sisu

The cat's the thing

A pretty girl is like a melody. Tiny during early-morning ball games this morning underneath a dining room chair with the bow of one of Tuck's totally awesome seat covers overhead.

Contemplating the ball just before going for its jugular.

For more biological contemplations, check out the Friday Ark at Modulator.

Sighted donk, sunk same

"[With whom] or where would you find [Hugh Hewitt's new book] Paint the Map Red that you wouldn't normally expect?" asks Senior Producer of the Hugh Hewitt Show Radio Blogger in a call-for-entries to the "Painting the Map Red Contest." 

"With section intros by Gail Sheehy, Nancy Pelosi and Al Gore, an inspiring collection of 50 call-to-action essays from MoveOn members around the country," MoveOn's 50 Ways to Love Your Country aims "to jumpstart an even broader civic dialogue and inspire all to become involved in our political process," according to their web site. Perhaps it's the far left's nuanced way with words that requires 50 essays to come up with a set of manageable talking points. In the interest of honing the word count down to a workable number, we've substituted Hugh Hewitt's new book -- Painting the Map Red: The fight to create a permanent Republican majority -- in MoveOn's ad, above. Hugh has whittled his own talking points down to four, as blogged -- not without our own petty carping to keep things interesting, of course -- here:

Win the war. Confirm the judges. Cut the taxes. Control the spending.

'Reminds us of the fabled WW II message "Sighted sub, sank same." In those days, "fake but accurate" had something more than petty power grabs in mind, like the nation's welfare for starters:

Unable to win at sea, the Americans decide they can win in the press. They announce that one of their aircraft found a U-boat and sank it, and that the pilot radioed, "Sighted Sub, Sank Same." This phrase becomes part of World War II mythology, but the event never happened.

Hugh Hewitt has sighted the enemy and with his book, not to mention his blog, radio talk show and TV appearances -- He's scheduled to appear on Larry King Live this very evening -- is calling up the Army of Davids to sink same:

I wouldn't push this hard except for the fact that losing the 2006 election means that much. A Senate with 60 responsible votes -- a result which can be achieved -- would mean real support for the war, progress towards energy security, restoring the judicial nomination process to the way it was pre-Bork, permanent tax relief and continued economic growth, a secure border, and yes, even some spending control.

To the ramparts, cyberslingshotters! Bloggers are invited to spread the word by entering the "Painting the Map Red Contest." Fame and fortune could be just around the corner -- Well, fleeting fame, at least. Radio Blogger explains:

Here's the assignment. [With whom] or where would you find Paint the Map Red that you wouldn't normally expect?

Here's what you have to do. First off, be creative. Be funny. Think outside the box. Do not be pornographic or offensive, or it'll never have a chance. When you've created your masterpiece, or masterpieces, as some of you get on a roll, send the picture in .jpg or .gif format only, please, and reduce it to about the size above, and send it to [email protected].

Photoshop is where we live. Our entry (above) is in the email. Meanwhile, this just in from our own nuanced junior Senator -- the fellow who voted for the war before he voted against it -- complete with gigantic typo in the salutation:

Dear Donot,

What you do in the next 12 hours could well determine whether we celebrate on November 7.

Nothing would do more to change Washington and change the direction of our country than the election of a Democratic majority in the Senate. We can get halfway there if we help elect three new Democratic Senators in Tennessee, Ohio and Minnesota. But we can't do it without your help!

Dear Donot? Do you mean Dear, Do not,? That sounds about right.

Update: Unaccountably, our "Painting the Map Red" entry (above) didn't make the semi-final cut. Cast your votes at Radio Blogger.

Inquiring minds want to know

Even as Borders and Waldenbooks bow down in dhimmitudinous submission to their Islamicist masters [via LGF] by refusing to stock the latest issue of Free Inquiry magazine -- declaring “For us, the safety and security of our customers and employees is a top priority, and we believe that carrying this issue could challenge that priority" -- the magazine itself online proudly headlines in bold red caps, "THE APRIL-2006 FREE INQUIRY INCLUDES FOUR OF THE CONTROVERSIAL DANISH CARTOONS. TO ORDER A COPY OF THIS ISSUE, CLICK BELOW!"

