathy and cynicism.
- Dad

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I agree! I, too, cried tears of elation and felt a deep sense of empowerment both as a black woman and as an American. I am proud to be an American. ALL men are truly created equal. We have overcome. I'm glad my grandparents and parents were alive to bear witness. Free at last, free at last, thank God Almighty, we're free at last!!!
- a friend

Lastly, PLEASE visit my friend's blog here. She's an African-American woman currently teaching English in Japan and that's interesting enough. However, her reaction to the Obama win is cathartic just to read! (And she's got an awesome graphic included.)

Happy new day, America!!

Good Election Morrow!

I'm in a line spiralling around the local school's blacktop right now, waiting to cast my ballot for president, senator and congressperson. Anticipating a multi hour wait, I downloaded this blog app to my iPhone, so I could stay productive. However, it looks like I may be in and out in an hour or less!

Got seriously little sleep last night. Maybe 2.5 hours tops. Schlepped down to Manassas, Va last night to see Obama. The return drive was just as hellish as the outgoing. The rally was very energizing. Tried to coordinate with VA Gal to meet up, but with tens of thousands of people, it was a futile effort. Fate being who she is though, we did run into eachother. The good folks of Manassas, Va provided the worst crowd control I'd ever seen in my life. Seriously worried we might have a Who concert crush on our way out; exits weren't marked and we parting attendants were like the Hebrew children without Moses trying to find their way out of the mess. The friends who joined me last night and I grumbled, but no one else was moaning. Then I heard a familiar raspy voice complaining a familiar, "aye chihuahua! You'd think ... Come ON, people!" And of course it was VirginiaGal. We got to chat briefly before scattering to the winds again, but I was so thrilled we got to meet up. Thanks Manassas fairgrounds for having so crappy a crowd control that 100,000 people had to bottleneck through a single ten foot space!

Well, I'm impressed. Been here about 20 minutes, and already about halfway closer than I was when I arrived. Not bad at all. Thanks early voters!

If you haven't already, to do your civic duty. Stand in the rain if you must. Your forebears didn't suffer for you to sit on your ass. Rock the vote! (or Barack it! ... but that's just my preference.)

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Update: I was in and out in less than an hour. When I got up to the check-in, I was given the option of a paper ballot or digital voting. While touchscreen might be easier, I'm still wary. There's no paper trail to verify how I voted, if there was ever any kind of repeat of Florida 2000. So, I opted for the optical scan paper ballot. Luckily, voting was so quick and easy this morning that I was able to get home in time to do other stuff before work. Think I might take a brief nap and try to catch up on a little of that sleep I lost last night.

3BT: Early "Voting," Soundtrack, Complacent Canine

In the spirit of Clare; some things that I noticed yesterday:

1. On a mid-day trip to 7-11, I caught a cardboard merchandise stand near the door. "Cast Your Vote '08," it pitches. I can choose to buy non-campaign endorsed keychains, buttons, bumperstickers and the like for either Obama or McCain. As you can see from the photo on the right, Obama's merchandise was all sold out. McCain's merchandise still had plenty to offer. It re-affirms my hope that we'll have a sincere change of leadership next week.

2. On my walk to 7-11, I plugged into my iPod to find I'd left it not on shuffle, as per usual, but on the Amelie soundtrack. I walked deliberately slowly down the blocks from my office to the store so that I could soak up the music. The capricious cold breezes and cool grey sky were completely opposed to the warm, semi-nostalgic light that bathes virtually every scene in that movie. Nonetheless, when the music began, I felt suddenly awakened to the world around me ... a little like the title heroine.

3. Babydog had to have a bath last night. Apparently on her walk yesterday, she decided to roll around in a pile of some other dog's poop, and our dog-walker discovered what enticed her too late. She managed to wipe off and gently clean the bulk of it, but Babydog still had some smudged in her fur, and she stunk. She hates being bathed and will wriggle away as much as possible. But last night, she dutifully stood in the bathtub as I focused the shower sprayer on her. With soaked fur looking like feathers, she looks up at me as if to say, "Is this what you want? Fine. See if I care. It was worth it!"

WMML for the last few days

Yes. I'm ripping off the title of this post from the regular feature on Sonnjea's blog. But imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so I hope she takes it as such.

Thank goodness for John McCain. Without him, a sophomoric joke from The Office that has had Honey and me in stitches since Thursday would've probably petered out by now. ("Petered out? Then why am I pregnant?" Hey-oh!)

In the season premiere of The Office, the folks at Dunder Mifflin were having an office weigh-in to compete in their company-wide summer weight loss challenge. As they crowded on the warehouse scale, Dwight was trying to get people to eat more to skew the results, so their end loss would be larger. He walked up to one of his officemates and held an eclair to her face. "Here, eat this eclair. If you can't swallow, at least hold it in your mouth." The camera focused on Jim who clearly got a kick out of Dwight's request. It took a few beats for me to figure out that it was a double entendre, but I've been riding it all week. Both Honey and I have been walking around the house looking for excuses to say, "If you can't swallow, at least hold it in your mouth." Yes. We're extraordinarily mature!

Around Sunday night, the joke started aging a little. But thankfully, the Republican candidate for the Presidency revived it for us. Monday morning, 6AM: we're sitting in the kitchen, checking emails, reading the news, etc and listening, as we do every morning to Morning Edition. The reporter is delivering a story about McCain and the bailout plan. They play a clip (about 15 seconds into this file) and McCain says something that rouses Honey and me out of our groggy Monday morning stupors. "This is something that all of us will swallow hard and go forward with."

Immediately, we died laughing. Awww, yeeeaaaahhhh! If you can't swallow the bailout, at least hold it in your mouth, America.

