Pogo's Latest

Murmers of Middle Earth:



This Pogo dude is a genius.

Michele Benson Huck Pottery

At the Palmer Park Arts Market, this Saturday, from 10am-4pm. Drop by and say hello. Until then, you can get a glimpse of Michele (at the 0:35 point) in this nice video plug of the Arts Market:

Another Thought on Wisconsin

I think the GOP in Wisconsin has way overreached in this conflict. On the one hand, the manner in which the GOP has tried to railroad through this union busting legislation comes across as very unseemly and autocratic. Check this out for some context:



Second, when the legislation seems to only punish those public service employees unions who didn't support the GOP Governor's candidacy, and actually exempts public service employee unions who did support the GOP Governor's candidacy from the legislation, it plays out as if the measure is one motivated by partisan preference and not any kind of principle. And when one of these exempted public service employee unions withdraws its support for and endorsement of the Governor because of how grossly partisan, unfair, and unseemly their exemption seems, you know that the situation is playing out poorly for the GOP in the public arena.

Third, when the whole fiscal crisis is being perceived in some quarters in Wisconsin as one primarily manufactured by the Governor himself, and is then being used disingenuously to attack basic collective bargaining rights that touch on labor freedoms, the lack of good faith here on the part of the GOP seems even more pronounced.

My prediction is that Walker, the GOP Governor, and the GOP legislators in the Wisconsin legislature, who simply refuse to even acknowledge the autocratic nature of the process by which they are trying to impose this preferential legislation, have gone a long way to turning Wisconsin once again as a solidly blue state. I wouldn't be surprised if the Democratic party not only retakes control over Wisconsin's state government in the next few election cycles, but does so decisively and for a fairly long time. I'm already counting Wisconsin's electoral votes in the Obama column in 2012.

Collective Bargaining Rights for State Workers in Wisconsin

The struggle going on in Wisconsin is the big news these days. Here's what I can't understand about the Republican position in this fight:

Collective bargaining is simply the ability of workers to come together to try to negotiate benefits, wages, and other employment conditions with their employers. From my perspective, this is simply a matter of freedom, and it is something that should be promoted and protected by government, not squelched by government.

I also don't understand the argument that somehow people should forfeit their freedoms when their employer is the government (and by extension, "the people"). When people who work for the state have to forfeit their freedom precisely because they are working for state, then that strikes me as walking a bit on the totalitarian line.

Let me try to break this down a bit and understand it better. What is at issue here is the right to collective bargain, not necessarily an entitlement to a particular outcome of the collective bargaining process. Because the legislation seeks to prevent what I think is a right to free association and to use that free association to negotiate labor conditions, without any guarantee as to what the outcome of that negotiation will be, I don't understand at all why Republicans would be opposed to this. It seems as if it is nothing more than antipathy to the whole idea of unions and the rights of labor, in principle, to band together to bargain for benefits.

The argument that the restriction of such freedom is necessary in a difficult financial crisis also seems bogus to me. For one, the financial crisis is partly one of the current Republican governor's own making. He cut taxes and then used the consequences of the loss of revenues generated by his tax cuts to fabricate a budget crisis to bust the union. Secondly, and more importantly, I thought Republicans believed that restrictions of such freedoms are prima facie wrong.

If someone can explain to me why collective bargaining is, in and of itself, a behavior that requires state repression, I'm all ears.

A Republican Supports Federal Funds for Contraception

Albeit for horses as opposed to women!

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up.

Blogging

I want to be blogging. I really do. And lord knows there's not a shortage of stuff to blog about. (And I still owe folks a review of Lonesome Dove!) But when push comes to shove and I open up the Blogger "new post" screen, all my initiative and enthusiasm for blogging just withers on the vine. And it's not even that it would take a lot of effort. The blogging mojo just isn't there. I'm not gonna give up on the medium, and I'll keep trying to motivate myself, but I just wanted to let folks know where I am and what's up.

