Bewitched? Now that's a thought

Tired of the IRS?  Well, follow what these Romanian witches are doing: curse them by hurling mandrake into the Danube river.  Mandrake in the Danube river?  How wonderful.  I know there's a certain contemptuous scorn in the article's tone.  And you can't help but chuckle.  But there's something almost warming about the notion that there are still places in the world where folks insist that the non-material, supernatural is real.  As a Catholic, so do I.  The witches, of course, go about it in a way my Faith teaches is wrong.  But at least they go about it.  Unlike the prevailing influence of secular materialism that says we're born, we live, we die, we rot.  All fine and dandy for most of the spokesmen of the modern atheist movement who live pretty high on the hog.  Just as Sam Harris pointed out in a recent editorial about why we should listen to rich people with no other credentials than high math scores and lots of money when it comes to our societal woes:

"I find that I have very few financial concerns. Many of my friends are in the same position: Most of us attended private schools and good universities, and we will be able to provide these same opportunities to our own children."

Yep, that's about right.  For that small percentage of folks who live the Champagne and caviar life of wealth and luxury, a belief system of strict materialist atheism, that says this is all you get and you needn't worry about a hereafter in which you may be called to atone for what you had, works.*   But for the bulk of humanity, including some for whom this life has showered blessings of material gain, there is a realization that more exists than mere atoms and DNA. 

In some ways, these Hungarian witches see more than Harris, or Richard Dawkins, or P.Z. Myers will ever be able to see.  For they realize a tale of inevitable oblivion goes down hard for the bulk of humanity who suffer in squalor, misery, and oppression.  And unlike the skeptical elite, who imagine such fairy tales are just ways of coaxing out the harsh realities of a pointless life, those witches, believers, and poverty stricken devotees of religious faith believe what they believe because something inside them clicks.  That something says, instinctively, that there is more to the universe than our eyes can see.  And moreover, it realizes the the real fairy tale belongs to those who think the universe was destined to put a bunch of random carbon based lifeforms at the zenith of moral realization in order to drink the wine of life and never have to answer for anything except the next luxury automobile. 

*Harris may not be a strict materialist, as he frequently showers certain strains of Eastern religious practice with praise and adoration, reserving his hatred and contempt for those religious traditions - like Theism - with which he disagrees.

And now, Happy Feast of the Epiphany!

Technically this feast was celebrated at the Sunday Mass this last Sunday.  It's most famous part being the revealing of Christ to the Magi.  This is one of those times wherein being part of a more traditional Catholic parish would be wonderful, as such celebrations were said to be marked with blessings of gold, frankincense, and myrrh and similar traditional trappings.  How cool is that?  For our family's part, we've wondered how to go about marking this day special.  For most of our society, the Holy Season of _______mas begins on the Feast of Black Friday, and ends when TBS stops its 24 hour marathon of A Christmas Story.  This year we thought we would save the Christmas cards for the boys - each with a little gift inside - for today.  Next year, who knows?  It's one of those things wherein Catholics live in a decidedly secular culture, one that is not aided by many Protestant, and certainly post-Protestant denominations whose historical knowledge tends to extend all the way back to the Superbowl XXXI party.  So it isn't as if there is a horde of Catholics who follow the same traditions.  They seem to be pretty much in the same boat, trying to eke out some traditions (if any) in the cultural soup of our commercialized and secularized nation.  Therefore it's pretty much make it up as you go.   So we'll see what happens.  Anyone with any information or suggestions, and I'd sure be all ears.

GOP drops campaign promises?

It's what they do.  It's all they do.  They can't be reasoned with.  They can't be bargained with.  They don't feel pity, or remorse, or fear.  And they absolutely will not stop - ever - until they need to make all the same promises to get elected again next time.