Our reaction was completely juvenile, I know. And, that I've been mashing up those two bits of media in my brain have kept me giggling for a week speaks to my utter lack of sophistication. But it certainly woke me up, on a morning when I so dreaded going into work that I wanted to cry. And it woke me up enough to really get a good workout on the Wii Fit - something I hadn't done in weeks. So ... thank you, John McCain. You are a Monday morning hero to this young woman!

Apropos of nothing. In fact, inappropriate

WARNING: If you're easily offended by bodily functions and non-medical/clinical discussions thereof, then it may be better for you to check out another blog.

Alright, so tonight I should be writing content which may or may not be used in collateral to be distributed at a fundraiser I hope to attend this weekend, but haven't really delved far into my wallet to see what kind of coin I can afford to part with these days. Yesterday I attended a baby dedication for a friend (or rather, for his baby) at a Unitarian church where I had several years previous, attended a memorial service for a former coworker, and I had been planning to blog on religion, ritual and variations on the theme. However, musings on religious expression will have to wait, and before I proceed with my writing assignment tonight, I simply must share with the few of you who read this what simultaneously turned my stomach and tickled my funny bone (all foreshadowed puns intended) this evening.

Honey and I have been watching The Tudors on iTunes; the first season anyway. It's totally as trashy as the website makes it out to be, but it's also got plastrin-front gowns! lutes! plague! Northam, Neill and Jonathan Rhys Meyers! Tonight, we watched the 10th (and I believe final) episode of season one. It opens with the young King Henry VIII masturbating into a cloth being held open by a servant-boy. I kid you not. I can't help but laugh just thinking about it!

The scene is awkward to say the very, very least. It cut away to shots of Anne Boleyn's heaving breasts and then back to the young king straining and whacking (all seen from the waist up). And just as the king came, we saw a closeup of Anne's delicate hands piercing a threaded needle through a piece of embroidery she was working on. Then, with the king spent, the servant, who had previously had his face maybe a foot from the royal junk and turned away (a wise choice in his position, I must admit), gets up, bows to the king, and holding the cloth slightly slack, leaves the room.

The way the scene played out, it seemed like Henry was working off some morning wood. Now, I have no idea if this was common practice for male monarchs to employ a manservant to accept his "kingliness," as it were. Though no history buff myself, per se, I place no faith in the historical accuracy of this series; I see it more as costume-drama porn set against the skeleton of historical events. All that said: what worse job could there be in the court than to be the Royal Jizz-catcher? Who did you have to piss of to get that assignment? I should hope that promotion was swift. My God! I'd much rather scrub the peasants' outhouses than have to spend each morning with my face inches from the sweaty scepter, praying that his aim was good. (Massive shudder!) I would be begging God every day for tuberculosis or the plague or leprosy to get me out of that job!

I was icked out by that for at least the first 5 minutes of the show. I wish I could tell you what transpired in those first five minutes, but I was temporarily blind. That's right: masturbation blinded me. All these years of the real stuff did nothing to my vision; seeing the staged version on TV blacked me out for five.

I apologize if I grossed anyone out. Mostly. This was just too weird and hilarious to keep to myself. ... I suppose it's discussing these sort of things that keeps be from being invited to posh places and events. This, and the fact that I'm not well-heeled.

Democrats doing what they do best: shooting themselves in the foot.

The more Hillary attacks Obama on bullshit "issues" like his pastor, that he doesn't always wear an American flag lapel pin, or that he referred to a certain demographic as bitter*, the more I want to kick her out.

*btw: wasn't she attacked in 1992, as an anti-family sorceress for saying she didn't want to stay at home and bake cookies? heaven forbid a candidate doesn't plot every word every now and then!

There are plenty of real issues and policy proposals she could go after him on, and he her, but instead her campaign focuses on the petty. Seriously? Are we 13? If she gets the nomination, I'll be behind her. I do think she'd make a better president than McCain and any other Republican currently serving anywhere. Not that intra-party campaigns have to be simpering and sweet, but her attacks on Obama have seemed as shallow as the attacks that will come his way from the Republicans and the attacks that the Republicans have hurled her way through the years. (Maybe this is a case of the bullied becoming the bully.)

Aside from my deep displeasure at the prospect of yet another White House dynasty on the rise, I guess this really all goes back to me feeling betrayed by her regarding the Iraq war. I've been watching her for the past 8 years, because I have been curious if she would make this run. And I've been disappointed. Until 2007, she had not put enough daylight between her and Spanky for my taste - more rhetorically than legislatively, I believe. And I was particularly upset that she joined the war bandwagon in '02. Even with all the chest pounding and appeals in 2002, I smelled a rat. (Maybe because I was one of the 30% of Americans who realized that Baghdad was not in Afghanistan and that al Quaeda was not the Iraqi Army.) At least Edwards recanted his vote. I was impressed by that. I liked Hillary in the 90s - frankly, I still like her and look up to her - but she just has not impressed me as a Democratic senator during one of the most embarrassing and mismanaged administrations in my short life, if not in American history.

I also wish she would come the realization that plenty of us who have grown up among the "bitter" voters outside the iron-clad ideological bubbles of the Metro East Coast Corridor, LA and San Francisco have: she will not win. She may win against the corpses of Benedict Arnold or Adolf Hitler, but that's about it. If she gets the nomination, she'll have a strong showing against McCain because Dems are tired enough of Bush, but she will not win. She is deeply and desperately hated out in the middle. Both Clintons draw the same ire in some parts of this country as W does here on the East Coast. She's hated by Democratic women, even: she didn't ditch Bill when he publicly humiliated her with the Lewinski scandal, so she's beneath their contempt. (Granted had she divorced him, the right would've slayed her for being a wicked wife breaking her vows, so she really couldn't have won either way; but don't tell that to my mom.) The disdain for her among even moderates living in Red areas is so thick and unmovable as to make molasses look more fluid than water.

