Friday, March 16, 2007

Let There be Verticality!, or How High Does Your Lo Go? (12.15.10)

Picking up where we laughed off jesterdeity, it is now Day Two. What's on the divine agenda? Oh, not much, just a little vertical plumbing job. Rig up a starry firmament to divide the waters above from the waters below. Call the firmament heaven. Knock off early. Sounds good.

Today is the day of verticality. First there was only chaos, so the first order of business was the business of order, i.e., creating a little light with which to Work. Can't work without the old photons. But there is "seeing" and there is "vision." The good vibrations of physical light allows us to see horizontally, but that isn't what makes us human. Rather, what truly distinguishes us from the beasts and the tenured is the vision made possible by virtue of the verticality of the cosmos. Wisdom and gnosis only exist because they represent human modalities that are adequations to the reality of the vertical. To turn it around, in the absence of verticality -- waters above and waters below -- wisdom is impossible, as proven by wackademia, where there are plenty of intelligent people but little wisdom and and plenty of cognitive nOnanism.

Now, in God's plumbing job, "heaven" is the nexus, or connecting link, between the upper and lower waters. Water is a reflective medium, so let us imagine that there is a "double reflection" of heaven in the waters above and below. Above is the realm of ideas, while below is the realm of material things. As Tomberg points out, knowledge involves "the process of relating the real to the ideal corresponding to it." To "understand" is bring into relation "the reflection above, the ideal, with the reflection below, the real." This is another way of saying that the light of the logos is reflected in both directions as "ideas" and "realities"; or it is reflected in us as substance and intellection.

Science is a deeply mystical enterprise, for it presumes the absolute unity of existence, a unity that is mirrored in the mind capable of reliably apprehending that unity. Because there is a uni-verse, there are universal truths, which is to say truth. Obviously, if the universe were not a true universe -- a relativistic multiverse with no underlying unity -- then truth would not be possible, nor would the truth-bearer, for that matter. So truth is ultimately guaranteed by the One without which science cannot function.

Interestingly, just this morning a McCoon named Alan sent me a link to a piece at the Belmont club on what is called "post-normal science," which could also be called "abnormal" and therefore pathological science, a cognitive disease that most definitely exists and even pervades the leftist looniversity bin. For example, hysterical environmentalism of the type promulgated by Algore is quintessentially post-normal, by Gore's own acknowledgment (in numerous interviews he has admitted that the main point of his impropaganda film was to frighten people into action, not to dispassionately inform them).

In Bion's terms, Gore's film represents the projection of unmetabolized "beta elements" of primitive thought into other minds. The idea is not to promote thought, but to spur action, or more specifically, acting out, or political wacktivism, to be precise.

Belmont Club quotes the wikipedia entry on post-normal science, which states that it comes into play when "facts are uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent.... In such circumstances, we have an inversion of the traditional distinction between hard, objective scientific facts, and soft subjective values. Now we have value-driven policy decisions that are 'hard' in various ways, for which the scientific inputs are irremediably 'soft'."

Just as there is always a moral inversion at the heart of leftism, there is a cognitive inversion as well. Their pathological epistemology is actually an inevitable consequence of their luciferian ontology, which denies the vertical up front -- and therefore the possibility of unity and truth. Instead of unity and truth, they substitute solidarity and commitment, which is to say exterior or "top-down" order and coercive action, for the lie is always coercive whereas the truth "attracts."

What is so objectionable about Gore's film is that, like all post-normal science, its intention is to coerce one into action before one even knows the truth -- not just any action, but probably the most massive and cataclysmic economanical actions ever undertaken by mankind, actions that will kill and/or ruin the lives of millions. There are undoubtedly "accuracies" in any post-normal science, including Gore's film, but the accuracies are not there to serve truth but to spur action. It is science for the limbic system -- the emotional center of the brain -- not the cerebrum, which is capable of disinterested objectivity, which is the foundation of the human capacity for truth.

It is always puzzling to me when people suggest that it is the right that is somehow "anti-science" when leftism itself is pervaded by an anti-science attitude -- not just in this or that particular policy, but by its very nature. The catalogue of instances of the leftist agenda -- or action -- taking priority over truth is endless, and Gore's weather hysteria is just the latest case. The people who are on the global warming bandwagon are the same ones who warned about global cooling, and who successfully undermined the construction of more nuclear power plants in the 1980's. Remember the China Syndrome? Silkwood? Between them they received nine Oscar nominations, so Gore's film stands in an undistinguished line of recipients for awards in Oscary and hysterical science.

