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More Turbulence Ahead

Things may be a bit muddled here at the Eyehackerblog.  I’m in the process of moving things to a web-hosting service.  WordPress.com is nice, but limited in what can be customized.  Hopefully things will be back to “normal” soon.

New Host for EyeHackerBlog

Because of continued problems with the home web server, for now I’ve decided to move the blog to the WordPress.com server to improve reliabltiy.  Comments and perhaps some other pages will still link to the old site which will remain up (hopefully) for the time being.

Easter Duty

I think that I may have posted on this before, but it is important and therefore do not mind posting it again.  At this time of year, it is so important to complete Lent with a sacramental confession.  It completes the forty days of penitence and fulfills the command to “repent” and fully seek the mercy of Jesus.  I know when I’ve made a good confession.  I will tear (with joy and gratitude) when the words of absolution are spoken to me.

“God the Father of mercies, through the death and resurrection of His Son, has reconciled the world to Himself and sent the Holy Spirit among us for the forgiveness of sins; through the ministry of the Church may God give you pardon and peace, and I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.”

It is the embrace of a Father for a prodigal son. 

Letter to a Grieving Mother

I learned, after the fact, the a childhood friend of mine died recently.  Although I had not seen him for decades, my memories of our friendship are still vivid and I feel a (strange?) connection to him.  I wrote this letter to his mother, a widow.

 

 

Monday, March 19, 2007

 

Dear Mrs. K,

 

Please forgive me for writing you rather than personally expressing my condolences on the occasion of your son Rick’s death.  It has been many years since I have seen any of the K’s and I regret that I did not see Rick in any of these past thirty some years.

 

But I have reflected on my memories of Rick as a childhood friend and look upon these memories with great satisfaction.  If my memory serves me well, I met Rick at Annunciation School, perhaps on the long bus ride to and from Akron.  I know that we developed a friendship rather quickly and we spent a fair amount of time outside of school together.  Rick was the first kid that I knew who spoke a language other than English.  At first I thought he was telling me a tall tale.  I remember asking him, “how do you say ‘My name is Ricky K and Richard is my friend?’ ” He responded, “Mein Name ist Ricky K, und Richard ist mein Freund.”  Well, for a kid like me who knew nothing of the German language, this sounded suspiciously like another kid just pretending to speak German!  Meeting you and Mr. K finally validated Rick’s claim in my mind.

 

I remember our chess games, both at your home and mine.  I preferred to play at Rick’s home since it always seemed much more quiet and peaceful than my own rather hectic (but loving) home.  But I must now confess there was another reason for preferring your house.  I remember that you always seemed to have wonderful cakes and baked goods.  If memory serves me, Sunday was the best time for these tasty treats.  I thank you for your hospitality.  You were always very kind to me.

 

And I remember going to some of Rick’s soccer games and on at least several occasions being a K family guest at the German American Club.  Soccer seemed like such a “typical European thing” at that time in my life.  For some odd reason, the high socks that Rick wore remain clearly with my memory.  I would never have guessed then that all of my five sons would play soccer in grade school!

 

I cannot think of even one unhappy memory of my times with Rick and the K family.  Not one.  I think that this speaks to the kind of friend that Rick was to me and the generosity of the K family.

 

I know that his death is painful to you and his wife and children.  I hope that your pain will be relieved with the passing of time and with pleasant memories of his life.  I will remember him (and you all) in my daily prayers.

 

 

In paradisum 

In paradisum deducant te angeli: in tuo adventu suscipiant te martyres, et perducant te in civitatem sanctam Jerusalem.	May the Angels conduct you to Paradise: And at your coming may the Martyrs receive you. May they lead you to the holy City of Jerusalem.
Chorus angelorum te suscipiat, et cum Lazaro quondam paupere aeternam habeas requiem.	May a choir of Angels receive you. And may you, with Larzarus – once a poor man – Possess eternal peace.

 

This is one of my favorite prayers for the dead.  I pray that the martyrs, all the saints, Mr. K and all Rick’s family and friends were there to welcome him home.  I hope that he may be there to greet me when I too leave this life for the next (although he may have some problem recognizing me after all these years!)

May God bless you, Rick’s wife and sons and console your loss.

 

Sincerely, 

 

 

One Third in DC Illiterate.

From the AP wire:

WASHINGTON (AP) – About one-third of the people living in the national’s capital are functionally illiterate, compared with about one-fifth nationally, according to a report on the District of Columbia.
Adults are considered functionally illiterate if they have trouble doing such things as comprehending bus schedules, reading maps and filling out job applications.

The study by the State Education Agency, a quasi-governmental office created by the U.S. Department of Education to distribute federal funds for literacy services, was ordered by Mayor Anthony A. Williams in 2003 as part of his four-year, $4 million adult literacy initiative.

The growing number of Hispanic and Ethiopian immigrants who aren’t proficient in English contributed to the city’s high functional illiteracy level, which translated to 170,000 people, said Connie Spinner, director of the State Education Agency. The report says the district’s functional illiteracy rate is 36 percent and the nation’s 21 percent.

Adults age 65 and older had the lowest literacy score of any group, the report found.

Two comments. 1.) How much higher is the illiteracy rate among the elected officials? 2.) How can we return the government education system and universities back about 60 years?

Obama the “Magic Negro?”

How can it be that the LA Times could publish such rubbish?  As if the label is not offensive enough, David Ehrenstein has published an opinion piece about Sen. Barack Obama which goes on to offend other famous “negros” including Sidney Poitier, Morgan Freeman, Scatman Crothers, Michael Clarke Duncan, Will Smith and Don Cheadle.