Hillary has good ideas. Obama has good ideas. Either will make a good president. But Obama has broader appeal and more successfully articulates what's been on my mind than she does, so for me, he's the man. The Democratic nominee will be crucified on the way to the White House this year simply because he or she will not be the traditional white man. Expect swiftboating the likes of which will make Kerry's attacks look like a booze cruise. Hillary may personally withstand slings and arrows well, but I think Obama will withstand them better politically.

In the meantime, if the Dems keep this up, the Republicans may not need to prep the crown of thorns for the nominee. Democrats are doing what they do best: starting of strong only to taper into a disorganized mess that practically begs voters to seek refuge in the Republican nominees.

Toward a More Purple Union

It's over. I'm in. I love Barack Obama.

Where I had been split on Hillary and Barack, Senator Obama's speech yesterday sealed it for me. I don't know that I have ever heard a politician or high profile figure give a call for such a genuinely honest conversation on race in this country. The only other figure I can think of who has has been our former pastor, a black man who successfully integrated a majority white congregation. It was not without struggle, but it was successful.

The furor over Rev. Wright's comments in some of his sermons kind of amuses me for a couple of reasons:

Firstly, it's naive, and frankly, insulting, to believe or imply that the purpose of a house of worship - at least in this country - is to uphold the policies of a government or the prejudices of a society. The church should always be challenging immoralities and injustices it sees around it. We may not agree on what those disparities are, but that's the job of each church. Plus, as my Dad was saying last night, he doesn't know a preacher out there that hasn't at least suggested that America will be judged by God somehow or another for something or another. "I've done it, your grandfather has certainly done it; all preachers do on some level, they just may not be as pointed or fiery as Rev. Wright." And, of course, not every pastor agrees on what draws the judgement of God, or what that judgement entails.

Secondly, it's insulting to the intelligence of people everywhere and the spiritual integrity of people of faith to imply, as the media hype has over this, and does over similar scandals, that if you are a parishoner of a church, then you agree 100% with 100% of the content - which apparently is devoid of nuance - that comes out of the mouth(s) of your church leader(s). Seriously? Give me a break. To paraphrase Barack: who hasn't sat in church, synagogue or mosque and at least, on occasion, thought I'm not sure I agree that's what God was trying to say? Reverend Wright may be Senator Obama's spiritual mentor, but give a person some credit; that doesn't mean Obama agrees with everything Wright believes. Wright merely led him to the table; they may not all use the same condiments. (The uptick of this is: this opens my eyes to my own prejudices against people on the other side of the aisle whose churches I disagree with. God, make me slow to judge.)

Thirdly, I feel like Wright's comments were not only taken out of context of full 40 minute sermons (you'll judge a man's whole outlook based on 30 seconds of one 40 minute sermon of over 4,000 sermons in his career?), but more importantly, were taken out of the context of the experience of the black church in America. Before we had attended our old church, I had worshipped in Spanish and with one or two black people, but never had my worship experience been influenced by the African American church experience. While our services were never as charismatic as described by Obama and as depicted in pop culture, our pastor preached with a style more characteristic of a Southern black minister than I had previously known and our worship was less staid than most mainline protestant churches. You can't have a 50% African American congregation and maintain a 100% white-traditional service - particularly since what many whites were looking for was more expression (and at least some of our black friends told us they wanted a little less). Nonetheless, I learned that righteous rage is part of the black church history. And why not? It's not like African Americans in the country were given the pass to build the country and set the story. Were it not for righteous rage born in black churches, my neighbors down the street would not be black; I never would've had a black boss, teacher or viable Presidential candidate. Righteous rage inspired my grandfather to rally with LULAC in the 50s for Mexican-American rights in West Texas; inspired him to demand respect for him and his family from retailers who denied them service. And frankly, the righteous rage that inspired the civil rights movement then further fueled the women's movements and gay rights movements of the 70s, 80s, 90s and today. Reverend Wright has said some out there things - that, I won't deny - but to be shocked (shocked, I say!) that a man who leads people with a history of neglect, who shepherds congregants who are homeless and downtrodden, would express anger or derision for the nation that lets people slip through the cracks, despite her vast wealth, is a little shocking in and of itself.

I agree with Obama that the furor over his pastor's remarks unmasks racial disparities in this country. Precisely for the last reason listed above. We may be the most church-going nation on the planet, but our churches are usually full of people that look and think just like us, so we aren't challenged, socially. One of the many blessings of our old church was that I had to be challenged every Sunday with preconceptions I had - some I didn't know I had, and many I still have, both good and bad - about people of color, homeless people, gay and transgendered people, old people and myself. How often do black and white people hang out together? Rarely. So if we don't hang out, we don't talk. And when we do talk, how honest are we about race? We usually suffocate under our own politeness.

Ultimately, what I love about Obama's speech yesterday is that he could've taken the easy, political road. He could have repudiated not just Wright's remarks - which he had to do anyway if he wanted to remain viable - but Wright himself. Then, he could've stumped and swept it under the rug and ignored the issue of race altogether. That would've been easiest. That's what most serious politicians would've done. Instead, he said, let's start a genuine conversation. For real. Let's be respectful, but we have to stop being so politically correct that white people are afraid to say anything. We have to stop being so anti-politically correct that racism concerns among black people are written off as whiny. Let's talk!