Now in the sixth miracle recorded in John, Jesus restores sight to a man who had been blind from birth. But this is a rather special form of blindness, for it prevents the works of God from being revealed in him (John 9:3). Jesus then makes a curious remark about the need to work while it is day -- since the night is coming, when it will be beer o'clock and no man can work -- but that "As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world."

The light of the world. Tomberg notes that the Logos "is not only the intelligence of the world, that is, the connection of the ideal with the real, but also the perception of the ideal and the real. For it is he who mirrors himself by way of ideas and by way of the facts of existence." In other words, there is no knowledge, let alone truth, at the level of the senses, which in itself is sufficient to undermine any purely horizontal materialistic philosophy, including, of course, any and all forms of leftism. For once you "understand" materialism you have left materialism behind, for matter cannot understand anything.

Even the most bare act of human perception involves the union of the ideal and the real. Sensory experience does not interpret itself. In fact, only a severely autistic individual (I am not speaking of all the modern pseudo- forms) reduces the world to naked sensory experience, and it would not be going too far to say that materialism itself is metaphysically "autistic" and therefore a priori incapable of "seeing the works of God."

The immanent logos -- i.e., the heavenly firmament reflected in the human intellect -- is that which confers our vertical orientation upon us, and allows us to be the reflecting medium -- the only one in all of creation -- capable of unifying the waters above (the ideal) and the waters below (the real). Conversely, the absence (or rejection) of this logos is what makes leftist deconstructionists such textual deviates. They cannot reflect upon reality because they do not reflect the Real.

There is more, but I don't think I have time to get into it -- the upper water provocatively represented by Jesus' saliva, the mixing of it with earth (i.e., the infusion of the word into substance) -- but you get the picture. After all, you have been bobtized by the upper waters, thereby opening the third eye of your Coon vision. Many of you have testified to the miracle of the "spittle on the computer screen" which makes me "present" to your most laughty self.

For the rest of you, feel free to renounce the sight which is blind to the revelations of the Divine and wait for the miracle of reinstatement of the true, original faculty of beholding which sees all things visible as 'works of God revealed' (Tomberg). You have nothing to lose but your blindness and cynicism, for your fidelity to the horizontal cannot help but make you unfit for human assumption. To put it another way, in your present state, your telovator doesn't go to the top floor.

47 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Instead of unity and truth, they substitute solidarity and commitment, which is to say exterior or "top-down" order and coercive action, for the lie is always coercive whereas the truth "attracts."

Outstanding post, Bob!
Truth attracts, ergo it has gravity.

Gagdad Bob said...

not to mention levity.

Anonymous said...

"There is more, but I don't think I have time to get into it -- the upper water provocatively represented by Jesus' saliva, the mixing of it with earth (i.e., the infusion of the word into substance) -- but you get the picture. After all, you have been bobtized by the upper waters, thereby opening the third eye of your Coon vision. Many of you have testified to the miracle of the "spittle on the computer screen" which makes me "present" to your most laughty self."

Blast it Bob! You did it again! Now I have to make a bigger sign:
Do Not Drink While Reading at Bob's One Cosmos! Seriously!

Anonymous said...

>>"post-normal science<<

Might be termed "post-Christian science" as well.

Were it not for Christian scientific inquiry and its accompanying sense of adventure in the so-called European "dark ages", scientific advancement would have died on the vine. And the Christian monasteries preserved, kept alive the ancient Greek ideals that eventually contributed so much to the arts, to philosophical ideals, to modern democracy. Obviously, this invaluable Christian contribution was non-agenda-ized - unless one thinks of the desire and search for truth as constituting an "agenda".

By the way, the history of Christian science and preservation of culture during times of "deluge" is the theme of what I think of as the greatest science-fiction novel ever written, A Canticle for Leibowitz, author Walter M Miller Jr. "Canticle" fictitiously chronicles the history of the Church and its efforts to keep culture alive following the "Flame Deluge", a nuclear war.

Rick said...

“As for the rest of you.”

And you know who you are. This is written for you:
Don’t take Dr Bob’s message as a command – an angry command. The shock of this message to you may appear to be a command. But it’s not really. I don’t mean to speak for Dr Bob – correct me if I’m wrong Dr – but your work here is more of a suggestion of The Suggestion. As if you say, as He says, consider these Things and then go do them. You will find they are the way things Work…when they work. You’ll find they work well. You have been given the gift of Freewill to make the best choice. Choose it.

