Skyfall

I'm a big 007 junkie. Love the series even though the movies are often completely ridiculous. It's all about the escapism for me.

Skyfall is pretty good. I found it lagging a bit at times. Javier Bardiem plays one of the best villians in the series. Daniel Craig is the best Bond since Connery if not better in some ways.

Glad Q and Moneypenny are back. I'm also glad M's office is moving back to the traditional wood paneled office with the padded door. Although the 1965 Aston Martin DB5 has made a few cameos in recent Bond flicks (Tomorrow Never Dies and Casino Royale) it actually got a centerpiece moment which was very well done.

The whole thing felt very retro yet with a modern tinge that freshened everything up.

2012 Election Post-Mortem

I don't believe in jumping to hasty conclusions. I do not believe the 2012 election signifies the end of the Republican Party or that we have entered a watershed moment in American demography. I don't believe American attitudes have shifted that dramatically. As we move forward we'll see if patterns continue to develop and trends emerge. I'm sure they are evolving.   However, the truth is elections come down to the candidates themselves. Mitt Romney did not lose because of a supposedly liberal media. He did not lose because of voter suppression conspiracies. He did not lose because of a hurricane or Chris Christie. He did not, as the Wall Street Journal absurdly claimed this week, because of a lack of funds. He lost because he was a weak candidate who could not even fire up his own base.   He lost because evangelicals weren't enthusiastic about a man who was once a bishop in a religion that denies the divinity of Jesus Christ. He lost because he changed his positions on just about every issue you could imagine to win votes from the right. These issues included core convictions that people simply don't change at the drop of the hat including abortion, capital punishment, gay rights and healthcare. The guy invents Romneycare (as Santorum labeled it) and then runs away from it as fast as he could.   People didn't trust the guy. He was rich by the mysterious means of venture capitalism which very few of us really understand. He refused to release his tax returns. When he released one it showed he had paid a rate 14% lower than mine...a teacher. He had bank accounts in the Caymans and Switzerland. He had no problem completely reversing himself in the middle of the primary debates. He offered Rick Perry that $10,000 bet (who does that?) and of course saw 47% of Americans as freeloading welfare leechers. In the first debate he completely denied his own budget plan which he had been touting for ten months. Then he said Jeep was moving their operations to China which the Republican CEO of Chrysler completely repudiated.   The only response Repubicans have is that Obama is worse.   And that's the problem. The Republicans have been so focused on being against Obama that they haven't been able to be for anyone. Look at the loons they had running in the primary. Santorum, Gingrich, Cain, Bachmann and Perry? Seriously? That's the best you got? Each one got their time in the sun because the Republicans wanted ABR (anybody but Romney). Then each of these loons fell on their own swords and Romney was the best alternative in a sorry lot.   I may not agree with all their positions but John Huntsman, Bobby Jindal, Chris Christie, Mitch Daniels and Marco Rubio would all have had a better chance of beating Obama than any of those nutjobs. Think about that. Obama against any one of those guys. I'm thinking unless any of those guys had had real skeletons come out of the closet they would have mopped up against Obama. Just speculation of course.   So the essential question is what is it about the Republican Party as currently constituted that discourages their most qualified leaders to run for their party's presidential nomination? Romney would have had a chance had he not had to move his positions so far to the right to appeal to the tea party wing. His move to the right came off as disingenious and he never could shed that label of being a flip-flopper.   Obama should have lost this election. The Republicans had an open door to the White House. Demographics and party issues are interesting and perhaps important but the real reason the GOP lost is because they put up a weak candidate.   The Democrats went through the same thing back in the 1980's with Mondale and Dukakis and then Kerry in '00s. These elections weren't about seismic shifts in American attitudes. It was about a weak candidate getting beat by the stronger candidate. Only the Gore loss is a bit of an anamoly since he was the VP during an economically successful (although morally bankrupt) administration. The Democrats can always blame Nader for that one. Plus, Bush was a much stronger candidate than Romney ever hoped to be.   If I was a Republican that would give me hope. I would stop making excuses and talking about how evil Obama is. I would start looking for a candidate that can win a national election. America is a centrist nation. We don't like people on the fringes either right or left. We can handle center-right or center-left. But you gotta get a candidate out there who can people can actually get behind.

Buddy Holly

For old times sake. The best music video ever. Circa 1995. =w=

Romney/Ryan Tax Plan

The Romney/Ryan Campaign have finally released their budget plan. You can find the details HERE.