Our thanks to Borders and Waldenbooks for unwittingly drawing the blogosphere's attention to Free Inquiry by refusing to stock the latest issue of the magazine of the Council for Secular Humanism because it contains -- gasp! -- four of the "controversial Danish cartoons." Checking it out online, we came upon an excellent article by Ibn Warraq [a pen name traditionally used by dissidents in Islam] -- one of the signers of that anti-Jihad manifesto blogged here, "Together facing the new totalitarianism." "What we need is an Enlightenment in the Islamic world, of the Islamic mindset or worldview," writes Warraq. The idea has been floating around in the ether for some time but is particularly well articulated here. A few excerpts [Warraq's quotations are from Jonathan I. Israel's Radical Enlightenment]:

". . . Spinoza offers an elaborate theory of what religion is, and how and why religion construes the world as it does, creating a new science of contextual Bible criticism" . . . In his attack on the very possibility of miracles, and the credulity of the multitude, Spinoza’s Tractatus made a profound impression everywhere -- in England, Italy, Germany, and France . . .  Spinoza’s ideas were easy to grasp in one sense even by the unlettered, ideas such as "the identification of God with the universe, the rejection of organized religion, the abolition of Heaven and Hell, together with reward and punishment in the hereafter, a morality of individual happiness in the here and now, and the doctrine that there is no reality beyond the unalterable laws of Nature, and consequently, no Revelation, miracles or prophecy" . . .

Qur’anic criticism, on the other hand, has lagged far behind . . . Without criticism, Islam will remain unassailed in its dogmatic, fanatical, medieval fortress: ossified, totalitarian, and intolerant. It will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality, originality and truth.

Western intellectuals and Islamologists have totally failed in their duties as intellectuals. They have betrayed their calling by abandoning their critical faculties when it comes to Islam . . . Karl Binswanger has remarked on the "dogmatic Islamophilia" of most Arabists. Jacques Ellul complained in 1983 that "in France it is no longer acceptable to criticise Islam or the Arab countries . . . Understanding has given way to apologetics pure and simple."

According to Warraq, the source of Western apologetics toward Islam and the Arab countries long predates the postmodernist, post-colonialist critique of "Orientalism" in the Edward Said sense as a "corporate institution for dealing with the Orient." Instead, in the aftermath of The War to End All Wars, Islam was seen as a counterforce to the Communist threat:

Patricia Crone and Ibn Rawandi have remarked that Western scholarship lost its critical attitude toward the sources of the origins of Islam around the time of the First World War. Many Western scholars of the 1940s were committed Christians, such as Montgomery Watt, who saw a great danger in the rise of Communism in the Islamic world and thus welcomed any resurgence of Islam. They were insufficiently critical of the Islamic, Arabic sources. John Wansbrough has noted that the Qur’an "as a document susceptible of analysis by the instruments and techniques of Biblical criticism . . . is virtually unknown" . . .

In recent years, Saudi Arabia and other Islamic countries (for example, Brunei) have established chairs of Islamic Studies in prestigious Western universities, which are encouraged to present a favorable image of Islam. Scientific research, leading to objective truth, no longer seems to be the goal. Critical examination of the sources or the Qur’an is discouraged . . . In December 2005, Georgetown and Harvard Universities accepted $20 million each from Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal for programs in Islamic studies [blogged here and here].

Back to American bookstores' metaphorical book burning in the ongoing dhimmitudinous "synchronization of culture," Pajamas Media sums up "A creepy experience at Borders Books" reported by Van of Kesher Talk:

Upset by Borders’ censorship of a magazine that carries those not-that-offensive cartoons of Mohammed, Kesher Talk is stunned to discover that Borders at 57th Street and Park Avenue -- not far from Ground Zero -- doesn’t have “a single book devoted to 9-11” in its section on New York. [Judith of KT has] also got a roundup of top blogs weighing in, with fresh fears that Barnes & Noble will also ban Free Inquiry magazine.

Meanwhile, a Borders employee emails Charles Johnson [via Dymphna of Gates of Vienna, who has a nice summary of her own on the subject]:

It is Borders policy as a whole (not my particular store) that due to complaints in the past from Muslim customers, we are not allowed to put our copies of the Koran on any shelf other than the top.

Finally, Robert Bidinotto of The Bidinotto Blog is mad as hell and isn't going to take this anymore. He's started an Instalanche. It looks like Borders has a dhimmi problem.

Update: Steven Green [via Instapundit] walks right in and drives the dhimmis away:

President Bush isn’t a fascist, and I can prove it.

