We are a commune of inquiring, skeptical, politically centrist, capitalist, anglophile, traditionalist New England Yankee humans, humanoids, and animals with many interests beyond and above politics. Each of us has had a high-school education (or GED), but all had ADD so didn't pay attention very well, especially the dogs. Each one of us does "try my best to be just like I am," and none of us enjoys working for others, including for Maggie, from whom we receive neither a nickel nor a dime. Freedom from nags, cranks, government, do-gooders, control-freaks and idiots is all that we ask for.
The Supreme Court has ruled that there cannot be a Nativity Scene in the United States' Capital this Christmas season. This isn't for any religious reason. They simply have not been able to find Three Wise Men in the Nation's Capitol.
A search for a virgin continues.
There was no problem, however, finding enough asses to fill the stable.
Readers know that we seasonally, and sometimes plain impulsively, change the image on our header. Some find those old images a little too cutesy and sentimental, but I think they are part of what we are. I love the details of 19th C life.
Of course, when Currier and Ives produced their images they were making contemporary illos and would never have dreamed of their ongoing appeal.
Why is it, he wondered, that certain intellectuals are “merciless toward the failings of the democracies but ready to tolerate the worst crimes as long as they are committed in the name of the proper doctrines”?
Mr Edsall notes that "demographic trends suggest the continued growth of pro- Democratic constituencies and the continued decline of core Republican voters, particularly married white Christians."
“I will not cede more power to the state. I will not willingly cede more power to anyone, not to the state, not to General Motors, not to the CIO. I will hoard my power like a miser, resisting every effort to drain it away from me. I will then use my power as I see fit. I mean to live my life an obedient man, but obedient to God, subservient to the wisdom of my ancestors; never to the authority of political truths arrived at yesterday at the voting booth."
We can but repeat that this is a scare that has run its course. The ersatz scientists will never again hold the global community in its thrall to the same extent, on this subject.
Here at Maggie's, we don't understand why people do not pray for some global warming. The Medieval Warming, and the Roman-era warming - both now reversed by historic cooling - were excellent for civilization. Mostly, we worry about the effects of the next Ice Age on our property values. A mile-deep glacier on top of my house would have a negative effect, and another Ice Age is a certainty.
I’ve been hiring twenty-somethings for about twenty years now, and though they are getting more tech-savvy, their productivity keeps plummeting. I believe this is due to their snowballing sense of entitlement.
'The New Tammany Hall' - The historian of the American city on what Wall Street and the 'Occupy' movement have in common, and how government unions came to dominate state and local politics:
One can appreciate why the "we are the 99%" militants might resist Mr. Siegel's logic. He links the liberalism of the 1960s, not any excess of the free market, to today's crisis. The Great Society put the state on growth hormones. Less widely appreciated, the era gave birth to a powerful new political force, the public-sector union. For the first time in American history there was an interest dedicated wholly to lobbying for a larger government and the taxes and debt to pay for it.
Must be human nature to desire some sort of supernatural political salvation, but that is far from an American notion: it's the fantasy of a having a perfect Master or a child's fantasy of a perfect parent.
64:1 O that you would tear open the heavens and come down, so that the mountains would quake at your presence--
64:2 as when fire kindles brushwood and the fire causes water to boil-- to make your name known to your adversaries, so that the nations might tremble at your presence!
64:3 When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect, you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.
64:4 From ages past no one has heard, no ear has perceived, no eye has seen any God besides you, who works for those who wait for him.
64:5 You meet those who gladly do right, those who remember you in your ways. But you were angry, and we sinned; because you hid yourself we transgressed.
64:6 We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a filthy cloth. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.
64:7 There is no one who calls on your name, or attempts to take hold of you; for you have hidden your face from us, and have delivered us into the hand of our iniquity.
64:8 Yet, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.
64:9 Do not be exceedingly angry, O LORD, and do not remember iniquity forever. Now consider, we are all your people.
I am grateful that Mrs. BD dragged me to see Einstein on the Beach on its world tour in 1992, at the BAM (for those of you in Yorba Linda, that's the Brooklyn Academy of Music).
Philip Glass and Robert Wilson, with dancer/choreographer Lucinda Childs, decided to call it an opera, but it really was a spectacle, and, with all of the repetition, choruses, and dancing, something like Greek theater with technology. I have grown to sort-of enjoy the Glass music in this, but it just drives some people crazy. It's a sound track, really.
The whole thing is hypnotically slow-moving (and it was over 5 hrs, no intermission, and people were welcome to come and go. We stayed, except for bathroom breaks - and they sold wine in the lobby.). There exist audio recordings, but, I believe, no video recordings of the whole thing. Video does not do justice to theatrical productions. You had to be there to be in the dream.
