Having proven themselves really poor losers over the past several years, the American Democratic Party now shows us how really bad they can be as winners.
Instead of doing a little happy dance when they came out of the convention season ahead of the Republicans and an almost certain shoe-in for the presidential election, they went into full attack mode, not at the Republican nominee, but his vice-presidential pick, Sarah Palin.
Completely unknown six months ago, Palin is now a part of our permanent cultural experience. Stories are coming in from all directions of the offers she's had for national television gigs after the election and she's twice now suggested she might be a candidate for president in 2012.
Had the Democrats reacted to Palin with a shrug as they should have instead of a full court press, the nation would have too. By now she'd be almost forgotten if it weren't for the almost pathological reaction Democrats had to her.
Having run a pretty clean campaign up to that point, Obama supporters will now go down in the history books as really a bunch of jerks for the way they attacked Palin instead of the fairly obvious choice, McCain, the actual Republican nominee.
Oh and let's not forget the pain we Democrat sympathisers felt when the possibility of the dream ticket hung in the balance, Obama announced Joe Biden of all people as his own choice for veep. Biden? Really? Biden?
It's not just the real Sarah Palin we'll have to put up with for the next twenty years, it's all the false Palins too. The Palin impersonators on SNL, YouTube, Political Cartoons, Halloween Costumes and more. The doctored photo of Sarah Palin in a Bikini and the real pictures of Sarah Palin as a beauty queen will hang around forever like painful mementos from that bad weekend trip to TiaJuana when you were in college.
So, thanks very much Democrats. Thanks to you we'll be living with this women for the rest of our natural lives: assholes.
The Life Of Boyd Campbell Jackson Mississippi
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Saturday, November 1, 2008
What Happens When We Die: Part 1
What happens when we die?
It's an obvious enough question. It happens to each of us and to everyone we know, yet nobody really seems to know for sure.
So far nobody who crossed that boundary for more than a few moments has reported back. They say Jesus was dead for two days before he came back, but that was almost two thousand years ago and the only testimony we have was passed around a good bit before anyone wrote it down so basically what we have from Jesus just wouldn't stand up in court.
There are several schools of thought on this issue. The first and nominally the most logical is that nothing happens when we die. We wink out of existence like a cheap light bulb and our bodies are disposed of.
This philosophy depends on the idea that our consciousness is nothing more than the biological and electrical processes of the brain and once those processes break down, we cease to exist.
The proof of this comes from observation. If you cut off the head then death is almost immediate. So far nobody has been able to keep a head alive without a body or a body alive without a head.
I think a lot of people refuse to even consider this possibility because it's very discomforting. It's not themselves they're worriying about primarily, when it's your turn to go, there's pretty much no turning back, but we all have friends and loved ones who died and most of us would like to think they continue somehow, even in a way that's utterly beyond us.
You can't posit this as the final word on the matter yet though. We understand so little of how the brain really works. We know some tricks, for instance if you add certian chemicals it produces certian effects, but when it comes to the real basics of how ideas are formed and stored we just don't understand how it's done.
It may be that the brain isn't the repository for our conciousness, but rather a conduit between our real selves and this physical world.
Marcus Aurelius talks about the futility of life because there's such a huge spance of time before we're born and after we die and such a brief moment in-between when we're alive, but, what if the issue here really is time itself.
We exist in four dimensions: three of space and one of time. The demensions of space we move about pretty freely in. We can go forward and back or up and down at any speed we wish whenever we wish. Not so with time, we are a slave in time. In time we can only move from the past to the future and only at one speed.
But, it's only in time that we die. Six months ago, my mother was alive, sixteen years ago, my dad was alive, and sixty years ago, my great-grandfather was alive. It's only in the present that they are not alive.
If we were somehow freed of time, then everyone who ever lived would still be alive because all we have to do is move through time to the peroid where they were alive or they could move from the time when they were alive to times when they weren't. If we could move into the past or the future of our own will then we would effectivly live forever.
Perhaps that's what happens we die. Perhaps that moment of breaking between life and death is the moment where we become free of time and maybe the reason nobody ever reports back after death is because our perspective is so different once we are free of time that there is no way to communicate with those who are still its slave.
I'm convinced that we are still in just the earliest stages of our full development. In time, we will overcome these ideas of life and death.