We’ve seen what American bookstores and publications and universities do when confronted with real fascists: they knuckle under. You might not be able to find those Danish cartoons anyplace respectable, but you’ll sure find lots of anti-Bush stuff.

Ipso facto, America is doing just fine, thankyouverymuch.

Goliaths=0, Army of Davids=1.

Update:  Michael Weiss of Slate makes our day:

Libertarian Sissy Willis of Sisu takes her free speech with an ironic twist of unintended consequence: "Our thanks to Borders and Waldenbooks for unwittingly drawing the blogosphere's attention to Free Inquiry by refusing to stock the latest issue of the magazine of the Council for Secular Humanism because it contains -- gasp! -- four of the 'controversial Danish cartoons.' "

Straight up with an ironic olive of unintended consequence, to be exact.

Update: We were delighted to find this post listed among the distinguished group of finalists in the Watcher's Council's "Best Non-Council Posts" of the week at Watcher of Weasels. Lots of good links there.

Hugh Hewitt has a lot to learn

The tanker "Acadian" out of Saint John heads out of the Chelsea Creek as the sun sets this afternoon. Note Bunker Hill Monument in the distance, stage left and traffic-stopper McCardle Bridge opening up, stage right.

"I would be very careful . . . in infusing religion and the Bible into partisan politics," the perennially amiable if wrongheaded Bob Beckel told Hugh Hewitt in a rare moment of clarity re "values voters" at a Heritage Foundation seminar blogged by Mary Katharine Ham at Hugh's blog this afternoon. Fred Barnes was there, critiquing Hugh's message for the GOP -- "Win the war. Confirm the judges. Cut the taxes. Control the spending" -- as not giving the Grand Old Party enough credit. All good stuff, but what caught our eye were Beckel's words:

He pointed out that the reason the Dem majority fell apart was because they were viewed as government interventionists. Any problem you got, we got a government program to come into your life and fix it. He predicts that the Republican majority will fall apart because Republicans are viewed as moral interventionists. He used the Schiavo case as an example.

Beckel may be on to something. The Shiavo case was one of a handful of issues  -- the ongoing "debate" pitting "Intelligent Design" against Darwin's theory of evolution being another, as was the hysteria that saw an Islamic crescent with star in the Flight 93 "Crescent of Embrace" memorial design -- where we've found ourselves "An opinion storm of one" vis à vis some of the leading lights of the right-of-center blogosphere where we normally ply our trade. Beckel was responding to this bit from Hugh's new book, Painting the Map Red, which stuck in our craw:

"Values voters" was shorthand for regular church attenders, but in late May 2005, my colleague on the radio, Dennis Prager, finally figured out how to define not only the "values voter," but also the "religious right" as understood by Democrats, their candidates, and their consultants.

The American people are not divided between those who believe in God and those who don't, Dennis argued. Almost all Americans believe in God, he pointed out.

But Americans are deeply divided over the issue of whether the Bible is of divine or human origin. Those who believe the Bible's text is divine in origin, and is thus not subject to revision, are very, very different from those who believe the Bible was cobbled together by fallible men, importing their own assumptions and pre-modern superstitions into their accounts of God's design.

In the larger context, the Mystic River Bridge spans upper right as the "Arcadian" heads out to sea.

We'll have to agree to disagree with Hugh on this one, big time. It recalls the last time we disagreed with the great man -- over two years ago -- when he asked for a theocratic litmus test for his political adversaries. As we wrote then:

Are we the only one whose antennae prickled at Hugh Hewitt's inquisitorial list of questions for MSM types?

What questions would I like answered? Very simple ones: For whom did the reporter vote for president in the past five elections?  Do they attend church regularly and if so, in which denomination?  Do they believe that the late-term abortion procedure known as partial birth abortion should be legal? Do they believe same sex marriage ought to be legal?  Did they support the invasion of Iraq?  Do they support drilling in ANWR?

I beg your pardon?  Is this Fifteenth-Century Spain?  Are bloggers now demanding a litmus test for the Fourth Estate? A RELIGIOUS Inquisition?  The Deist Founding Fathers must be spinning in their graves.

As usual, we agree with ourselves. Religious litmus tests fly in the face of the American Dream, as the recent unpleasantness re the Muslim turned Christian in Afghanistan reminds us.

"He's a cat's cat"

When you fall off a horse, you get right back on before fear starts playing tricks with your mind. Similarly, after the recent attack on our hand, we got right back into hand-feeding Baby (shrimp in hand above). Besides, it could be a lot worse. Baby attacks only when provoked. Some cats (see story below) initiate hostilities and get their human companions in trouble with the law.

