Attorney Season

Driven to distraction by perversions of the legal system? Astounded by how fast the lawsuits proliferate in the wake of any accident or terrorist attack? Amazed that lawyers would be willing to touch evil terrorists with a ten-foot pole, much less defend them? Wish you could do something about it?

Write to your local delegate to support the proposed new law governing the hunting of lawyers in Virginia (where there are more lawyers than deer, and that's saying a lot). Here, as a public service, is the text of the proposed legislation:

Proposed Virginia 2010 Attorney Season Regulations

Section 1300.01 - General

1. Any person with a valid Virginia hunting license may harvest attorneys.

2. Taking of attorneys with traps or deadfalls is permitted. The use of currency as bait is prohibited.

3. Killing of attorneys with a vehicle is prohibited. If accidentally struck, remove dead attorney to roadside and proceed to nearest car wash.

4. It is unlawful to chase, herd, or harvest attorneys from a snow machine, helicopter, or aircraft.

5. It shall be unlawful to shout "whiplash," "ambulance," or "free Perrier" for the purpose of trapping attorneys.

6. It shall be unlawful to hunt attorneys within 100 yards of BMW dealerships.

7. It shall be unlawful to use cocaine, young boys, $100 bills, prostitutes, or vehicle accidents to attract attorneys.

8. It shall be unlawful to hunt attorneys within 200 yards of courtrooms, law libraries, whorehouses, health spas, ambulances, or hospitals.

9. If an attorney is elected to government office, it shall be a felony to hunt, trap, or possess it.

10. Stuffed or mounted attorneys must have a state health department inspection for rabies and vermin.

11. It shall be illegal for a hunter to disguise himself as a reporter, drug dealer, pimp, female legal clerk, sheep, accident victim, bookie, or tax accountant for the purpose of hunting attorneys.

Don't forget - let your elected reprehensives know what you think!

No, wait! They're all lawyers, anyhow.

Never mind.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Farmers to the Rescue?

I found this very interesting article yesterday: Can Farming Save Detroit?

Detroit, of course, is the very poster child for dying cities - the collapse of the auto industry and years of mismanagement have left it a decaying shell of the vibrant city it once was. With the economy in its current state, there isn't much chance of reviving Detroit any time soon...so why not turn it into a giant farm? A man named John Hantz thinks this is a good idea, because it could "...restore big chunks of tax-delinquent, resource-draining urban blight to pastoral productivity; provide decent jobs with benefits; supply local markets and restaurants with fresh produce; attract tourists from all over the world; and -- most important of all -- stimulate development around the edges as the local land market tilts from stultifying abundance to something more like scarcity and investors move in."

Personally, I think it's a great idea. Rather than having a vast area of dilapidated and unproductive buildings that serve only as breeding grounds for crime, tear them down, plow up the land, and start growing things.

Of course, farming is hard work. Where will the farmers come from? Small family farms have been going out of business for years, leaving the giant agribusiness firms to take their places. Will they be interested in farming the ruins of Detroit or other failing cities? It's an interesting question, and one that may be a key to land use in the 21st century.

Read the article, and imagine yourself in bib overalls with a pitchfork in your hand.

It may be the picture of the future.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

The Banned Words List

Each year for the last 35, the faculty and staff of Lake Superior State University has published its list of Words Banished from the Queen's English for Mis-use, Over-use and General Uselessness. A word or phrase earns its place on the list for being, as the title of the list indicates, misused, overused, or generally useless. It's a word or phrase so annoying or overused that it makes your grammatical and semantic gorge rise. The list of banished words/phrases for 2010 (with my comments added) includes:

1. "Shovel-ready" - I actually don't mind this expression, because it's useful in discussing almost anything dealing with Congress. You need a very big shovel, of course.

2. Transparent/Transparency - best comment on this word was from a wag who said, "I just don't see it."

3. Czar - Ivan the Terrible was a czar. Everyone else is a cheap knockoff. 'Nuff said.

4. Tweet - Birds tweet. People who tweet should be called "twits."

5. App - Short for "application." Also short for "appallingly overused."

6. Sexting - Refering to the transmission of sexually explicit messages and photos by phone. The word is just as stupid as the activity.

7. Friend (used as a verb) - The actual verb is "befriend." Why not use it...it's only one more syllable.

8. "Teachable Moment" - We used to call them "lessons."

9. "In These Economic Times ..." - Just dumb. All times are these times. It's just that in these times we want tar and feathers for the members of the financial mismanagement industry. No further comment necessary.