I know, that's a tad cynical.  But in a way, we deserve what we get.  We demand our politicians tell us they will give us everything we (defined as 'me') want, while not really caring about anyone else who may want something different.  Of course they must then tell that 'anyone else' the same thing.  If someone got up and said, 'Look, fact of the matter is this country is bigger than any of you.  I'll do my best to help as many as possible, while standing on my own principles and beliefs (in which they are stated here:________), but I can't promise you everything, and may only be able to do a little bit overall - some of which may end up costing some of you as others benefit.  Hopefully it will all even out in the end."

Can anyone imagine a promise like that leading to an election?  Nope.  Which is why we get the usual from our elected officials.  In the end, a Democratic society, even a Republic, has itself to blame when bellyaching about its elected officials.

A very Merry 12th day of Christmas!

I know, a day late and a dollar short.  I didn't get back in to make the proclamation last night, so here it is.  Contrary to popular belief, the war on Christmas didn't start a few years ago when merchants foolishly decided to censor their employees from speaking the "C-word" in public during that shopping season formerly known as  ______mass.  Rather, it began hundreds of years ago as successive generations of Protestants tossed out more and more of the traditional garb of a practicing Christian.  This was typically under the auspices of it being 'too Catholic.'  Sometimes, as Protestant denominations are wont to do, they did it in order to separate themselves from all the other denominations that they concluded were doing it wrong.  Nevertheless, by the time Christmas began to reemerge in the 18th and 19th centuries, it was picked up only on the actual Feast day - the 25th - and from there a mountain of traditions, mostly secular and commercial, were added to the pile. 

Still, there are some, and a growing number at that, who are starting to yearn for a less commercialized, 'we hate religion but love money' approach to the frenzied orgy of consumerism and self centered greed, who are beginning to discover what Christians for centuries knew - this should be a period of celebration and festivities that rejoiced in the birth of God our Savior, and looked for the eventual consummation of our salvation in his gracious and loving arms.  And that it shouldn't end in one day when stores stop running ads for the latest sales.

So Merry 12th day of Christmas, belated. 

News Flash! Pope credits God for creation of Universe

A strange story from Reuters.  The Pope is basically saying the obvious, that no matter what theories happen to be coming down the pike, remember God is behind it all.  And of course theories are theories are theories.  They say if everyone who had sold something to someone based on credit suddenly wanted their money, our economy would collapse (which may be what happened, I dunno).  I often wonder if we stopped and looked at just how much of what we think is true is just a theory based on a theory that assumes another theory that was founded on a previous theory, just how shocked we would be. 

All the more reason not to chuck God out the window just because the latest scientific theory purports to explain how the magician did his trick.  What struck me was why this made it into a news story.  What's the news?   Sure, it's from a message Pope Benedict gave on Thursday (or today in my neck of the woods).  But there's really nothing big here.  It isn't as if the Pope suddenly reversed course, or made some bold proclamation that it's time Christians believe in atheism or something. 

When I see stories like this that more or less make news about the fact that Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence, I have to believe it's for some other reason than just telling us something most folks already know.  My hunch?  Just so the journalist could include this little segment that wrapped up the story:

"Benedict and his have predecessor John Paul been trying to shed the Church's image of being anti-science, a label that stuck when it condemned Galileo for teaching that the earth revolves around the sun, challenging the words of the Bible."

That would be John Paul II by the way.  I love how they assume all of this 'science is OK' stuff is just an elaborate strategy to undo a former reality that wasn't that real.  If anything, the journalist does well to point out that it was just a label that stuck, rather than an accurate appraisal of the historical facts.  Who knows, perhaps that's the biggest news in the story: journalist admits what most historians know, that the Church was not anti-science or anti-knowledge.  That was just 'a label that stuck.'  For that alone, perhaps it was worth the print.

In the name of bullying

I'm the first to say bullying can be bad.  There are times when one has to step in and take control of a situation and protect children from gross levels of persecution and violence.   But, on the other hand, there is also that need to allow kids to learn to take care of themselves, to fend for themselves, to learn that bullying doesn't stop in school, but goes on through life.

