RAMBLINGS on the day after Xmas

I am refusing to say Happy Holidays. I think we have gone overboard in the PC category. Christmas has become a cultural holiday, I think: for whatever it's worth, fine with me. And, to try to avoid saying Christmas is uncool, at least to me. So, I hope you had a Merry Christmas.

Some asshole in San Fran objected to a star on the top of a Xmas tree. The guy looked like he needed a decent meal or maybe had too many and naturally the media gave him lots of coverage. Oh, I just thought, Happy Boxer Day for us Brits Actually I'm Irish, does that count? Somebody is probably somewhere objecting to that.

Now somebody might object to me using Xmas but the X is the Greek symbol for Christianity. Speaking of Greek, that great leather jacket, Andy, went to the Church candlelight service the other night. People were constantly telling me, "that is a great jacket."

OK, I know you are hanging on every word, so here's the last subject, As I was messing with one of my blogs this morning, I had this thought. "It is nice to have the fantasy of possibly one of the GFs actually reading what I have to say." The fact that it is an illusion, still I am "playing like" as we say im NC, one of the buds might be. One advantage to this personal jabber is that nobody interrupts. Who knows that anybody ever reads anything. I did quiz Larry and he actually read Brothers. I was astonished.

According to the Airborne Press counter, about a hundred people a week click on the link to "breakfastwithmygirlfriends." And, what I put on the blog is not some of the good stuff like considering whether being called a "low life moron" is more civil than MF. I am sure what the "guru" meant to say is that he occasionally thinks there are moronic views, not that the person is a moron. I personally like MF better. It has a kind of melodious Buddhist chant feel to it. (I think I've said this before).

What I try to put on the blog is more useful stuff/opinions (I hope) like the 16th chapter of Revelations which sounds like the predicting of global warming. Just kidding but it does. If I was a fundamentalist and could write a book about the 16th chapter of Revelations, all the fundamentalists would feel guilty unless they bought the book; they would then flock in "Sarah Palin numbers" to the Christian bookstores who had been given huge discounts by the publishers to stock the book; the fundentalists would buy one or several copies. The fundamentalist preachers would start teaching the book in their churches, requiring all members to buy one or more copies less the Holy Spirit strike them down, thus increasing sales. And, I could get super rich, maybe get a megachurch and make all of the GFs deacons with a nice salary. I'm going to think about that. If I got a megachurch, some of you might want to run the church restaurant or other businesses of the church that God has directly appointed to be successful We could actually have a theatrical production and one of the GFs could play the role of Jesus driving the money changers out of the temple. Of course, there is only one GF fitting for that role, Malnekoff, as in Michael. God would make us such legends in our own minds that we could buy "The Raintree" and have our own restaurant with the little pudgy Hispanic waittress. We would have to get a Greek to be in charge of the menu with some "eyetalians" handling foot traffic.

Comment

Your frustration over whether the troops are brainwashed ("they have access to the same information that we do") is understandable but these are volunteers who have signed up out of economic distress or other motivations and expect to be put in harms way....so, as a coping mechanism, they have to throw in completely to the mission's "rightness"....the only way that this lemming outcome could be checked is to initiate the draft again.....then , those non volunteers i.e. draftees, would definetly question the "rightness" of the wars, of course, within the bounds of military law....there would also be mass demonstrations like there were against the Nam War... until the whole society has a direct stake in the wars, there will be no such questioning of the "rightness" of the wars....Freedom is not free but a great majority of our society is not being asked to share directly in the sacrifices necessary to maintain that freedom....it's like Rome asking mercenaries to fight its wars as the Roman masses became lazy and undisciplined which was a basic reason that the Roman Republic came to an end.....there has to be a sacrifice sharing expectation in our society to maintain the necessary vigilence over our Republic and our freedoms.....until the time that this comes to pass, we are in the same danger as the Roman Republic was before its fall..........It's Wake Up Time In America ! ! ! !
Sam D.

