by David Burn | Jun 29, 2006 | Media, Politics
When you publish a small town newspaper in a conservative, faith-based community, it takes “stones” to run a weekly column from John David Rose, especially when the man is in top form, as he was in yesterday’s piece.
Freedom-hating Christian fanatics seek to write their peculiar, strained interpretations of “holy writ” into our body of law, democracy be damned.
The threat is not overblown, it’s real.
A secretive theo-political movement set out a decade ago with the goal of imposing Old Testament law upon the United States. Now working under a number of guises, their enemy is democracy, their objective theocracy.
One of the “25 articles” of a coalition of Christian fundamentalist leaders declares: “We deny that anyone, Jew or Gentile, believer or unbeliever, private person or public official, is exempt from the moral and judicial obligation before God to submit to Christ’s lordship over every aspect of life, thought, word and deed.” The coalition’s “biblical blueprint” for the United States advocates the death penalty, preferably by stoning, for homosexuals, adulterers, blasphemers, astrologers, witches, teachers of false doctrine and incorrigible children.
Fundamentalist leaders like James Dobson (Focus on the Family) and Robertson (Christian Broadcasting Net work) and others of their ilk, Christo fascists in clerical disguise, use the tithes of bedazzled followers to enrich themselves and intimidate media, mainline churches and those who dare oppose them in what they characterize as the struggle between good and evil, God and Satan.
The editors and publisher of Bluffton Today deserve some kind of award for bravery, and for their faith in the U.S. Constitution, which protects the rights of a free press. Maybe the Pulitzer crew could create a new category for just this type of thing.
by David Burn | Jun 28, 2006 | Literature
A letter from Harper Lee, the 80-year old Pulitzer Prize-winning author or To Kill A Mockingbird, is appearing in this July’s O Magazine. This would not be a story, except for the fact Lee stopped giving interviews about 40 years ago and, other than a 1983 review of an Alabama history book, has published nothing of significance in some four decades.
In her letter to Oprah, Lee tells of her discovery of books as a girl growing up in a rural, Depression-era Alabama town. She writes about the scarcity of books in the 1930s in Monroeville, where she grew up and still lives for part of the year. That deficit, combined with a lack of anything else to do – no movies for kids, no parks for games – made books especially treasured, she writes.
“Now, 75 years later in an abundant society where people have laptops, cell phones, iPods and minds like empty rooms, I still plod along with books.”
While the literati has likened Lee to Ralph Ellison and J.D. Salinger for her reclusiveness, the Mobile Register says she is far from reclusive. Accordingto the paper, Lee has been described by friends and neighbors as “amiable,” “serious about golf,” “charming,” and “at times cantankerous.”
by David Burn | Jun 27, 2006 | Media, Politics
According to Associated Press reporter, Terrence Hunt, President Bush today sharply condemned the disclosure of a program to secretly monitor the financial transactions of suspected terrorists. “The disclosure of this program is disgraceful,” he said.
“For people to leak that program and for a newspaper to publish it does great harm to the United States of America,” Bush said, jabbing his finger for emphasis.
No.
An administration actively dismantling The Bill of Rights does great harm to this nation. An administration willing to lie and manipulate meaning does great harm to this nation. An administration that takes us to war under false pretenses does great harm to this nation. An administration that blows a CIA operative’s cover for political leverage does great harm to this nation. An administration with a blind eye to torture does great harm to this nation.
I keep thinking there’s hope. That the people will come to their senses and ride these clowns out of town. But that will never happen when the only source of truth–a free media–is under constant attack.
Is it not obvious how important discrediting the media is to the right? They have their own TV network (run by the same man who put the first King George in office) which spews propaganda 24/7. That ought to give us a pretty good clue how important media manipulation is to their strategy.
Karl Rove has memorized Joseph Goebbels’ playbook. And we are all worse off for his mastery.
by David Burn | Jun 24, 2006 | Music
“It seems like a critical time to participate in our democracy,” says Eddie Vedder. “I think we’re representatives of America. We certainly have as much clout as, well, Rush Limbaugh. So if he’s gonna fuckin’ blow hot air, using his platform, then we should be doing the same.”
[from Rolling Stone’s cover story on Pearl Jam]
by David Burn | Jun 23, 2006 | Lowcountry, The Environment
Dean Schmelter, who owns several chemical processing businesses throughout the Southeast, was speaking to his mechanic at Black Forest Imports in Mount Pleasant last summer. He was complaining about the high cost of fuel. The mechanic, being of sound mind, said, “You’re a chemist. Do something about it.” He did. And now, the Lowcountry is about to benefit from this man’s ingenuity.
According to The Charleston Post and Courier:
The Lowcountry’s first biodiesel plant will be built in an unused warehouse on the former Navy base, creating a local source of nontoxic, low-cost fuel that can be used in nearly any diesel engine and marking a further advance in what’s been a largely backyard industry in South Carolina.
While one biodiesel plant already is being operated in the Upstate by Carolina Biofuels, the North Charleston plant will be unique in that it will use waste vegetable oil from hundreds of area restaurants to eventually fill the tanks of school buses, automobiles, trucks and even shrimp boats.