I suspected before that he may be the man who can bring this country together. Now, it's just up to the country to want it. Barack, you've given me a mission to heal and a charge to keep. Where do I sign?

Still No Lap Top; still split on the Dems

As you see from the post title, I still have no personal laptop at my disposal. Blah. I haven't been cruising blogs a lot in the last two weeks mainly because driving someone else's machine makes me a little self-conscious. I can't really cruise at work. I can from here, but it just feels foreign going to familiar sites on this other machine. It's a mental block. I'll get over it. I'll have to.

In other ramblings ...



I'm still split on Obama versus Clinton. It really chafes me that Edwards dropped out. I think he brought the best of both. I didn't know how much I liked him until he left. It's like a boyfriend that you thought you were luke warm on until he moved away and you realize the dating pond just got scummier without him. I want to want Clinton, but my aversion to serial political dynasty just won't allow me to. I want to want Obama, but I just don't know enough about him yet, and my aversion to liking things I'm told to like gets in the way. (See #4.) I'm mad at Clinton for voting for the Iraq war and like the fact that Obama (even though he wasn't in the Senate at the time) was publicly against it from the get-go. But damnit, Barack. Could you not please just complete a full term for me, so I can see how you run?

One thing is certain: whichever candidate gets the Democratic nomination will have a hell of an uphill slog to the White House. That's true of any Democratic nominee. Presidential campaign politics have always been crude and nasty, but the neo-cons have made a sadistic, fear-mongering art out of it. Add to the fact that the nominee will be either a woman (an opinionated woman at that - the GREATEST sin of all) or a black man, and I guarantee you, the right will do all they can to crucify the Democratic nominee. And as fear has a stronger tug on people than faith - witness the whole of the middle east and their theocracies; witness my own lame attempts to avoid panic attacks in the London Tube a few weeks after the bombings - they very well could succeed. (Heck, the neo-cons canibalized John McCain; they won't be above preying on prejudices for Hillary and Barack.)

As a minister, my dad gets lots of email from folks who assume because he is a Christian, he will agree with their narrow viewpoints. (Heck, as a Christian, I sometimes get these emails.) Most of these, I think, are sent him from a contingent of old college friends who, from stories I've heard, used to engage in passionate genuine discussion back in the day, but have settled into right-wing thinking - assuming that Jesus is a Republican. (As if he'd get behind any party.) I haven't heard many people worry about Barack Obama's past, though I know the grumblings are out there: Went to a Muslim school! Middle name is Hussein! (Um, who chooses their middle name?) With that in mind - and I'm sure he won't mind - below, please find a brief essay my dad wrote the other day about Barack Obama which he sent out to get ahead of the inevitable mean-ball that will follow this summer and fall.

I have never carried water for anybody but my high school football team and the church of Jesus Christ, and I do not intend to start now. Least of all can any political party or candidate count on me to stake my reputation on them. Like everyone else, I try to choose and support the party or candidate that will best serve the needs of our country and our world, but that does not mean I give up the right to oppose their actions or words when needed.

That first paragraph is to say that the following paragraphs should not be taken as my endorsement of Barack Obama. It is just my meager effort to silence some of the misguided, if not intentionally unfair attacks on him. There may be plenty of good reasons to vote for someone besides Obama, but many of the objections that I (and you?) have been receiving by email and hearing from the windbags on the radio are not good reasons.

We might hope that American voters have had enough of the absurd accusations hurled against candidates for public service. Did you get the email four years ago that said John Kerry would give the Southwestern U.S. back to Mexico? In the 1980s, there were some claiming that Ronald Wilson Reagan was the Beast spoken of in Revelation because there were six letters in each of his three names. Thank God that was before email could be used to spread such nonsense.

As a Christian minister, I am most troubled by some of my colleagues who question Obama’s Christianity. The very idea of one person passing judgment on another’s confession of faith should give us pause, but basing that judgment on the background of his parents or a distorted view of his church (as does an email I received) is inexcusable.

Obama was not raised in the church and then baptized or confirmed in his adolescence as many of us were. Rather, he confessed Christ as a young adult and clearly understands his public service as a way of living out his discipleship. Christians should rejoice in that, not disparage it.

Of course, the fact that Obama is a devout Christian does not mean he should be president. There are many wonderful Christians who would be total failures as president. We all need to examine what the man says and does and make our decisions with clear, rational minds guided by faith, hope, and love rather than by a barrage of unsubstantiated, irrational fears.

Here’s hoping we will do so in this noisy election year.

Laptop Withdrawal

I love my husband. He's such a details nerd.

He's online looking at a road construction plan for a big freeway "to do" that's been going on in our city. He's reading the plans and specs aloud and marveling at how much more efficient it will be. As he has been feeling like death warmed over for the last few days - enough so that he will not be accompanying me to a play tonight and that we had to disinvite friends from a Superbowl get-together tomorrow night - I am satisfied that he is content to geek out over publicly available engineering details.

In the meantime, I have been going through laptop withdrawal. My endearing iBook that I've had for 3 years and some change, suddenly, and without warning, went kaput about a week ago. Thankfully - and amazingly - it was mere moments after I had finished some work for my office and emailed it to myself there. It needs a new harddrive, but right now it's looking like we'll just buy a refurbished (more recent) model. Since we were probably going to buy a whole new one next year, we may as well get one with a few months under the hood this year - especially since the cost of a new harddrive would be half the cost of a refurbished one with a warranty.

All this is to say: this is why I haven't posted, surfed blogs or sent you the delicious bananas foster recipe I promised. (Okay, I've promised none of you any such thing, but it's the comedy rule of three. I needed a punchline.) I've been leeching off of my computer at work to do my personal email, and it's been weird to come home and not go check out the sites I wouldn't dare check at work. (None of them dirty, just ... you know. Not cool for workies to see.)