Binders

Shaky Pedastals

 

 

I have really wanted to believe Lance Armstrong. Despite years of allegations I always gave him the benefit of the doubt although admittedly there was always a nagging little voice in the back of mind warning that something didn't seem right about Lance.

I shrugged off the French journalists as jealous xenophobes. I blew off the American journalists as attention hungry muckrakers. I dismissed his former teammates as bitter.

But the evidence continued to pile up. Even his best friends gave up the goods. Lance himself gave up trying to defend himself. But then it got even worse. Reams of evidence has been released that show that Lance not only used PEDs he was active in pushing them on others. It has been revealed that he was the mastermind of a wide spread and sophisticated doping operation.

Nike (NIKE!) has ditched him. Lance has even been forced to step aside from his own cancer fighting charity LIVESTRONG.

And it's all terribly sad. This guy misled millions of fans. He was the inspiration for so many cancer fighters and athletes. And now it turns out that he was a cheat. He was a dealer. He was a criminal. All while playing the sanctimonious cancer survivor card. And there's even a possibility that he got his cancer as a side effect from doping. That's mere speculation but testicular cancer is indeed a well known possible side effect of the type of PEDs he's been accused of taking.

Dwell on that one for a minute. The one thing that gave him moral credibility, the one thing that kept a lot of people off his back, the one thing that served as a huge inspiration to others...surviving cancer...may have been caused by him cheating and breaking the law. It's in the realm of possibility that he may have never gotten cancer had he not taken PEDs.

Sickening.

I watched all seven of Lance's Tour de France victories. I rooted him on. I wore the yellow bracelet. I argued in his favor through years of allegations. Turns out he wasn't worth it.

Of course this happens when you place your faith in human beings.

No words...

 

 

Dinesh D'Souza is one of the most dangerous men in America. But fortunately his hubris has finally caught up with him.

His "documentary" Obama:2016 was nothing more than character assassination. Even the conservative magazine, The Weekly Standard, dismissed it out of hand as the ravings of a right wing lunatic. In fact, that is an insult to right wingers and lunatics everywhere.

In his debates and interviews, desperate for credibility,  Dinesh always reminds people that he is a college president. However, he conveniently forgets to remind people that when he took over The King's "College" it had seventeen students. It was a school that had gone bankrupt and actually dissolved until revived by the Campus Crusade for Christ (now called Cru). Until recently the school's motto was "God, Money, Power." At least they put God first.

Academic credibility? D'Souza does not possess an advanced degree nor had he ever taught before becoming a "college president."

And now World Magazine, an evangelical magazine, has exposed him as a full fledged hypocrite. At a values conference in South Carolina event organizers discovered that he was sharing a room with a woman he introduced as his fiancee. Even more interesting was the fact that he wasn't divorced from his first wife at the time. The King's "College" is now investigating. D'Souza says that he did indeed share a room with the woman but that "nothing happened." Their engagement has since been called off.

What an absolute and disgusting hypocrite who's an embarassment to anyone who identifies themselves as a Christian.

My Newest Hero

On the back wall of my classroom I have a section I call the wall of heroes. Lined in a row are figures both current and historical who inspire me in some way. I added a new portrait this week. Malala Yousafzai is a 14 year old girl who lives in the Swat Valley of Pakistan. She has been a passionate advocate for the right of girls to attend school. For the past few years, since she was eleven, she has written and spoken eloquently about the transformative power of education. 

The Taliban extremists who live in the region found her a great threat to her twisted ideology. Last week they boarded her school bus and in front of her frightened classmates shot her twice, once in the head and once in the neck.

Miraculously she survived the attack. Her life still hangs in the balance. At the time of this writing she was in critical but stable condition. The Taliban have vowed to murder her should she survive this first attempt at assassination.

She is an inspiration to me. I hope she is able to resume a normal life. I hope the attempt on her life can finally galvanize the Pakistani people to once and for all reclaim their nation from these mindless thugs.

Malala Yousafzai (1998 -      ) is one of my newest heroes.

Specialization Schmelcialization

My whole post-secondary academic career I was pressured to specialize in one particular area of history. Problem is, I get bored easily. I am fascinated by all areas of history. I didn’t want to dedicate my life to one highly specialized area of study. I didn’t want to dedicate years of my life to one subject. Some enjoy that level of detail. I, however, am a proud generalist. This shot of my daily topic board is what I love best about my job. In one day I’m ranging all the way from Chinese philosophy to French religious history. It’s also why I actually like having three different preps (classes). In fact that’s one reason why I’m pursuing a Masters in the Humanities at SMU…it allows me to range all over the spectrum of history, art, religion, culture and literature.