Now if Dr Bob seems upset at times it’s because the things he writes about here seem so obvious to we ‘coons – like you are looking for your hat and it’s already on your head. Don’t confuse anger with frustration. Anger is what you guys have.

I once was a lib so I have the benefit of remembering what the blindness felt like and how the things Bob writes about used to repel me because, I suppose, I didn’t understand them. But I wasn’t really trying to understand. It all sounded like so much gobbledygook. I was so wrong.

Anonymous said...

Gore is a manipulative student of the great fire and brimstone evangelists that came before him. All he did was strip away the message and replace it with falsehood. Few noticed the bait-and-switch since content no longer matters.

Creating a false religion must be the easiest and most lucrative business in the world - for awhile, until fickle followers get bored (the UFO's don't arrive, the second coming is delayed, the seas don't rise, instant riches don't materialize). But there is always a new batch of sheeple every generation ready to embrace endarkenment, so the cycle can repeat ad nauseam.

The light of the world - what an antidote!

Anonymous said...

Ducks, ducks, ducks on the wall.
Ducks, ducks, ducks on the wall.
Oh those ducks on the wall are beginning to move
They're talking to me
I've got to get away from those ducks.
Kinks!

Anonymous said...

I'm an admirer of Senator Edwards.
I don't understand why Ann Coulter called him a faggot. He has a female mate, after all.

I'll submit that the Left should not lead spiritually but they do seem to do politics pretty well. We shouldn't suffer righteous people in office because they don't have the stomach to do what has to be done.

On the global warming hoax: it's practically the only way to kill big oil, which is our single chance to win the war on terror. Al Queda and Chevron are one and the same corporate entity: one department takes your money, the other blows up buildings, but it all stems from the bubbling crude--texas tea, that is.

The route to the right place is often a circuitious one.

Rick said...

Tusken sand raider,

You had me (nauseous) at “I'm an admirer of Senator Edwards”.
The rest just gets more silly.
Go back and read outloud what you wrote there. Listen to yourself.

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

You admire Edwards? How... gay.

Gagdad Bob said...

I'm pretty sure that Ms. Coulter wasn't suggesting that Edwards is gay. Rather, it was obviously a joke about the silly effeminacy of this mental featherweight. You leftists are so literal. In other words, he is soooo gay. If a gay person had said it -- which they have -- it would have been perfectly acceptable.

"Big oil" does not cause terror; rather, human evil does. There is no reason why we should be forced to give up oil because of a desire on the part of mendacious ones to appease evil doers. Oil is a global commodity. If we stopped using it tomorrow, it wouldn't make a bit of difference anyway.

Anonymous said...

Quack.

Rick said...

Tusken sand raider,

Let me help you.
Ann was making a joke. When we were kids we used to call each other gay when we were acting gay - when one of us was acting like a girl or a pretty boy. We didn’t mean this literally. Act like a girl if you are a girl we say. Act like a man if you’re a man. You can’t help the way you look, but you can help how you act.
And he’s a lawyer of the kind that is the worst kind.

Anonymous said...

"..so obvious to we ‘coons – like you are looking for your hat and it’s already on your head."

Well put.
Another way of saying that "we are spirits living a human experience, not humans living a spiritual experience", I might have screwed up that quote from Dr. Wayne Dyer but it's along the same line.

Anonymous said...

Thank you for the days,
Those endless days, those sacred days you gave me.
I'm thinking of the days,
I wont forget a single day, believe me.

I bless the light,
I bless the light that lights on you believe me.
And though you're gone,
You're with me every single day, believe me.

More Kinks.

Rick said...

Tusken sand raider said,

“Al Queda and Chevron are one and the same corporate entity: one department takes your money, the other blows up buildings”

Now I know this is a joke.

I’m not even going to dignify the multiple, multi-faceted backwardness of that statement by responding to it. Or the intentional equivocating.

But I will point out how you, of all people, refer to a voluntary purchase as ‘taking your money’. This tax ‘payer’ finds that a bit too much to take. Hold on while I go purchase some more taxes.

There is nothing stopping you from dropping what you’re doing and refuse to participate in big oil. Stop blaming the rest of us for your guilt. You signed up willingly.Big oil is not some big fat guy smoking a cigar raking in the cash. It’s a huge industry – a hidden industry – employing thousands of hard working people who are sick of being characterized as ‘evil’. I know. It’s where I work. It’s a thankless job.
Go put some more gas in your car. Hypocrite.

Anonymous said...

"It is always puzzling to me when people suggest that it is the right that is somehow "anti-science..."

