mennonno sapiens - one giant leap for mankind: Recent Comments

Comment on Moving Daze, the Aftermath

2010-09-02T20:18:52Z

I've always liked having a "room of my own". And I think as long as living alone doesn't spiral into isolation, as long as you have a relatively robust and healthy social life, being a career bachelor is not a bad gig.

Comment on Fight the Right by Fighting for Right

2010-09-02T20:05:44Z

This is perfect and very useful; thanks for posting it.

Comment on Fight the Right by Fighting for Right

2010-09-02T19:30:24Z

Powerful.

It pisses me off that this is an issue. I only wish it surprised me.

Comment on Moving Daze, the Aftermath

2010-09-02T19:08:16Z

After my boarder moved out I promised my dog that only she and I would inhabit the house for the near future. The vestige of wanting to share a home diminishes to an infinity of near zero. There will always be the fantasy of coming home to an Adonis of a spouse, time ceasing at the door, a perfect domesticity keeping at bay the chaos of the outside world. But living with only my dog today leaves me quite content.

What is the origin of that trace for perfected shared domesticity? Is it an archetypal desire for perfect safety, or desire to return to a momentary infantile state of timelessness? While intriguing not all that important. What does matter to me is that I like living alone.

On the other hand I can't truthfully say, "Oh sorry, you can't come over right now, my roommate is home."

Comment on Moving Daze

2010-09-01T23:02:43Z

Beginning with my B.U. undergraduate days in 1962, through graduate school at Brandeis, five years running the theater design dept at Emerson college and 32 years at MIT, I became more familiar with Moving Day than I care to admit.

Welcome to your new place, Mike!

Comment on Moving Daze

2010-09-01T20:40:32Z

But where is the compact OED? My first boyfriend had a compact OED. I don't remember whether I was more enthralled with him or with the mother dictionary of the English language. Add to that the technological achievement of printing four regular OED onto one side of a page. I was in Gutenberg heaven.

But then the first time I saw an actual Gutenberg at the NYPL I cried. Books are part of my mental DNA.

Sadly the OED publisher will probably cease printing their gift to the English language. What need is there for printed dictionaries or encyclopedias (though I still have my Britannica from some year in the past). It's a hard argument for keeping printed matter when DVDs and web access are cheaper and smaller and easier.

So perhaps in the next century books will go the way of the LP.

I can imagine this scenario: laying back on a couch reading Fahrenheit 451 on an Ipad or Kindle and wondering what all the fuss is about since books no longer exist. Right Glen, I mean Guy?

Comment on Moving Daze

2010-09-01T17:27:25Z

Loving the shelf photo. I know everyone says the internet is for pictures of cats, but I could easily spend a day perusing bloggers' bookshelves.

Comment on Moving Daze

2010-09-01T16:23:20Z

Best wishes with the move today. I have witnessed the chaos, been a lucky sod who's escaped that pile of spaghetti, but still understands the monumental nature that is Moving Day.

At least Earl hasn't rained on the parade. And, bonus, the heat will kill any bedbugs the kiddies are bringing with them from home!

Comment on The Pity Party

2010-09-01T06:59:19Z

I'm actually a bit surprised you posted on this nonentity. Yet I was persuaded to visit The Gay Patriot to read the item (and was compelled to comment myself). Thinking of gays like Ken Mehlman (Heaven knows I try not to), I'm reminded of something Bella Abzug of New York once said: "Our struggle today is not to have a female Einstein get appointed as an assistant professor. It is for a woman schlemiel to get as quickly promoted as a male schlemiel." Perhaps we GLBT's can one day say the same thing. Then again Ken Mehlman does behave like a schlemiel. Courage: our time has come!

Comment on The Pity Party

2010-09-01T03:07:49Z

In the 50s it was communists and homosexuals. With the Holocaust still in focus in the historical rearview mirror Jews were of less concern - excepting the case of the Rosenbergs.

In Uganda - via American right-wing religious elites - gays are used as the top scapegoat. Though what is obvious to anyone willing to be honest is that this is just another exercise in creating a devil for sake of claiming the role of saviour, father of the nation, etc.

Wedge issue is certainly an element in the right's use of gays; just as important is that wedge issues are part of their MO for gaining and holding power.

It is always about power. Why the majority of media ignores that I don't know.

Beck's rally in D.C. is a perfect example. The entire show was orchestrated to make Glen Beck the hero of the moment. Everyone present was an actor in Glen Beck's moment to become the great American saviour. He follows the classic pattern of painting himself as a hero. Claim some high moral ground of restoring America, Constitution, etc. without any specifics or particulars that would get in the way of painting himself as a moral hero.

One thing I heard which made my ears burn. An interviewer asked an executive with the Southern Baptist Convention what the fellow thought about Beck's Mormonism. His response - a rationalization worthy of Joseph Goebbels and Soviet propaganda: that the Mormons are the 4th Abrahamic religion.

To compare Mormons to Judaism, Christianity and Islam is an absolute perversion of logic, history and theology.

On the other hand it makes sense to me: this guy from the Southern Baptist Convention sees Beck as someone they can use. Therefore it is necessary to rationalize away the huge theological differences between conservative Baptists and Mormons.