Like most things in our floundering culture, even if the problem is valid, our solutions are almost guaranteed not to be.  Take for instance this little gem from The Lookout.  Researchers, who often get it wrong because they tend to focus on a single leaf on a single branch on a single tree, conclude that playground gossip has to go. 

The usual study is cited, the results, the joyous and Utopian paradise that arises when we just do it the way researchers say to do it, is lauded.  And yet something behind it all gives me the shakes.  Playground gossip should be monitored; it should be stopped?  Some of this is just the ages old kids talking about kids.  Kids being kids.  Kids learning to grow up and be adults.  The idea that kids' speaking habits should be so closely monitored has that whiff of the Orwellian.

No, I don't want kids beat up, persecuted, and tormented to the point they can't function.  But on the other hand, I still want a society that allows for freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of thought.  And things like this are commensurate with the growing tendency we hear in other venues that suggests it's time to put away some of these freedoms for those who advance beliefs that are 'bigoted', or 'hate', or 'intolerant'  - all subjectively defined by the latest, hippest who can't help but know they have the right to tell everyone else the way it should be.

My biggest gut feeling is that this is the foundation stone of a new Order.  The progressives who, throughout the 70s and 80s, insisted that students should have total freedom, their lockers a sacred Holy of Holies where no teacher or authority should dare to tread, their opinions and their ideals completely unfettered (especially when trashing America, religion, or traditional values), are now the ones acting as if it's time we demand all children conform to The Truth (TM), the New Way, the Absolute Value that demands absolute obedience.  There is an underlying current behind this and a growing number of studies that sounds less like the forces at hand are tyring to solve the bullying problem, and more like they are trying to exploit the worst parts of an age old problem in order to begin truly seizing the reigns of our children and moving them toward the New Order that all soon will be expected to follow. 

Maybe I'm being a little paranoid.  But when set within the overall context of our society over the last few years, I can't help but feel it's only paranoid to a degree. 

Christianity will go

It will vanish and shrink.  I needn't argue about that, history will prove me right.
                                                                                                                        John Lennon

The 9th circuit court of appeals has, shockingly, reversed a lower court ruling and concluded that a cross at the San Diego war memorial is unconstitutional.  There is no apparent order about what has to happen to the cross.  But it can no longer stand as is.  The case was brought by Jewish war veterans who were offended by the presence of a cross back in the 80s.

Is this a huge defeat?  A massive assault on Christian faith?  I don't know.  I'm not a legal scholar.  My understanding of the finer points of law is right up there with my ability to build a space shuttle in my garage.  Like many things, I weigh such decisions in light of other goings on.  If we continue to see an openness and willingness for our public institutions to embrace or promote things like Islam or Judaism or Eastern Religious thought or atheist belief systems, while continuing to eradicate only Christianity and Christian symbols from the public sphere, then yeah, that's a problem. 

But for this, it's hard to say.  I feel bad for those veterans who liked the memorial as it is.  But we've found out already in our society that being offended is a matter of privilege.  Some folks can, using the current legal and social strains of thought, scream offense and move mountains.  Others can say the same things about what offends them and garner nary a yawn. 

Some Muslim scholars praise assassination?

So apparently some Muslim scholars are praising the recent assassination Governor Salman Taseer in Pakistan of Punjab province. The story points out the background and the turmoil in that part of the world.  But what struck me is the headline.  The fact that some scholars praised the assassination.  What's that supposed to mean?  Am I supposed to be shocked?  Am I supposed to say,  'figures, that's just like those Muslims'?  Why didn't it say 'The Reason Some Muslims Scholars Praise the Assassination'?  Why is the headline acting as if the very fact that some do is news worthy?

