Jimmy Carter still thinks he's president

So I see his picture in the paper today, all serious and pensive like a sitting president, and he's been trying to broker a big Mideast peace package by, among other things, talking to the leader of the terrorist group Hamas. Must miss the Anwar Sadat/Menachem Begin days but I'm beginning to think we have a budding syndrome on our hands here just waiting for a name, ex-presidents who can't just retire and go away and hit the links but

get involved,

perhaps in his own mind he still sees himself as a great president, dunno, maybe this is one symptom of the syndrome as yet to be named but it annoys, geez guy, gas lines were high, 'member? and you took in a whole boatload or two or three of rogue criminals from Cuba courtesy of ole Fidel, go home and rent a classic movie, know what I'm sayin'?

RETIRE ALREADY!!!

Robowhat?

Yup, the young people be experimenting with the cough medicines. New term for Webster, robotripping as in taking well beyond the recommended dosage of such cough medicines as Robitussin, say 20, 30 or even 50 liquid gels. Read an article about this the other day, more and more young people are doing this to get high, to go on a trip, but then their blood pressure skyrockets, they're totally out of it and usually some nurse or doctor then calls the bewildered parents who had no idea. The age is getting stranger by the day, used to be the biggie was pot. I never got the whole trip thing, I mean whatever personal problem you're tripping from is going to be right back there foursquare and center when you get back. Must be bored, they're not out playing baseball and fishing anymore, that's too Fred MacMurrayish I guess. So watch out for all those robotrippers out there, the newest and youngest members of our zombie-fied culture.

Pope Benedict's remarks at youth rally

This was in my neck of the woods, St. Joseph's Seminary in the big YO on April the 19th on a lovely Saturday, would've loved to have gone but watched it on TV just the same. Closed-captioning is wonderful, it helps not just the hard of hearing but all of us. I was able to enjoy a fine cigar outside on the patio while reading Pope Benedict's inspiring words on the screen while looking through the window. One of his main messages to these young people was this era of moral confusion we live in and what he called "the manipulation of the mind" that produces this moral confusion. He did not mention the a-word (abortion) or any other specific word for that matter since he deliberately seems to have cultivated a pastoral style that goes to first principles in a generalized way in the hopes of making us more amenable to the Church's teachings, he wants to get beyond the NO-NO-NO part as he is fond of saying but we all know what he's talking about. One passage in particular struck me and he seems to have purposely evoked the Message of Fatima as his predecessor often did: "The second area of darkness - that which affects the mind - often goes unnoticed and for this reason is particularly sinister. The manipulation of truth distorts our perception of reality and tarnishes our imagination and aspirations...yet freedom is a delicate value. It can be misunderstood or misused so as to lead not to the happiness we all expect it to yield but to a dark arena of manipulation in which our understanding of self and the world becomes confused and distorted by those who have an ulterior agenda." It's as if this is Benedict's own theological explanation for part of the Message of Fatima wherein the Virgin Mary says to Lucia: "Look my child, don't be surprised if, at a certain moment, a certain diabolical disorientation affects the best of minds, a disequlibrium, so that they no longer judge according to the voice of my Son and of Peter." What better way to describe the times we now live in?

The best way I can describe Pope Benedict's birthday

healing, a balm, it's something we as a nation who suffered through 9/11 really needed. The news is always bad, always has been, seems ratings thrive on bad news, his papal visit coinciding with his 81st birthday, it's like just what the doctor ordered. I am usually not big on pomp and circumstance, though I wasn't there in person the sheer pageantry on the South Lawn of the White House yesterday I really enjoyed. Weatherwise the perfect day too, it's like God was smiling. 'Tis a simple blog today, Life in general is bad enough, I just found it healing is all.

Mean People

They could be people in general, many times they're bosses and I'm not talking about somebody having a bad day. It takes such an effort to be this way, it saps you of your energy and ain't good for your health, what purpose does it serve exactly to be known as a toxic person if I were sitting them down for an interview. Rational bosses are known to get more out of their employees, the respect trickles down but what do mean people in general garner? So how do mean people see themselves? do they have an inkling? Even Scrooge came around after a time so wassup?