I leave you with two non-sequitirs:

1) Now that Edwards has dropped out, I'm unsure who to support. Not that I've been bursting at the seams for anyone, really. My gut says Obama, but it's really hard for me to get past his lack of Washington experience. Even Edwards had a solid term under his belt. Nonetheless, I feel he can do a better job of bringing people together than Hillary. As much as I admire her, on many levels, and as popular as she is among the base, the sad truth is, come November, it's not the base that will be voting for her. The electorate will include myriad of people who despise her specifically because she is unapologetic about being a powerful woman. (She shouldn't be, of course, but that's neither here nor there.) There will be myriad voters who despise her for myriad other reasons; many petty, some legitimate. It's hard for me to throw my support behind someone who is essentially a lightning rod; we can't have divisive folks anymore, even if - counter to what Shrub insisted, I fully believe he intended to divide - you go in wanting, with all your heart, to bring two sides together. ... all that, and frankly, I find it hard to support her because I've been watching her since 2000, and until she began her campaign, I don't think she put enough distance between herself and some critical Bush policies. ... so that's what's on my mind as our primary nears.

2) Below is a link to a video of a performance group I love. I think they really challenge us to think about what art is, what performance is, what social experiment is and what the role of the audience is. Enjoy Improv Everywhere's recent "mission." ... oh, and it reminded me of a similar art blog that RocketBoom did a few months ago. (But IE's was cooler!) (PS. It may be sacrosanct in the nerd world, but I like RocketBoom' Joanne Colan a lot better than her predecessor, Amanda Congdon. The former is much more natural than the latter.)

Now, off to see a play!

PS. If anyone can tell me how I embed Youtube/Brightcove/MilkandCookies/etc, etc, videos here, I'd appreciate it. I feel like such a dork just posting links.

El trabajo del salvador en El Salvador

I talked to my parents last night.

My mom's cholesterol is coming down. Her blood pressure is stable.

Dad is going to El Savador.

WHAAA?!

Yeah. He's going next month for about a week with a Christian aid group that digs wells to bring fresh, clean water to poor, remote villages. This is nice and good, except for a couple of things:

1) My father has post-polio syndrome and can't walk a whole lot. He uses a cane, he tires easily. He's essentially a 61 year old man in the body of a 76 year old man. The group he's going with has assured Mom that they'll be in flat-ish land - better for digging wells - so it's not like he'll have to heft up slopes just to get to an outhouse.
2) It's EL SALVADOR!!

I keep thinking back to the handful of teenage boys my church provided refuge to as they passed through West Texas en route to DC and New York City, 17 years ago. They ranged in age from 14 (my age then) to 19. They fled door-to-door conscription by either the rebels or the government. I can't remember which. All I remember was that they were forced with an option: take the gun we're thrusting you, or we kill you.

I know technically, El Salvador has been "at peace" for the last 16 years, but it's a country where that peace is tenuous at best. And if some FARC-style faction attacks their group, my dad is not in the kind of physical condition where he could run or hide out in the jungle. Do they have FARC-style groups there? I hope not.

Dad won't be doing any well-digging. He's physically incapable. He won't be one of the educators who give hygiene classes, because his Spanish is merely conversational. In fact, he said when the group approached him - usually this organization sends teams of various folks, but this time the entire team is from his church - he declined for the above reasons. But they persisted, so he's gonna go and ... hang out. "Maybe they'll ask me to do something 'spiritual.' I dunno," he told me. The organization has sent been sending teams to build wells in tiny 3rd world villages for 20 years or so. They usually go to Africa, but have done a lot of work in Central and South America as well as Asia. The team-leads for Dad's group have done about 6, themselves. He'll be with a group of about 10. There's a liaison in the town with whom the group has been working, so it's not like the locals will be startled by a group of smiling Americans with shovels and soap. Everything about this trip sounds just great. It's the kind of thing I've always wanted to do, but have not yet had the chance to do. It's the kind of thing Dad used to do when he younger and abler. My brother used to do stuff like this in Mexico. Everything about it sounds find, except for the location.

Maybe I'm being too worried. When I was in college, at least once or twice a year, our church would send groups to Nicaragua to small towns to build churches and schools. (I was always working.) And one of Dad's good minister friends went to Nicaragua years ago to help clean up after Hurricane Mitch and discovered a hell of a lot of orphaned street boys. So he stayed and established a home and school for these kids whom society has abandoned. Heck, Honey and I got lost one night driving around in Johannesburg - and anyone will tell you that Joburg is the most dangerous city in South Africa, the carjack capital of the world. And we weren't with any organization. The point is, if people go into other countries which have suffered war and political upheaval, as aid workers or as tourists all the time with no troubles, then maybe I should just relax. At least Dad can speak the language. I know the children and old people in the village will love him. (Dad's always a hit with folks on either end of the age spectrum.)

Still, he's my poppa. And he's got physical limitations. And it's ... El Salvador. It's going to be a nerve-wracking week for me. I can tell you that!

Sad and confounded

Benazir Bhutto is dead.

That was not the breaking news headline that greeted me at 8:30 this morning. Instead it was "Suicide Bomber kills 2o at Bhutto rally ... more details to come." It was only as I was pulling into the parking lot of my office that I heard the announcer on our local NPR station say that the blast also took Bhutto. I felt a welling sadness sink into my stomach and my eyes began to wet.

