Everyone knows what senior civil servants are like. They're all grey in colour; they read summaries of books that discuss how to team-build effectively through inspirational PowerPoint presentations; if they once dreamt of anything else, those sweet dreams of youth are now long dead.Now an exciting new item out of the States knocks those assumptions into a cocked hat. It seems it is possible to hold on to the passions that define you extracurricularly even while haunting the corridors of power (who knew they had those in Michigan?).CNN reports that, "For nearly six months, Andrew Shirvell, an assistant attorney general for the state of Michigan, has waged an internet campaign against college student Chris Armstrong, the openly gay student assembly president at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor." And not just an internet campaign, really, when you consider that Shirvell has also picketed Armstrong's family home. Primarily, though, Shirvell has conducted what he calls his "Chris Armstong Watch" through his blog.Shirvell has decided to spend his time targeting Armstrong rather than, say, dragon-boat racing or playing competitive Scrabble, because he feels that Armstrong is "Satan's representative on the student assembly." He claims it's within his rights to identify Satan's local representative because he is acting as a private citizen. Wouldn't you start a blog if a minion of Satan were agitating for extended cafeteria hours at your local post-secondary institution?And anyone who thinks that politics and loyalty are incompatible is in for a pleasant surprise. Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox has made no move to remove Shirvell, although CNN's legal correspondent assures me that it is entirely within his rights to do so, regardless of the First Amendment. It's possible this lack of action has something to do with the fact that Shirvell and Cox share many strong Conservative values and that Cox is interested in retaining the support of the evangelical Christian voting bloc. So all in all, a lovely and heart-warming tale with a couple of important lessons:1) Civil servants don't have to choose between personal interests and taxpayers' money; and,2) Even in politics, you can still count on your friends, as long as you all hate Satan.
Send the Catastrophizer your requests for advice and/or rationalizations using the form conveniently provided HERE. I will publish my responses on the THE CATASTROPHIZER page.
POLITE DISCLAIMER: This site is intended for entertainment purposes only. If you are not entertained, fair enough. Also, I'm not very good at copy-editing, so if something looks wrong, it was put there by accident.
Various Important Lessons that can be conveniently illustrated thanks to a cursory examination of CNN's website 1. Trouble Doesn't Save You From More Trouble.Some sadly inexperienced and unimaginative people believe that once they have been burdened with a terrible weight of pain, the world will somehow see to it that they are given no more of it. It might make is less likely that you will suffer great hardships after already having suffered great hardships, but that doesn't make it beyond the bounds of possibility. Never, ever, believe yourself to be safe from additional tribulations.Case in Point: Fires burn across Detroit as high winds knock down power lines.2. Sometimes Hollywood movies aren't far-fetched; or, death from above.This morning, a "small" (still very large) asteroid passed "very close" (still very far away) to the earth. Another is slated to do so later on today. NASA is calling on people to care about astronomy beyond just taking one undergraduate course in it and arguing there is a need for "closer monitoring of near space for Earth-threatening encounters". This is all very disturbing, as A) we could all at some point be killed by objects from space, and B) NASA could be on the verge of admitting we are all "harvested beings" living in a facility, but way less attractive than Ewan McGregor and Scarlet Johansson.3. Your position is never unassailable.No matter how successful, gorgeous, and rich you are (and if you are any or all of these things, I refuse to believe you visit this website), you must never consider yourself immune from the nasty tricks Fortune has a tendency to play. Case in Point: Just when Texas thought it was a shoe-in for the Craziest State in the Union title, who should come of nowhere but Florida? Texas spent all that time changing its text books so that the slave trade would now be referred to by schoolchildren as the "Atlantic triangular trade" (not kidding) and trying to get approval for the Institute for Creation Research to offer a master's degree in science education (not kidding), and now it might all be for nothing. The Dove World Outreach Centre in Gainsville, Florida, plans to hold "International Burn a Quran Day" on the ninth anniversary of the September 11th attack on the World Trade Centre. If you are unable to make it to Gainsville, never fear. I'm sure there's still a way for you to purchase one of the church's "Islam is of the Devil" t-shirts or mugs. Don't think, though, that combatting the spread of radical Islam (by which they mean plain old Islam) is their only occupation. They also make time to condemn Craig Lowe, the openly gay mayor of Gainsville. A sign on the church's front lawn reads: "Aug. 2 Protest, No Homo Mayor, City Hall." 4. If you have no obvious talents, you don't have to become a serial killer to garner media attention and win your place in history.At minimum 56 episodes of Criminal Minds feature some unfortunate white male in his 30s who concludes that only by killing numerous young women in a particularly gruesome way can he ensure he will be remembered after his death. If you have always wondered what small animals look like "on the inside", but don't yet own or rent a storage locker, never fear: there are other ways to catch the attention of posterity.Case in Point: "11 Students Stung by Yellow Jackets in Dover." Send the Catastrophizer your requests for advice and/or rationalizations using the form conveniently provided HERE. I will publish my responses on the THE CATASTROPHIZER page.
POLITE DISCLAIMER: This site is intended for entertainment purposes only. If you are not entertained, fair enough. Also, I'm not very good at copy-editing, so if something looks wrong, it was put there by accident.