Unmasked: The Disturbing Blending of Christian Fundamentalism and Politics

""Anybody here today who has not accepted Jesus Christ as their savior, I'm telling you, you're not my brother and you're not my sister, and I want to be your brother." -- Recently-elected Governor of Alabama, Robert Bentley

Of course, he instantly apologized for the remark; but I can't help but ponder the implications of what this means in a democracy rooted in equality. There is a mindset of inequality in this line of thinking. As I see it, it is just another manifestion of the belief that there is a "real" America, and a "lesser" America. I don't like it one bit. When I hear stuff like this emanating from the mouth of a Conservative Republican state governor, I would consider any argument that the Conservative movement and Republican Party doesn't have a basic and pervasive problem with an intolterant religious fundamentalism pushing through the thin veneer of the secular democracy upon which our government was formed and emerging as a governing philosophy itself to be a flimsy and half-baked argument indeed.

The Right Wing's Anti-Elite Elitism Exposed

Charles Krauthammer, no Obamaphile by any stretch of the imagination, exposes Rush Limbaugh for the Anti-Elite Elitist that he is:



I've said it before in different contexts and in different ways, but I'll say it again now: certain anti-elite demagogues of the Rightwing, of which Limbaugh is one, point to intelligence, statesmanship, competence, and gravitas in a liberal President as if it were somehow a bad thing. It is quite telling of the partisan hack and fraud that he is that Limbaugh demeans what are essentially admirable qualities by calling it a kind of hallmark of "elitism" -- which in Palinite code is a bad word akin to a profanity. When this branch of conservatives claims that it prefers that its President NOT demonstrate such "elitist" characteristics, it is essentially embracing the idea that it prefers the opposite for its leader: ignorance, un-statesmanship, incompetence, and unseriousness. And it links this kind of unflattering and ordinary mediocrity in its leaders to what it considers to be the solid, average, "real" American. They would like their President to be, for lack of a better way to describe it, nothing better than the average Joe. I am always baffled by this. Why would any American not want his President, the leader of the free world, to be an extraordinary person? I don't know about you, but I'd rather my President not be just "average." I don't want my President to be like my mother. God bless her sweet soul, but my mother, as magnificent and wonderful as she is in so many ways, has no business being President. Why is having a President who is exceptional in intelligence, leadership, creativity, oratory, persuasiveness, etc., always suspect to such people? Maybe conservatives don't think Obama rises to this level, but Limbaugh's comment exposes the reality that it's not really Obama that is the issue, but rather the whole idea of what they think defines an "elite." George W. Bush had to "dumb himself down" to win the accolades of the "average Joe" wing of the conservative movement. In their effort to counteract a notion of "elitism" as arrogance coupled with an unwarranted claim of privilege, they also abandon the notion of elite as special, unrivalled excellence. When we speak of the Green Berets as an "elite" unit within the armed forces, isn't that something we admire and take pride in? When we speak of Peyton Manning as being among the "elite" of NFL quarterbacks, aren't we talking about something positive? So, for Obama to act Presidential as we would want any President to act, for him to deliver a truly elite performance in terms of quality and excellence, that demonstration of excellence becomes for folks like Limbaugh nothing more than an expression of "elitism" worthy of scorn and derision. Krauthammer just nails Limbaugh on this point and exposes him for the partisan hack and fraud that he is. In fact, I'd say Krauthammer's point is a veiled dig at Limbaugh, a dig which hints subtly at a kind of small-minded, unpatriotic, anti-American attitude festering in the soul of Talk Radio's most notorious grinch. Interesting also that this is all coming from within the ranks of the conservative movement itself.

New Year's Resolutions

A Preface: I just can't seem to get motivated to work myself up enough to put posts on this blog more regularly. Maybe I need to go back to my blogging self-nudge; but right now I think my heart is just not in it like it has been and could be. Maybe that will change. We shall see. In any case, I'll blog when I can rouse myself to do so. Right now, I'm moved enough to post a couple of my New Year's Resolutions. And they are ...

1. Write two books (one fiction and one non-fiction) by the end of the year.
2. Submit a couple of articles for publication in peer-reviewed academic journals.
3. Save my heated political commentary for my blog and reserve the use of Facebook for non-political stuff. (Although I had basically decided on this weeks ago, the recent tragedy in Tuscon has strengthened my resolve in this direction even more.)
4. Read the following books: (A) The Grapes of Wrath (Steinbeck); (B) The Federalist Papers (in their entirety); (C) I, The Supreme (Roa Bastos); (D) Absalom, Absalom (Faulkner); and (E) The Adolescent (Dostoevsky)
5. Finish what I'm calling the "Display Room" (for my B-2/3's pottery) in the "Basement."

