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The Wasteland

Passing observation…

To me “oldies” refers to Purcell, Palestrina and des Prez. Contemporary music after Duke Ellington mostly… isn’t. Music that is. Yeh, there are some truly remarkable exceptions–including a few in rock music. But on the whole the latter part of the 20th Century anno domini was a musical wasteland–especially in the “serious” music category, IMO. And it’s not gotten much better in the first decade of the 21st Century. Still even the worst music can perform a useful function, serving as very good bad examples. Unfortunately, it seems the moral decline in our country (and generally in the Western world) is matched or even overmatched by a decline in musical perception among the masses.

Jose Ortega y Gasset’s “mass man” strikes again…

Writing in 1930 or so, Ortega y Gasset said, “The characteristic of the hour is that the commonplace mind, knowing itself to be commonplace, has the assurance to proclaim the rights of the commonplace and to impose them wherever it will.” And it is even more so today, as the lowest common denominator in morality, in knowledge and in reasoning yields us such nightmares as crap rap and Barack Hussein Obama… Ortega y Gasset’s observations echo the reasons the Founders did NOT structure the United States as a democracy. And yes, I do certainly believe that crap “music” and crappy government are related in a society that has come to think of itself as democratic.

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Celebrate Flight!

Today, June 18, is the Women’s Transatlantic Flight Anniversary. In 1928, Amelia Earhart flew from Newfoundland to Wales in 21 hours. In 1932, she became the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic Ocean. Now, of course, we have the TSA strip-searching lil old grandmothers. My how times have changed…

For something more on the spirit of flight,

The music is

The Mass

The Mass

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Speed! ;-)

Geeky. Skip if compgeeky stuff isn’t your thing. Other stuff below.

About once or twice a week, I use several “Internet speed test” sites to check my ISP’s service. I was REALLY disappointed the other day when it was down to about a 4mb/s download speed and latency was an order of magnitude worse than my usual; yeh, even though I already knew everything was loading r e a l l y, r e a l l y s l o w l y, I was still disappointed. Still, with an average d/l speed of 8.36mb/s (and my peak, so far, of 8.92mb/s), I’m not too disappointed with my ISP. Upload speeds are under 0.5mb/s, of course, but I rarely upload multi-gigabyte files, so that’s not a huge bottleneck (I break my uploads for backups into more manageable chunks, and usually do them overnight, anyway).

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Decaying Moral Fiber

[A repost, with redactions for typos, orthography and tenses, of a post buried two years back in the archives]

Originally stated as, “A decaying moral fiber, especially in America’s so-called ‘Christian’ churches.” And, of course, once again I’ll not do more than skim a very, very small aspect of the issue, leaving you, faithful reader, to do your own homework to discover the veracity of my observations… or not..

Now, before some subliterate self-lobotomized moron jumps in making a defense of “slut and rut” sexual mores resulting from a thoroughly moribund sexual morality and attacks the raising of this issue as mere prudery, let me remind us all that morality relates to all of our daily lives, not just sex.

Honesty, respect for property, respect for persons, etc., that results in a condemnation and avoidance of lies, thievery and unjust violence against and manipulation and coercion of individuals: those are hallmarks of moral individuals and a moral society.

What we have is… not that.

Simple example: heck, forget cops who speed on their way to a donut break–an all too common occurrence. What about so-called “Christian” pastors who break traffic laws speeding to a preaching gig?

…it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also because of conscience. This is also why you pay taxes, for the authorities are God’s servants, who give their full time to governing. Give everyone what you owe him: If you owe taxes, pay taxes; if revenue, then revenue; if respect, then respect; if honor, then honor. — Romans 13:5-7

So-called “Christian” pastors who think nothing of disobeying traffic or other laws are worse than politicians and LEOs who break whatever laws they wish, because in breaking the law, these so-called “Christian” pastors know they are accountable not only to the State and to society at large for their behavior but have represented themselves as accountable to a Higher Power for obeying the laws of the land.

But even if the shepherd of a flock leads the sheep astray by his actions, the sheeple of individual flocks of self-proclaimed “Christians” are still responsible for their actions.

Years ago, a group of us were discussing the passage above (and others) in a morning study group one Sunday. A deacon who was present had responsibilities in the service that followed, and interrupted the service for a personal confession and act of repentance. Between the time of the study group and the morning service, he had gone out to his car and removed his radar detector which he placed on the communion table saying that he was “convicted” of his sin in using it to disobey the law and get away with it. He made a public commitment then to start obeying the law.

Laudable, on its face.

After the service, of course, he picked the radar detector back up and re-installed it in his car and drove off as usual.

