Sometimes, people do stuff which you can’t understand or explain no matter how hard you try to think of circumstances in which their actions would make sense.  A case in point: in a little town in Ireland called Listowel this week, a man was due to be sentenced for the sexual assault he’d been found guilty of by a jury a while ago.

After he’d been brought into court, but before the judge entered, between forty and fifty people queued up, filing past the victim… to shake the perpetrator’s hand, or hug him warmly.

Why?  Was there some miscarriage of justice?  Had the guy been convicted on shaky evidence?  It seems not.  When you read this article, for instance, the facts seem simple and straightforward.  The guy was found with his bared penis in his hand, leaning over this woman, who lay with half her clothing removed beside a dumpster.  She was covered in bruises and scrapes which were consistent with being dragged across the ground.  No clinical evidence of sexual assault was found.  He said he’d found her there when he went outside to relieve himself, but CCTV camera footage showed him carrying her to the dumpster.

There’s more, but that alone seems to me to make it a pretty straightforward case.  So it seems unlikely the guy was wrongly convicted, in fact, I think if the Gardai (Irish police) had not come across the scene he would have raped her.

And even if there was some bizarre circumstance which might make us all go: “Oh, now I understand,” if it were to come to light (though so far, nobody’s been able to come up with anything of the sort either during the trial or to the papers since), what kind of stupid idiot can’t understand that shaking the hand of a convicted sex offender in court, in front of his victim, might make you look like the arsehole of the century?

If this guy is your friend, is usually a really nice bloke, if you’re convinced this was a once-off slip-up and you know he’s really sorry, surely you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to realise that the place to show your support for him is not in court, in front of his victim?

No, I don’t think these people were merely stupid.  I think they were defiant, that they knew precisely what message their actions sent, and that they sent it deliberately.  What I find outrageous is that they were allowed to intimidate, taunt and humiliate the victim of his crime in court, openly mooning the law, the process that put him behind bars.  And without suffering any consequences.  There should be some sort of punishment for such actions.

Oh, wait, they’re already suffering punishment, though they don’t know it.  They’ve been barred from the delights of having a functional brain.  For life.

More on the case here, here (scroll down), here.

I recently learned a new term: Poe.  In internet slang – as most of you will probably know but bear with me here – it means a parody which is mistaken for the original.  The implication is that the original concept is so bizarre and crazy that… that it cannot really be parodied?  That it’s a parody of itself, like a pair of mirrors facing each other, and little way to tell which is the original reflection?  No, wait, it’s simpler than that.  The original is so crazy that it’s impossible to exaggerate the crazy, because it’s already up against the wall that denotes the outer boundary of crazy and there’s no way to pass it.

Recently, there was a lot of gobsmackedness and head-shaking in the blogosphere about the Christian Side Hug video. 

I know, I know, I should have posted a torture warning.  The bloody thing is also a bit of an earworm.

Well, there is much pointing and laughing going on at the moment as it turns out the rap was a joke.

I’m still confused, for two reasons:

1.  I fail to see what the joke was.  I suppose you would have had to be there to have understood, or to have seen the preamble or build-up to the performance of the song.  One of the originators of the song says:

We all find it sad that the public doest believe a church can be fun and use self-deprecating humor. We also find it extremely funny to read all the rumors about us being a “real rap group traveling to promote purity at churches”, which is not true at all, and would be completely obvious if people would stop getting their info from other peoples opinions and come to the source.

So i had to put this up because its a purdue classic video even tho i wasnt here for this i feel like i can still post it so enjoy..

Courtesy of IllVibes:

LMFAO!! Ok i thought the Affion parody was funny, but this shit is down right retarded!!! NO DOUBT YOUR GONNA… ENJOY!!

Courtesy of: IamNotARapper

NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — AIG announced Tuesday that it completed a deal wiping out $25 billion of its debt to taxpayers by selling stakes in two subsidiaries to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The troubled insurer gave the New York Fed preferred shares of two of its international life insurance companies, including $16 billion of American International Assurance Co. and $9 billion of American Life Insurance Co. The deal was originally announced in March.