I had a wonderful discussion today with a good friend about McMurtry's Lonesome Dove and I promise I will be writing up at least a brief review of the book sometime soon on the blog.

That's it for now.

A Second American Revolution??

There's a bumper sticker that is popular with many Beckian conservatives. It reads:

"2010: The Second American Revolution"

Let's remember that the First American Revolution was a bloody and violent armed struggle in the cause of freedom from oppression. In my mind, in comparing the First American Revolution with the current political situation, the subtext of hinting at a justifiable violence in the cause of freedom from oppression today (i.e. 2010) is crystal clear.

Frankly, I think Gabby Giffords is a casualty of this "Second American Revolution."

This narrative of political violence justified under the banner of patriotism has got to stop.

Assassination Attempt in Arizona

We've all by now heard much about the assassination attempt of a Democratic Congresswoman in Arizona earlier today. It's worth noting that this Congresswoman was one of 20 Congress people put in the gun sights of a Sarah Palin posting on one of her new media sites. Conservatives are now on the defensive trying to show how this assassination attempt was the work of a deranged, disturbed individual -- and that ideology has nothing to do with it. Well, perhaps.

But here's the thing conservatives need to know: when one of the 20 Congress people put in the gun sights of a Sarah Palin online media posting, or whatever it was, ends up the victim of a brutal assassination attempt, you have to expect that such connections between actual assassination attempts and the figurative calls for them are going to be drawn. The lesson is pure and simple: don't put people, figuratively or otherwise, in the gun sights. It just encourages the nuts. And that's why this narrative of Second Amendment remedies, spilling blood in the cause of freedom, "shooting down" your electoral opponents, etc., -- narratives that have come almost exclusively from the right wing in this country -- is just completely irresponsible. And it has nothing to do whether this guy was a loony or a Tea Partier or an anarchist or whatever. Hinting at armed violence as a means to resolve political disputes is just wrong. Period.

If there were nothing at all untoward in advancing such notions, even figuratively, why then are all such references being hastily taken down? Couldn't be some residual sense of guilt, could it? Couldn't be some nagging awareness that such inflammatory imagery and rhetoric of politically-motivated violence just might have encouraged this nut, could it?

I think people, deep down, understand this; and I think it took something like today for people who defended this use of inflammatory narratives and imagery of armed political violence as harmless expressions of free speech are only just now looking in the mirror and saying: "Oh, sh*t! We really have crossed the line!"

I've said it many times, both on this blog and in comment threads, criticizing the tolerance of such rhetoric on the right wing, that words and imagery of violence do have consequences and do encourage the behavior of others, especially those disturbed individuals prone to act out such narratives.

Well, Ain't This Grand

Just got wind of this.

At the very least, the University seems to be doing everything it can to handle the situation.

But what I want to know is what the hell was this information doing on a portable laptop in the first place; and, moreover, what the hell was this employee thinking to leave a laptop with so much critically sensitive information unmonitored in a car, on an out-of-town trip? I don't think this information should ever be placed on a laptop to begin with; but if it had to be, then the person responsible for it should have handcuffed the damn thing to his or her being.

I'd hate to be that person right now.

Home

I just love this one by Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros:

Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros "Home" from Edward Sharpe on Vimeo.

That's the "official" video; but I think even better, more energetic, and more magnetic is this live performance on Letterman:



But, being a daddy of two lovely young daughters, this rendition, God bless, just absolutely takes the cake:



Her arm resting on his while he plays. There is nothing more uplifting than this.

Back to Blogging

OK. Holidays over. Time to get back to the blog. I needed a bit of a break, I think. Some quick updates:

1. I finished McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove." I'll be writing a more detailed review; but the short of it is that I liked it very much. On the whole, a thumbs up, though I do have some criticisms. I've also watched the movie version and thought it was very good, too.