"I don't feel the cat could kill anybody, but it could latch onto people's legs and arms and bite and scratch to the point where they could be hospitalised," said the animal control officer. No, it wasn't Baby Cakes but Lewis, a black-and-white terror tabby in Fairfield, Connecticut:

Solveira slapped a restraining order on Lewis which, rather splendidly, allowed the tearaway limited freedom to leave owner Ruth Cisero's house "if Cisero gave him Prozac."

The cat declined to take his medication, and soon after escaped custody and laid into Maureen Bachtig, who recalled: "I felt Lewis's claw on my left leg and I shook him loose, he then lunged and clung to my right leg, leaving one very deep puncture wound, one long deep gash across the top of my knee."

As a result, Cisero found herself cuffed and Lewis indefinitively restrained within his domicile. She claims the neighbours have been tormenting the poor creature, spraying him with hoses and chucking eggs at the four-legged ne'er-do-well.

Cisero said: "I've tried to tell them to just stay away from Lewis and he will stay away from you; this has caused complete havoc for me. He's a cat's cat, he climbs trees and sits on people's roofs but now he's forced to be in the house all the time."

We first caught the story on CNN's morning show, a great photo op for them -- cute cat -- but haven't been able to find a single picture of the offending feline online, so Baby will stand in for all things red in tooth and claw:

A "watch the birdie" moment as we dangle a piece of shrimp with one hand, wielding our camera with the other.

It's tricky keeping your Optio 450 clean when you've got shrimp all over your hands.

Update: Drudge has a picture:

"He looks like Felix the Cat and has six toes on each foot, each with a long claw," Janet Kettman, a neighbor said Monday. "They are formidable."

Update II: Thanks to reader Matt of MartiniPundit for this link to the video.

The doctor is in

Are we reading in, or is Babe troubled over his mauling of our hand yesterday? Probably reading in. He's obviously annoyed with the relentless flash of our camera, not to mention his encounter, just moments before we took this picture, with a raccoon hissing and rambling through the yard. A lot on his plate, and not all good kitty treats. Tomorrow's another day.

At the recommendation of our kind blog friends and relatives, we bit the bullet and took our scratched and bitten hand to the doc this afternoon. As usual, we had put off having a physical over the last period of time, and the good doctor took the opportunity of our visit to suggest we take care of business then and there, which we did. Now that it's over, what a relief. Everything seems to be up to snuff except the blood pressure, a longtime issue inherited from our mother and grandmother, which we agreed to monitor weekly and email him the results for evaluation. We had a slight temperature, which suggested infection from the bite wounds. Are now on the antibiotic Amoxicillan three times a day for the next period of time. You never know what tomorrow will bring.

"The anonymous fourth man"

"He is an expert on the budget and our economy. He is a man of candor and humor and directness. No person is better prepared for this important position," President Bush said this morning, announcing the resignation of Andrew Card (left) as Chief of Staff and the appointment of "creative policy thinker" OMB Director Joshua B. Bolten (right) as his successor. Oh, to be a fly on the wall . . . or even better, an operative behind the scenes . . . to know what was really behind Andrew Card's resignation. The talking heads were all over the entrails, reading in their own agendas, hopes and despairs.

Freddie the Beetle Barnes, in his Opinion Journal op ed last week, said Andrew Card must go. Now GW's Massachusetts-born Chief of Staff has stepped down, and Tony Snow on Fox News is saying "This has been an amazing White House in that there's been so little turnover . . . I think in resigning he was also trying to send a message to some of his colleagues: Maybe some of you guys ought to think about firing yourselves." Meanwhile Fox News White House correspondent Wendell Goler thinks it's the same-old same-old: "I doubt you will see much change in the operation of this White House. He has brought in [current Budget Director Josh] Bolten -- Bolten with an e, not Bolton with an o (the one with the white mustache that repels bullets, who speaks truth to impotence at the UN) -- in part because he has a long history with him." Then there's our favorite, from Ankle Biting Pundits [Do you suppose ABP pundit H-bomb's sources know what they're talking about?]. We do so want this one to be true:

My sources tell me that White House Chief of Staff Andrew Card's resignation has almost nothing to do with a "staff shakeup," as the AP has reported.