The deal brings the New York-based insurer’s debt to the New York Fed down to $17 billion. AIG also still owes the U.S. Treasury $44.8 billion from a separate Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) loan, so the insurer still owes taxpayers just under $62 billion.

Read full article here

Traditional Catholics are baffled and angry, as discussion on the internet reveals. One blogger writes:

After wagging an admonishing finger to the incoming Traditionalist Anglicans that they may not “pick and choose”, Archbishop Nichols chooses to go to Europe’s first Hindu temple to receive a pagan blessing.

You can understand this anger. The leader of the Catholic Church in England and Wales doesn’t mind taking part in Hindu ceremonies, but try asking him to say Mass in the Extraordinary Form and you won’t get very far.

Read the article

…it could have been worse.  Much worse.

Am I saying that because it’s worse elsewhere, we should be grateful for what we have and not moan about its shortcomings?

No!

Because almost everyone in the world can always find someone, somewhere, who is worse off than they are.  We should always strive for better, but at the same time I think it’s never a bad thing to realise what a privileged life we lead in developed countries.

I remind myself every day what a privilege it is for me to be here.

Anyone who now wants to gleefully throw all the warnings over Global Warming out the window, rush out and buy six SUVs which use fuel like a watermill uses water, just wait a minute here.  Read this first.

I’ve read a few of the leaked emails, and while there is definitely a problem here, I’m also glad that I’ve been reading about science and scientists, specifically their battle against those who call solid, undeniable science into question.  Complete morons can pounce on even the tiniest, most mundane and irrelevant crumbs and magically turn them into huge misconceptions which then take unbelievable effort from scientists to dispel.

Take this example: it will take me two seconds to type: “It’s a well-documented fact that Darwinism led directly to Nazism.”  Easy-peasy.  If I have some impressive-sounding title like Doctor Nadia Williams PhZ, Ft, MdSC, there are an awful lot of people who would assume without a moment’s hesitation that the letters I simply put together off the top of my head mean I know what I’m talking about.

Now, if you want to undo the damage I might have done there in under one minute, it would take you writing an article perhaps twenty times the length of the paragraph up there.  You’d have to make sure the audience understands what Darwinism is, address the fallacy of the Darwinism-Nazism link, perhaps delve into the origin of this misconception.  You’d then have to explain the abbreviations for degrees, show that no university in the world (I bloody well hope) has qualifications such as the ones I claim to have, perhaps research the institution I might claim to have studied through to earn the right to call myself ‘doctor’.

In your refutation, you can’t just suck facts from your thumb, you will have to go and research and verify your claims.  That means my five minutes’ effort to do damage can cost as many hours to undo, and even then, three quarters of my audience will probably never get to read your thoughtful, well researched reply.  They all will continue to believe Darwinism caused Nazism, and not only that, they’ll believe this is a well documented fact. I mean, that Doctor with all the degrees said so, didn’t she?

And in the time you’ve written your excellent rebuff of my claims, I will have written six more articles spreading lies.

To my mind the leaked emails have exposed a worrying tragedy: scientists can be so easily frustrated, tied up in trying to prove to those who can’t smell that crap stinks, that to me it looks as if they have become paranoid with making sure there are no tiny, irrelevant details in their research papers which can become weapons in the hands of the kooks. I remember once reading a heartbreaking piece from a young scientist who wrote a well researched paper, got it published, and had it so cut and hacked by the publisher that it said something completely different from the original.

Could it be that scientists have closed ranks, gone into a mode of being under siege?  If they did go so far as to act unethically to protect their hypotheses, I would ask: was this caused by a gradual move away from sound scientific method by the frustration of having to guard against fringe dissenters who could bog them down so easily and so thoroughly that they’d spend their lives clearing mud instead of doing the research that is vital to humanity’s wellbeing?