2. New Year's Resolutions coming soon in a separate follow-up posting.

3. Still proud of Barack Obama. If he gets serious about the debt situation, which I think he will (especially if he finds common ground on this issue with someone like Tom Coburn), he'll be in great shape for 2012.

4. The only disappointment I have with the 2008-2010 Congress is failure to pass the DREAM Act. My greatest joy about the 2008-2010 Congress is passage of the Health Care legislation and repeal of DADT.

5. The Saints are in the Playoffs and have a good, realistic chance of making it to the Superbowl again. Looking forward to the post-season run. I predict that the NFC Championship game will be in New Orleans, with the Saints hosting the Packers.

6. Finally, let's start the New Year with this bit of "Wow!" ...

Why I'm An Exodus Catholic, ctd.

Yet another reason. Certain things repulse me about the callous behavior of the Catholic Church and how it privileges the lives of the unborn over the lives of the already living. There is something fundamentally un-Christ-like, something unforgiving, something unwelcoming, about the attitude that leads to such decisions like the one emanating from Bishop Olmstead.

Palin Speaks On Haiti

Credit where credit is due. As a fierce and regular critic of Sarah Palin on this blog, I think it is especially incumbent upon me not to gloss over where Palin does something that I think is laudable.

Sarah Palin has visited Haiti and urged that we not forget this suffering and troubled country.

I agree with that message. And, as far as I'm concerned, you can't have too many people delivering this message. Sarah Palin's voice in this respect is more than welcome.

From the Archives: Big Bad Voodoo Daddy's Heat Miser/Cold Miser

Remember this from the Classic Rankin/Bass Production, The Year Without A Santa Claus? It was (and remains) one of my favorite Christmas cartoon experiences of all time. This particular YouTube clip nicely matches the Big Bad Voodoo Daddy version of the tune with the actual scene from the original film. Enjoy!

Top 10 Christmas Movies

I've run this in years past, and I'm running it again now. Nothing has surfaced since last Christmas to warrant a change in my rankings.

Here's The Huck Upchuck's Top 10 Christmas Movies of all time:

10. Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey -- This may not be on par with some of the better full-length feature films that treat Christmas, but I have always adored this little 22 minute Bass/Rankin animated Christmas story. I guess it's thematically of a piece with the classic "Little Drummer Boy" Bass/Rankin animated short, but I like it better because it's not as well known and gives the animals of the Christmas story their moment. And who can forget: "Ears, Nestor!" :-) This is the only Bass/Rankin animated production that I'll include in my list, though there are certainly some more classics in this bunch of Christmas shorts that entertain the little ones every Christmas season. Honorable mentions in this category of "claymation" Christmas classics include The Year Without a Santa Claus, which features the Heat Miser, the Cold Miser, and Mother Nature, and Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

9. Barbie in the Nutcracker -- Given that I have two young daughters, it's hard not to find room for something like this in the Top 10 list. However, I have to say that this is actually quite a very impressive digital computer animated adaptation of the Nutcracker story. It's the first of these Barbie movies, and I remember thinking how graphically stunning it was at the time. The music and the dancing scenes in this version of the Tchaikovsky-scored Ballet are also quite good. None of the many subsequent Barbie animation movies compares in both production quality and plotline development as this original one. If you can overlook the whole Barbie culture and how it crafts an unrealistic and idealistic notion of female beauty, you can find a little gem of a Christmas movie here.

8. Emmet Otter's Jug-Band Christmas -- This charming muppet musical Christmas story from Jim Hensen conjures nostalgic Christmas memories for me. It is filled with all the great Christmas themes of selflessness, love, family, and friendship. It's not as technically slick as some of our modern day animation and muppetry, but it was a masterpiece of its day. I just love the sweetness and wholesomeness of this lovely little story, and the tunes are catchy and fun. Heck, even the bad guys in this story, the Riverbottom Boys Gang, have their own redeeming charm. Another little interesting tidbit to note is that the actors who provide the voices for Emmet Otter and his jug band friends also provide the voices for the characters in the Riverbottom Boys gang. It's fun to try and identify the alter egos in these two groups. Yes, there are times when the puppetry is so noticeable that it distracts from the story, but I am always struck by how few these moments are. For families with kids 12-yrs-old and younger, this Jim Hensen masterpiece should be a Christmas standard.