A divorce culture is a depressed culture

a working theory of mine, I could be wrong so go easy, I've been known to think out loud here a few times. Used to be you'd go to the pharmacy for your flu medicine or whatever and there might be a handful of people on line, just recently I went to shop at a Walgreen's and the parking lot was jam-packed as it always is, turns out many of them were on line to see the pharmacist, it looked like Ticketron for a minute, young and old, didn't matter. Our society is not whole imo, it's not really intact, emotional issues and baggage are the order of the day, unresolved issues, routine divorce, abortion an everyday occurence, ergo more problems. Now z would much rather see people take more natural routes to these things, a more holistic approach but I can't judge them either, people are tired of being tired, tired of being depressed, tired of whatever and so here's something, has a few side effects but let's try it. Z's point is a conservative society would be a better society, a healthier society, divorce being rare only when necessary, forgiveness, resolving issues for a change, abortion being more or less a relic of the past, families helping each other out in times of need instead of this one not talking to that one for 20 years...we ain't livin' right, and if it wasn't just cats and babies who slept right and never got depressed might there be less of a line at Walgreen's?

The Hitchens bug is going around

Obama has put conservatives on the couch, blue-collar workers he said are bitter about life due to economic conditions and so they often turn to things like religion and become pro-gun, anti-trade and anti-immigrant. Hillary blasted back calling him an elitist and says she learned as a kid how to shoot a gun, he makes an Annie Oakley and duck-blind comment which was actually quite funny, gone is the old Obama of political civility, Jay Leno could have written this one. This is it folks, the 12th round, the 9th inning and word has it, according to Bob Novak, that her "ousted" political advisor Mark Penn still has her ear. This is really fun entertaining stuff and I only wish we had this on the Republican side but that one was over way too early imo. The Hitchens Virus, it's a bug that first starts up, well you know where, and it concerns all things religious and revered through the ages. Don't hate, participate.

DONAHUE

He's been retired for years now, after his seminal talk show finally went off the air, well he had no choice what with the Big O and all, he hooked up with MSNBC with a more political type show that failed and now he's made an anti-Iraq war movie, "Body of War." So here's what's up with Phil, he wants to be relevant again like in the good old days when he'd have on his show some sexually active grandmother and he takes her hand and says "God bless you grandma" all at 4:30 in the afternoon when the kids just got home from school and Mom's making some peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and some "more Ovaltine Mom" in the kitchen. It's like this, everyone has either a talk show or a blog these days, hell the local dogcatcher even has a blog, so Phil sees everyone on the bridge with their fishing poles leaning against the rails and sitting on their white buckets that they keep the snappers in and he

wants to get in there too,

"Hey buddy, can I have a cold one? How's the action?" "Pretty damn good, everyone's gotten something today, guy's got a monster blue over there" so he runs home and gets his spincaster, hasn't used it in awhile and hopes the line still holds, it's old and so he squeezes himself in next to the other anglers, "hey, is that Joe Scarborough?", only thing is he ain't catching anything, everything he does post-retirement is a big fat flopperoony.

So I hear Bill's been defending Hillary's version of sniper fire in Bosnia and she's like it ain't helping, darling dearest hubby why don't you STFU?

Daughtry has a nice sound

Went up the line yesterday way up in the sticks, packed a few miles on the car, kinda my version of a retreat aka a daytrip, had the station tuned and on came a few hits by Daughtry, just one of many stars flung off that fiery pinwheel known as "American Idol." Has a nice sound to it like he was born to do what he's doing, has a heavy touch of angst to his lyrics not in a depressing way but haunting just the same, hard to put into a genre (philosophical rock?) but perfect for a long trip. I'm going with Michael Johns on this season, caught him midthrough but saw enough to know he should win hands down. So far through these many seasons though nobody has that unique trademark sound like a Daughtry, he's like Steve Perry of Journey, other singers may be great but they don't have that extra hard-to-put-down-in-words quality, count me a fan.

Finally, a Hollywood celebrity who gets it

There is something refreshing about Richard Gere's support for the Tibetan democracy movement, shows you don't always have to support socialist and communist regimes like Cuba. Michael Moore & co., wanna jump on board?

Talking and shilling

Time was talk radio was the new kid on the block, unwelcome by the liberal msm for counterbalancing their liberal bias, but it's like it became so infatuated with itself and its political influence it began losing sight of its original goal. Rush was fresh and funny when he first started out, his political parodies were first-rate but now he's just a rubber-stamp for everything Bush especially on the immigration problem. And as for Sean, well a week or so ago a caller called up asking him but what about McCain's own pastor problem and while Sean didn't dismiss such concerns outright he downplayed it by drawing a sharp line of distinction between Obama's own pastor problem and McCain's, his reasoning being that the Rev. John Hagee isn't McCain's personal minister/spiritual advisor but this misses the point imo. By his warm acceptance of Hagee's endorsement he is saying, even if this wasn't his intent, that we should be tolerant of intolerance but Sean, like Rush, has become a shill for a party and a president. Re the Iraq war you should be for the war not because Sean tells you you should be for it, this ain't thinking, but because in your heart you're for it, make sense? and you should also not have such a closed mental universe, political solipsism if you will, that you can't accept the fact that people have political differences about everything under the sun. There are still many good pockets of talk radio still worth listening to, Laura Ingraham's at the top of my list, but I think a good part of it has outlived and outdone itself, intoxicated with its own power, its hackneyed use of the formula the Democrats can do no right and the Republicans can do no wrong. I don't listen to much of it in the car anymore, I have my preset music stations and when they grind the same playlist into the ground everyday I fall back on my CD player. I check out Hannity only on a very occasional basis and it's always SO-SO (same old same old) or SS-DD as people like to say at work.