One snippet of video - you can search on YouTube it to hear more of Glass' music for the show:
Addendum, by complete coincidence I see that the Met is celebrating Glass' 75th birthday with “Satyagraha.” Wierd coincidences: I posted a Tagore poem this morning, mentioned Robert Wilson in a photo post yesterday, and stumbled on the news of that Philip Glass/Tagore opera today after preparing the above post.
The more you get out and about, the more fascinating life gets. Everybody needs to get out more, I guess. Possessions are expensive: cool life experiences are cheap by comparison.
Sometimes I think about things during my morning work-out. I try not to think and to go into a mindless, timeless state, but sometimes my brain wins. Often, I use my aerobic time to pray, and I hope God laughs about my multitasking.
Many things in life test our will-power and, in a sick kind of Yankee way, I tend to enjoy such tests of mental strength. Few things present conflicts with one's will-power like facing another ten minutes on the Elliptical, or one more set of squats.
Well, maybe paying bills and doing other paperwork almost compares. My personal attitude towards paperwork is infantile, defiant, and not admirable. I often fail these tests.
Does persisting with the things we find difficult, and seek excuses to avoid, build character? We say Yes. The Maggie's heart says "Easy stuff first, hard stuff later." The Maggie's conscience and the Maggie's tradition says "Hard stuff first, easier stuff after."
Spandex? All the women in my gym wear Spandex (or Yoga pants), and I'd say it's 50% women there early in the morning. Guys on the machines alternate their gaze from CNBC or FOX to the bouncing youthful Spandexed behind in front of them with the bouncing blond pony-tail, then back to CNBC.
Being pure of heart and mind, I stay glued to the FOX. Don't you?
That's interesting, because I recently read a piece about tax policy which referred to taxpayers as "tax units." I guess that's how bureaucrats think. Are you an income unit, an expense unit, or neither?
On the Seashore, by Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)
On the seashore of endless worlds children meet.
The infinite sky is motionless overhead and the restless water is boisterous. On the seashore of endless worlds the children meet with shouts and dances.
They build their houses with sand, and they play with empty shells. With withered leaves they weave their boats and smilingly float them on the vast deep. Children have their play on the seashore of worlds.
They know not how to swim, they know not how to cast nets. Pearl- fishers dive for pearls, merchants sail in their ships, while children gather pebbles and scatter them again. They seek not for hidden treasures, they know not how to cast nets.
The sea surges up with laughter, and pale gleams the smile of the sea- beach. Death-dealing waves sing meaningless ballads to the children, even like a mother while rocking her baby's cradle. The sea plays with children, and pale gleams the smile of the sea-beach.
On the seashore of endless worlds children meet. Tempest roams in the pathless sky, ships are wrecked in the trackless water, death is abroad and children play. On the seashore of endless worlds is the great meeting of children.
All that we call human history - money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery - [is] the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy.
C.S. Lewis, in Mere Christianity. Fair enough, CS, but being in requited love with a young lady comes close, given our human limits.
Bustling downtown Gambier. I like the way my camera captured the Robert Wilson-like light which he used to amazingly enchanting effect in Einstein On The Beach at the BAM:
Come, ye thankful people, come, raise the song of harvest home; All is safely gathered in, ere the winter storms begin. God our Maker doth provide for our wants to be supplied; Come to God's own temple, come, raise the song of harvest home.
All the world is God's own field, fruit unto His praise to yield; Wheat and tares together sown unto joy or sorrow grown. First the blade and then the ear, then the full corn shall appear; Lord of harvest, grant that we wholesome grain and pure may be.
For the Lord our God shall come, and shall take His harvest home; From His field shall in that day all offenses purge away, Giving angels charge at last in the fire the tares to cast; But the fruitful ears to store in His garner evermore.
Even so, Lord, quickly come, bring Thy final harvest home; Gather Thou Thy people in, free from sorrow, free from sin, There, forever purified, in Thy garner to abide; Come, with all Thine angels come, raise the glorious harvest home.
The Pilgrims sustained so many deaths in their first year, it's a wonder they did not give up and return to Holland. They maintained their faith, and endured, and were relentlessly grateful for the Lord's will, whatever it might be. Some of the BD's ancestors were there, and survived. We connect.
Besides the wonderful tune, what I especially like about this one is that it makes it clear that the true harvest to be celebrated is not pumpkins and corn and big birds harvested by man, but people harvested by God for His kingdom. Also, it's the first tune I learned to play, on an old foot-pedal pump organ at the farm. You had to brush the mouse shit off the keys first. They lived inside that old organ in the fall and winter.
It would be more fun if it were giving thanks for sex, or the intertunnels, or freedom from government "help" and control, or something. However, survival comes first, and God has provided us all with his fruits.
Did the Pilgrims get the idea from Sukkot? Who knows. People have given thanks to God or gods since the beginning of time. What did the Pilgrims have for their Thanksgiving feast? Clams, Cod, corn meal, eels, turkey, vension, ducks. All organic! It went on for a few days, with plenty of Indians visiting with game meat in hand (the sturdy few who had not died off due to European diseases introduced by earlier explorers).