The Magic Negro is a figure of postmodern folk culture, coined by snarky 20th century sociologists, to explain a cultural figure who emerged in the wake of Brown vs. Board of Education. “He has no past, he simply appears one day to help the white protagonist,” reads the description on Wikipedia http://en.-wikipedia.org/wiki/Magical_Negro .

He’s there to assuage white “guilt” (i.e., the minimal discomfort they feel) over the role of slavery and racial segregation in American history, while replacing stereotypes of a dangerous, highly sexualized black man with a benign figure for whom interracial sexual congress holds no interest.

Just for the record, I think that Ehrenstein is right in the second paragraph, but he forgot to elaborate on the “white guilt” being a liberal (oh, sorry, “progressive”) guilt which has resulted in failed after failed program designed by liberals to “help” black citizens.  The “highly sexualized” crap is just … crap.  (The Wikipedia reference is clearly an appeal to the Black Studies scholars that might be reading the piece.)

And what does the white man get out of the bargain? That’s a question asked by John Guare in “Six Degrees of Separation,” his brilliant retelling of the true saga of David Hampton — a young, personable gay con man who in the 1980s passed himself off as the son of none other than the real Sidney Poitier. Though he started small, using the ruse to get into Studio 54, Hampton discovered that countless gullible, well-heeled New Yorkers, vulnerable to the Magic Negro myth, were only too eager to believe in his baroque fantasy. (One of the few who wasn’t fooled was Andy Warhol, who was astonished his underlings believed Hampton’s whoppers. Clearly Warhol had no need for the accouterment of interracial “goodwill.”)

But the same can’t be said of most white Americans, whose desire for a noble, healing Negro hasn’t faded. That’s where Obama comes in: as Poitier’s “real” fake son.

Like a comic-book superhero, Obama is there to help, out of the sheer goodness of a heart we need not know or understand. For as with all Magic Negroes, the less real he seems, the more desirable he becomes. If he were real, white America couldn’t project all its fantasies of curative black benevolence on him.

When I read a piece like this, it’s like a liberal again pulling the curtain back just a bit more exposing what Hollywood types and those of like mind really think.   David Ehrenstein is describing the average liberal mindset and not the average American’s attitude.  I’m not sure that a conservative has entertained the notion of “Magical Negros” in such a public venue, but you can be sure that he would have a tough time getting such notions published in the MSM.  The reactions to Ehrenstein will be at least as educating as the piece itself.

Pete Stark an Atheist

Here’s an interesting bit from the LA Times online edition.  Seems that Democrat Pete Stark has revealed that he is an atheist.  But in the usual liberal double-speak, such individuals may prefer to be called “nontheists.” 

THERE ARE A gazillion ways to get into trouble in Washington, but Rep. Pete Stark (D-Fremont) has picked one of the rarest: He has come out of the closet and acknowledged that he does not believe in God.

Stark outed himself in a questionnaire from the Secular Coalition for America, which searched for elected officials willing to identify themselves as nonbelievers. It found only four, including Stark, and it claims that he is “the first open nontheist in the history of the Congress.”

“Nontheist,” by the way, is the latest secularist term of art for folks “without a god-belief,” replacing the traditional terms “atheist” and “agnostic.” (The former believes there is no God; the latter isn’t sure.) But the American Humanist Assn. — and who’s not a humanist? — prefers nontheist because most Americans wrongly think that atheists are anti-theists: people who not only don’t believe but also object to others’ belief in God(s). The association took out an ad in the Washington Post on Tuesday to congratulate Stark for his “courageous decision.”

Wonderful

Subpoenas For Rove And Miers?

Well can you imagine?  Democrats are upset about the firing of US Attorneys on Bush’s watch.  This is precious:

The Senate Judiciary Committee is set to vote Thursday on whether to issue subpoenas to 14 current and former administration officials, including White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove and former White House Counsel Harriet Miers, John Bresnahan reports.

Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.), the panel’s ranking Republican, are expected to convene the committee Thursday to vote on the subpoenas for Rove, Miers and William Kelly, a former top aide to Miers.

The committee will also vote subpoena six of the fired U.S. Attorneys and five Justice Department officials, including Kyle Sampson, the recently fired chief of staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Since Rove, Miers and Kelly were just added to the schedule for Thursday’s committee meeting, panel rules allow any member to postpone consideration of the subpoenas for one week.

Hey guys don’t forget to subpoenas for Bill Clinton and Janet Reno.  Recall the Clinton in 1993 fired 93 US Attorneys including those investigating the Clintons’ involvement in Whitewater and Webster Hubbell (still in jail?) and replacing the Attorney in Arkansas with a former student of Clinton.  I think that Dan Rostenkowski (served jail time) was being investigated at that time as well.

In 1993, shortly after she was installed as attorney general, Janet Reno sent an unmistakable signal that her Justice Department would primarily serve the political ends of Bill Clinton rather than the ends of justice. At once, she fired all 93 of the country’s United States attorneys. According to no less an authority than Ted Olson, President George Bush’s chief post-election attorney, Reno’s move was extreme and unprecedented. “In order to maintain continuity in thousands of pending prosecutions, and as a statement to the public that elections do not influence routine law enforcement, the nation’s top prosecutors are traditionally replaced only after their successors have been located, appointed, and confirmed by the Senate. On instructions from the White House (she claimed it was a ‘joint’ decision; no one believes that), Reno ordered all 93 to leave in ten days. There could not have been a clearer signal that the Clinton campaign war room had taken over law enforcement in America.”

Bill knows something about politicizing the US Attorney’s office for goodness sake!