I’m also quite puzzled by why these emails should now scupper Obama’s proposals re cap and trade, and other measures against the effects of climate change, as that seems to be what quite a few opinion pieces online think will be the effect.  Hopefully that’s just the extreme opinions, but perhaps that just proves exactly what I’ve tried to say.  From the article I linked to above:

But do these revelations justify the sceptics’ claims that this is “the final nail in the coffin” of global warming theory? Not at all. They damage the credibility of three or four scientists. They raise questions about the integrity of one or perhaps two out of several hundred lines of evidence.

Science has to work a hell of a lot harder to be believed than to be disbelieved.  If you had to constantly fight against that, perhaps you, too, would start cutting corners.

Vanuatu’s prime minister is stripped of his post and parliamentary seat because of a basic paperwork error…. From BBC News. Full story

This site may contain information about: travel to. The blog is also related to: flight information.

This morning I listened to the Ray D’Arcy show on Today FM.  He read an email from a listener, who responded to a comment Ray had made yesterday that we should stop trying to lay blame for the current economic crisis and instead focus on working together, pulling together and getting through it.

I don’t think the text of the email is available online, so you’ll have to go by my memory here.  This lady’s father had run his own business for 45 years.  When the crisis struck, his was one of the operations that were hit badly and he had to let his eight staff go.  Weeks later, he was diagnosed with Lymphoma (I think it was that, it was a form of cancer, in any case) and he had no choice but to stop working altogether, and close his business down.  His insurance didn’t cover all his medical costs, and the whole family helped as much as they could to pay the bills.

A month after his diagnosis, he received a tax bill resulting from the closure of his business (WFT?  Someone’s business goes down and you then screw them for yet more tax?  But let me finish the story before I start ranting).  They sold their car, their son and daughter both sold their cars as well, and with that money settled part of the bill.  With the help of both an accountant and a solicitor, he made an arrangement to repay the balance monthly.

He’d paid a few months’ instalments, on time, the agreed monthly amount in full, when one night at 11pm, the sheriff arrived, waved a warrant under the wheelchair-bound man’s nose and started taking everything that was not cemented down from the house.

The writer’s father showed the sheriff the letters from revenue agreeing to the monthly payments, he asked for 24 hours grace so that he could contact Revenue and find out what the hell was going on, but he was, to use her word, “rebuffed”.

The mother phoned her daughter (the writer of the email) at work in tears, distraught.  She went immediately to try and help, but was flatly ignored.  Neighbours tried to intervene, and the Guards (police) were called.  They warned neighbours to back off or be arrested.

These arseholes took everything, except the fridge, though they wanted to and checked to see how much food was in it.  They took the wheelchair-bound man’s buggy which he used to get around outside.  They took the small gifts the grandparents had bought for their granddaughter’s eighth birthday, which was the next day.

As soon as their office opened, the shocked family phoned Revenue to ask what the hell was going on, and how it could be fixed.  They were informed that the matter was out of Revenue’s hands now, and in the hands of the Sheriff.

Her father just gave up after that.  He managed to raise two thousand Euro more from what he had left, paid it over, and fell into decline.  He is now dead, only a short while after this ordeal: not from his cancer, but from a stress-induced heart attack.

It doesn’t end there.  Revenue still sends letters demanding their money to this day.  The outstanding amount remaining?  One thousand Euro.

Way to go, Revenue.  That money was certainly worth someone’s life.

There are so many times when people can follow the rules, go by the book, and use that to inflict despicable, inhumane, cruel treatment on fellow human beings.  I’ve said in a previous post as well that there are times when someone can do things to another which can be made to sound as if it’s not such a big deal, but if you step back and just use your brain, embrace the fact that whether or not this world is a good place to live in is up to YOU, you will realise that such behaviour is unspeakably cruel.

There were many texts and emails sent in response to the story, most expressing shock and outrage.  What was more worrying was that there were numerous people confirming that this kind of treatment is not some freak accident, some exception to the rule, terstifying that they made arrangements to pay their bills in instalments and were still handed over to the collectors.  That the agreed amount was constantly and arbitrarily changed for no discernable reason.  That collectors used intimidating tactics more in line with some Mafia operation than a government institution.