One of the odd aftereffects of 9/11 was the bi-polarization of the Islamic world in the minds of many observers and commentators.  Suddenly there were only two types of Muslims: those who hijacked jets and flew them into skyscrapers, and everyone else who was no doubt peace loving, kind, tolerant, enlightened, and wanting to embrace a world view that looked suspiciously like our own (whoever the 'our' happens to be). 

Fact is, Islam is every bit as complex and diverse as any other grouping of human beings.  Out of the 1 billion plus Muslims in the world, it's highly likely that some are terrorists, and others appalled at any such violence in the name of Islam.  But in between those two sides is a potpourri of viewpoints and ideals.  Some who no doubt recoil at the thought of terrorism, but who fully support the subjugation of the world to Islam.  Others who would never want violence, but yet still see Islam as the force against which all other belief systems are to be measured.  Others who may reject any traditional views of Islam in order to embrace a post-modern progressive world view.  The list goes on.

So when an article headline says some Muslim scholars praise this attack or that assassination, it goes without saying.  Just like some atheists praised any amount of military action in the Middle East in order to set up secular governments.  Or some Christians support violence or even torture against Muslims in the name of counter terrorism.  Or some Buddhists or Hindus are involved in attacks against religious minorities.  It means about nothing. 

Given the horrendous track record of the last century, it would be nice if we humans learned that every group has its bad apples.  When we accept that, we won't be shocked to find out that the bad apples may come in different varieties.  And therefore, won't be inclined to make anything of it other than news as usual.

The man with a golden voice

Lands a job and turns his life around.  Glad to hear it.  A nice story for a closing of the day.  See you all tomorrow.

Lawyers cash in on the Priest abuse scandal? Nah

I, like most human beings, was shocked and appalled at the priest abuse scandal in the Catholic Church.  While I know pedophilia is in no way related exclusively to the Church, celibacy, or any such thing, I also know that the unique structure of the Church, and the tendency of bureaucratic CYA as a matter of policy, made the Church a lightening rod for attention.  This was the Catholic Church after all.  And it did appear that the cover up was more than just a few rogue bishops.  It showed an ineptitude and structural rot that still doesn't appear to have been properly addressed, IMHO.

Nonetheless, it isn't difficult to see that much of the ire and outrage that was just and good quickly got swallowed up by people who were more interested in advancing agendas, building upon anti-Catholic bigotry, or just making a buck.  After all, it isn't like abuse only happens in the Catholic Church, despite Hollywood and Media portrayals. Just look at the public education systems.

Many ask why, if the school system is a greater source of sexual abuse, we've not heard any more about it than we have.  Several reasons.  Like Bill Maher said, when a hot, buxom blond makes it with a fourteen year old, that's not rape.  That's luck.  I wonder if he thinks the same about a handsome priest and a fourteen year old?  Plus, of course, the education system is heavily into advancing progressive values, a task shared by the media that is never quick to torpedo its allies in the cause.

But most of all, because lawyers haven't found a way to cash in on the huge treasure chests of public school systems yet.  The Catholic Church was a giant trove just waiting to be plundered.  Not so the public school systems.  But if there should be a way to cash in, expect lawyers at least to be leading the charge against yet one more evil and vile institution.  Just like all the other evil and vial institutions that lawsuits expose.

Obesophobic bigotry

Mark Shea continues to have fun while making a point.  Much of the Gay Rights movement is a farce.  Anyone with half a brain could see it.  But just as Sean Strub points out for the Huffington Post, it's never about truth and facts when it comes to advancing Gay Rights.  Mr. Strub is upset because a new HIV awareness campaign is too harsh, too frightening.  Using graphic images of the ravages of various diseases linked to HIV, the campaign seeks to advance awareness of the toll it is taking, particularly in the gay community, where one in five men will become infected. 