An Alternate Universe

Based on our discussion yesterday when a few actually appeared to be listening, here's another thought with you hanging on every word, naturally. One thing that bothers me no end are the things like I related that I saw on TV, a soldier being interviewed in Afghanistan, talking about missing his daughters, sadness, the wife and her sacrifices (ignore the fact that both were overweight--I'm slapping myself for even mentioning). Anyway, he goes on to say, "we are doing such good over here. These people need us and depend on us." And, here we are, out here in the hinterlands reading, watching the news and thinking, "what and who is he talking about." I feel bad that I am thinking this way as I know from having been at war, you have to believe in what you are doing, it is your job. For Ray, not to put words in his mouth but his view was that he was focused on his little niche, that which was right in front of him. The right/wrong strategy if it didn't affect his men had little impact on him I think for Larry, going on patrol, making it back in one piece, left little time for cogitating your navel. For Hank, dropping his ordnance and firing up a few black pajama types and getting back to his Filipino servant left little time for world events. All that aside, have our soldiers been brainwashed? Is it the type of soldier we have enlisted? What? They have assess to the same media we do. Dang, this really bothers me.

BROTHERS

For those who haven't seen Brothers, here is my review. Some
plagerized from Karl. Brothers is one of those movies that I
expected to have trouble sitting through. However, it really wasn't. I
think that mainly I had read so much and talked to those who
had seen it that I was not the least bit surprised. The brothers, one
the epitome of the good son and the other a perpetual "F..." up.
However, they loved each other. The theme of the movie had already
been done in The Valley of Elah. War simply plays hell with the
warriors. Tommy, the n'the well younger brother shapes himself up when
his brother Sam is killed in Afghanistan or they think he's dead. All
the while he is being tortured and eventually forced to kill one of
his own. I'm not giving away too much because even this had been done
before.

The toll on families is a given. Natalie Portman, playing the wife is
very good. Jake Guillenhau(sp) and Toby McGuire are also very good but
one of the small daughters stole the show. Her facial expressions and
attendant actions overall are simply precious. A good movie which
should, along with many war themed movies, have more impact but not
so. In Brothers, the movie never really hit on any opposition or even
asking any sort of the basic question of "why are we there" The one
brother did mention IT briefly but moved on. Being a good Marine was more
the philosophical tone. There are so many more themes that are lightly
touched which could have been fleshed out but not in 2 hours I guess.
For instance, Sam Shepard, playing the straight arrow retired Marine
father, Vietnam vet, tries but wrestles with his own demons and mostly
fails.

A last view. Why are these movies not box office successes? My view:
the 50% of the American population that "thinks" is in bigtime denial
that we are in two unwinnable, untenable wars which are draining us in
every single way. Thirty five percent of our fellow Americans don't
think at all: they support a position such as war and having their
minds made up, also prefer denial. The other fifteen or twenty
percent are simply "out to lunch." They don't care one way or another
and take little or no interest beyond their own narrow limits. And,
they don't go to movies, not war movies anyway.

HE'S BACK, HE'S BACK

Yes, Ted is back as in Ted Haggard, the former pastor of the Colorado mega church. Think, you will remember him? He was the voice of family values and the darling to right wing fundamentalists until he was caught frequenting a gay masseuse. The preacher went from a host of microphones, TV, and so many attendees on Sunday morning, they had to go in shifts to disgrace.

Haggard in his return, has closed in on a space close to his old stomping grounds. The Lord probably spoke to him to locate close to his former flock. On his first appearance, so many came that they had to move to a barn. He's back and like Jim Bakker(minus Tammy), probably a TV show is to follow. With Bakker, I actually watched a little of his show one night: same old stuff, selling a dream. Send in your money. And, they are. Redemption is a big issue with people of faith, along with forgiveness. But, it seems to me that the "faith" might be better served if these guys would keep a lower profile. Forget it! Once they have tasted the limelight, with egos as big as all outdoors, they can't give it up, even with the shame. And, what about those who flock back to them--people are pretty forgiving. And, then again, in my view, let's try stupid.