The Weirdness of Homecoming Week

So sophomore Kevin Olvera made this light-up mouse helmet to wear on Homecoming Friday. He “scavenged” materials from around his house and garage. The shell is made made from an old world globe. Kevin built it in only a day. Now, I’m not sure how this relates to KHS Homecoming. The helmet is gold in color which is one our school colors. But regardless, I was greatly impressed by the creativity and work behind the creation of this mask thing.

State Fair Madness

Went to The State Fair of Texas today. Some photos of our excursion can be found on my Flickr site HERE.

Incomplete Thoughts on Free Will

Six students from the high school where I teach were involved in a fiery car accident this past week. Their Suburban rolled over and crashed into an electrical tower. The SUV caught fire. Two students were thrown from the vehicle. Three others were trapped. One student heroically dragged the unconscious students from the burning overturned wreck. All six survived although some are dealing with long term injuries.

People are describing their survival as miraculous, that God must have had his hand on them. 

I must admit that I'm not so sure. On April 19th, 1995 me and two college classmates were scheduled to take a tour in the Murrah Bulding in Oklahoma City. One of them called the night before to cancel due to a school golf tournament. Had he not cancelled we may have been in that building when it was bombed. We possibly survived that day because of a fluke phone call ten hours before the explosion. 168 others, including over a dozen children, weren't so fortunate.

In 1984 I survived a traumatic car accident while my sister who was sitting next to me was permanently disabled. Three people in the other car were killed that day.

I know all the theological arguments and pithy statements suggesting otherwise, but I can't easily accept the idea that God chooses to save some and allows others to die or suffer. I especially can't accept that fact when some pretty rotten human beings survive these things while some Christian people, like my former student Collin who drowned this past summer, do not.

You can psychoanalyse me all you want. You can say I have survivor's guilt or whatever. But I wholeheartedly reject Calvinist predestination or fatalism. I believe in free will. I believe that we live in a fallen world. I believe that things in this life are not fair. I cannot accept that God chooses at certain times not to intervene to save someone from death on this earth when he has the power to do so. His salvation is fulfilled when we do die and enter His Kingdom.

And yet, perhaps contradictory to my position I still pray every day for God's protection for my son and wife. I will continue to pray for healing for people because one, prayer is meant more to get us into communion with God rather than provide Him with a wish list and second, I'm well aware that my ideas about the nature of His intervention could be wrong or short-sighted or both. My comprehension of His grace and mercy are pathetically ignorant.

I do believe in God's calling, however I do not believe we have a predetermined path. Many Christians fret about big decisions...is this God's will or not? I believe that if you are walking in true relationship with him you are always in God's will no matter the circumstances.

I do believe God does intervene in the world through the Holy Spirit. I do believe The Holy Spirit comforts, empowers and provides wisdom. 

Yes, I know you can drive buses through the holes in these views of faith. But the question is, how much do you truly believe in free will?

photo: that was the Suburban, yes a Suburban, the six students were riding in. It was completely burned up.

Wait, what?

"This contemptuous disdain for our elected leaders of either party is worrisome and unhealthy for our democracy." Dr. John Mears - SMU

Dr. Mears is a legendary professor on the Hilltop. I'm currently taking his course The Cultural and Intellectual History of Europe. I agree wholeheartedly with his assessment.

The other day, one of my friends posted on facebook that he had overheard a conversation in a restaurant between two old men who were comparing President Obama to Hitler. My friend, a Republican who does not support Obama's re-election bid, was nevertheless shocked that these two ignorant fools actually believed what they were saying.

What was more shocking was some of the comments posted on my friend's status. Many of these are people I knew at SNU and are supposedly educated although their words indicate otherwise. One said "Those old guys are right! Look at Obama's agenda!" Another said, "He may not be like Hitler personally but governmentally he has a lot in common, after all Nazi means National Socialist." Another said "we can never truly know what's in Obama's heart."

My moderate Republican friend tried valiantly to argue that no matter how much he disagrees with Obama on matters of policy, comparing him to Hitler is the height of insanity. He said Obama has never invaded another nation with the the goal of wiping out an entire race and so on...