You'd think that's just the kind of hard hitting honesty the gay community is looking for right?  Right?  Well, apparently not.  Mr. Strub cites several Gay Rights groups who are bothered by the ad, because it seems to focus on the fact that somehow the physiology behind male homosexual sexuality is a little more risky than good old fashion heterosexual sexuality.  Of course, the overwhelming testimony of medical science (you know, science that is always - ALWAYS - supposed to be listened to), suggests it is true.  And like the old anti-smoking campaigns of old, the new one simply tries to get gay men to take protection seriously, even by grabbing by the collar and shaking a bit.

But as Mark demonstrates with humor, there is little desire for truth or fact in the post-moder quest for sexual fulfillment.  Little things like facts, data, science, medicine - or tens of millions dead - won't stop what we want to happen.  So we have silly things like 'if a person is born with a tendency toward a certain something in some cases, then it's OK in some cases', as if that's supposed to mean anything.  As Mark points out, plenty of people are born with the tendency to be overweight.  That doesn't stop our media, our pop culture, our government, and our medical establishment from jumping over 'fat and obese' people as if they should be ashamed of themselves.  Yet it does keep those same groups dead silent regarding that other tendency which those same groups actually admit can be risky. 

Perhaps that's the problem Mr. Strub has.  Ultimately, gay rights is in many ways based on the same truth finding as the Emperor's New Clothes.  For the most part today, as agencies like CNN pine for the day when punishment is immediately handed out to anyone who criticizes homosexuality, asking about facts is simply verboten.  You don't do it for fear of the dreaded homophobe label.  Even though no one cares about the dreaded obesophobe label.  It almost makes you think that as a society we haven't learned anything from the last 5000 years of lessons.  Almost, though everyone assures me we are truly on the cutting edge of an enlightenment revolution, so that can't be the case.

Remove Jew, add Christian

The Pope is calling for a summit in light of a recent wave of anti-Christian violence.  OK.  We'll see how that goes.  One reason I think for the violence?  Because all those old liberal professors I had were right.  You see, when I was growing up, I learned about the harmful effects of societal bigotry. That corporate racism in which we all lived.  Not the laws that sad blacks had to use a different drinking fountain.  But the undercurrent of racial bigotry.  It was the ease with which our society used racial slurs, made racial jokes, put down people of color as a matter of course.  It was the day-to-day living out of racism that was every bit as bad as any law that said a black must go to a different school.

Same with anti-Semitism.  It wasn't as if the Nazis took over and invented anti-Semitism.  That bigotry against Jews was in the life blood of Europe.  It didn't matter why, whether it was racial or religious.  It was there, in the atmosphere, in the air people breathed.  It was that assumption that all Jews were crooks, that Jews were corrupt, that Jews 'those kind of people'.  It was the easy acceptance of anti-Jewish caricatures, a willingness to laugh at and mock Jewish customs and traditions because of a dislike of Jewish people.  It was, in effect, the subtle acceptance of hatred and contempt for the Jewish people that was so acceptable in Europe that allowed for the Holocaust every bit as much as any flagrant Nazi policy of extermination.

Fine.  I believe them.  Because not only have we seen violence across the world against Christians, we've seen it here at home.  Oh, it's still never assumed to be a 'hate crime.'  When a man opens fire on Christians in a Colorado church, despite his writings signalling a hatred of Christianity and call for its extermination, most in the media chose to focus on his mental instability.  That happens.  Any vandalism, church burnings, assaults against Christians is immediately assumed to be due to some other reason.

Yet these things are happening.  And globally, they are happening more every day.  Why?  Need I say.  Look at how Christianity is portrayed in our popular media.  Look at movies and books like The DaVince Code.  That is nothing other than the The Protocols of the Elders of Zion applied to Catholics.  It's the old [___________] are part of a great, vast conspiracy of evil and murder trying to take over the planet.  You simply remove the old 'Jew' from the blank, and insert Catholic/Christian. 