Now, you may think I’m playing nit-picker singling out traffic scofflaws as examples of moral depravity among churchgoers. Well, imprimis, traffic scofflaws can stand simply as examples of the many ways in which “good” church folks are often anything but. And those who stand as some sort of authority figures within churches who are scofflaws in one area of their lives have no moral suasion when speaking in others. And, as with the deacon mentioned above, most often the outright lies and blatant hypocrisy are moral wounds that even more deeply hamper “good churchgoers'” ability to impact society for good.

And after all, why should they even try to do so when their congregations are more and more openly embracing the “bread and circus” atmosphere of society at large in order to draw “seekers” in for fleecing?

Bah. The fundamental lie that blemishes most so-called “Christian” churches today is that they claim to be “people of the Book” all the while picking and choosing and explaining away or just flat denying what the Book they claim to use as their manual for life says.

And that’s the fundamental immorality of much of so-called “Christendom” today: the lie of claiming to be followers of Christ while trampling on His teachings.

(Liars are always immoral, by definition. )

Go ahead. Apply these thoughts to yourself, if you claim to be Christian, or even if you claim–if only in your own eyes–to be as “good” as a Christian ought to strive to be. Are “white lies” acceptable to you? Where do you draw the line between telling the truth and lying? Does it make any difference that you draw your own line? No. Does it make any difference that intellectual and spiritual laziness and dishonesty permeates much of what calls itself “Christian” today? Yes. Such, “Well, sure I do such and so (or, alternatively, “fail do any bit of real good at all, at all”), but I’m still a good person!” lies do nothing to persuade onlookers who see only the lies, the hypocrisy, the self-serving disrespect for law*, the fact that so-called Christians cannot be discerned in behavior from those who are outside the club. (Indeed, because of a long association with Christians–both genuine and typically fake–I avoid doing business with anyone who sells themselves and their services by promoting their self-proclaimed Christianity as a reason to do business with them. Almost always a sure sign of fakery, IMO.)

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is… Romans 12:2

Anyone who denies that distinctly Christian principles and manners of thought and behavior form the basis for (former?) American success in creating a free and open society is an idiot, a liar or an uninformed idiotic liar. And one has to ask oneself what the motives of the liars who deny the Christian foundations (or who deny the value of those foundations, as the ACLU and its ilk regularly do) are. Still, as those values steadily erode and I watch more and more Christian churches wallow in pellagianism, embracing “hip-hop theology” and denying the life and work of the One they putatively claim to follow, I have to wonder, “Where is the Amos to call these contemporary faux Christians to account?”

I dunno. It certainly doesn’t seem to be something many (most?) of the pulpits of contemporary “Christian” churches seem wont to do. I do know a prophet is without honor in his own country, and that anyone who points out that the emperor’s new clothes… “ain’t thar” is in very deep doo-doo.

As [a past] quote in the header of this blog read,

“Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act.” George Orwell

Methinks we need a few more revolutionaries.

*BTW, is there such a thing as a true Christian who nevertheless disobeys the law deliberately? Of course there is. One instance in the New Testament gives an example of the only legitimate excuse a person claiming to be a Christian may have to deliberately disobey the laws of his community. Other excuses are bushwah, B.S., phony, lies. None of the folks I’ve heard make arguments for churches running “sanctuaries” for illegal aliens meet the criterion for biblically proper civil disobedience. None. Not one. Zero, zilch, nada, a big suck on a sour lemon’s worth. And never is simple personal convenience, pleasure or advantage a legitimate excuse for flouting laws, at least not for people who claim to be following the Nazarene. People who claim to be followers of Christ but who routinely and habitually and illegitimately flout the laws of their community without pang of conscience are plainly and simply liars, hypocrites and the truth is not in them–and that’s a fundamental failing of morality.

See also,

http://www.thirdworldcounty.us/?p=2212

http://www.thirdworldcounty.us/?p=2230

and

http://www.thirdworldcounty.us/?p=2250

for more along these lines.

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Quote of the Month…

…maybe demi-decade:

The problem in the next four years will be not just that the president of the United States serially does not tell the truth. Instead, the real crisis in our brave new relativist world will be that those who demonstrate that he is untruthful will themselves be accused of lying.–Victor Davis Hanson

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ACORN Recruiting Rally

After the Lakers’ 15th NBA championship win, ACORN apparently held a recruiting rally.

ACORN-recruiting-rally

(source for photo: LA Times, as is following pic)

ACORN-recruiting-rally-02

Makes ya feel all warm n fuzzy, eh? “Diversity” in action.

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Obaducky

(Stolen and modded from Robert Pearson)

Obaducky, the anti-Superman: Truth, Justice and The American Way roll right off his back.