Rudolph Diesel, founder of the diesel engine, originally created his spark plug-free motor so that farmers could power their tractors with oil from plants they grew. Nearly any diesel engine built today will run on straight vegetable oil, but the fuel system must be modified to heat the oil so it flows smoothly. This process is unnecessary with biodiesel.
by David Burn | Jun 10, 2006 | Literature
David Romtvedt is Wyoming’s poet laureate. I had not heard of the man until this morning, when I read his geo-cultural essay, “Red Politics And Blue In Wyoming” in this month’s issue of The SUN.
Coding our states red or blue according to whether they have given their electoral-college votes to a Republican or a Democratic candidate tells us very little about the people who live there and with whom we pass our lives. This simple-minded labeling is degrading. It isolates us and forces us to lead lives that are intellectually and emotionally impoverished. Worse, it is an early symptom of the thinking that led to ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and to the restructuring of Baghdad into separate Sunni and Shiite neighborhoods.
Having spent much of my life in so-called red states–I’m from Nebraska and I live in South Carolina–I found Romtvedt’s piece moving. And it left me wanting to read more of his work.
According to Milkweed, David Romtvedt was born in Portland, Oregon and raised in southern Arizona. He graduated from Reed College in 1972 and received an MFA from the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, and was a graduate fellow in Folklore and Ethnomusicology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is the author of two books of fiction and several books of poetry including the National Poetry Series selection A Flower Whose Name I Do Not Know. His work has appeared, most recently, in Prairie Schooner, Ploughshares, and North American Review.
Romtvedt believes literature has a role to play in the protection and expansion of democracy. He says his writing arises from trying to understand the collisions between our personal lives–domestic activities, family, friends–and larger social and spiritual issues.
by David Burn | Jun 9, 2006 | Music
Harp Magazine has an interesting piece on Michael Stipe of R.E.M. and Conor Oberst of Bright Eyes. The pub makes several comparisons between the two, but when it comes to the subject of Stipe, 46, being some kind of guru, or “godfather” to Oberst, 26, Stipe says it’s not like that.
I’ve compared it in the past to the tugboat operators who move up and down the Hudson River in New York City and have a very peculiar and a very particular job, and they have a bar that they go to and they have a vernacular that their wives or partners don’t understand, and little stories about their jobs that only tugboat operators will understand. Well, that’s exactly what it’s like to be a singer in a band. It’s a very particular little universe that you move through. It’s really nice to find somebody who’s experienced the same things that you have.
by David Burn | Jun 9, 2006 | Digital culture, Literature
Wendy Atterberry and Sarah Hatter publish Awesome!, a site about cool shit. The pair also launched a book publishing concern in January, Misc. Books and Press. Their first release, The Very Best Weblog Writing Ever By Anyone Anywhere In The Whole Wide World, is now available for pre-order.
We were so sick of bad writing and boring weblogs getting so much attention, we started a publishing company with the intent to issue an anthology of the best weblog writing we could find. We wanted to bring all the attention back to people who deserved to be mentioned in the press but were overlooked because of the popularity of the status quo.
Sure enough, I’ve only heard of two of the authors–Claire Zulkey and Holly Burns. The others I need to discover.
The release of this book brings me back to a topic I’ve given a lot of thought to in recent months–writing styles and editorial directions on blogs, particularly my own. I generally practice what’s become known as cut and paste blogging. My posts here and on Adpulp tend to be more about what I’m reading, than what I’m writing. I point to things.
Because I have other outlets for my writing and writing is my job, I don’t often feel the need to stretch creatively in this space. I approach it more like note taking. My blog posts are a narrative archive that I can access later, for whatever reason. And I’m good with that, but when I read a literary blogger or professional journalist who does use her blog to stretch creatively, it gives me reason to pause.
by David Burn | Jun 4, 2006 | Digital culture, Music
There’s a new Panic podcast, or Panicast, on the block. We have Ted Rockwell of Everyday Companion to thank for this effort.
At the moment, I’m listening to the Panic’s first-ever performance at Red Rocks in Morrison, CO. I love early 90s Panic. It’s got that whiskey in hand, rocking chair on the front porch sound that I find comforting.
Everday Companion Podcast is available on iTunes. There are curretnly nine episodes for download. Just search for “Widespread Panic” in the podcast directory.
by David Burn | Jun 4, 2006 | Chicago, Food & Beverage, Place
I returned to Chicago this week for the first time since I moved from the city 16 months ago. It was a good trip. I stayed at Kimpton’s Hotel Monaco on Wacker and Wabash. I enjoyed some salmon downstairs at South Water Kitchen before venturing out to The Map Room, “A Traveller’s Tavern” on the corner of Hoyne and Armitage. While there I finally got my first taste of Victory’s HopDevil Ale.
The brewer’s site describes it thusly:
Menacingly delicious, with the powerful, aromatic punch of whole flower American hops backed up by rich, German malts. HopDevil Ale offers a roller coaster ride of flavor, coasting to a smooth finish that satisfies fully.
I had reason to cheer. Since, my hotel was but a block from 233 N. Michigan, I could not help but reflect on how much things have changed for the better since I stopped working in that black building. Which is not to say I don’t love Chicago, because I do. Without a doubt, it’s one the great American cities along with San Francisco and New York.
While we don’t have the number of amazing restaurants, neighborhood bars or limitless live music possibilities, life in Lowcountry or Slowcountry, if you will, has its own advantages–natural beauty, great weather, affordable housing and recreational pursuits like beachcombing, boating, fishing, surfing, etc. Yet the thing that trumps all of this is the fact that I now have the job I was looking for in Chicago and could not find.