10. Stimulus - A picture of a beautiful lady in a nice dress is a stimulus. Vast quantities of money hurled at mismanaged industries to allow them to continue to mismanage at our expense are not.

11. "Toxic Assets" - I prefer "bad debts." If it's an asset, it's a good thing by definition. This is a world-champion oxymoron.

12. "Too Big to Fail" - The government is willing to bail out industries too big to fail, but not to help individuals too small to notice...like you and I.

13. Bromance - this one is so stupid I can't even think of a snarky comment. What's wrong with good old "friendship?" Just flush it.

14. Chillaxin' - combines "chilling (out)" and "relaxing." Utterly pointless. A waste of ink just to comment on how stupid it is.

15. "Obama" (when used as a prefix, generally with a negative intent, as in "Obamacare," "Obamanomics," etc). We also had "Reaganomics," also generally used in a negative context, but the overblown use of "Obama" as a prefix has gone far beyond the bounds of satire or good sense. You don't like the President. Okay, he was elected. Get over it.

Any other words or phrases you'd like to add? I'm ready to hear them...

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Donating Blood

Both John and Mike have blogged in the last few days about donating blood. Imitation being the sincerest form of flattery (and lacking a good original idea for this morning), I thought I'd add my own story on the subject.

I used to donate blood regularly when I was in college and in the Air Force. I didn't make it to the ten-gallon level, but I was getting close...it was a good thing to do, and the free coffee, orange juice, and cookies were too good to pass up. I had to stop for a few years after I finished a temporary assignment to a particular location which - according to the Red Cross - made my blood temporarily undesirable, and after that I sort of got out of the rhythm of donating. I know I should start again, and perhaps now is a good time.

Anyhow, here is my favorite blood donation story...

This took place while I was a student back at Penn State in the early 1970's - a much skinnier version of the robust fellow I am today. I reported to the blood donation center and ended up on a table next to one of the well-known members of the Penn State Nittany Lions football team - a fellow who outweighed my by at least a hundred pounds and was big enough to warp gravity in his immediate vicinity. The nurses were all fawning over him, and he was (of course) enjoying the attention. I just laid there and bled, quietly and obscurely, into my bag.

The football player and I finished filling our bags at the same time, and each sat up on the table for a few moments before walking over to the snack area for the free orange juice and cookies. When the nurses thought we were ready, they took us each by the elbow to help us down from the table...we hopped down...

...and the mighty football player's eyes rolled up in his head, he passed out, and fell to the floor with a mighty crash, while skinny Bilbo trotted proudly to the snack bar.

This is what the Germans call Schadenfreude.

But don't let that stop you...donate blood. It really is the gift of life.

Time to get dressed and head back to work...the holidays are over. Sigh. And the worst part is that Mike will probably make some snarky comment about being retired.

Double sigh.

Have a good day. Donate blood. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Praise the Lord and Pass the ... uh ... New Laws

During the Second World War, Frank Loesser wrote a popular song titled "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition." It was written in response to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, and told the story of a chaplain (known in military slang as a sky pilot) whose ship was under enemy air attack. The sailors asked him to say a prayer for them while they fired at the attacking planes, whereupon the chaplain put down his Bible, jumped into one of the ship's gun turrets, and began firing back at the enemy, shouting, "Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition!"

It was a very popular song at the time, and goes to the heart of the rather rocky relationship between violence and religion. The sacred writings of most religions offer some variant on the commandment "Thou shalt not kill," but also put an asterisk next to it to indicate the various loopholes (self-defense, participation in a "just war," "jihad," "getting rid of "infidels," and so on). Some religions urge the penalty of death for blasphemy, defined by Merriam Webster's Online Dictionary as, "1 a : The act of insulting or showing contempt or lack of reverence for God; b : The act of claiming the attributes of deity. 2 : Irreverence toward something considered sacred or inviolable." In his famous "Devil's Dictionary," Ambrose Bierce defined the related word impiety as "Your irreverence toward my deity."

Be patient, I'm getting to the point.

Mike beat me to a discussion of the law which came into effect in Ireland on January 1st, which makes blasphemy a crime punishable by a €25,000 ($35,800) fine. According to CNN (see the link in the last sentence), the law makes it a crime to say or publish anything "grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion."