From Tavis Smiley to Keith Olbermann, Christians are routinely attacked, accused of outlandish crimes, mocked and derided.  Movies portray them as corrupt, evil, stupid, zealous fanatics.  People like P.Z. Meyers, Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris, and Richard Dawkins frequently use the old terminology, phraseology, and condemnation that was once applied to minority groups like blacks or Jews.  They simply change the terms to Christian/Catholic and receive rave reviews, invitations to speak at our leading universities, and praise from our media culture.

And that's here at home.  The way Christians are perceived and portrayed throughout the Muslim world is just as disconcerting.  Since 9/11, I've lost track of how many Muslim pundits have brought up the Crusades - or at least the part of the Crusades where Christians did bad.  Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said it best when he blamed Christianity for anything and everything done by any nation of the Western world, even if such things - like the dropping of the atomic bombs - were widely condemned by such Christian groups as, you know, the Catholic Church. 

Now, if my old liberal professors were correct, and such constant and acceptable trashing, thrashing, and re-trashing the re-thrashed trash is a major reason for old bigotry and racism and slavery and genocide, should we be shocked that the socially acceptable contempt for Christianity in our popular culture, our popular media, and our academic intuitions should facilitate such things?  And if in the Muslim world, where at least a fair number of Muslims have no problem emphasising all that is wrong with Christianity, receives nothing but vindication for their views by people they consider to be living in a 'Christian' culture, ought we to be shocked that such violence is springing up around the world?  After all, it wasn't just Hitler who was to blame.  It was all of European Culture, all of the Christian West.  It wasn't just the slave owner who was to blame, but all of European and American culture that accepted the bigotry and prejudice and stereotypes. 

Therefore, based on the traditional liberal interpretation of events I learned all those years ago, I can only suppose that no matter what the Pope says, it will do no good.  As long as Hollywood, Keith Olbermann, Christopher Hitchens, and Imam Rauf continue to spin the Christian Faith as they do, the violence will continue.  And those fine institutions and individuals will, of course, no doubt accept the blame they've been all to willing to bestow on others for so long.

Only twelve shopping days until Martin Luther King, Jr., day

That's right kids, so better get that old moldy tree from whatever holiday that was out of the way so we can turn our attention to America's only true Holy Day of Obligation.  Where a godman is worshipped and venerated.  Not that silly old fable that everyone knows is a lie.  And thank goodness we don't have to worry about the evils of America like we do at that unfortunately named Thanksgiving day, or those other patriotic anachronisms now best suited for barbecues and furniture sales.  Nope, this time we're not just celebrating old dead men, but a god among insects.  A day in which the true spirit of the day is called upon, the true meaning of the day is agreed upon, where our nation, our government, our society joins together as one and agrees upon the true meaning of Kingmass.  Yep, thank goodness we're not like we used to be, back in the 70s when progressives laughed at silly old holidays that lifted people up as if they were some type of divine figure.  All the type of thing silly, unsophisticated cultures do.  Nope, this time we have it right, and the proper worship, veneration, celebration, and trappings are unanimously agreed upon - or else. 

So get your Kingtrees ready, roll out the holly, devote your lives to the True (TM) cause,  and let the true meaning of a holiday will be celebrated in the most pure, holy, and sacred manner in which it always has, or always ever will be.

File under: Oops

Contractors in Philadelphia leveled the wrong home.  Fortunately, no one was hurt.

Attacks against Christians may be a bummer

According to our State Department, the recent wave of attacks and mass killings of Christians in unidentified parts of the Middle East and Africa (that is, not necessarily defined as the Muslim world), is cause for concern.  Darn nice of them.  Glad to hear it.  If nothing else, at least the Muslims who are doing the killings, and those who choose to yell at the Pope for getting involved rather than, you know, focusing on the killings, might be waking a few folks up to the problems at hand.  I'm confident many immersed in the anti-Western super-narrative will continue to imagine it must be our fault somehow.  But as events unfold, that approach is beginning to sound hollower by the minute.