Being now passed the vast ocean, and a sea of troubles before them in expectations, they had now no friends to welcome them, no inns to entertain or refresh them, no houses, or much less towns, to repair unto to seek for succour; and for the season it was winter, and they that know the winters of the country know them to be sharp and violent, subject to cruel and fierce storms, dangerous to travel to known places, much more to search unknown coasts.
Besides, what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wilde beasts and wilde men? and what multitudes of them there were, they then knew not: for which way soever they turned their eyes (save upward to Heaven) they could have but little solace or content in respect of any outward object; for summer being ended, all things stand in appearance with a weatherbeaten face, and the whole country, full of woods and thickets, represented a wild and savage hew.
If they looked behind them, there was a mighty ocean which they had passed, and was now as a main bar or gulph to separate them from all the civil parts of the world.
Bad luck. They were headed for the cozy Dutch village of New Amsterdam, and ended up in rugged Cape Cod due to bad weather and imperfect navigation. Decided to stay anyway, trusting God. "Occupy Plymouth!" They tried out a Christian commune, but it didn't work so they switched to free markets and private property. The investors got a successful colony, the Pilgrims got religious freedom and real estate, and the rest is history.
My pics from a BD family TG groaning board a few years ago. The oven turkey was on another table. We always have Indian Pudding too, but I guess it didn't make this photo op (we always use fresh Indians from Costco).
Note pup banished outdoors, drooling at the door. Two pups, this year. Maybe three. Thanks to God for all the dogs!
Unlike we modern whining Americans among whom none go hungry or cold, the Pilgrims saw reason for thanks despite their hardships - half their number dead.
"In everything, give thanks..."
Yes, that's a Pumpkin Cheesecake. Our friend always makes one.
Mike, The Figure you sent is very deceptive[...] there have been a number of dishonest presentations of model results by individual authors and by IPCC [...]
Follow the money...same goes for us: the ICTSMECE (Internation Cartel To Support More Evil Carbon Emissions) gives Maggie's Farm $2 million/year for our skepticism about settled science. Cash, directly to our secret Cayman Island account. It comes in handy during cash flow jams.
We have two generations that have been raised to believe that, ultimately, someone else is responsible for the essentials of their lives. They believe they are supposed to retire in their fifties or early sixties, with a pension followed by Social Security. They believe they are supposed to relinquish concern for healthcare costs when they turn 65. They believe that if things get bad enough in their lives, unemployment, and later welfare, will keep a roof over their head and food on the table. They’ve been trained to believe this by a ruling class that has been assuring them since the 1930s that they have the fundamental right to a soft life.
These people do not want to think about a world where these things are not true.
In Manitoba. A morning in a goose blind with friends is a darn wonderful thing, no matter how cold it is or how frozen your poor fingers are. Decoys, hay bales, and distant high-tension wires carrying electricity from good, high-carbon Canadian gas and oil:
Buddy is right: it took balls for a young kid - a boy, really, a recklessly-ambitious first-year college dropout - to do this old song on TV in 1963 (Bob's first TV performance). He used Woody as his adult accessory ego. Artists always do things like that, borrowing and stealing ego-ideals to help fill out their ever-growing selves.
Hermit Crabs, as I have often seen on Cape Cod, sometimes will take on a moon shell far too large for them to fill. They can hardly drag it across the mud. Eventually, if lucky, they grow into it. And, if luckier still, someday have to find a new larger shell to inhabit.
Bob will be forever an old soul, and forever young. Restless, wonderfully lost, and doing much of the seeking and searching for us drones.
JFK was assassinated by an ardent Leftist and Castro-lover, and RFK by a Jordanian who hated his support of the nation of Israel. Might as well get the facts right.
...the failure of the Supercommittee should be no surprise. The Democrats have only one election strategy and that’s to blame the Republicans. They have nothing to gain from cooperation and everything to gain from conflict. They would see the economy burn, even if they didn’t have anything to gain from the flames—but they do.
Hypocrisy abounds on the Republican side where symbolic votes cover a multitude of economic sins. And when he symbolic votes tank, then the masks come off. But why expect anything different? The United States is not a one party system and congress can only be held hostage so far. The Republican Party is not innocent, only comparatively less guilty, their crimes those of greedy and complacency, rather than the ideological agenda that fattens up the spending of the left.
Everyone talks cuts, but no one makes them because cuts are a dangerous thing. Elections are expensive and someone has to pay for them. Indirectly that someone is the poor schmoe sending off money to D.C. without getting anything for it but aching fingers.
Old-timey 
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Anchoress is 
Global Warming Bubble is Popping
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Sometimes I think about things during my morning work-out. I try not to think and to go into a mindless, timeless state, but sometimes my brain wins. Often, I use my aerobic time to pray, and I hope God laughs about my multitasking.
So soon? Advent begins tomorrow.
Ten Commandments via 
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