7. The Nativity Story - While I found The Nativity Story to be a bit superficial and overly simplistic, it is perhaps the best effort that I've seen to portray the nativity story on film with somewhat of a realistic feel, even though I think its pretensions to realism cynically mask what is essentially a romanticized and imaginary representation of history. The script is perhaps the weakest element of this movie, and the plotline is thin and incomplete in parts; and, unfortunately, the scene where a laboring Mary and Joseph arrive at Nazareth and make their way to the manger for the climactic birth of Jesus is so surreal that it almost sinks the realist believability of the whole movie. Nevertheless, it gets my recommendation for effort and for its undeniably impressive cinematography, not to mention the subtle beauty of actress Keisha Castle-Hughes as Mary and the wonderful performance of Ciaran Hinds as Herod.

6. The Polar Express -- This slick, cgi animated telling of the classic train-to-the-north-pole story merits a place in my top ten because it is visually stunning cgi animation. The storyline is 100% pure Christmas spirit -- of giving, friendship, and faith. I originally thought that the movie would be too saccharine for me and would wear off after the initial viewing and captivating animation "honeymoon" period. However, I found this not to be the case. Every time I'm in a room and this show is on the TV screen, I find myself drawn to it, less so for the visuals and moreso for the storyline. Most of the kids are slight caricatures, and it really is an unabashed feel-good movie, but it all tends to work in the end. I think this movie will become part of the classic Christmas movie lineup.

5. A Christmas Carol -- Of the numerous versions of this Dickens classic Christmas tale that exist, and that I have seen, the one that I find to be the most moving, best directed, and most skillfully acted is the 1984 version produced for TV starring George C. Scott. What I love about this particular version is that George C. Scott's Ebeneezer Scrooge is so understated. Unlike the Scrooge one sees in almost all other productions, Scott's Scrooge is not the caricatured heartless and unreflective miser that experiences an over-dramatic conversion. Scott's Scrooge is a troubled and conflicted soul, wracked by regrets, who hardens his heart principally as a mechanism of avoiding pain and disappointment. His greed and vindictiveness are not really central to his character. They exist, but they are sidebars to the real roots of his anti-social behavior. And his conversion does not come from fear, but rather from an awareness and eventual acceptance of his brokenness as a human, and that this brokenness is not unique and can be repaired. What I also like about Scott's Scrooge is that his "converted" character is softer, but still retains some of his gruff and troubled edges. In other words, when Christmas day dawns, he's not a completely different and unrecognizable Scrooge, as is so often portrayed, just a more vulnerable and human Scrooge, willing to open up, share, and smile.

4. Miracle on 34th Street -- I prefer the classic 1947 movie starring Natalie Wood as the little girl and Edmund Gwenn as Kris Kringle. There is something about the 1940s that makes the telling of this tale of belief in Santa resonate much more powerfully than the more recent 1994 remake starring Richard Attenborough. The simplicity of the Christmas message, the lack of pretense in the characters, the absence of a post-modern angst about the meaning of Christmas all make the 1947 movie such a joy to watch. What is interesting, I think, is that this particular movie takes on much, much better the alienation that has come with the creeping materialism of the holiday season than any other modern efforts. It's a refreshing, clean, wholesome and inspiring film. And its relevance to the contemporary Christmas environment is still very much real.

3. A Christmas Story -- One's top 10 Christmas movies list would never be complete without this classic included somewhere in the list. For me, this story ranks up there with the best of them. Maybe it's because I'm a guy and this film is really about little boys at Christmas. Ralphie's daydreams are hilarious, especially his "A+++++++++++" essay daydream. And who can forget the irony of the "You'll shoot your eye out!" admonition that actually almost happens. As a parent, I can't say that I'm thrilled about the fact that Ralphie creates the whopper lie that "the Icicle did it" when his Red Rider BB Gun almost puts his eye out, and then gets away with it! But, hey, what little boy hasn't gone down this path? I do, however, feel obliged to issue a warning to parents, though. This movie is marketed as suitable for Children, but beware that there are some really rough, uncensored moments of strong profanity here. It's a movie that is very much politically incorrect, so some might find some of the humor a bit much. But, if taken in the right spirit, it can make for an enjoyable film experience.