Andy Staples prove my point

Over at Inside College Football, Andy Staples demonstrates my point.  OSU deserved to win because now it's as morally corrupt as any SEC team.  Yeah, because again what those foolish freshmen did should have derailed the entire program's season.  What they did two years ago.  Because a five game suspension just isn't enough for getting tattoos by selling team paraphernalia.   I'm not saying they didn't break rules, or didn't deserve to be punished.  But 'crime'?  As in:

Five players sold memorabilia to a Columbus tattoo artist for cash and ink and got caught. For their crimes against the NCAA, they were suspended five games.

OK, crimes huh?  How about this:

Ohio State also has players who commit NCAA violations. Five of them played Tuesday, and Ohio State wouldn't have won without them.

Not the verbal tense: Who commit.  As if this is an ongoing thing.  As if OSU has players willy-nilly violating NCAA rules on a daily basis, with the team covering for them and making shady deals.  The point is, make this moment of Freshmen foolishness into one of the great scandals in sports history.  That way the focus is off the obvious: OSU beat Arkansas, the Bit Ten beat the SEC. 

By the way, I do thank Mr. Staples for admitting to some moral superiority that apparently OSU enjoyed.  Because until I read his article, I can't recall any fans of the SEC or non-Big Ten teams speaking of such a lofty ethical perch upon which the Big Ten apparently roosted.  It's a little sleight of hand.  It's saying OSU deserved to win only because it made a deal with the devil.  It's Staples saying what most will say: as always, the Big Ten never deserves to win, so when they do, we must deflect attention so that no credit need be given.  It's saying OSU didn't deserve to win while saying it did.  It is, as we've seen over the years, the typical sour sportsmanship that occurs whenever an SEC team loses to anyone.  Congrats OSU, if for no other reason than putting that thorn in the side of the SEC support network.

Ohio State beat Arkansas, didn't it?

Well, you'd barely think so to read some of the coverage.  Like this AP story, the focus is on the player suspension.  Just the first sentence:

Ohio State might want to send a thank-you note to the NCAA for helping to end its bowl misery against the SEC.

Yeah, because a simple stupid mistake made two years ago by then freshmen players that involved a tattoo parlor was worth upsetting a multi-million dollar sports franchise.  Not accepting gifts, cars, big screen TVs.  Not peddling drugs, illegal arms, or raping women.  A single, relatively small infraction by young and foolish freshmen back before Barack Obama was president.  And for that, apparently a five game suspension next season just isn't enough.

But as predictable as the Big Ten losing to the SEC had become, even more predictable has been the sports media's ability to take any Big Ten victory and ensure that it was only because of any possible reason other than the Big Ten team deserving to win. 

When OSU beat Miami for the National Championship, we were assured it was only due to a bad call.  Yes, the call was controversial, but there were other bad calls that game which hindered OSU.  Not to worry, those were irrelevant.  Or when we beat Texas, we were reminded it was only because Texas had lost two of its start players due to suspension.  When OSU lost to Florida, the fact that its star player was hurt in the first play and out of the game suddenly became irrelevant.

No, for the media that seems to loath any Bit Ten victory in general, and an OSU victory in particular, this will be small potatoes.  It was shady deals with the NCAA, it was because Arkansas was inexperienced, it was a sloppy win by OSU who just got lucky...it was the barometric pressure, the presence of one celled organisms in the artificial turf, the position of Orion in the southern sky, it was anything other than OSU simply deserved to win because this time it was a better team.

This does have an impact of course.  After the National Championship victory, I watched the following year as a team that should have been riding high was dispirited.  Why?  How would anyone feel after accomplsihing what everyone said you couldn't accomplish, only to be told by the 'media' and other pundits that you didn't deserve it, you still suck. As we are often reminded when it comes to fan treatment of the players, these are just kids.  When a nation of blowhards insist on telling them they are no good no matter how many games they win, expect there to be a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Of course I'm one who thinks the bowl games should be dispersed across the country.  It's possibly not a coincidence that southern teams do so well when every bowl game is essentially a home game in familiar environments and acceptable climates.  Mix it up a little, and then see how things work.  But I won't hold my breath.  There is a love affair among sports casters for the SEC, and yes, the SEC is good.  But since the current set up, if it doesn't aid the SEC, it sure doesn't hinder it, I'm not holding my breath.