The "staff shakeup" meme plays into the MSM's obsession with the president's "slumping poll numbers" -- which they all too gaily report -- but does not really add up. Card served as a traditional CoS; an administrator, not a policy or political guy, and for all the shortcomings of this White House, staff administration has never really been one of them.

Rather, I have been told by Washington insiders that Card is leaving to play a significant role in the presidential campaign of Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. This announcement will not be made for several months; perhaps not until after the 2006 election, but many of Card's associates have already been working for Romney behind the scenes.

Bill Krystol on the Brit Hume Show this evening approvingly notes "this could be the beginning of a series of changes," and "we could end up with a much more combative White House." He's crazy about the new Josh who will be moving into Andrew Card's shoes, described by The New Republic's Ryan Lizza -- cited in Slate way back in November of 2001 -- as "'the anonymous fourth man in the inner circle of Bush's staff' (after Andy Card, Karl Rove, and Karen Hughes)."

The dark corners of the medieval imagination

The Babe on a mousing expedition this afternoon in the tunnel Tuck excavated last winter in the basement to get access to the broken steam pipe. Note etiolated stems of Ailanthus emerging from the mound, stage left.

Baby Cakes as the force of darkness. He turned on us big time this morning -- nothing personal -- when we were trying to hook him up to his harness outside. Tiny was already out there on her end of the harness, so we had to carry him out there unattached. Usually we do all the hooking up inside, so no problem. But today the cord got caught up in some twigs and leaves, we took too long, and he went berserk, glomming onto our hand and wrist with tooth and claw. We were in full shock-and-awe mode -- afraid he might get away and head for the deadly street -- grabbing him by the scruff of his neck the way mother cats do with their kittens to immobilize them, but he is so powerful that it was touch and go all the way inside as to how badly we might be mauled, as we clamped him between our ankles and walked him, duck-waddling-style, back into the house.

Baby's mousing expedition above called to mind "The Temptation of St. Anthony" by Hieronymus Bosch, who "was preoccupied with themes of torment and the sinfulness of man, which replaced earlier, more optimistic visions of Christ and the Virgin with feelings of anxiety, fear, and guilt."

Once inside, we called loudly and desperately for Tuck to come help. Tiny came scrambling in, crying in anxiety at her brother's yowling, hissing and spitting, not to mention Grandma's panic. Tuck came running downstairs and poured on a bucket of water -- with Pine-Sol -- that he just happened to have on hand as he was in the middle of a major cleaning project. That did the trick, and Baby released his claws and ran off upstairs.

"The sources for such unusual images were the dark corners of the medieval imagination, the gargoyles and monsters of cathedral decoration, and the marginal illustrations of books and popular prints," says the Hieronymus Bosch web site. No wonder they feared pussycats as witches' familiars. They are not to be taken lightly.

We ran our wounds under running water and applied Bacitracin with bandaids, and only moments after the horror of it all, Baby was back downstairs having both forgiven and forgotten all. Compartmentalization, thy name is kitty cat. They know everything, and we ignore their psychological messages at our peril.

Shell game

Beauty in unexpected places turned up on the kitchen counter this morning after we crushed a few egg shells in a paper towel, turned it around and then looked at what we had wrought (above).

Hippity, hoppity, Easter's on its way, and if you don't like it, don't immigrate! If you want to make Eggs Benedict, though -- as we did for breakfast this morning -- you've got to break a few eggs. Above, crushed shells in the morning light -- with a flash assist -- are candy for our camera's eye.

"We have found the enemies of art to be fanatics"

Benedetto, the Pope who loves cats and Mozart, will pray today in Richard Meier's Jubilee Church -- blogged here and here. (National Buiilding Museum photo from "Liquid Stone: New Architecture in Concrete") 'Wish we could be there. Cable won't carry it. C-Span won't, either. Is there a website out there with a video?

"To be Western means surrounding ourselves with what we find uplifting, and using the material for spiritual ends," writes David Warren [via Blue Goldfish] in a contemplation on the power of great art to bring out the best in us, paired with a critique of Islam's apparent soul-killing hatred and fear of great art as an evil temptress to our baser nature. We are reminded of the Taliban's grounding of kites (not to mention the unconscionable blowing up of the giant Buddha statues of Bamiyan) and also of all fear societies' -- both heavy and lite -- urge to brutalize the human spirit by crushing dissent:

The Pope will pray tomorrow [that's today, Sunday, as we write] in a beautiful but bare new church [ blogged here and here] at Tor Tre Treste, a northern suburb of Rome, designed for the millennium by the great American Jewish architect, Richard Meier. In its form, the church itself is symbolic, having the shape of a boat with three white concrete sails. It is considered a masterpiece of postmodern architecture. [We would have said modern -- or neo-modern -- as opposed to postmodern. There is no moral equivalency there but only transcendence.] But there is nothing on the walls, nor above the altar, except a single 17th-century crucifix, placed to catch light at sunset. A couple of articles posted on the interesting Catholic website “Chiesa” focus on this bareness, as I will today, on this Feast of the Annunciation.