2. Love, Actually -- I just love, love, love this modern British movie. It's not really about Christmas, but it takes place around the Christmas season, and its theme is about the mundane beauty of love. The different vignettes are wonderfully done, and the cast is star-studded and stellar. What I particularly like about it is that not all of the stories have a happy ending, but all of them are about love in the Christmas season. Bill Nighy's irreverent performance is absolutely fantastic, and the proposal scene between Colin Firth's character and his Portuguese beauty is so classically romantic that I can watch it over and over and over again, and never get tired of it. And the fact that I know a bit of Portuguese helps me better appreciate the moment. Oh ... I get all wound up just thinking about all the dramas in this movie. I could go on and on about it. And, though I could have done without the sappy kiddie-crush subplot, even this, with some screening of the some fo the more adult scenes, makes it something even the tweens could enjoy. I should say, though, that there are some adult moments, and not all of the film is appropriate for young people, even tweens. For instance, one of the story lines features two characters who are stand-in doubles for what is apparently a porn film, and their scenes often involve nudity and sexually explicit actions, though the relationship itself is ironically sweet and innocent, which makes the contrast with the porn thing all the more stark. Overall, though, I think this film is just fantastic, and the message of love, in all its complex messiness and varied context, can't be beat. Highly recommended, but with appropriate caution when youngsters are involved.

1. It's a Wonderful Life -- I don't care how cheesy, overplayed, and overdramatized some think this movie is, it's still the best Christmas story out there. And I still get all choked up every time I see that last scene when everyone shows up and showers George Bailey with more money than he could ever need to resolve his dilemma. As an actor and person, Jimmy Stewart is one of the best. And Lionel Barrymore's portrayal of the villain, Henry F. Potter, is more classic Scrooge than Scrooge himself!

The Gross Unfairness of the Senate

The U.S. Senate, with its abused filibuster mechanism, is the place where legislation goes to die. I detest both the filibuster and the way the Senate is constituted. It is inherently unfair by any stretch of the imagination when it comes to any just understanding of democracy. Take, for example, resident population of the U.S. in 2009 broken down by state:

Reliably "Blue" states:
California - 37 million citizens - 2 Senators
New York - 19.5 million citizens - 2 Senators
TOTALS - 56.5 million citizens - 4 Senators

Reliably "Red" States:
Alaska - .7 million citizens - 2 Senators
Idaho - 1.6 million citizens - 2 Senators
Kansas - 2.8 million citizens - 2 Senators
Kentucky - 4.3 million citizens - 2 Senators
Mississippi - 3 million citizens - 2 Senators
Montana - 1 million citizens - 2 Senators
Nebraska - 1.8 million citizens - 2 Senators
North Dakota - .7 million citizens - 2 Senators
Oklahoma - 3.7 million citizens - 2 Senators
South Carolina - 4.5 million citizens - 2 Senators
South Dakota - .8 million citizens - 2 Senators
Texas - 24.8 million citizens - 2 Senators
Utah - 2.8 million citizens - 2 Senators
Wyoming - .6 million citizens - 2 Senators
TOTALS - 54.1 million citizens - 28 Senators

This includes the highest-ranked reliably conservative population state of Texas. And even if you put some of the small population liberal states in the mix, you'll never be able to match the gross disparity in representation here by always including the highest-ranked reliably liberal population state, California, in the mix. No matter what combination any conservative may try to put together that includes California and New York on the liberal side and Texas and Georgia on the conservative side, the balance will always penalize states that consistently lean liberal.

Lets look at it another way:

Top 15 population states: California, Texas, New York, Florida, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Georgia, North Carolina, New Jersey, Virginia, Washington, Arizona, Massachusetts
Bottom 15 population states: Wyoming, Vermont, North Dakota, Alaska, South Dakota, Delaware, Montana, Rhode Island, Hawaii, Maine, New Hampshire, Idaho, Nebraska, West Virginia, New Mexico

Even here, the imbalance is quite obvious. In the end, Liberals Democrats are always at a disadvantage in the Senate.

will.i.am

Check it out:

you a chihuahua
I'm a rotweiller