Now, Ireland is a traditionally Catholic country, and the Catholic Church takes a dim view of blasphemy, as do many other religions. But it's very clear to me that the purpose of the law is not so much to prevent the denigration of religious beliefs in general as it is to protect Ireland's people and economy from the sort of violent reactions that come from the Muslim world whenever there is a hint of criticism of Islamic beliefs in general or of the prophet Mohammed in particular. The violent reactions to Pope Benedict's speech at Regensburg in 2006 (in which he appeared to criticize Mohammed in the context of a scholarly discussion of reason and faith), the death sentence imposed on author Salman Rushdie by Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran over Rushdie's allegedly blasphemous book The Satanic Verses, and the widespread Islamic outrage and violence over the infamous Danish cartoons in 2005 are still fresh in the minds of countries with substantial Muslim minorities.

Is it wrong to criticize the deeply-held religious beliefs of another? What constitutes punishable criticism or blasphemy (could "Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition" be considered blasphemous)? What punishment is appropriate? Who decides? In a country like Saudi Arabia, there's no question about any of these: it's illegal to build a church or practice any religion other than Islam. Compare this to overwhelmingly Catholic Ireland, which not only has a relatively small Muslim population, but also a mosque and community center in Dublin to serve it.

Is it right to deliberately insult someone's religious beliefs? It may be boorish and mean-spirited, but should it be illegal in the context of a pluralistic society? I think not.

As John pointed out in his comment on Mike's post, the only winners in this situation are the government that collects the fines and the lawyers who prosecute or defend the cases. Religion is a matter of the heart, but is all too often disconnected from the brain.

What we need are not laws, but common sense and a little bit of fallback to the Golden Rule. This may be difficult for adherents of a religion that absolutely believes it's right and everyone else is wrong and needs to be shown The Way, forcibly if necessary, but perhaps there's hope.

Until then, we'll see nations fall back on stupid laws.

Have a good day. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Cartoon Saturday

Welcome to the first Cartoon Saturday of the new year. And the new decade. You know you need it...

Ninety-three people were killed in Pakistan on Friday when a car bomb was detonated at a volleyball game; police in Denmark shot and arrested a Somali man armed with a knife and an axe who tried to break into the home of the cartoonist condemned by Muslims for insulting Mohammed with his cartoons; twenty-two people were killed and dozens injured when a rain-weakened mountain collapsed and buried a resort in Brazil; two Washington Wizards (remember when they used to be called the Bullets?) teammates drew guns on each other in a locker room dispute over a gambling debt; and 40,697 new state laws are scheduled to take effect in the new year.

Hang in there...Cartoon Saturday is still with you to help get you through the lunacy.

I'll take what's behind door number two...

Two cartoons riffing on the subject of Greek mythology. If you don't know the story of Medusa, check here...

And...

There's a silver lining for some inside the dark clouds of economic disaster and swine flu...

If you've been a parent on a long road trip...or if you just love stupid twists on ordinary situations, you can relate to this one...

And, finally, for those of you disappointed over what Hollywood did to your favorite book...

Welcome to 2010! If you're new to this blog - welcome! - hope you'll come back. If you're one of my regulars, you're in for more of the same. Aren't you lucky?

Have a good day. There are over 360 of them still to come in the new year.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Recipe for a Happy New Year

Did you have a good time last night? I'm whispering in case you overdid the partying and imbibed a little too much of the bubbly.

Everything okay, then? Well, let's get on with 2010, which just has to be better than 2009...it could hardly be worse. Actually, for me 2009 wasn't all that bad, if you omit discussion of the twisted, smoking wreckage of my retirement savings and my seething rage over the despicable conduct of our elected reprehensives. I'm still healthy, I still have four (soon to be five) wonderful grandchildren, and I'm still married to the world's greatest lady (she has gone another year without killing me in my sleep). I got reacquainted with some great old and new friends from my high school class at our 40th reunion, enjoyed a nice vacation with Agnes, and discovered a great new author in Rennie Airth. So for me, things aren't bad.

But what can we do to help 2010 get off on the right foot, besides building a wall 500 feet high and 100 feet thick around the entire Middle East (including Somalia, while we're at it), filling the area thus enclosed to the top with sand, and starting over?

Yesterday in her wonderful blog, Miss Cellania offered this Recipe for a Happy New Year, which is probably worth trying out. After all, nothing else seems to work, as The Golden Rule seems to be utterly ignored by Congress, the financial mismanagement industry, Islamist radicals, and posturing political buffoons of all sorts...

Recipe for a Happy New Year

Take twelve, fine, full-grown months,
see that these are thoroughly free from all old memories of bitterness, rancor, hate and jealousy;
cleanse them completely from every clinging spite:
pick off all specks of pettiness and littleness;
in short, see that these months are freed from all the past;
have them as fresh and clean as when they first came from the great storehouse of Time.