Obaducky

Now, will someone please Photoshop that into a toilet for me? Preferably one that’s performing a topnotch swirly. 🙂

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More Tightwaddery

I posted some “tightwaddery” posts several times around the turn of the year, when the portents of the economic times we now face–rather, that anyone with more active brain cells than a head of cabbage can see we face–were strong, though still straws in the wind compared to what The 0! and his evil minions in Congress and his cabinet have now wrought. Although I’ve let the posts fall off, my exercises in tightwaddery have continued apace.

Here’s a lil mini-micro-nano tightwad tip: can lids. Plastic containers constantly wear out, become damaged or simply wander off in the hands of family members. As our menus have become more contrained, with only two or sometimes three family members eating here at any one time, semi-convenient foods, such as canned tomato sauces that can be enhanced with additional spices, herbs or vegetables into something edible and nutritious, are becoming more common in our fare. But. Small amounts as used for two-person meals can be more expensive when bought in small containers, so larger containers that are less expensive per unit of food are the “convenience tightwad” choice. But how to conveniently store, say, half a 26-oz can of pasta sauce? Well, most folks’d store the leftover sauce–not yet customized for a specific dish–in some sort of plastic container (that they’d later have difficulty cleaning the tomato sauce off), but not me. You see, I’ve collected a variety of plastic lids–from some beer making supplies, cans of “wasabi” peas, and even yogurt containers. The lids from the “wasabi” (really just horseradish-seasoned) peas fit perfectly on the 26-oz pasta sauce cans and enable safe storage for a day or so until next use. Other lids fit other cans, from dog food to black eye peas to cranberry sauce. And since all the cans are clearly labeled with WHAT they are, leftovers don’t wait long for usage.

Oh, and the “wasabi” pea cans themselves? Rings for poaching eggs, cooking perfectly round scones and even plaster molds for making some medallions for door trim (with the aid of some wax molds made from selected patterns).

Use a little imagination and you too may be able to dispense with some plastic storage containers. For “free” (cos you’ve already spent the $$ on the food the lids came off the cans the food was stored in).

Oh, for purists who insist on all their veggies coming straight from the vine/branch/whatever or at least being frozen: sure. If you can find, for example, fresh, ripe tomatoes have at it, but unless you pick them from your own vines, they’ll be neither fresh nor ripe when bought at the farmers’ market or your local grocery store. At least not both at once. Same for corn or beans or whatever. (If you’ve ever tasted corn fresh from the stalk, you’d know what I’m talking about. Amazing stuff.)

But speaking of…

For fresh foods, even if you have as little arable land as we have here in “rocky bottom” neighborhood, America’s Third World County, you can still economically grow food in pots, especially if you compost leftover vegetative matter from your kitchen and yard. I have some peppers (Habanero and Caribbean Red) that’ll be a hearty addition to meals later this summer, if we don’t get too much rain. (*sigh* These kindsa peppers are better with less rain than we’ve been getting. I’m a little afraid they’ll turn out whimpier than I’d like.) And you know, don’t you, that a handfull of pinto beans–the kind most likely to be used with a beans n cornbread meal or in a nice chili n beans meal–will likely sprout for you and either grow more beans for you or be a perfectly acceptable substitute for expensive bean sprouts from the grocery store. I have friends who planted a perach seed and have since–several years later–gotten some good peaches from it. Better soil than I have, but still…

Encourage volunteer pecans and walnuts, usually planted by absent-minded squirrels, to grow and reap the rewards in 10-20 years.

Plant window boxes with herbs. Harvest and eat volunteer plants like dandelions or “possum” grapes. No, one doesn’t get a lot of sustenance from any one small contribution of such volunteer vegetation, but they can make a very nice addition to meal times. But plant gardens that need lots of weeding and watering? Not me. I’ll plant things that’ll grow with little or no attention from me or use volunteer growth. My time’s simply more useful elsewhere, and I won’t pay money to water some fussy lil plant that’s not meant for my climate and can’t survive without constant attention.

Now, if only I could kill off the rest of my grass and get more useful plants like dandelions to volunteer in its place… Heck, maybe I’ll break down and buy dandelion seed. 😉

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Borrowed Thoughts

From Odd Hours, by Dean Koontz:

If evil geniuses are so rare, why do so many bad people get away with so many crimes against their fellow citizens and, when they become leaders of nations, against humanity?

Edmund Burke provided the answer in 1795: The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

I would only add this, It is also essential that good men and women not be educated and [that they] be propagandized into believing that real evil is a myth and that all malevolent behavior is merely the result of a broken family’s or failed society’s shortcomings, amenable to cure by counseling and by the application of new economic theory.

Seems like I ought to be getting a “Well, duh” from readers…