Of course, the problem is the "right" is actually left, and the "left" is whacko. What puzzles me is any federal involvement in "science" in the first place. I don't want my tax money funding any scientific adventures, at all.

One interesting aspect to that global warming swindle film you linked to the other day, was the unintended consequences of Margeret Thatcher dumping tons of money for scientists to promote nuclear energy, and, also, create anti-carbon propaganda. Why is it that those who most promote free markets and democracy end up having so little patience and faith with what they believe. They end up being Jacobins/Marxists in practice.

Rick said...

Tusken sand raider,

One more thing. If you think ‘Al Queda’ is mad now, wait till we stopped buying Middle East oil. That’s what you want, isn’t it?

Noid said...

I used to live in Pete Stark's district, on the face of it, a very blue collar, church-going area. It never made sense to me that the creep kept getting re-elected. Probabably it was stupidity radiating southwards from Berkeley, but I was always careful never to drink the water, just to be on the safe side.

Further to yesterday's discussion, Sherwood Schwartz, the creator of Gilligan's Island, has said that each of the characters reflects one of the Seven Deadly Sins:

Gilligan: Sloth
Skipper: Wrath
Professor: Pride
Mary Ann: Envy
Ginger: Lust
Mr. Howell: Greed
Mrs. Howell: Gluttony

Shwartz has only admitted this recently, saying that at the time the show was being made, it would have been considered too crazy or some such.

Ephrem Antony Gray said...

joseph: I think it is because many of them are idealists without true depth or substance - enough to have to make their ideas work in the compromising reality of societies and civilizations: so they end up getting fed up and wanting to shove their ideas down everyone's throats.

Anonymous said...

Noid said:

"Further to yesterday's discussion, Sherwood Schwartz, the creator of Gilligan's Island, has said that each of the characters reflects one of the Seven Deadly Sins..."

Wow, now the theme song really takes on significance as a synopsis of the Ar(k) of Salvation.

[Opening Gilligan's Theme]
Just sit right back and you'll hear a tale,
a tale of a fateful trip.
That started from this tropic port,
aboard this tiny ship.
The mate was a mighty sailin' man,
the skipper brave and sure.
Five passengers set sail that day,
for a three hour tour, a three hour tour………
The weather started getting rough,
the tiny ship was tossed.
If not for the courage of the fearless crew,
the Minnow would be lost; the Minnow would be lost.
The ship took ground on the shore of this uncharted desert isle,
with Gilligan, the Skipper too,
the Millionaire, and his Wife,
the Movie Star, the Professor and Mary Ann,
here on Gilligan's Isle.

[Closing Gilligan's Theme]
So this is the tale of our castaways,
they're here for a long, long time.
They'll have to make the best of things,
it's an uphill climb.
The first mate and his skipper too,
will do their very best,
to make the others comfortable,
in the tropic island nest.
No phones, no lights, no motor cars,
not a single luxury.
Like Robinson Crusoe,
it's primitive as can be.
So join us here each week my friend,
you're sure to get a smile.
From seven stranded Castaways,
Here on Gilligan's Isle.

Anonymous said...

Victor Davis Hanson weighs the wacky mind of Dinesh D’Souza - he's found wanting.

robinstarfish said...

there is but one door
leading to eternal light
open from inside

Jamie Irons said...

Bob,

I like very much your saying "Truth attracts..."

Where you wrote:

It is science for the limbic system -- the emotional center of the brain -- not the cerebellum, which is capable of disinterested objectivity, which is the foundation of the human capacity for truth.

I wonder if you meant "cerebrum" rather than "cerebellum" here?

Jamie Irons

NoMo said...

tandem river ride
unexpected adventure
springtime wandering

Gagdad Bob said...

D'oh! Cerebrum! Where have my editors been all day?

Anonymous said...

Celebrating Friday, of course

(wv: hfdmaeqa, in spidery thin typeface - not an easy task when you've had a pear cosmopolitan with dinner; the letters appear to be dancing...)

Anonymous said...

Riccoon:

Four responses to TSR... Seems someone has a thin skin. I submit you're the one with the guilty conscience. Washing it in a safe house doesn't mean it wasn't dirty.

