Posted in History, Politics on November 11, 2008| Leave a Comment »
During the new Obama administration and 111th Congress, the old South will be shut out of power, for only the third time since 1930. The other two times were brief (1953-54 and 1965-66).
If Obama does well, then the coming dry spell for the old South could match the post-Reconstruction record of 14 years (1897-1910).
Posted in Sports, Texas on November 11, 2008| Leave a Comment »
So I was all set to head to a bar tonight with a fellow Houston refugee to watch the University of Houston men’s basketball team play against mighty Duke on national television. All the Coogs needed to do was to beat Georgia Southern yesterday afternoon, and they would be in the game tonight. Easy, right?
Apparently not. Yesterday’s final score: Georgia Southern 65, Houston 63. Not nearly as bad as the Coogs’ loss to Prairie View A&M that Thomas Gray and I saw live and in person lo these many years ago, but still…
Posted in Blogging on November 11, 2008| 2 Comments »
I’m using my iPhone to blog from home because my home network has gone down. Again.
Posted in History on November 11, 2008| Leave a Comment »
The 11th minute. Of the 11th hour. Of the 11th day. Of the 11th month.
Ninety years ago today, Europe ended its first attempt at collective suicide. At war’s end, France had suffered 1.7 million dead and 4.3 million wounded from a population of 39 million; it had been “bled white”. Ninety years later, as the war is close to slipping from living memory, France has perhaps finally recovered.
A generation later, the United Kingdom and Germany would be bled white in turn.
I wonder how aware Americans are about the fact that we ourselves are not immune to such a fate.
Posted in Politics on November 10, 2008| Leave a Comment »
Tom Hayden is still not a member of the reality-based community.
If we’ve learned anything from the last eight years, isn’t it that evidence is a good thing?
Posted in Tarot on November 9, 2008| Leave a Comment »
We have just seen the close of two major presidential campaigns: one driven primarily by love and hope, and the other driven primarily by hate and fear.
The campaign that was driven by love and hope was a productive and fertile campaign, amazing observers with a stream of innovative methods and creative output; appealing to voters on a variety of different levels.
The campaign that was driven by hate and fear produced little but anger and backbiting, disgusting most of those who watched it sputter and die.
It is true that anger and hatred can lead to creativity—how else can we explain the impressive career of Elvis Costello?—but I have come to believe that the highest and best creative effort comes from love and joy.
The Empress card in the tarot deck symbolizes (among many other things) the loving fertility that makes life both possible and worth living.
Posted in History, Politics on November 8, 2008| 1 Comment »
It just hit me what Barack Obama’s biggest accomplishment was this week.
Let’s look at the last three Democratic presidential wins. When Clinton won in 1992 and 1996, Republicans could blame Perot. When Carter won in 1976, Republicans could blame the long-departed Nixon.
Obama’s win was the first time since 1964 that the Republicans have lost the White House without having any plausible excuse for it. The GOP was flat-out, straight-up beaten. Many prominent Republicans have never experienced that before, which might explain the shock we’ve been seeing.