Although tempted I refused to comment on the facebook status because I know how much of a waste it is to argue with morons. Logic doesn't apply to these folks.

First, Hitler's National Socialism has nothing in common with the Marxist Socialism that right wing whackos accuse Obama of espousing. Only the word is the same. In fact, Nazis considered Communists their mortal ideological enemies. National socialism did not favor a planned economy. Nazis had no problem with the concept of private property. Most upper-class businessmen in Germany and Italy favored the fascists because they represented order in the midst of economic chaos.

And most true socialists are upset that Obama isn't socialist enough for their liking. Obama has deep ties with Wall Street. It was his administration that bailed out the banks and the auto industry. It was the Bush administration that propagated a war for no good reason, created the No Child Left Behind standardized education system and The Patriot Act which brought government intrusiveness into private lives to a whole new level. And everyone knows Bush was no socialist or fascist.

The last time America had a balanced budget was during a centrist-Democratic administration. America's debt has grown expotentially more under Republican administrations. Yet there are fools out there who compare Obama to Hitler, ignoring the fact that Hitler was a rascist who executed people of color by the millions.

Disagree with Obama but leave the contempt and mischaracterizations aside. Yes, I've been guilty of the same treatment toward other political figures. But I now realize how dangerous such behavior is. Please join me in trying to help promote civil dialogue in this nation.

jPod

Last night my wife and I stopped at the Half Price Bookstore in Mesquite. She was wanting to buy a gift for a friend. While she was shopping I wandered over to the fiction section. I normally gravitate to my three favorite living authors Douglas Coupland, Dave Eggers and David Mitchell.

I pulled out a hardback copy of one of Coupland's books, jPod. It's one of the few of his works I haven't read although it's been on my wish list for awhile. When I opened the cover I was stunned to find what appeared to be his signature in the front cover. It was addressed to "Sam of Austin." The inside cover even had a post-it note with the name Sam on it. By all appearances it looked like the typical situation where a writer is given a stack of books to sign to specific people. Somehow or another this book had made its way from Austin to Dallas.

I was super excited. Here was a signed edition of a book by one of my favorite authors. Half Price Books had it priced at $7.99. I hadn't planned on buying any books that night but I got that one quick. When we got home I immediately went online to find photos of Coupland's signature. Sure enough it looked exactly like the dozens I found via Google. It had his distinguishing X mark as well.

You see, Douglas Coupland is one of the most important post-modern novelists of the late 20th and 21st century. He is the man who coined the term "Generation X" which is often applied to those of us born in the mid 1960's through the mid 1970's. Generation X, his first novel, became a major benchmark in observations of our particular little subset of society. GenX was a satirical reaction against the over labelization of culture.

Coupland, a Canadian, has also become world renowned as an modern artist. His books and artwork are amazing. He's been one of my touchstone authors since at least 1992 when I was first exposed to his work.

And by sheer dumb coincidence I have come into a signed edition of one of his works. I asked my wife how could Sam have let this out of his possession? She said maybe Sam got a divorce and his ex pawned the book to Half Price or maybe Sam died, who knows? I whispered "Sam's dead." I just wanted to buy the book and get out of there before Half Price Books realized what they had missed.

4,486

Yes I'm mad.

I'm mad because documents released this week show the CIA admitting they were wrong about WMD's in Iraq. It's nothing we didn't already know but now it's official. Now it's on the record. And all the CIA basically has to say is "oops."

Oops?

4,486 Americans died because of that oops. And you know what? No one will be held accountable. George W. Bush will continue to live his cushy live in Preston Hollow. Dick Cheney will continue to live in his Halliburton retirement funded bunker. Rumsfeld will continue to mumble nonsense to himself wherever he finds himself.

There will be no prosecutions, trials or even a simple investigation. 4,486 brave American soldiers dead and no one will be held accountable for the fact that they were sent to Iraq on false pretenses.

They have congressional hearings for steroids in baseball but not for faulty government intelligence that led us into war?

Remember the reason we went to war was because we were told without a doubt, by Colin Powell on the floor of the UN Security Council chamber, that the Iraqis possessed weapons of mass destruction. Even Powell has offered various mea culpas the past few years for what he admits were "faulty intelligence."

I was called Un-American and unpatriotic for opposing this war in 2003. I was called a nut for believing it had more to do with oil and Halliburton than WMDs.