I have only to look to our nation's experience of Katrina to galvanize my opinion of big oil: while every major retailer you can name was busy bringing semi-truckfuls of relief to the area, Exxon-Mobile gave zero relief on fuel prices, then posted during that relief period the largest one-quarter profit in the history of the world: ten billion, if I remember correctly. Why, that's enough to power Bush's War on Terror for another 3 months. Or, if you've a stomach for such things, to give an entire generation of American Children a public education. Filled with Creationism, OneCosmosism, Science, or The Rotating-Axis, Ten-Pin East/West Split. If you've a stomach for such things, you being easily nauseated and all. Instead we have "thousands of hard-working people sick of being characterized as evil", all enjoying record profits on their investments through no fault of their own. Unless you count knowing forfeit of moral accountability a fault.

How much big oil stock is in your portfolio, oh objective one? "Go put some more gas in your car. Hypocrite." Indeed.

And as for the Ann Coulter resolution, come on Coons...since when does "gay" convey the same meaning as "faggot"? You contend that AC is suddenly a poet, meaning something else than what she said? Hmmm. Interesting.

Or could it be that she actually meant what she said, just like she usually does, that she was attempting and succeeding in provoking knee-jerk reactions among the right rank & file? If the lead pipe fits...

What a spin. Yes. Nausea.

NoMo said...

Coordination of movement and balance...

OR

Control of speech, memory, vision, personality and muscles.

To which were you referring, Bob?

Anonymous said...

Well, everyone be careful on the roads tomorrow/today. It's the Feast of St Patrick, or as the non-Irish among us call it, National Let's Get Fucked Up And Drive Day... I'm part-Irish, part-German, part-Czech, so the day is a temptation for me. As Wikipedia points out int heir German-beer article: "The Germans are behind only the Czechs and the Irish in their per capita consumption of beer."

My ancestors invented Guinness, Bockbier and Pilsner, and yet my favorites are Pauli and Newcastle Brown. Odd, that.

USS Ben USN (Ret) said...

Remember Rick, Old Yellah has hydrophobia (rabies).
It's a voluntary rabies, and easily transmitted to dolts who just can't get past their own envy and greed.

The Left believe they have the "moral" authority to tell businesses how much profit they can make, and how much to give away...to the Leftist handlers and their victims.
Quite a racket they got going there. Extortion makes them feel so good.

Ricky- great rant btw. It's obvious that old yellah doesn't bother to do his homework.

USS Ben USN (Ret) said...

Will said:
"Obviously, this invaluable Christian contribution was non-agenda-ized - unless one thinks of the desire and search for truth as constituting an "agenda"."

And the Left is trying it's damnedest to obscure, twist or obliviate that inconvenient truth.

Thanks for the recommendation. Now I must check it out.

Anonymous said...

Old Yeller--

You sound so young. How did you get so stupid so fast?

Anonymous said...

No ben, the yellah agrees with the coons that a vertical awareness carries with it a sense of unity, one cosmos under god, if you will. Yellah doesn't give a rat's ass how much less you have than he does. He just asks the holy choir to do some solo scatting in private. The definition of greed is still the same old hoss, even if its you doing the grabbing. Especially if. Talk about homework.

Dupree, get a body. And quit spitting when you drool. It makes you sound shrill.

wv:wdhzyxab waddyasoexcitedabout?

Anonymous said...

One last attempt re Ann Coulter:

It was so NOT about the light-in-the-loafers aspersion supposedly cast upon the Breck Girl. (Funny how no one seems to think that is offensive!)

Her comment in context was an ironic slap at Leftist Fascism, i.e., "you have freedom of speech, but only the speech we deem acceptable. Otherwise, you're a hater and we'll send you to rehab faster than you can write out the hush money check to the Hollywood Reporter and the Democratic Party."

There now, Kos kids. There's a proper definition of fascism. Please use it more carefully as it is not a really good political slur and doesn't mean what you think it means.

wv: kjvnhrk (I hate Swedish words! Send me to rehab!)

wv, 2nd attempt:iclxaza (I actually know how to pronounce this word in Nauhuatl.)

Anonymous said...

Ode to an Old Dog

Now dear ol' yeller's
a decent sort
the kind of feller
who jaws for sport
He hears himself
say marvelous things
of evil profit
that's fit for kings

It's easy enough
to spout this tripe
from such a gob
that's overripe

But really, folks
it's hardly fair
to tell a farmer
he must compare
His first-sown quarter
where all is lost
'gainst harvest time
yet minus the cost!

Eleven percent
is all that's left
to pay back all
whose help and heft
kept ExxonMobile
pumping oil
so other farmers
can till their soil.