I liked Benazir Bhutto and I'm not really sure why. Like most Americans, I don't keep up with Pakistani politics, other than knowing they get into nuclear pissing contests with India every few years. I know that Bhutto was controversial and probably marginally better than other Pakistani leaders, at best, if that. I don't know if her human rights record was any better than anyone else's. Nonetheless, she seemed to be modern and unashamed. She seemed to be exactly the kind of female the Muslim world needs in a leadership position. (Hell, in a visible position at all.) My God: she didn't marry until she was 34! And she really only did it because she knew her political career needed it. Maybe she was otherwise happy being single. She did not demure, publicly, once she was a wife. Her marital status did not subject her to being a submissive piece of property. Hell no! And though she wore a veil when in office, she made it look good, girlfriend! How I WISH the Muslim world produced more women like her! Now that she's gone, what Muslim women carry the banner of Strong, Public and visible at all? Queens Noor and Rania are the only ones I can think of. Bhutto was a kind of hero in my book. ... of course, it doesn't hurt that she at least gave the impression of being pro-American during my lifetime.

And now she's dead.

Another bloody idiot with a bomb strapped to his chest sent her, and 20 innocent human beings, to their deaths! I am so angry and sick and tired of these self-hating, self-righteous morons who feel that other people should have to suffer - AND DIE - for their own pain. Your life sucks. I get it. So if you're not going to get help, kill your own self. Don't barge into a classroom and knock out a couple dozen students before you spray your own brains; don't go park-and-pop next to a group of job applicants trying to feed their families after a botched to hell invasion; ; don't barge into church or a mosque and take out some worshippers and the clergy because your wife hates you or whatever; don't brood-and-boom on a public bus because the ruling class in your country is treating you like shit; don't hijack a plane and crash it into heavily populated buildings because the owner of the building is an imperial prick. The adage of "if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem" is not only true, it should have an extra line for suicide bombers: "you make the problem worse for everybody - and 1,000 times worse for everybody you think you're helping."

Of course, I can't help thinking Musharraf might be behind this. He may have been helpful to us post-9/11, but seriously, this is dude who took over his country in a military coup. I can never tell what to make of him. Sometimes I want to like him, and others ... not so much. Especially in the last year or so. I don't envy his position. But I don't take him off the hook for this one. ... Pervez, you'd better not be behind this one. Jon Stewart gave you a Twinkie, for God's sake!

A grouse and a gladness

One problem about having the radio alarm set to NPR is that sometimes the first thing you hear in the morning just depresses or angers the crap out of you. Such was the case this morning when I heard about the latest update on BBC reporter Alan Johnston. The latest video shows him with an explosives belt strapped around his waist.

What the crap? If Palestinian separatists and dissidents want help and respect from the outside world, maybe the should drop the shit like threatening people who are there to tell their stories or killing wheelchair-bound cruise-goers or even blasting their own damn selves up in shopping centers! They've been pursuing terrorist and illegitimate means for over 20 years (in my lifetime anyway) to right what many people in this world agree is a political wrong. And what has it gotten them? Some of the worst unemployment in the world and a big fat wall. Here's a thought: try some Ghandi-style peaceful resistance. It took 20 something years in India, but it looks like you guys have all the time in the world on your hands, just no patience or even any realistic or reasonable goals. Here's another thought: I can't speak to the opinion of local Israelis, but I know that my Jewish friends here would prefer an Israel where Palestinians and Israelis live peaceably with dignity and opportunity. Your adversary may be actually be your ally if you stop and listen. But violence does not breed a credible partner.

There is some good news in my life. I don't want to post only on irritating subjects.

For one, Babydog has decided to sleep in this morning. This is good for me, because this means we'll probably have breakfast together, instead of her at 5AM and me at 8:30.

More excitingly, though, last night, I sent in my completed thesis to my thesis committee for their review and revisions. If I understand the process correctly, once they have sent it back to me, I make the changes, they and my advising professor sign off on it, I send it to the library and we're done! Since there's essentially nothing I can do with the content this week, I'll use this week to go to Staples and buy the correct weight paper that it's supposed to be printed on. And I'll run it by the library again to be reviewed for formatting. I have to admit that I'm rather nervous. Having worked on this for the last 10 months, I know the vein of my advising professor's comments, but not the general opinions of the committee members'. So I don't know what to expect when it gets kicked back!

TEN MONTHS! As Honey was saying last night, this thesis is past due. We need to induce! And how! I'm so ready for this to be over. And when it's done and we can stick a fork in it and it's published and I can truly chant, "no more pencils, no more books," then I'm looking forward to sleeping for two months and having a big ol par-tay!

What's Molly Dreaming Now? Edition 3

It has been almost a month since I've blogged anything. Why is this? Because my thesis will never die and it has been keeping me out of the blogosphere (and rehearsals for my show had begun). My professor wanted it to be done, forever and ever amen by next Friday. But due to some delayed communications, it will probably be at least another month. Chispas!

In any event, stress over my thesis has definitely been affecting my dreams. Namely, I've been dreaming of tornadoes again. Tornadoes are Molly's shorthand for sinister mayhem in her life. Quite often I won't even know that I'm under stress until I begin dreaming of twisters. It's the dreamworld tornadoes that often reveal the stress that I've been suppressing and bring it to the surface for me to acknowledge. (And sometimes deal with.)

But the tornadoes haven't plagued my dreams for a few days now. No, what surprised me was theme of my dream last night.