The head of the Revenue Service, whose name I can’t remember now and can’t find quickly, gave a phone interview on the show to respond to this story.  It was just outrageous to hear him trying to avoid admitting that he is ultimately responsible for what these thugs did, and still do, to those who are in financial trouble.  Like a fucking eel.

But was it outrageous?

In the purest meaning of the word – causing outrage – I suppose it was.  But in the sense of this being something out of the ordinary?  No.  So a government man (would this guy be a politician?) is a slippery, slidey arsehole who is like a quadruple-covered teflon pan is to an oiled pancake when it comes to taking responsibility for something bad.

What else is new?

And this is the question that weighs me down right now: how will this ever change?  Democracy is somehow broken.  Governments are cumbersome, creaky, inefficient, unfriendly, bloated, sick institutions the world over.  We, the people, choose who governs us, but what choices are there for us?  In my frustration I think that only people attracted to power and privilege are attracted to politics, not those who want ot make the country run better and more efficiently.  Election time seems to give us the marvellous choice: do you want arsehole A or arsehole B to call the shots?

What I find even more exasperating is that people still admire those who have screwed them over with a giant cucumber.  Charles Haughey stole MILIONS from this little country when it could ill afford leaking money from every pore.  Bertie Ahern looks in many ways to have lined his pockets as best he could.  And they are loved and admired.

In Britain, politicians across the board made use of every possible opportunity to suck every penny they could from legitimate allowances, doing the wrong thing again because hey, it was sort of possible to read the rules that way.  What about common sense and decency, for heaven’s sake? What about not just grabbing everything you possibly can because in your heart, you know it’s not right?

Ireland and Britain, at the very least, seem infested with politicians who are parasites.  And Africa… oh, gods, let’s not even go there.

How do we change this?  For all our right to vote (well, except for us immigrants, hehe), we are powerless to fix the festering, distended monsters that are our governments.  Politicians promise whatever they have to, in order to gain the power they crave.  And then?  Then they set about enriching themselves as much as they can for as long as they can.

Okay, I’m cooling down a bit now.  I will be happy to concede that there probably are loads of people in politics who are in there not for the thrill of the power, for the adrenaline rush of getting away with murder.  I know there is at least one politician in Ireland who said no thank you to her luxury, top-of-the-range government car, reasoning that her Toyota Camry is perfectly capable of getting her from point A to point B.  I realise that possibly the view I expressed above is very much mistaken, that politicians in government might be doing a difficult job with the best of intentions.

That still doesn’t change the fact that things are not the way I’m sure most people would want them to be.  We still have several million Euro inquests into wrongdoing so sneaky and so tangled that it takes years to unravel.

And there is no prospect of alternatives that give me even the slightest hope that things might change.

While I can see why most want to end this war I also see reasons for continuing it. If the war is ended America is at risk of the Taliban being able to regroup and plot attacks similar to 9/11. But on the other hand if this war goes on then we risk having another Viet Nam on our hands and wasting more money on what seems to be an endless war. One thing I know for sure, I’m happy I’m not the one who has to make the decision! Sorry Obama…

Washington (CNN) — The Pentagon is making detailed plans to send about 34,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan in anticipation of President Obama’s decision on the future of the 8-year-old war, a defense official said Tuesday.

Read full story here

Jurgen Sierens, één van de betere doelmannen in de Belgische competitie, was ongetwijfeld de pechvogel van de 15de speeldag. Terwijl hij op zoek is naar de bal, werkt hij hem zonder het zelf te beseffen in doel. Volgens mij had hij de Swakiri meer verdiend dan ‘laatkomer’ Nabil Dirar van Club Brugge.

i want to kill this disgusting munafiq with my bare hands… i pray to ALLAH let his stinking gut enter Pakistan .. and i will not miss an opportunity to send his disgusting ***** to hell where he rightfully belongs… Altaf Hussain Murdabad InshAllah

It would be hard to say it much better than this.  This guy wrote this piece 4 months ago, 6 months into the Obama usurpation.  It’s as accurate as if it were written yesterday.