Jay-Z and Beyonce are getting hitched!!!

& they might even live in Scarsdale, NY! Actually I don't find this particularly interesting, on second thought I don't find it interesting at all. It's like when I'm watching some of those evening entertainment shows and there's George Clooney being interviewed about this movie or that girlfriend I find myself being vaguely irritated, it's not so much George Clooney even though of course he's a big-time lib, I just never got this whole celebrity worship thing. I might admire somebody's craft and want to know a little about his or her life but that's about it. We have a war going on amongst other things, I'm sorry, I don't get it.

The Government Checkbook

I know myself that I have very finite resources in my checking account, usually people have bigger savings accounts than their checking accounts but even combining the two finitude is the fiscal reality here. I can't write a check for a new speedboat if I don't have the money, in the days of yore you'd wind up in debtor's prison. These everyday rules for the rest of us don't seem to apply to the federal government though and maybe that should be the yardstick whereby we choose our next President. So right off the bat it can't be Obama or Hill and Mac we are reminded time and again ain't a true dyed-in-the-wool conservative so maybe the Constitutional Party is where it's at. The Federal Reserve, our nation's central banking system, can just print more money in a pinch but if we did that, had a printing press in our basement we'd be arrested for counterfeiting. The richest person in the world isn't Vladimir Putin or Adnan Kashogi, it's the U.S. Government, or at least they act that way.

The 2nd Collection at all the Masses today...

...is to help defray the costs of gassing up the Popemobile during Benedict's upcoming trip to NYC this month. You should have received your envelopes in the mail and if you could make a very sacrificial and minimal payment of at least $20 it would be most appreciated.

Our zombie-fied nation

or why do people walk in the road? Regretfully might be a new feature of this blog.

This has been a phenomenon for years now and I don't mean simply crossing the street or even jaywalking but literally people, usually they're not alone but in groups of at least two, who walk down the road at a leisurely pace. This cuts across all racial and age groups, maybe in some cases of the young it can mean a statement of defiance, dunno, but none of them even look around them. You have to ever so slowly pass them and hope a toot or two won't anger them. My .02 worth, most of 'em are on drugs, could be the illegal variety, could be over-the-counter and prescription drugs. Saw a commercial the other day for some wonder drug and the woman goes nonchalantly "I take five different medications already." Oh, OK. The way I was brought up was roads are exclusively for motor vehicles, maybe a bike or two can get into the act but that's it, "cross at the green, not in-between", but when you have people in LA-LA Land, well, it's kinda like being in some horror movie, Zoloft Nation or something.

Meat Lasagna - European Style

The key to making a great European-style lasagna is your meat sauce, it has to be packed with flavor. Now you need a heavy-duty stockpot for this as you'll need to get this very very hot first, the oil will start to smoke, and a thin pot will have somebody call the Fire Department in no time. Get some nice white onions and dice them up rather small with a chef's knife, have some crushed garlic on the side and when that pot is hot enough put your onions in and a spoonful or two of the garlic. Now whenever any recipe calls for onions always sautee them first so as to bring out their flavor, 5 minutes or so. So you have your ground beef, not too lean 'cause you want that fat, and you put all that into your pot and mix it all up with a wooden spoon so it cooks thoroughly. Now you add your spices, salt and pepper, garlic powder, crushed oregano and parsley flakes, a few packets of Goya Sazon, really anything you can come up with, even some Italian dressing. When the meat sauce is almost done as it begins to turn brown add some cans of crushed tomatoes, some diced tomatoes, I like Del Monte with the basil/garlic/oregano blend, and a small can of tomato paste, depending on how much you're making you be the judge on how much. So the meat sauce takes a while but not too long either 'cause it's going to get cooked again when you put your lasagna in the oven. Meat sauce done so pour it into a colander over the sink but not too long, you want to save that fat, and when you're done straining pour it into a long hotel pan. Now you have another hotel pan and you ladle some marinara sauce on the bottom and spread it around, next I add my lasagna noodles, I tend to prefer the big industrial ones but no matter, and into your first layer you spread your meat around, then add your dollops of ricotta cheese in rows and then sprinkle in your shredded mozzarella and don't be bashful here, next spritz on some parmesan cheese, then add another layer of lasagna noodles and repeat the next layer as you did the first. When you're done adding your last noodles to form the top very important to spread some more marinara sauce all around else it will crack when you bake it and lastly spritz on some more parmesan, get a bakery sheet or parchment paper and put that on top and lastly some aluminum foil. If you don't add the paper some bits of the foil will flake off and you don't want that. You have your oven set to 350 or 375 degrees if you life and I bake it off for at least 50 minutes, better a little too long than too short, you want that mozzarella to melt. Take it out and let it cool on the side for about 1/2 hour before putting it in the 'fridge if you're not gonna eat it right away. A word about bay leaves which many chefs like to use when their meat sauce is simmering, when putting together your lasagna always take them out of your meat sauce as they're not really edible and people can choke, their use is purely for the flavor. Bon Appetit!