There was a time when light and dark were absolute forces to us. During the day, we had light, but at night or in the shadows we had none and there was nothing we could do about it. Then we discovered fire, then mirrors, then electricity and more and now light and dark are a matter of choice to us. We can bring light to the darkest room or the longest night.
Perhaps it will be that way with life and death too. At the present we have no control over it, but perhaps, in time, we will come to a place where we can illuminate death as easily as turning on a lamp.
It's an obvious enough question. It happens to each of us and to everyone we know, yet nobody really seems to know for sure.
So far nobody who crossed that boundary for more than a few moments has reported back. They say Jesus was dead for two days before he came back, but that was almost two thousand years ago and the only testimony we have was passed around a good bit before anyone wrote it down so basically what we have from Jesus just wouldn't stand up in court.
There are several schools of thought on this issue. The first and nominally the most logical is that nothing happens when we die. We wink out of existence like a cheap light bulb and our bodies are disposed of.
This philosophy depends on the idea that our consciousness is nothing more than the biological and electrical processes of the brain and once those processes break down, we cease to exist.
The proof of this comes from observation. If you cut off the head then death is almost immediate. So far nobody has been able to keep a head alive without a body or a body alive without a head.
I think a lot of people refuse to even consider this possibility because it's very discomforting. It's not themselves they're worriying about primarily, when it's your turn to go, there's pretty much no turning back, but we all have friends and loved ones who died and most of us would like to think they continue somehow, even in a way that's utterly beyond us.
You can't posit this as the final word on the matter yet though. We understand so little of how the brain really works. We know some tricks, for instance if you add certian chemicals it produces certian effects, but when it comes to the real basics of how ideas are formed and stored we just don't understand how it's done.
It may be that the brain isn't the repository for our conciousness, but rather a conduit between our real selves and this physical world.
Marcus Aurelius talks about the futility of life because there's such a huge spance of time before we're born and after we die and such a brief moment in-between when we're alive, but, what if the issue here really is time itself.
We exist in four dimensions: three of space and one of time. The demensions of space we move about pretty freely in. We can go forward and back or up and down at any speed we wish whenever we wish. Not so with time, we are a slave in time. In time we can only move from the past to the future and only at one speed.
But, it's only in time that we die. Six months ago, my mother was alive, sixteen years ago, my dad was alive, and sixty years ago, my great-grandfather was alive. It's only in the present that they are not alive.
If we were somehow freed of time, then everyone who ever lived would still be alive because all we have to do is move through time to the peroid where they were alive or they could move from the time when they were alive to times when they weren't. If we could move into the past or the future of our own will then we would effectivly live forever.
Perhaps that's what happens we die. Perhaps that moment of breaking between life and death is the moment where we become free of time and maybe the reason nobody ever reports back after death is because our perspective is so different once we are free of time that there is no way to communicate with those who are still its slave.
I'm convinced that we are still in just the earliest stages of our full development. In time, we will overcome these ideas of life and death.
There was a time when light and dark were absolute forces to us. During the day, we had light, but at night or in the shadows we had none and there was nothing we could do about it. Then we discovered fire, then mirrors, then electricity and more and now light and dark are a matter of choice to us. We can bring light to the darkest room or the longest night.
Perhaps it will be that way with life and death too. At the present we have no control over it, but perhaps, in time, we will come to a place where we can illuminate death as easily as turning on a lamp.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Millsaps vs Belhaven
I was never a big fan of the program they have over at Belhaven. Mixing evangelism and academics never made much sense to me. I always thought learning should be free of any preconceptions, be they religious or social or political so that you could follow the path wherever it took you.
They sure are successful though. Their program is growing much faster than ours at Millsaps. Part of it I think is because college is for young people, and parents always want their children to take the most secure path and maybe they see tying math and science and literature and art to some sort of larger religious purpose as more secure.
Being successful or popular doesn't mean it's the right path though. Sometimes the safer path doesn't travel nearly as far or as high as the one with more risks.
The Belhaven plan wasn't always that popular either. There were times when nobody knew if they could keep the doors open from one semester to the next. Millsaps has had its share of lean years before, but never as bad as that.
In the end, I will always believe that Millsaps offers the best deal possible for the people who can keep up with the challenge. We're not at the top of our game right now but that's just temporary. The time will come very soon when we'll shine brighter than ever.
They sure are successful though. Their program is growing much faster than ours at Millsaps. Part of it I think is because college is for young people, and parents always want their children to take the most secure path and maybe they see tying math and science and literature and art to some sort of larger religious purpose as more secure.