Cut these months into thirty or thirty-one equal parts.
This batch will keep for just one year.
Do not attempt to make up the whole batch at one time (so many persons spoil the entire lot in this way), but prepare one day at a time, as follows:

Into each day put twelve parts of faith,
eleven of patience,
ten of courage,
nine of of work (some people omit this ingredient and so spoil the flavor of the rest),
eight of hope,
seven of fidelity,
six of liberality,
five of kindness,
four of rest (leaving this out is like leaving the oil out of the salad, don't do it),
three of prayer,
two of meditation,
and one well selected resolution.

put in about a teaspoonful of good spirits,
a dash of fun,
a pinch of folly,
a sprinkling of play, and a heaping cupful of good humor.

Pour in lots of love, mix with vigour.
Cook thoroughly in a fervent heat; garnish with a few smiles and a sprig of joy;
then serve with quietness, unselfishness, and cheerfulness,
and a Happy New Year is certain.

Try it out and let me know how it turns out for you. As recipes go, this one sounds pretty good.

Happy New Year! More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Favorite Authors

On this date last year, I published a post titled 2008 - The Year in Books in which I listed every book I'd read during the year, along with capsule reviews. I'd intended to do the same this year, but when my Mac's hard drive died a few months ago, it took me a few weeks to recover the document I'd created to track my reading list ...then it was out of date and I was too lazy to keep it up...and...well...I only have a list accurate through the beginning of October. Bummer.

So, in the absence of my "what I read in 2009" list, I thought I'd take a different approach and shamelessly plagiarize an idea from The Mistress of the Dark, a lady who - like me - is an avid reader. This past Tuesday she posted a list of her favorite authors "so," she writes, "you will remember that I do love reading."

I love reading, too, and so - thank you, Andrea - here is a partial list of Bilbo's current favorite authors...

Bernard Cornwell - Mr Cornwell writes historical novels that are masterpieces of descriptive writing. He's written several series, including the Sharpe novels, which follow the adventures of an English soldier during the Napoleonic Wars. This year he published Agincourt, which looked at the famous battle through the eyes of an English archer. You'll be glad you weren't there. If you like historical fiction, this is the author for you.

John Dunning - An author who shares my love of old-time radio, and who writes intricately-plotted, exciting mysteries. His "Bookman" series follows the adventures of a retired-detective-turned-old-book-dealer...and the stories are both marvelous mysteries and interesting looks into the world of publishing and book collecting. Last month I read his novel Two O'Clock, Eastern Wartime (for the third time), which is one of his best - a crackling good mystery set in a radio station during World War II. Intricately interweaves radio production and the search for a vicious killer with a motivation you won't see coming.

Wilbur Smith - If you like hairy-chested he-man adventures, well-plotted and set in a wide range of meticulously researched historical settings, Wilbur Smith is your guy. His bad guys are really bad (if sometimes almost cartoonish), his heroes are strong and lantern-jawed, and nobody can write awful sex scenes and describe naked bodies like he can. Most of his books are set in Africa, which he describes as lovingly as only a person who has lived his life there can. His most recent novel is Assegai, a thriller set during World War I and involving a complex German plot to tie the British down in a war in Africa. If you want a great story of the search for a lost Egyptian tomb, try The Seventh Scroll. His books are brain candy, but exciting and fun.

Harry Turtledove - the master of the alternative history novel. He's known for The Worldwar series, which imagines the Second World War interrupted by an invasion of lizard-like aliens from distant space, and for The Great War series, which imagines World Wars I and II as fought between the United States and it's allies and the Confederate States (who won the Civil War) and it's allies. This year, he published The Man with the Iron Heart, which imagines what might have happened if a defeated Germany had carried on an Iraq-style insurgency after World War II. Also recommended is his offbeat novel Household Gods (co-written with Judith Tarr), which imagines the life of a Los Angeles lawyer, dissatisfied with her life, who wakes up one morning to discover that she's living in a provincial town ruled by the Roman Empire. Great author, lots of fun to read...although some of his descriptive language tends to be overused.

Carlos Ruis Zafon - his two novels, The Shadow of the Wind and The Angel's Game, are moody, descriptive, stories set in Barcelona that are part mystery, part ghost story. Strongly recommended.

Rennie Airth - I discovered him this year and am hopelessly hooked. His series of novels featuring English police detective John Madden are brilliantly written and meticulously plotted, and his ability to depict England and a cast of characters that change and evolve over the years is marvelous. I strongly recommend all three of the Madden stories: River of Darkness, The Blood-Dimmed Tide, and The Dead of Winter.

