Unconditional Surrender Day

Taking a page out of Tengrain's book, I have decided to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the surrender of the traitor Robert E. Lee and the defeat of the Confederate States of America, a nation rooted in racism, sustained by slavery, and birthed in treason. It is unfortunate that the ringleaders of the Confederacy, such as Robert E. Lee and Jefferson Davis, weren't hanged like the traitorous dogs and war criminals they were.

Many years ago, I visited the battlefield at Gettysburg for the first time. While standing on Cemetery Ridge, overlooking the site of Pickett's Charge, I overheard an elderly woman lamenting, "If only we'd won, things would be so much better today." I started chortling and snorting in derision, noting that she was probably of the "cannon fodder" class that died so that plutocrats could own people even more poor and degraded than they were. I have no doubt that, had she been a resident of a late 20th Century Confederate States of America, she would not have had the right to vote, and she probably wouldn't have had the right to own property.

It's amazing that people still believe in the nobility of the Southern Cause, and pine for time when they would be worse off than they are, only taking solace in the fact that "those people" were still chattel.

Happy Unconditional Surrender Day! Let us honor the great heroes of the United States such as Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant and William Tecumseh Sherman, who defeated those who committed Treason in Defense of Slavery.

Too Evocative a Name to Lose

In the midst of some really horrible news, here's a bright note- the name Brontosaurus will be restored to an iconic sauropod dinosaur. The name Brontosaurus was in 1879 to a nearly complete fossil dinosaur discovered by Othniel C. Marsh. In 1877, Marsh had given the name Apatosaurus to an incomplete sauropod skeleton he had discovered. In 1903, Elmer S. Riggs determined that Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus were one and the same, and the rules of binomial nomenclature mandate that the earlier name for a genus takes precedence (this can be circumvented in the case of misidentified organisms- for instance, the cane toad was originally lumped into the genus Bufo but now is more commonly included in the genus Rhinella).

In the case of Brontosaurus, a recent analysis of fossil remains by a team led by Paleontologist Emanuel Tschopp of Portugal’s Universidade Nova de Lisboa has determined that there were sufficient anatomical differences between Apatosaurus and Brontosaurus to restore the generic name Brontosaurus.

Brontosaurus has had a pretty strange "journey"- before the name was retired, the "type" specimen of the fossil lacked a head, so a "conjectural" skull largely based on fragmentary remains of a skull of the sauropod Camarasaurus was mounted with the skeleton. Camarasaurus had a much blunter head than those of diplodocids such as Apatosaurus and, once and now Brontosaurus. The Apatosaurus in Rudolf Zallinger's famous mural in the Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History portrays this "pug faced" dinosaur.

I'm happy that the name Brontosaurus has been rescued from its non-official status. Its meaning, "thunder lizard", is too evocative to lose... imagine the rumble that a herd of them would have produced as they traversed the landscape!

It's a Two-fer!

Being a bigot can be profitable if you're an early adopter- it's kinda like a multi-level marketing scam, that way. The owners of the pizzeria that wouldn't cater a gay wedding have received about a million dollars through a "Go Fund Me" site set up by affiliates of Glenn Beck. Being a cynical person, I imagine that quite a bit of the money won't find itself to the pizzeria bigots ("finders' fees" and all that...).

Besides being a show of solidarity among anti-gay social conservatives, this influx of cash also bolsters an economic conservative agenda- John Steinbeck famously noted:

“Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.”

What better way to keep the Republican "useful idiots" addicted to low income tax rates for plutocrats than to demonstrate that they, too, can become sudden millionaires just by being shitty people? Now, gullible people don't need to hold out for the miniscule chance that they win the lottery, they just need to be the right kind (meaning the Right kind) of asshole at the right time, and they just might hit the jerkpot. It's the perfect synergy of the two broad varieties of right-wing nuttery- country and western, bigotry and greed.

Happy Easter!

I always liked Easter- the holiday always seemed embody the promise of Spring. Until Easter, Spring can be pretty harsh here in the northeastern United States (this Spring has been one of the rough ones). Finally, on Easter, Spring actually feels, uh, Spring-y. The daffodils won't be too far behind now.