The part that he is the most correct about is that the idiot masses that elected this fool will NEVER admit that they made a mistake.  Obama may be the destructive force taking apart America, but those who voted for him are the ones who enabled him to start his campaign of destruction.

I Told You So – Yes I Did Barack Obama

Thursday, July 23, 2009
By Howard Galganov

When Obama won the Presidency with the help of the LEFTIST Media, Hollywood and Entertainment Liberals, Ethnic Socialists (ACORN), Stupid Non-Business Professionals and Bush Haters, I wrote:

It won’t take 6 months until the people figure this guy out and realize how horrible a mistake they’ve made. And when they come to that realization, the damage to the United States of America will be so great, that it will take a generation or more to repair – IF EVER.

The IDIOTS who not only voted for the Messiah, but also worked their sorry asses-off to promote his Lordship, are now left holding the bag.

Here are two things they will NEVER do:

1 – They will NEVER admit to making a blunder out of all proportion by electing a snake-oil salesman with no positive social history or management experience of any kind.

2 – They will NEVER take responsibility for the curse they’ve imposed upon the immediate and long-term future of their country.

In essence, the people responsible for putting this horror-show in power are in themselves responsible for every cataclysmic decision he makes and the consequences thereof.  (Also, those who stayed home and did not vote as a real citizen must gave Obama his slim margin of victory.)

In just 6 (SIX) months, the Messiah’s polls are showing the following:

On Healthcare Reform – He’s going under for the third time with polling well under 50%, even within his own Party.

Even though he might be able to muscle a Healthcare Reform Bill by using Chicago BULLY tactics against his fellow Democrats, it will just make things worse.

On Cap And Trade (Cap & Tax) – The Fat-Lady is already singing.

On the Stimulus Package (Tax and Spend) – His popularity is in FREE-FALL.

On the TARP package he took and ran with from President Bush – It’s all but Good-Night Irene.

On the closing of GITMO and “HIS” war on what he no longer wants called the War On Terrorism – He’s standing in quicksand with his head just about to go under.

On a comparison between himself and George W. Bush at the same 6 months into their respective first term Presidencies – Bush is ahead of him in the Polls.

On a comparison between He Who Walks On Water and the 12 preceding Presidents between WW II and now – Obama ranks 10th.

On a Poll just conducted, that asks who would you vote for today between Obama and Mitt Romney – It’s a dead heat.

Between Obama and Palin – Obama’s ONLY ahead by 8 points and she hasn’t even begun to campaign.

It seems to me that Obama wants to be everywhere where he shouldn’t be.

He’s personally invested in screwing-over America’s ONLY REAL Middle Eastern ally (Israel) in favor of Palestinian Despots and Murderers.

He’s traveling the world apologizing for the USA while lecturing others on how to do it right, when in fact and truth, he has no experience at doing anything other than getting elected.

He went to the Moslem world in Egypt to declare that America IS NOT A CHRISTIAN NATION while he heaped praises on Islam, where he compared the “plight” of the Palestinians to the Holocaust.

The Russians think he’s a Putz. The French think he’s rude. The Germans want him to stop spending. The Indians want him to mix his nose out of their environmental business. The North Koreans think he’s a joke. The Iranians won’t acknowledge his calls. And the British can’t even come up with a comprehensive opinion of him.  (None of these views have changed or improved in the 4 months since this article was written.)

As for the Chinese, he’s too frightened to even glance their way.  (At the time of this writing, Obama is over in China cuddling up to the Chinese, doing everything he can to show subservience to them.  He is bargaining from a position of weakness, and the rest of the world knows it.)

Maybe, if America’s first Emperor would stay home more and travel less, and work a little bit instead of being on television just about everyday, or forget about his Wednesday Date Nights with his Amazon Wife, or stop running to “papered” Town Hall Meetings, perhaps he would have a little bit of time to do the work of the nation.  (Sadly, if he were to take Mr. Galganov’s advice he would have more time and energy to devote to actively destroying the America he hates in order to build his totalitarian utopia.  Catch-22.)