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child - they've written many books together, and each has written several on his own. None of them are great literature, but they're all exciting page-turners that are fun-to-read brain candy. Try the Special Agent Pendergast novels (there are nine so far, with a new one coming in May), Thunderhead, and Riptide. Lincoln Child's solo novel Deep Storm is a great thriller with a plot element I've written about before.

Anne Rice - this is the only place where my favorite author list intersects with Andrea's, and it's really only because of one of her many novels: The Witching Hour. This is an amazing book...very long, but engrossing, thrilling, and full of plot twists and wonderfully-drawn characters. Plus it's downright frightening in some places - every bit as good as Stephen King when he resists the urge to wildly overwrite (which isn't often). I don't think she's ever written anything else as good.

Okay, that's enough for now. There are lots of other authors I like, but they will have to wait for a second installment of the list...now, it's time for breakfast.

If you're going out to celebrate tonight, please don't drink and drive...my regular readership is holding steady at about 40 people, and I can't afford to lose any of you. Party hard, but be safe and come back to visit in the new year.

Have a good day. Read more. More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

P.S. - Amanda had her baby! Check out the news here. Congratulations, Amanda and Richard!

B.

Operation Bombshell

One of the sad by-products of the ongoing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan is the difficulty faced by many military families of keeping marriages going in the face of repeated, lengthy deployments. When your husband...or wife...or mother is gone and in grave danger for months at a time, it can put a strain on the most solid of marriages. The services go to great lengths to provide support services and counseling to help couples stay together and children calm in a parent's extended absence, but military divorce rates are very high.

Some Army wives have taken a bit different approach to keeping their marriages fresh and their spouses interested in them, according to this New York Times article: To Keep the Home Fires Burning, Grab a Boa.

Yes, Ms Lily Burana, an experienced exotic dancer, writer, and Army wife, has started Operation Bombshell: she offers striptease classes for other Army wives. The object is twofold: to give lonely wives an outlet for their energies, and to provide the ability for the ladies to give their husbands a gift that says, "I'm waiting for you, I love you, and what you see is what you get." One wife commented, “When they first come home after a year away, you don’t really need burlesque...But maybe in a few months.”

Ms Burana said that the idea for Operation Bombshell came to her when she met a young Victoria’s Secret saleswoman who was wearing her deployed husband’s dog tags. “I had this bizarre wacky moment of divine inspiration to give these women an escape by doing what I do best,” she said.

Of course, a question remains: what is the equivalent course of instruction for nonmilitary men whose wives are deployed? I'm a pretty good ballroom dancer, but I probably wouldn't be able to do striptease particularly well, The Full Monty notwithstanding. What's a man to do? Perhaps take some gourmet cooking lessons?

It's one way to keep the pot simmering, after all.

Have a good day. Support the families of your deployed friends and co-workers.

Striptease optional.

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo

Threats to Your Hearing

I found this amazing headline on CNN Health this morning: "Metallica Drummer Struggles with Ringing in Ears."

Well, duh...

Lars Ulrich, the 46 year-old drummer for the heavy metal band Metallica, is quoted in the article as saying, "I've been playing loud rock music for the better part of 35 years...I never used to play with any kind of protection."

Who does he think he is, Tiger Woods?

Anyhow, those 35 years of sitting on stage, awash in the vast and discordant noise of heavy metal "music" has resulted in severe tinnitus, or ringing in the ears. I've suffered from tinnitus in the past, and it's no fun. And I don't even listen to loud music.

Unfortunately, I do listen to the news, and I am now concerned that my hearing may be damaged by the loud and discordant noises not of rock bands, but of talking heads, religious fanatics, and bozohead members of Congress...not to mention the sudden spike in television volume when commercials interrupt the shows you really want to watch.

What can you do? Well, all I can say is God bless the person who decided to put that mute button on the remote control. I just wish there was a selective remote control that allowed me to mute politicians, lobbyists, morons who use their cell phones indiscriminately in public, and people who want to share their hearing loss with me by using earphones with their music players, and then cranking up the volume so high that you can hear it across the street.

Sigh.

I have to agree with the anonymous person who once said that what this country needs is more free speech worth listening to.

And less music played loudly enough in New York that you can hear it in Washington. State, not DC.

Have a good day. I said, have a good day! Whatsamatta? Can't you hear?

More thoughts tomorrow.

Bilbo