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Uncle Walt

"The point of putting a "racially insensitive" white man up to question a Latina has nothing to do with bad GOP planning and everything to do with intimidation. Republicans know she's getting confirmed; what they really want to do is intimidate the White House, the media, and me and you from embracing progressive views.

So, if you're going to embrace affirmative action, feminism, equal rights, economic fairness, civil rights, -- Jesus, even empathy -- you stand warned you will be attacked. It has nothing to do with defeating Sotomayer and everything to do with discrediting what most Americans believe and intimidating us from expressing it. It's also a signal to their dwindling base -- disenfranchised, uneducated whites -- that the GOP is still the party of the cluelessly and inarticulately disgruntled.

Hence economic fairness is "a special interest," universal healthcare is "socialism," and believing in a right to privacy is "judicial activism;" all of it bullshit, but all of it useful.

That's the goal here; keeping ignorance alive so you can cajole it to the ballot box, the streets, in front of David Letterman's studio, at the local Board of Ed meeting or the commencement at Notre Dame.

Or outside Dr George Tiller's women's health clinic or the Holocaust Museum -- carrying a gun."

  Rag and Bone: A Journey Among the World's Holy Dead by Peter Manseau is a non-fiction book about sacred artifacts -- their history, their veneration, their authenticity (or lack there of), the reliquaries where they reside and the market for them throughout the centuries.  The stories behind these items and the strange histories that surround them are fascinating.  I'm sure there are more comprehensive and scholarly works on this subject, but for one with a passing interest, like a fantasy writer looking for plot ideas, the book is perfect.  For me, it was a bit of a slow starter, and it wasn't that long, but once Manseau began laying out the anecdotes and little known facts, I was hooked.  There are pieces about the remains of Joan of Arc, the missing and perhaps rediscovered foreskin of Jesus, a single whisker of Muhammad, St. Anthony's tongue, Lama Yeshe's leg, etc.  He discusses the miracles associated with these objects, the miracles of historical coincidence, the every day "miracles" of the every day people who seek them out, study them, and preserve them.  A fairly quick and very interesting read.  I'd say definitely worth checking out.  Here's a little review of it from Booklist:

This is a peculiar book about a peculiar subject, the veneration of the sacred remains of saints and other holy men and women called relics, which every Roman Catholic church possesses. Manseau looks at relics through the prism of history. The Reformation denigrated their use, accentuating the differences between Catholics and Protestants and triggering schisms within the church. But relics aren’t only a Christian tradition. Muslims also revere relics. Nor are relics strictly remnants of the past. When Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI, he sequestered himself in his apartment with the heart of Saint Jean-Baptiste-Marie Vianney, patron saint of priests. The eight chapters of Manseau’s book focus on various body parts—a toe, a leg, a whisker, teeth, and nails—of a holy person as a way of commenting on their contemporary relevance. To some, venerating relics may seem a strange custom, but, Manseau somberly points out, people fight and die over these very artifacts. They are certainly not to be taken lightly. --June Sawyers

I had a dream the other night.  I wasn't in it, but it was like I was observing it.  The scene was an old age home.  The patients were gathered in a room, sitting on folding chairs.  There was a younger man with a beard, sitting at the front of the room on a stool.  He started strumming an acoustic guitar and singing Neil Young's song, "Tell Me Why."  The old timers sang along.  

Sailing heart-ships
thru broken harbors
Out on the waves in the night
Still the searcher
must ride the dark horse
Racing alone in his fright.
Tell me why, tell me why

When I woke up, I thought about the dream and wondered what the music in old age homes would be like in another twenty years when I'm no longer just observing.  I pictured a crowd of old farts, leaning this way and that, some asleep, some hooked up to oxygen, some whispering to themselves, and half of them half crazy.  Up in front there will be a middle aged woman at the piano, playing a wobbly, slowed down, "Black Magic Woman," striking every note as if with a hammer. 

I told Lynn what I was thinking and said, "Imagine 'Layla.'" 

She said, "They'll be playing screwed up air guitar."

Other performances I'll probably pay good money to see:

"In-A-Gadda-Da-Vita" performed on the accordion. 

A barbershop quartet of guys with wigs, bad chompers, and cardigans doing "Ramblin Man."

They're already probably doing this one -- "A Walk On the Wild Side."  I perceive it as a piece performed by a middle school chorus.   

"Beast of Burden" with group hand clapping.

If we're lucky, they'll save "Us and Them" for when they hand out the meds. 

Everybody had to pay and pay