I always liked Easter... I also like Easter Everywhere, now there's some really good psychedelia. Come to think of it, colored eggs and neon-bright marshmallow peeps are pretty psychedlic. Gotta get a sugar high and give a listen:


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Come to think of it, I always liked Mitch Easter, that guy was a pop powerhouse back in the days when I had hair. Hell, I even had hair like Mitch Easter's back in the day. I always liked the song Blue Line, and an Easter Egg with a blue line on it would be pretty cool. Not as cool as a Let's Active reunion, and it's cool to know that the band got back together for a benefit concert:





Here's wishing a happy Easter to everyone, and wishing that Mitch Easter is happy as well. Now, get your sugar high on, and rock out, people.

Now, That's What I Call a Moon!

Here in the northeastern United States, we didn't experience the lunar eclipse, but we sure have a gorgeous full moon tonight. I'd always been taught that Easter fell on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Vernal Equinox, but the calculation of the date of Easter caused a great controversy in the early Christian church, and Orthodox churches calculate the date differently. This year, the Orthodox Easter falls on the 12th- I always make a note of it because it usually means that I can pick up a leg of lamb or two for a lot less money than I'd usually spend.

I just came back from my regular walkabout, and took time from glorying in the gorgeous moonlight to tell a nice couple that they had to leave the premises. I know the view is pretty, and the spot you were in was easily accessible from the street, but I can't have you tripping, falling, and suing. Sorry, people, my rent money is more important than your mood.

As usual, religious fundamentalists ruin everything- they look at a beautiful celestial phenomenon and they lose their shit over it. Forget the assertion that "people of faith" are humble, they think that they are the center of the universe. Imagine, looking up at the sky and reducing its majesty to something small enough to fit into their narrowly-interpreted book.

Tengrain has done his Blog Against Theocracy bit, so I guess I'll consider this post and yesterday's post as my contributions. Seriously, these people need to shut their book and take a look... if they truly believe in a transcendent God, they shouldn't try to interpret an astronomical marvel into a sign of such parochial matters.

Good Friday, Bad Policy

Today being Good Friday, I have to confess that I have long pondered the fact that so many self-described Christians are pro-death penalty. One would think that people who claim to worship a deity that manifested as an innocent man who was brutally executed would be against the execution of criminals... especially since eventual exonerations are not uncommon. The incompatibility of the death penalty with the teachings of the Gentle Nazarene becomes even more stark when one ponders the actual words of the Gospel (in this case Matthew 5:


38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. 41 If anyone forces you to go one mile, go with them two miles. 42 Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.

43 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ 44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45 that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46 If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? 47 And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that? 48 Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect.


It's almost as if death penalty supporters don't really care that innocents have been executed... it seems that other considerations are at work in the application of the death penalty.

Bumper stickers that say "Keep Christ in Christmas" are quite popular... maybe we need ones that say "Keep Christ in Christianity".

Class Naval Warfare

From the "what the hell were they thinking?" file, we have news of a tax break on yachts valued at more than $230,000. This isn't really a tax break for the "one percent", it's a tax break for the merest fraction of the one percent. Seriously, how many "mere millionaires" are going to be purchasing boats that expensive?

Basically, this means that some poor schmo buying, for example, a used Honda Fit will pay a higher percentage sales tax than a plutocrat buying a twenty-billion dollar yacht. Meanwhile, a proposed hike in the mimimum wage has failed. Needless to say, there has been a public outcry, but NY State has a majority Republican legislature and a conservative Democratic Governor.

I don't think I've ever seen so stark an example of a "fuck you" to the working and middle classes in this state. I sure as hell can't think of a more regressive tax structure being implemented. Of course, apologists for the yacht-building industry claim it's a jobs program and will lead to a tax revenue-increase.

I'm sympathetic to the boating industries, having spent much of my childhood in a place with a storied nautical history, but I think this legislation is giving too much away to the yachting type:





Wow, never thought I'd have an excuse to post that video for a terrific-yet-obscure New Wave band and have it be on topic.