Detail of interior of the Sunday School addition of Tadao Ando's Church of the Light, Osaka (Galinsky Photo)

Without reading any further, we would already take polite issue with the author, being a Miesian "less is more" type (see Tadao Ando image above). But we see the point, and he makes a compelling case about the larger issue of Christianity's role through the centuries as patron of the arts:

My reader, knowing that I am Catholic myself, may entertain scepticism when I say that the Catholic Church created “the West”, and not vice versa. He should not doubt this assertion, however, for it is fact. It becomes evident when one looks into history, including the histories of the Protestant denominations which are themselves rooted in a specifically Catholic past -- i.e. were not products of Byzantium, nor Islam. Nor did they originate in Hinduism or Buddhism. More generally, Christendom has been alive to the arts, to poetry, music, architecture, through 20 centuries. Our churches have been, through the centuries, by far the greatest patrons of all the arts. We expressly deny that they are evil in themselves. Art, music, poetry, architecture, plate and robe, are extensions of the liturgy; and outside the Church, each art may broadly serve human needs, by giving witness to the good, the true, and the beautiful. And even caricature and satire have been accepted, for their moral content -- when they point to a truth . . .

Whereas, in Islam for contrast, figurative art and melodic music have ever been banned in themselves -- from the mosque, and often outside it.They are considered evils in themselves.

A church with blank walls is not, to this Western way of thinking, a place without distractions. As so many wise Western minds have observed, the blank wall easily becomes a screen upon which to project the phantasms of the human heart; a mirror in which we look not for God, but for our own faces.

That brought to mind the contrast between neo's and our own photographs of the harbingers of spring in our gardens, the first crocuses:

Our crocus image (left) was close up and personal, while neo set her botanical jewel in the crown of her early-spring garden with last summer's dry leaves and twigs interspersed with tiny green shoots of the new generation. As we said to her, "I love your crocus image . . . very much in context, whereas mine is probably the exact opposite, totally removed from context to allow the viewer's imagination to read into it at will. It takes two -- 'reminds me of the Harvey Mansfield 'Manliness' debate" [Yup. That sounds like something you would say. --ed]. Out of context, our image might be David Warren's blank wall which "easily becomes a screen upon which to project the phantasms of the human heart; a mirror in which we look not for God, but for our own faces." Always a temptation.

David Warren concludes:

To put it another way, we have used art as a means to break down our own narcissism; and over time, repeatedly, we have found the enemies of art to be fanatics.

Yet recently, from our society at large, we have been stripping the symbolism, the public imagery that recreates what we are and believe -- mostly to achieve the lowest common denominator of “multiculturalism.” And now, even our churches are becoming bare and "unwestern."

This is another aspect of the suicide of the West.

Dhimmitude is alive and well and spreading insideously through the heartland. First they came for Santa Claus. Now it's the Easter Bunny. From yesterday's Minneapolis-St.Paul Star-Tribune [via Laura Lee Donoho of The Wide Awake Cafe]:

A small Easter display was removed from the City Hall lobby on Wednesday out of concern that it would offend non-Christians.

The story went on to explain that a secretary decorates her area, which is apparently near or in the office lobby, for each holiday. This time it was “a cloth Easter bunny, pastel-colored eggs and a sign which said ‘Happy Easter.’” This, apparently, enraged the city’s human rights director because it negated, damaged or threatened somebody’s human rights. This tower of Midwestern cultural nobility, Tyrone Terrill, said that nobody had complained to him about it, and no city money was used to finance the display, so his actions clearly are signs that we are looking at the man’s character, here.

As our imail correspondent comments,

It's astonishing that we have to stop and take notice of Ramadan, but we must ignore Easter.

Not as long as there's a blogosphere. We stand more firmly than ever behind our very first post, over two years ago, "The tidings that dare not speak their name."