In all fairness, it wasn’t HARD to be RIGHT in my prediction concerning Obama’s Presidency, even in its first 6 months, so I’m going to make yet another prediction:

OBAMA WILL PROBABLY NOT FINISH HIS 4-YEAR TERM, at least not in a conventional way.  (We can only hope for change, and pray that it happens soon.)

He is such a political HORROR-SHOW, and so detrimental to the USA and his own Democratic Party, that the Democrats themselves will either FORCE him to resign or figure out a way to have him thrown out.  (Again, we can only hope.)

Who knows, maybe he really isn’t a BORN US Citizen and that’s a way the Democrats will be able to get rid of him.  (They don’t have the guts for that approach.)

Or – MORE LIKELY THAN NOT, the Democrats will make Obama THEIR OWN LAME DUCK PRESIDENT.

I don’t believe the Democrats have nearly as much love for their country as they do for their own political fortunes. And with Obama, their fortunes are rapidly becoming toast.

The Democrats can keep on blaming Bush for EVERYTHING. But, that game’s already begun to wear real thin.

Their mantra was “WE DON’T WANT 4 MORE YEARS”, which the STUPID people bought, since McCain was nothing at all like George W Bush.

The new mantra will soon become: WE DON’T WANT 6 MORE MONTHS.  (Or 6 more days, or 6 more hours, or 6 more minutes, or…)

Best Regards . . . Howard Galganov

The other night, Bruce Springsteen said, “Hello Ohio” about three times. That would have been so awesome if he was actually in Ohio playing a concert. Unfortunately, he was actually in Michigan. Steven Van Zandt had this to say while playing with him:

“I just grabbed him and said, ‘You don’t realize it, but you’re saying Ohio and we’re in Michigan.’ He said ‘What?!?,’” Van Zandt, who played Silvio on The Sopranos, told the Rolling Stone magazine. “In his mind, he knew he was in Detroit, but somehow Detroit wound up in Ohio for a minute.”

This is pretty much my whole argument while rock and roll performers shouldn’t tour after a certain age. I think it should basically be like Logan’s Run where after they turn 30…they have to retire…or we just get a wild angry mob together and chase after them. Then we can make a reality television show out of the whole thing and make tons of money together. What do you say? The first episode will start with Bret Michaels. I’m pretty sure it would be better then The Hills…we just need somebody to play the dumb blond.

Just a reminder that I’m offline again until 19 November, but I’m at least going to try to check email and so on daily from a wifi hotspot.  Why am I in this pickle again, when we’d just been reconnected after our move?  Well, here’s why:

We’d moved from the house where we’d lived since arriving in Ireland to another place which we hoped to buy.  The estate was beautiful, the house was fantastic and well built and the view of the Cooley mountains was to die for.  However, in the three months we lived there, Jonathan got beaten up three times, Nicholas had money and sweets taken off him, all three the kids had fireworks thrown at them, our babysitter’s parents witnessed a firework being thrown under a passing car (with a whole family in it) and exploding under it – the underside of the car was a mass of flames, according to our friends.  If there had been even the tiniest leak in the petrol tank…

We had ‘bangers’ set off near enough to our house to inspire us to call the Guards (Gardai [pronounced gaar-dee] is the Irish word for the police, also referred to as the Guards), one time it was set off right on our doorstep.  Don’t know what a banger is?  It’s a firework which does nothing but make noise.  No pretty colourful explosion in the sky, no frizzy flower of sparks.  No other possible explanation for its purpose than noise.  When one of these goes off on your doorstep, it sounds as if a bomb exploded in front of your house.  Come to think of it, that’s exactly what it is.

As a result of all this unpleasantness, Lara became a nervous wreck.  She’s a highly strung child at the best of times, and though we’re handling it, it was hard to comfort her when there was real cause for concern.

Our rent agreement was a rent-to-buy thing, which meant the rent was very high, but the idea was to save a deposit over a period of eighteen months.  We would have gotten every cent back.  Because we withdrew from the contract after only three months, we lost the deposit.  Taking in consideration with that the money we would have saved in lower rent if we’d just rented somewhere, we lost about €1 900 on this deal.  However, the huge relief to feel we are safe, to not stress myself to death when the children are out of sight, to have Lara sleep soundly and not be nauseaous with tension all the time, is worth every cent.