Being successful or popular doesn't mean it's the right path though. Sometimes the safer path doesn't travel nearly as far or as high as the one with more risks.
The Belhaven plan wasn't always that popular either. There were times when nobody knew if they could keep the doors open from one semester to the next. Millsaps has had its share of lean years before, but never as bad as that.
In the end, I will always believe that Millsaps offers the best deal possible for the people who can keep up with the challenge. We're not at the top of our game right now but that's just temporary. The time will come very soon when we'll shine brighter than ever.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Not Everybody Loves A Parade
A parade is great if you're in it. It's about half that great if you're not in it, but you have a child or grandchild who is and it's about half of that half if you're just watching for whatever entertainment value the parade might hold. (That figure increases slightly if the parade features multi-million dollar special effects like Disney or young women exposing themselves for plastic beads like Mardi Gras.)
For the rest of the world, a parade is pretty much just and obstacle to traffic and a nuisance. The nuisance factor is exaserbated by the size of the parade (and the amount of traffic it blocks) and the noise and garbage factors.
The trash factor is not negligible. The Mal's St Patricks Day Parade, besides enough beer bottles to open a pub, has in the past left dog shit and dirty diapers in the small space in front of my business, several blocks away from the parade itself. They do a pretty good job of cleaning up, and within 24 hours most of that stuff is gone, but still, if you're not in the parade, it just isn't very pleasant.
Today they had the Jackson State Homecomming parade. They've been having the Jackson State Homecomming parade every year for my entire life. You'd think, by now, everybody involved would have it down to a science. Not so. You never saw so much confusion and mess for one marching band in your life.
The worst part was the traffic detours. The parade stretched from the campus itself to the fairgrounds, which meant it split downtown in half with almost no possible way to get from one side to the other. The detours lead to nowhere, mostly moving you to dead ends or stuck, the wrong way, on a one way street.
Twice I stopped to ask the police officer or homeless person or whoever was directing traffic at intersections how to get around it, and all they could say was "follow the signs". Well, the signs lead to nowhere. Eventually, I was able to cross Capitol street somewhere around The Stewpot and wind my way back up to court street and finally to my destination.
So, I called city hall to find out what went wrong and let them know what they were doing just wasn't working very well. Nobody knew and nobody cared. One lady told me, it was Jackson State and I just had to put up with it. I suppose she was an alumi.
So if you're ever in a position to plan a parade or be in a parade or even just watch a parade, keep one thing in mind. It's great for you, but for the rest of the world who's not involved in your little event, a parade can be a huge pain in the ass.
For the rest of the world, a parade is pretty much just and obstacle to traffic and a nuisance. The nuisance factor is exaserbated by the size of the parade (and the amount of traffic it blocks) and the noise and garbage factors.
The trash factor is not negligible. The Mal's St Patricks Day Parade, besides enough beer bottles to open a pub, has in the past left dog shit and dirty diapers in the small space in front of my business, several blocks away from the parade itself. They do a pretty good job of cleaning up, and within 24 hours most of that stuff is gone, but still, if you're not in the parade, it just isn't very pleasant.
Today they had the Jackson State Homecomming parade. They've been having the Jackson State Homecomming parade every year for my entire life. You'd think, by now, everybody involved would have it down to a science. Not so. You never saw so much confusion and mess for one marching band in your life.
The worst part was the traffic detours. The parade stretched from the campus itself to the fairgrounds, which meant it split downtown in half with almost no possible way to get from one side to the other. The detours lead to nowhere, mostly moving you to dead ends or stuck, the wrong way, on a one way street.
Twice I stopped to ask the police officer or homeless person or whoever was directing traffic at intersections how to get around it, and all they could say was "follow the signs". Well, the signs lead to nowhere. Eventually, I was able to cross Capitol street somewhere around The Stewpot and wind my way back up to court street and finally to my destination.
So, I called city hall to find out what went wrong and let them know what they were doing just wasn't working very well. Nobody knew and nobody cared. One lady told me, it was Jackson State and I just had to put up with it. I suppose she was an alumi.
So if you're ever in a position to plan a parade or be in a parade or even just watch a parade, keep one thing in mind. It's great for you, but for the rest of the world who's not involved in your little event, a parade can be a huge pain in the ass.
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