Nonetheless, expect more coverage of the above sort.  Arkansas would have won if all those things that happened to make them lose would have been different.  It's the NCAA's fault.  The BCS doesn't work right.  It's all rigged.  Or, again, Orion was in the wrong part of the sky.  But for OSU fans, we all  know better.  And even if the rest of the country changes the rules to maintain the narrative, we know the best team won.  Congratulations Buckeyes, you earned it.

Happy Birthday Professor Tolkien!

I can't believe I almost forgot J.R.R. Tolkien's birthday.  He would have been 119.  I won't go into detail, except to say I've never been much of a fantasy or sci-fiction fan, but his masterpiece The Lord of the Rings still ranks as one of my favorites.  I try to read at least one of the three books every year (always starting in September of course).  His works are loved by many, and like anything, disliked by others.  But few try to dismiss the influence he had on fantasy in particular and fiction in general.  A work of such magnitude, by a man so brilliant in his field and yet possessing that rarest of qualities in so many academic settings - common sense and wisdom - molded a tale that is wonderful on more levels than I can grasp.  The films, cartoons, animated specials all have their own visions of what he wrote, and each has good and bad.  But there is nothing to compare with his magnum opus, a story that makes other popular fantasy literature seem like pale reflections at best.   So for the influence, the enjoyment, and the sheer depth of the literary undertaking that stands almost as its own genre, thanks for everything!  And Happy Eleventy-Ninth Birthday!

Scientists advise: More Narcissism!

Scientists once more make me wonder why we worship the science profession as we do.  A civilization weaned on the glories of self focus and radical individualism is dying.  Marriage rates are down.  Birth rates are down.  And we're on our way out.  Everyone knows it and admits it.  But there are still those who appeal to our basest, most animal instincts for pure self.  Not content with the age old talk show psychobabble that has assured generations of couples that they owe it to themselves to put their marriage above all other priorities, researchers now realize that's not enough.  Focusing on a marriage is still including someone else.  No, their 'research' (and boy do I use that term lightly) now shows that a person has to put himself or herself above all other things, including the spouse. Only by focusing on self above all things can true happiness then swing around and lead to happier marriages.  Of course those silly fools who stay married for such quaint reasons as religion or children fly in the face of human=animal morality that so many scientists pedal in.  That many who live according to such standards may not have as happy marriage is likely because those who focus on self make up the bulk of divorce rates, and therefore aren't in 'unhappy' marriages.  It's a circular form of logic that tells people what they want to hear, all compliments of folks with lab coats that makes them smarter than everyone else.  It is a delicious scientific discovery:  focus on yourself above all things, and there you will find true happiness.  It's a lie we've been peddling for generations to a society that has accepted it to the damnation of its posterity.

Scientists prove how birds first flew!

Which should be news the reporter, given that we're usually led to believe that science already knows little things like that.  Truth be told, as a physicist and mathematician once explained to me, based on our current laws of science and understanding of flight, flight could not have evolved.  It's impossible, for flight is more than the existence of wings, or as this article suggests, wings and a brain wired for figuring out how to fly.  It has to have the entire organism in place, bone weight, mass, body shape, wing size, etc., in order to be able to fly.  There is no way those things could simultaneously evolve - or the chances are so beyond comprehension that it's far easier to believe the Tooth Fairy did it.  That's not to say he believed such was some slam dunk against evolution or anything.  It merely went to show the deficiencies in what we actually know versus what we wish we knew but often pass off as knowledge - something that would have been nice for this reporter to catch.