So we moved again this past weekend, and though it was bloody awful, it was so worth it.  We now live in a very small estate, in a nice four-bedroom house, in a good neighbourhood.  I am hugely relieved.

But internet-less again for a while, unfortunately.

Now to the reason for the title of this entry.  A post inspired by the recent Ford Hood shootings which gives a lot of food for thought on war in general.  I’ll let Stonekettle Station speak for itself.

Tracey’s Facebook privacy blunder after she finally got laid again.

Tracey's Facebook blunder after finally getting laid again.

Following the Helmand Province incident, I decided to re-write Alfred Lord Tennyson’s ‘The Charge of the Light Brigade’ to fit the tragedy. I feel that the whole situation is too reminiscent of the Vietnam war; when will people learn?

1.
Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Helmand
Flew the one hundred.
“Forward, NATO crusaders!”
“Bomb the huts!” he said:
Into the valley of Helmand
Flew the one hundred.

2.
“Forward, NATO crusaders!”
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldier knew
Someone had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and to fly:
Into the valley of Helmand
Flew the one hundred.

3.
Bombs to right of them,
Bombs to left of them,
Bombs in front of them.
Scared as Hell, being
Bombed by barrage and shell,
Terrified they fled,
Into the jaws of Death,
And far, far above,
Flew the one hundred.

4.
Flash’d as bombs blasted the once-peaceful air,
Flash’d as the innocent turned to prayer,
Obliterating the citizens dwelling there,
Breaking a country, while
All the world wonder’d: why?
Plunged in the rubble and dust
Children cried over the deeds unjust.
The innocent civilians
Reel’d from the bombs
Shatter’d and sunder’d.
Then they flew back;
Comfortable one hundred.

5.
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered:
Honour the charge they made?
But we should ask ourselves,
“What of our minister?”
For ’tis indeed sinister,
That we should call him noble.

It’s strange that in a country where religion was king until a very short while ago, I feel there is greater religious freedom than I perceive Americans experience.  True, the schools are still heavily influenced by the Catholic church.  Mother Mary stares me in the face when I walk in the front door.  Religious pictures grace the halls.  There are religious lessons in class.

But religion doesn’t get stuffed down my throat.  My kids read story books during religious lessons, at our request.  Nobody looked askance at us for this, and the school staff are friendly to me and treat my kids no differently for our views on God.  I often get the feeling most modern Irish people are Catholic the way I’m a Boer – they were born into a society that revered it, grew up with it, but as adults it’s more an afterthought than something they embrace.

From entries in blogs I follow written by Americans, I get the feeling that for all their secularism, they have a much higher percentage of people who identify as Christians and are really serious about it.  Fox News is a glaring example of this demographic’s strength: it would have died a quiet death if it didn’t have support.  People watch this shit.

And shit it is, I’ve concluded from numerous clips I’ve seen on YouTube.

Bill O’Reilly is the worst television host I’ve ever come across.  He simply shouts his guests down, with a superior, shame-on-you attitude to everyone who does not subscribe to his views.  I’ve read many articles analysing opinion given by various well-known Fox News hosts, which pointed out their erroneous views, poor grasp of facts and strong bias.  It’s one thing to not be too well informed – hell, I’d be the first to admit that I’m shaky on facts, as I live in the worlds I create in my skull.  I don’t keep up to date as much as I could with what’s happening outside my head, never mind outside my town.  I often get things wrong, and hope if it’s ever pointed out to me, that I’d be humble enough to admit my mistake and correct it.

It’s another thing to attack an individual or an organisation with accusations that are easily showed to be untrue, if you do so through a medium which thousands, if not millions, of people are exposed to.

When I was a radio newsreader in South Africa, I felt a huge responsibility, knowing 150 000 people listened.  One of the reasons I got out of the profession was because I realised I’m not naturally on top of things.  I can tell you a lot about fantasy and mythology, about the accepted characteristics of an Elf or a Wood Sprite, but I wasn’t too hot on who’s the current minister of finance.  And that’s just not on.