You say this is all old news and I need to get over it? Tell that the the loved ones of 4,486 young Americans who died trusting their government.

Maybe we should think about that number, 4,486, the next time we are tempted to jump on the war bandwagon.

Maybe we should think about that when the party that stoked that war fever asks us for their vote.

Fiesta de Propaganda

Why bother watching the political conventions? Both the Republican and Democratic conventions are nothing but propaganda festivals filled with exaggerations, distortions and downright lies. It's high time the networks stop broadcasting these ridiculous pep rallies. They do nothing to serve the political process in America.

If people aren't informed enough about the candidates by now then that's due to laziness. If you want a better introduction to the candidates watch the upcoming debates. But don't waste your time watching the Pharisee and Sadducee conventions.

In fact, let's ban political parties altogether. Good ideas are often rejected simply because it came from across the aisle. After all, "Obamacare" was the invention of the Republican nominee. It's worked quite well in Massachusetts. But because it's now associated with the Democratic Party it's become toxic to Romney and he's gone to great lengths to distance himself from his creation.

I guarantee our economy would have improved much more quickly if both sides had agreed to work together. But the GOP didn't want Obama to get any credit and obstructed at every opportunity. And the Dems would do the same thing if a Republican was in office. Let's ditch them both.

Happy Labor Day!

Sure, labor unions have sometimes evolved in troubling ways. Like most institutions of man they have often become corrupt, selfish and self-destructive. But a couple of things to remember this Labor Day is that without labor unions the United States may have come close to experiencing a revolution, similar to the Russian Revolution, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Tensions were high due to the excesses of laissez faire capitalism. Violence and worker unrest was common across the nation. But concessions earned by labor unions took away the incentive for all out revolt by the working classes. These same concessions may have also prevented more revolutionary fervor during the Great Depression as well.

Because of labor unions we have...

• Forty Hour work weeks.
• Paid overtime.
• Workman's Compensation in case of workplace injury.
• Due process in termination.
• Eight hour work days.
• Minimum Wage.
• Vacation days.

Yes, the excesses of labor unions may have contribued to the near collapse of the American auto industry a few years ago. But overall they have been a great for our nation and today I salute them.

Me and SMU

Classes started at SMU last week. I'm only taking one course this semester: The Cultural and Intellectual History of Europe. It's a two part class. This semester begins with the Renaissance and ends with the Enlightenment. It dovetails very nicely with my AP European History course which also begins with the Renaissance. Plus it's taught by a legend in history circles. Dr. Mears was once president of the World History Association. He's been at SMU since 1967 but is still as sharp as ever. We meet around a Harkness style table in Dallas Hall (pictured above. It's the first building built on campus and the oldest) and the course is in the seminar format. The first class went very well and has me stoked about the semester.

The Temple of Doom is Ready

The classroom (The Temple of Doom) is cleaned up and ready to go. School starts Monday. This will be my fourteenth year in education. It also happens to be the halfway year for me to attain full retirement. But in fourteen years my son will be a freshman in college so I doubt I'll be quite ready financially to retire. This room has been my classroom for twelve of the past fourteen years. It was also the birthplace of our cat Simba. Long story.

QR Code Madness!

I am somebody!

The internets knows me!

I finally have a QR Code!

Okay, so I may be behind the game but I know I'm ahead of some you out there. I don't have a smartphone. In fact my phone is quite dumb. I even took off the data pack on my phone plan because I didn't want to be one of "those guys," Those guys who always have their head bent over staring mindlessly at a tiny screen. People are often shocked that I don't have an iPhone or at the very least an Android.

So I had no use for those QR codes, you know those little squares of garbled lines that when you scan them with your smartphone direct you to a website.

But now I have an iPad thanks to my school district. And last week during iPad training we learned about QR Code generators. So I've gone QRazy. I've put QR codes on the back of my personal business cards which direct your mobile browser to my blog. That may not be a great idea with all the nonsense I post on here.

However, I also have a QR Code for my school website. I have it posted on the wall of my classroom. If students point their smartphones and click it will direct their browser to my school website. That will direct them to study guides, make-up work and all sorts of other important things for class. Typing in an entire browser address seems too laborious for today's students so we're making it easy for them.

If you open up your QR app on your iPad or phone and scan the code at the top of this blog you'll be directed to my school website. Yes, maybe I'm easily impressed. And maybe this is so 2007 techwise. But for me, it blows my mind.