Sunday, September 24, 2006

Edinburgh comes in herds of stags and flocks of hens

Stags drunkenly stumble up and down the ravines from pub to pub with football (soccer) transmissions and dreams that some girl might find there combined alcohol fumes attractive.
Hens flock together in the back of buses and drink fifths of vodka from plastic-bag wrapped bottles, moan about loss of chewing gum packets, mistake a gay couple for possible prey for pointless flirtation by claiming one is, or looks, like Harry Potter. The two Scots behind the couple are jealous of the attention and offer one of the hens some gum.
Covens of mixed sex college kids come around the corner with determination to find the next pub offering student discounts (2 pints for one, or such) on inebriating substances.
The castle is illuminated and from the garden in the ravine behind it BBC is broadcasting live some version of "whoever wants to be a millionaire must laugh at anything".
The buses have usually no back doors.
The food is in general good.
And watching the natives is a source of infinite entertainment!
Pictures later.

Sunday, September 17, 2006

NYTimes is right

This editorial from the Times is exactly right, and the sooner the busbaby is not allowed influence beyond his own little playpen, the less the sound of his raging baby rattle will unsettle the world!
Bush Untethered - New York Times
And here the beginning:

New York Times - September 17, 2006 - Editorial
Bush Untethered
"Watchng the president on Friday in the Rose Garden as he threatened to quit interrogating terrorists if Congress did not approve his detainee bill, we were struck by how often he acts as though there were not two sides to a debate. We have lost count of the number of times he has said Americans have to choose between protecting the nation precisely the way he wants, and not protecting it at all. On Friday, President Bush posed a choice between ignoring the law on wiretaps, and simply not keeping tabs on terrorists. Then he said the United States could rewrite the Geneva Conventions, or just stop questioning terrorists. "
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It is really time to teach the executive branch that they must enforce ALL laws and uphold the Constitution, which of course requires that branch to obey all laws and abide by the Constitution. The judicial branch decides on guilt and innocence and consitutionality, the legislative branch decides what laws exist. And attempts to change that are an ATTACK on the American system of government. Homeland Security should provide some defense against these lasting assaults by the bushbaby playpen on the USA!

Tuesday, September 12, 2006

Reignite the Enlightenment

Anyone who recognizes this post's title, at least as an echo, is probably committed to doing what it suggests, since it is a "free" translation of the first essay in the new issue (n° 96) of L'Infini, «Rallumons les Lumières», by Philippe Sollers.
He also, in this piece, writes that «Les Français vont mal parce qu'ils n'aiment pas leurs Lumières.» I would add that not only are the French doing badly because they don't like their Enlighteners, but the whole world is equally bad off!
And that largely because most are too puritan or fundamentalist or sexually hung-up to deal with these libertines! Yes, the great writers of the Enlightenment were also committed to sensual pleasures.
And, as Sollers also reminds us in this excellent piece, Voltaire summed it up this way: «J'ai toujours préféré la liberté à tout le reste.» And when he said he had always preferred liberty to everything else, he was also denouncing ANY sacrifice of it for security or "morals" or "beliefs" or "social pressure".
Thinking is free, thinking is freely questioning everything, always, never finding the "final" answer, because always continuing to question.
Besinnen! Contempler! Consider!

Sunday, September 10, 2006

What you've seen you can now hear !

To hear what the famous parrot Koko has to say about our niece's USC student apartment cavorting in the internet, just click on his name.

Saturday, September 9, 2006

Five years later and what do you get ...?

Cinq ans après le 11 septembre 2001, le monde n'est pas plus sûr et Al-Qaida n'a pas atteint ses objectifs politiques et religieux. La "guerre" contre le terrorisme a, quant à elle, fait d'innombrables victimes. Des milliers de morts et des libertés sacrifiées, un peu partout dans le monde, à la faveur de l'instauration d'un climat de peur généralisée et d'une demande de sécurité.

Le Monde.fr : 11-Septembre, la peur permanente, par Jean-Pierre Stroobants is the link to the entire piece.

Think and don't succumb to those who would use fear to promote their ideologies!

Wednesday, September 6, 2006

internationales literaturfestival berlin

Worthy of attention:
internationales literaturfestival berlin
The 6th international literature festival in Berlin has just begun and promises to be very rewarding for all who come in contact with it.
The site also has an English link.
Yesterday evening's keynote address by Édouard Glissant (F/USA) highlighted the possibility of beauty in art as the glory of difference in the world with all the potential for human understanding that implies.

Monday, September 4, 2006

Today's Tyranny

From- Guy Debord: Œuvres; Paris: Quarto Gallimard, 2006, p. 1509 ("Note de l'éditeur pour Tuer n'est pas assassiner d'Edward Sexby [1657]")

... cette tyrannie d'aujourd'hui, si insolemment surdéveloppée qu'elle peut même assez souvent se faire reconnaître le titre de Protecteur de Liberté [...] et qui s'est enfin donné la puissance de défier une vérité aussi éclatante que le soleil lui-même, et le témoignage de vos pauvres yeux, en vous faisant admettre qu'il est bel et bien midi à dix heures du matin.

... today's tyranny which is so insolently over-developed that it can rather often even lay claim to the title of "Freedom's Protector" ... and which has finally granted itself the power of disputing a truth as dazzling as the sun itself, and what your own poor eyes tell you, by getting you to admit that it is indeed noon at ten o'clock in the morning.