I think I made up for this by carefully checking my facts when I compiled a story.  I knew my weakness, and did my best to compensate.

Perhaps that’s the problem with Sean Hannity’s remarks about the Coalition of Reason’s print ads in the subway. He asserted that Christian groups are not given the freedom to advertise in the same way.  It proves to be embarrassingly easy to show he’s mistaken.  What’s more, I am left with the impression that he’s a pompous ass who doesn’t give a shit for the environment, as well: he made fuming claims about advertising in the subways, while it seems he never takes the subway himself, preferring to use his SUV.

I would guess it’s not impossible that he is secure in his view of himself as well informed, and perhaps this leads to mistakes.  If you’re too sure of yourself, you don’t always feel the need to confirm what you think is true.

Sadly, the majority of his viewers probably share his opinion of himself, that he is a reliable source of truth.  They are left with a world view that is skewed, believing a lie.

It’s a shame, really.  But what can you do.

Its funny how weird you act when you are disturbed in the middle of your slumber. Just moments back, I heard the sound of my landline phone ringing and i remembered the incident that occurred to me last night when i was deep in my sleep. The phone ringer that sounded totally normal just now sounded totally alien and that caused quite a confusion with me. As I was extremely tired due to my day long meeting (even on sunday), I retired to bed early as I had to take a break in my sleep to see a cousin off. So, I slept at 11:30 PM.

It was around 2:15 in the morning when my sleep was interrupted by some continuous ringing sound. Initially it sounded very distant as if it started in a dream but sono my mind got conscious that this ringing sound was from the real world not from the dream. But the dilemma was that my mind couldn’t correlate the sound with the source. It was very loud very crude ringing sound. At first i thought about door bell but the idea was immediately rejected as i knew my door bell is very melodic, then my thoughts wandered towards fixed phone but the idea was again rejected as it never sounded like it. The sound resembled like a fire alarm. The only possible source i could think of was that the sound was coming from another phone and that another phone wasn’t mine.

So, I nudged my brother and in sleepy voice ordered him to attend to his cellphone. His reply “STFU – Its not mine” got me out of my sleepy thoughts. I sat on the bed with the mysterious source still ringing. Suddenly It dawned upon me – GodDammit, it was the landline phone which i had earlier dismissed that was ringing. Ringing of my landline phone at this hour of night is never good news. I hoped for the best and rushed towards the lounge where the phone was placed. I picked up but there was no sound coming from the other side. I cursed the phone and the caller and headed back to bed and slept instantly.

Again in the sleep, I heard the same sound… same struggle with my brain about the source of the sound but this time i had known the source. The same damn phone ringing again. I rushed again and picked up the phone. No sound from the other end,

Me: ‘Hello??’
<NO SOUND FROM THE OTHER END>
Me: ‘Hellooooooooo’
A male voice: ’Hello?’
Me: ‘Yes?’  
That male sound: ‘Hi, Edhi Ambulance?’
Me: ‘What?’   (my mind was still drowsy)
That male sound: ‘Are you from Edhi Ambulance Service?’
Me: ‘No, Sorry wrong number’.
That male sound: ‘oh, ok’
<HUNG UP>

I checked the time, It was still around 2:15 and i thought i had slept for hours between these two phone calls.
In any other situation, I would have grumbled a few obscenities after placing the phone, but the conversation was disturbing enough to keep me pondering. Somebody needed an ambulance and dialed a wrong number… Great! Those precious seconds that he wasted talking to me could have made a difference in saving somebody’s life. The more I thought, The more disgusted I felt about myself. Why the hell didn’t I tell him the number? I had that number stored in my cellphone. Somebody needed help and i was too sleepy to help him.
The only thing i could do after this mishap was to say a silent prayer for the person who needed an ambulance. Prayed to God to have mercy on the soul of the person who needed that ambulance.

… and then I went back to sleep as if nothing ever happened.