It was current day. Bush had just suspended the Constitution and taken sole control of the government. Another terrorist attack had just occurred on our soil, but it was not as vast or terrifying as 9/11. All I remember from my dream were the feelings of anger, disenchantment, disillusion and utter sorrow - not at the attack, but at the totalitarianism, at the fragility of our democracy that I love and take for granted and our apparent willingness to cede it so quickly to a single person under the guise of security. (A person who consistently displays no regard for the lessons history or promise to the future, no less.) And in my dream, I was terrified that I would be jailed and my family disbanded, simply because I - and my family - don't like our president and have been "foolish" enough in the present to actually exercise our freedom of speech both publicly and privately, against him and the policies he pursues in my name.

I wandered the streets of my neighborhood wailing like madwoman; hands in my hair, mouth agape. The image that flashed in my mind in my dream was that of an American flag. It was like any other American flag, except that the second red stripe under the blue field had been stripped out and replaced with a black stripe.

What triggered this dream, I don't know. I just know this morning, talking to Honey while he had breakfast, I had a feeling of dread. I seemed to worry that there would be a terrorist attack in the near future. Then I remembered my dream. Maybe it was the story in the news lately of the JFK plot. That's really scary, but I haven't really been following it closely. I also seem to remember hearing on C-Span radio a few weeks ago, though, that Spanky had quietly signed some piece of legislation essentially allowing him to suspend the Constitution and assume all control in a time of crisis if he felt it necessary. But I don't know the details of that, either. Quite frankly, the prospect of a single person taking over our government is equally terrifying to me as another 9/11 or a more invasive attack from a foreign agent. In fact, it's more terrifying: how can we fight to preserve our democracy, our "freedom," if we don't feel it can stand in times of direst crisis?!

la mort d'un tyrant

Yeah, you probably know what I'm going to post about.

Unlike the apathy I feel about President Ford's passing, I feel something about Hussein's execution. I probably feel apathetic about Ford's because he left office when I was 6 months old and I have no memory of his leadership (yes, I have memory of Carter's). That, and the fact that the man has been in and out of the hospital on the brink of death for the last year, leaves me feeling a little more relieved for his own health. I do believe that death is a friend once you reach a certain level of sickness or elderliness. With Hussein, it's different.

I don't mourn his passing. He was a bloody tyrant, so I can't be sad that this human is off the planet. I am sad, though. What I mourn is the incompletion of justice. He still had at least one more trial coming. Why should the victims and surviving family members for whom that trial was to be held be denied the justice of a trial? Why should a trial be deliberately shoved aside like that? Even if he would've been found innocent at the second trial - which I sincerely doubt would've happened - he still would've been hanged for this one, so he'd be no less dead for his transgressions. (Though let's say that scenario had occurred: would the surviving families have felt justice was served by his death, even though he'd been found innocent at the second trial? Perhaps a topic for another post altogether: what is the nature of justice?) That Hussein was going to be executed was certain the moment he was discovered hiding in a pit three years ago. I trust though that Iraqis really wanted justice this time and not just revenge. Frankly, if his trial had been held in America, the case may be made that it was not a fair one, what with all the interruptions and lawyer shuffling. But it was probably far fairer than anything Iraqis had seen in a long damn time. I am sad because the second trial didn't go forward. I'm sad that those who'd weathered so much agony under his spiky fist didn't get to tell their stories in court.

Truthbeknown, I'm also sad because I really feel like he should've been tried at the Hague. He was a war criminal and a had committed crimes against humanity in between wars. If the West who started this current war and supposedly liberated Iraq (whatever the hell that means in their current mayhem) really wanted to hold him to the same standard as other war criminals, he should've been tried at the Hague. ... hmm. That reminds me: I was also sad when Milosevic died. Again, not because I doubt his guilt, but because his trial was never completed; human justice was never served. Though in his case, I gratified myself with the thought that "what goes around comes around." Kind of like with Kenneth Lay. ... yet another person for whom human justice was not carried through. He was found guilty, but it's my understanding that because he died before he went to jail, not only is he sort of expunged, his estate isn't subject to paying any recompense. (Which is barbecued bullshit in my opinion, but I should really read up on all the details of that kind of decision before I blow a gasket.) Maybe that's what irritates me most about Hussein's death: it came before full human justice was decided and if it had to be premature, it wasn't a case of karma taking him out.

I lost no one to his hand. Those who suffered under him are elated and for the relief they feel today, I am satisfied. I am not a fan of the death penalty but am overall generally ambivalent about it as a concept. If Saddam Hussein's death brings closure to a lot of people in Iraq, as proponents of the penalty claim it does (topic for another post, I'm sure), then I am glad for them. For those for whom his execution is justice denied, I am sad for them.

I guess the one good thing is this: An evil man is dead.

Wonderful Wednesday

I love it when my fears are dashed!
I don't know if last night's wins will cause drastic change, but I am so more than ready for this shift! ... maybe with the departure of Rummy, we see that they're already effective!

thoughts on election eve

First, of course some items a la Clare to clear a little fog and burden:

Uno - spending the weekend in a small town in upstate New York. I hadn't spent an overnight or downtime in a small town in so long I couldn't remember the exact last time that I had. (pretend that made sense, gramatically.) My favorite part? Upon stepping outside of our friend's dad's house late one night, I paused and turned to Honey and said, "do you hear that?" Our friend smiled and Honey and I exchanged satisfied looks, "Yeah," he said. It was the music of stillness. It sounded the way fine wine tastes.

Due - seeing our friends' marriages and feeling gratified that our friends delight in each other.

Tre - treating a friend to lunch, today.

Churchgal wrote a nice post about the Ted Haggard disgrace, today. I commented on the blog, but I'll tell you now, her sympathy for him is really moving, to me. Guffawing at his shame is easy and shallow (that's why we all do it), sorrowing for him is blessed.