Book reviewers

I've long held that since we're all human it is virtually impossible to be 100% objective at all times and this came to mind after reading two very divergent reviews of the new book out by Melody Peterson sarcastically entitled Our Daily Meds. OK, so her whole premise is the pharmaceutical industry is greedy and gets dubious drugs to market before proper and thorough studies are done and once on the market lobbyists for these corporations strongly ply doctors to dispense them more and more and yada yada yada and do we really have chemical imbalances in our brains and what about all these potentially serious side effects to the most popular drugs and...well you get the picture, hers is not an uncommon position on the drug industry. Now the first review I read was very positive and called it important work but the second one was just the opposite and pretty much dubbed her part of the anti-medical progress crowd which brings home the point our biases are brought to bear on everything, ditto for movie reviews of films dealing with controversial topics, think Michael Moore. The point of today's blog is not my own personal position on the meds situation though I do tilt towards her position that we are a vastly overmedicated society but how we review and critique things we may strongly disagree with (or even agree with for that matter) which kinda got me thinking are book and movie reviews worth reading and considering in the first place? In an artistic sense isn't a review of anything literary or cinematic that may be loaded with social and political themes simply a reflection of ourselves and our own moral certitudes and pieties?

Our cashless society

I was watching this paid program on NBC last night about low fixed-rate loans by the government so more average folk can buy homes, it's Uncle Sam's way of trying to solve the subprime mortgage mess. The loans are completely protected by the federal government so lenders would not lose anything, they are guaranteed. Hey, I'm no egghead economic scholar, sounds good but the part that got me were the four people at the end who had questions for the expert. They had various questions about the loan program but all four were swimming in credit-card debt, not only that but the show's financial authority figure said nothing on this like tear 'em up and don't use 'em for now or only use them to rent a hotel room or if your car breaks down on a cross-country trip. I kid you not but the other day at Wendy's I saw a young couple whip out their piece of plastic to buy some burgers, is this worth going into debt over? I've made the personal decision to not use credit cards for now, I paid them off years ago and you know something? I'm better off, have more money in the bank and live well within my means. So these four troopers who maxed out on their credit cards are going for these government loans to own a home, well good luck but this Gotta Have It Generation doesn't set an example for the Next Generation.

Clearly Barack has rattled Hillary's cage

How else to explain her self-sabotaging ways? If it were anybody else, John Edwards or Joe Biden let's say, I'd bet dollars to doughnuts you wouldn't be hearing about all that sniper fire on the Bosnian tarmac or her pivotal role in the Irish Peace Process. NO, she didn't misspeak because she didn't remember every detail correctly or was sleep-deprived, she is clearly threatened by Barack's meteoric political ascendancy and so when you're under this much stress and pressure people weird themselves out. She wants it so badly she's self-sabotaging her own campaign and like the famous band still playing while the Titanic sank she doesn't know enough to say "stop the orchestra, we have a problem here."

Made in China

Don't know how we can protest and lodge our discontent over China's current crackdown of the pro-democracy movement in Tibet, after all even our toothpicks and keychains are made in China (apparently we now longer have the technology to make dolls over here). Sure the Administration always lodges its pro-forma condemnations but what kind of teeth does it really have? Nixon was famous for opening up trade with China but I don't think he had in mind that you couldn't walk into a Payless Shoe Source and not have trouble finding a sneaker made in America. New World Order.