I don't have the right kind of friends. I know this because not one of them has traveled in a bus through the United States arguing against Obama's socialist takeover of the country or burned Nancy Pelosi in effigy. Or burned Obama in effigy while traveling through Nancy Pelosi in a bus. Not ONE of my over-educated liberal elitist pay-what-you-can-theatre loving, The Wire-watching friends has sent me the hilarious email mentioned by Michael Goodwin in his timely and incisive opinion piece on foxnews.com: "Good News - The 'Move the Mosque' Movement is Growing". Tell me you don't feel your sides splitting because of all the mirth after reading this:
I just applied for a building permit for a new house. It was going to be 100 ft tall and 400 ft wide with 9 turrets at various heights and windows all over the place and a loud outside entertainment sound system. It would have parking for 200 old cars and I was going to paint it snot green with . . . pink trim. The City Council told me to f--- off. So I sent in the application again, but this time I called it a mosque. Work starts on Monday.
Get it? Your average (i.e. Christian, Obama-care hating, and rotund) American wants to build a giant hideous building somewhere and stupid bureaucrats will not let him, but a MUSLIM wants to build a giant hideous building and he's allowed to because bureaucrats love Muslims almost as much as they love screwing over populists. As Michael Goodwin states,
"It's a joke, one of those mass Internet mailings that gets a laugh and captures the spirit of the moment."
What concerns me is something I just quoted. That's right. The "mass Internet mailings" part. I use the internet. I check my email regularly to read the messages amazon.com has sent me confirming my order of the most recent Madeleine Albright memoir or This American Life CD compilation. Not ONCE have I found that humourous mosque email waiting for me in my inbox. I can only conclude that I don't have the right kind of friends.
I do, though, have a plan to remedy this situation. What I'm going to do is the following: convince a black or Middle Eastern-ish man with some ambiguous form of head-covering to walk through a crowd demonstrating against the mosque planned for the neighbourhood of Ground Zero. The first person who starts yelling at him and calling a coward? I'm giving that person my email address. Then Michael Goodwin and I can enjoy a good laugh in "the spirit of the moment" together.
Send the Catastrophizer your requests for advice and/or rationalizations using the form conveniently provided HERE. I will publish my responses on the THE CATASTROPHIZER page.
POLITE DISCLAIMER: This site is intended for entertainment purposes only. If you are not entertained, fair enough. Also, I'm not very good at copy-editing, so if something looks wrong, it was put there by accident.
If death were an encounter with an aquatic creature, which one would it be? I tend to think it would have something to do with a member of the cephalopod family, but for the purposes of this post, I am providing myself and you with only two choices: shark or dolphin.
I'm not going to do anything original or creative with these options. As such, the shark is the Bad (BLOOD IN THE WATER) One, and the Dolphin is the Good ("Pardon me, but does your ship need saving?") One.
So which one will you meet when death Comes For You? Obviously, it depends on whom you're going about asking. Those without belief will unerringly go for the shark. It's vicious. It's unerring. It's kind of cool. It will eat you without compunction and then go off to find a momentarily unguarded cephalopod and eat that as well. When death is an encounter with a shark, it means nothingness, extinction, no one being able to hear you scream if you were able to scream anymore which you emphatically are not.
And then you have the dolphin. Ah, the dolphin. Super-intelligent, but somehow not cool because of all the tween girls and "spiritual" adults with dolphin tattoos and necklaces. The dolphin death people are those with a belief in some kind of benevolent post-death experience. You run into the dolphin (death, in this analogy - follow closely, won't you?) and it greets you with smiles (really not a smile, just a physiological characteristic, but in this analogy, it's a smile) and friendly guidance. "Come with me," it says. "I'm like the boats at the end of Lord of the Rings. I will take you to another country. I will not eat you up like that son of a bitch Shark."
So which death scenario is correct? Do we believe in the cool, sharky atheists, or the friendly pious dolphins?
I believe in neither. Because both are based on some kind of faith. If we have a problem in mathematics, we can go and see the best mathematician and he (field still largely dominated by men, alas) will either give you the answer or tell you to get the hell out of his cramped bungalow. Ditto business (except for a far larger house)...English literature (although all answers will be provisional and totally unhelpful)...medicine (actually, still many advances to be made, but my point is that advances CAN be made)...but have a question about death, and where can you go? Whom can you ask?
"Oh, see a priest," someone would undoubtedly say. And the priest would tell you what he (field still largely dominated by men) really BELIEVES will happen. "Oh, see an atheist with a book on the New York Times bestseller list," someone else would undoubtedly say. And the atheist would tell you what he (it's either Hitchens or Dawkins) really BELIEVES will happen. They don't know anything. Both belief systems are BELIEF systems. There is not an expert in the world who can give you any real insight into death. The smartest people who have ever lived would be unable to help us because they are either alive and therefore cannot research the subject, or they are dead and can't publish the research.
So choose: shark or dolphin. You have a 50/50 chance of being something close to correct. Or do what I do and choose neither. That way, you can spend the rest of your life haunted by your own ignorance and the malign mysteries of the world.
Send the Catastrophizer your requests for advice and/or rationalizations using the form conveniently provided HERE. I will publish my responses on the THE CATASTROPHIZER page.
POLITE DISCLAIMER: This site is intended for entertainment purposes only. If you are not entertained, fair enough.
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