Some pump oil
while others sow seed
yet one man's profit
is another man's greed

Yet hardly a moment's
thought is spent
on credit card interest
at eighteen percent...
Folks happily pay it
to keep them in toys
manufactured by Taiwanese
girls and boys

So here's to the hypocrites:
be of good cheer!
They're never in short supply,
Look in the mirror!

Anonymous said...

Bravo! Some mighty terrific examples of the “coonmunity” tempering the obnoxious narcissism of the ego" ( - GB) were posted here in the wee small hours.

lioqw = light on quacky wackery

Van Harvey said...

"Obviously, if the universe were not a true universe -- a relativistic multiverse with no underlying unity -- then truth would not be possible, nor would the truth-bearer, for that matter. So truth is ultimately guaranteed by the One without which science cannot function. "

Which is what gets me frosted. The whole "Inte"-grating crew with their multiple 'truths' each being valid - valid by what? True by what? Which separate 'truth' are they operating under, and why does it have any integration with the other 'truths'? All the separate 'truths' are being referenced as somehow contained within... what? If they were indeed separate, they would be separate and inaccessible and incoherent to other 'truths'... as I've said before, they use words as flat images, window dressing, mannequines in their meaningless displays, useful only for making 'statements' and assertions. They have no comprehension of the concept of Truth, much less of the words they use to abuse it.

Van Harvey said...

Joseph said "What puzzles me is any federal involvement in "science" in the first place. I don't want my tax money funding any scientific adventures, at all."

Amen to that.

Van Harvey said...

Joan of Argghh! Well said and rhymed!

Van Harvey said...

tusken sand yeller,
Too dumb for words. I toss a dried length of a branch in your general direction.

Van Harvey said...

Perhaps Ann Coulter can retrieve it for you.

Anonymous said...

Joan-

Wow! Brilliance. Really brilliance. We could discuss what's meant by "first quarter" when it comes to oil companies...that would have been around the time they stepped in with a "cheap fuel alternative" for Rudolph Diesel's invention of an engine powered by a farmer's own produce, right? Never mind. It's art what you done by gosh and I get the point. Good comparisons all around.

Please understand I'm all for making a profit. But I'm all against making a profit during a time of stress because of that stress. Had they made even a passing gesture toward relief it would have been felt. There was none, conspicuously none. Then to wave that kind of record-breaking gross over the backs of so many beleaguered souls bent only on getting a roof over their heads and clean floors underfoot was/is hard to bear. Or should be. No matter who you "work" for. I don't understand anyone who would argue that corporate ethics should differ from personal ethics.

Again, brilliant little stretch. I'm honored to have so moved you.

Anonymous said...

Yeller,

I'm ornery and you're honored!

If charity is not voluntary, it becomes a state religion. If it is voluntary, why waste your emotional energy on those who exercise their choice?

It seems that you are saying that it's not that they didn't help, but that they received a windfall profit from previously-purchased options long before the storm hit. Moreover, while they DID decide to stay in business and provide much-needed jobs--- it just looks bad because they didn't join in the frivolously easy money dump from around the country. Looks to me like they toughed it out in a long-term commitment to the community. Everyone else has moved on to the next tragedy.

Or perhaps you have some other agenda?

Anonymous said...

Other agenda? Of course I do. I've got a hardbound bookful.

You would separate these events (no aid, record profits) and in the the doing apparently render each benign. I accept your contention that they may not be related, that the profits generated from girding loins when help was needed rather than chipping in from the old bottom line may not show up on the books until 2nd quarter 07, but the two facts don't change. That you don't choose to connect these dots is also a choice you make, from atop your own pile of agendas. You're still a damn charming poet.

Anonymous said...

My only agenda is consistency of thought.

Either people (and businesses) are truly free to give, with no strings attached, or they are bound by our own private ideas of what is appropriate and sufficient. And that is the most ungenerous and politically-biased attitude of all; "strings attached" to the ideal of free choices.

Like so many other politicians, you are using a tragedy to vault to some supposedly superior position that justifies your sense of proportion, and hiding it all behind "compassion" as a keyword. Failing your private test has made E-M loom large in your thoughts, and has reassured you that some folks, some businesses just have too much money, and "should" make their generosity conform to your ideals. Nevermind the years of investment, donations to schools, jobs, sound business practices that assure future jobs. Just this one instance.

Nah. Sorry, I don't buy it. Your agenda goes waaayyy back.

To the 60's I'd guess.

Anonymous said...

Thanks JofA. Believe it or not, I consider your words carefully. I'm not sure I understand what you are saying, but the road is upon me and I can't take time to clarify. May we pick this up again? I'll mention it in a comment on a current post.

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