Tomorrow is election day. Midterms. I do hope the Democrats take the House and the Senate would be nice, too. But that's just because I am a Democrat - well, mostly because I'm a Democrat. But my optimism is very cautious for a few reasons:

A) I don't feel like the Democrats have a clear, unified point of view which the nation at large can identify, unlike, say the Republicans' "Contract with America" in 1994.
B) I no longer underestimate the ability of the Dems to either screw it up in the end or lose a lead. Likewise, I don't overestimate the effectiveness of Bush machine attack strategies. Look at how they treated Max Cleland and John McCain - taking character assassination to new lows.
C) Living on the East Coast, the general energy among people I talk to is, "the Dems are going to take this one; maybe not a landslide, but certainly at least the House." Mmm. I dunno. You have to be careful you don't live in an echo chamber. In 1992, I lived in West Texas and was surrounded by Republicans, there were a few supporters of Clinton (most of whom went to our church, ironically) but by and large, we all thought Bush would win because that was local sentiment. We were wrong. In 2004, people around me thought Kerry cinched it. Nope. Living in conservative areas of the country, I've heard people look at nationwide polls that show a more liberal leaning in the response and say, "i don't know ANYONE who feels that way; who are THESE pollsters talking to?" and living in this more liberal region, i've heard people say the same about nationwide polls that show a more conservative response. We are a huge nation with varied opinions and limited interaction with people outside our own ideologies. I can't assume the Dems will bag this.

... but I hope I'm wrong.

Frankly, I don't know if a Democratic majority in either the House or Senate would make things "better" per se, but I do think it would at the very least create an environment that embraces dissent. We always say we want bipartisanship and I do think every so often we see shifts in political power to make sure one party doesn't control everything (as in 1994), so hopefully we'll see some bipartisan compensation tomorrow.

No doubt, mourning Annie contributes ...

It occurred to me that part of my emotional instability this weekend - I felt weepy - was not mere homesickness, or rue at my parents' aging, but a little bit of grief for a fallen hero. In any event, below is something I penned on my flight back home, tonight. Miss you, Ann! Thanks for rocking my world when I was a teenaged girl who needed a badass Texas woman to admire. You done good!
Okay, so I'm homesick. What can I say? Here I am 35,000 feet above Missouri or Kentucky maybe, about another 90 to 120 minutes left to go to the east coast and I've just finished browsing this month's copy of Texas Monthly. (I always try to snap a copy when I leave the Great State.) On my i-Pod shuffle, a rare three or four songs by Robert Earl Keen out of the past 5 or 6. One about an illegal immigrant, which I think I had heretofore not known. Robert Earl Keen always makes me miss West Texas. Couple that with the brief article on stargazing in the middle of nowhere where I used to live, and Keen's "Hard Amarillo Highway" (apparently covered by REK) and I sincerely miss West Texas. As my immediate family has moved to the eastern half of the state - as has most of my extended family - I no longer have a "reason" to visit, but I feel a pressing need. I feel the need to to gaze into those inky night skies, to experience the utter dryness again. It's been nearly a decade since I've experienced a dry summer, and a baker's dozen since I've known bone-dry, parched weather. I so long for that isolation right now - the isolation that maddened me as a teenager. It's funny how sometimes you need a million people crushing you and other times you need a million miles to breathe.

This past trip, too, however has made me glad to be where I am at the moment. Though I wish I were geographically closer to my and my hubby's extended family right now, I also really - today - appreciate where I am at the moment. I guess it helps to know we don't want to be here forever. But it also helps to know if we are, the world won't end. Maybe I'm finally heeding my own (self-enforced) prayer: "God, thank you for who I am, when I am, where I am ..." I suspect it's always good to be grateful for the present, becausee that's where we live, but it also helps to assuage anxiety over the future in the long run. Not to mention each day is a day closer to another where I am supposed to be and a nother day when I'll have the opportunity to do good. Each day is a constant becoming.

I seriously miss Texas, but it will always be my home and where my bones and dust will return. I have today - that's all I have - and each today is another opportunity to love and to achieve.

Wow, the thin air up here is awesome!

Corruptibility

In an effort to get back into a daily writing routine, I'm going to jot something out this morning before I leave for work. Evidently, when I get home, I'm too zonked to want to do much more than eat, cruise the net and then sleep. Cruise E-bay: who am I kidding?

Anyway, yesterday I was listening to Marketplace on my drive out to meet my professor. I was only halfway listening, so you'll have to click on this link to find out how accurate what i'm about to tell you is. Here's what caught my ear: some sociologist/economist/somebody or other wanted to know how corrupt members of a generally corrupt society were. How do you measure that? On the micro level people always claim to be more morally upright than their governments. He decided to see how people abuse - or don't - diplomatic immunity. He tracked parking tickets of ambassadors and their staff to the UN. What he found was that over an 8 year period, ambassadors to places like Bangladesh and Chad and other countries that have poor human rights records and whom the international community generally agree are corrupt governments, there were thousands of outstanding parking tickets which went unpaid because of diplomatic immunity. However, in the whole of the Scandinavian countries - countries generally who have good human rights records, etc - he found a mere twelve, over 8 years. And most of those were from the guy from Finland. Damn Fins.

Granted, the biggest problem with that fun little exercise is that those individuals represent the corrupt governments, so we'd have to presume they are in fact corrupt individuals. It still doesn't tell us much about the regular folk on the ground. Though, if I were a betting person, I'd bet that many if not most of the people on the ground live corrupt lives as well, simply because that's what you have to do to stay alive. ... in other news, I heard on the radio yesterday - though not a news station, so I can't account for its accuracy - that 12% of the GDP of Mexico is from bribes. Way to go, my peeps. Keep up the embarassment for your American cousins.

Happy Wednesday