Charlotte Observer | 06/27/2004 | OBSERVATIONS COMPILED BY JANE MCALISTER POPE

The New York Times > Opinion > Garry Wills: The Bishops vs. the Bible

Nothing I have said is a defense of abortion. There are strong arguments from natural reason to oppose it, including a presumption in favor of personhood where the possibility exists. That they are not so strong as to command general assent does not free anyone from the duty of considering those arguments seriously, and of making a decision in conscience based on that consideration.

All I am saying is that the bishops have no special mandate from their office to supplant the individual conscience with some divine imperative. For them to say that this is a matter of theology is, simply, bad theological reasoning. If they, as citizens, wish to express their opinion on the natural-reason arguments, they have every right to do so. But that does not give them the right to deny others the same kind of arguing, on the same grounds. The subject of abortion is not a matter of church-state relations, since the bishops as church authorities have nothing distinctive to contribute to the discussion.

... hmmmm

cool pix at Kite Aerial Photography... thanks, pete...

i'm wondering how long my knee is gonna be jacked up... yeah... apparently maladjusted something with the jogging earlier in the week... kind of gimpy now

i'm hoping mom's road trip is going well

today's videobinge involved wag the dog and the apostle in that order... with a five-minute intermission... because i had to return rushmore and american splendor today anyway... and two thirds of my community would not be interested in waqtching these others... so... they were two fine movies... especially the latter... duval...

viewed and thoroughly enjoyed American Splendor last night... a formal playground... now yr in the cartoon now yr in the movie now yr sitting in the room watching the movie of harvey pekar... just too much fun for the gloomy subject

7. How would you explain what a poem is to my seven year old?
'It's like reading someone else's dream.' (via tex files)

R. I. P. Carl Rakosi (1903-2004)... read his poems "The Citizen"... and "The Lobster"

new poetry reviews at The Constant Critic

finally got around to seeing Rushmore (1998)... meh... some nice moments... but... i'm wondering why criterion (whcih version i did not see but have investigated) would give it such classy treatment... says more about criterion than the movie...

U B U W E B :: 365 Days Project... if you have the capacity to download and listen to the pieces in this project, yr in for a great treat... judging from the few i was able to access from school... back in the day... knock yrself out... (i believe it was the great jan brill who first told me about this)

'Some people out there think I'm a saint,' he laughed at the Albert Hall later in 1965, when jeers greeted his rock band ambling on-stage. 'But I ain't.'

He never was a one to meet expectations. True fans worship him warily. True geniuses don't offer a fixed target for adulation.

and just before now i was watching john sayles' casa de los babys... some touching stuff... how could women in search of babies to mother not be?... seemed like it didn't know how to end so he went with a lady or the tiger/limbo bit... not that there's anything wrong with that... this is one of sayles' big canvass movies... the social spectrum... could have used another hour or so for development of certain threads... or not

listening at this very moment to wilco's new a ghost is born... and liking it very much... a very pretty album... sonically (and graphically)... generally quieter... less expansive than the last two... very nice...

o... by the way, here's mine:

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):

Wal-Mart is famous for the stingy pay and benefits it offers its employees. But another giant chain store, Costco, is the opposite. It's so good to its workers that some business gurus disapprove. 'From the perspective of investors, Costco's benefits are overly generous,' says retail analyst Bill Dreher, quoted in the Wall Street Journal. He thinks the company's benevolence depresses its stock value because investors are afraid its profit margins aren't as high as they could be. But the fact is that Costco is very successful, and its five-year growth rate has been 10.1 percent annually, better than Wal-Mart's 9.8 percent. All this is preface, Virgo, for my warning that your gifts may also be criticized in the coming week. Be unfazed, please. Have faith that the best way to build your prosperity is to cultivate your generosity.

so bring it on... i'm ready...

Free Will Astrology... a quirky horoscope that cites whitman, dylan, ashbery, and the wall street journal

Old-Timey Printing Techniques Disappear

We know two aging printers - J. Hill Hamon in the Kentucky Bluegrass and Frank Anderson here in Spartanburg - but their days are probably numbered (numbers 98 and 99 in a limited signed edition of 100).

A residual handful of "private" presses, such as Larkspur Press in Kentucky, still produce occasional works for purchase, such as some works by Wendell Berry, but they are increasingly hard-to-find.

watched LotR3 last night... i suppose it's possible that someone would not be touched by it all... but i don't know why someone wouldn't want to be... a very pretty film

a random slice from The Devil's Dictionary... ambrose bierce was born 162 years ago...

ABSURDITY, n. A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with
one's own opinion.

ACADEME, n. An ancient school where morality and philosophy were
taught.

ACADEMY, n. [from ACADEME] A modern school where football is
taught.

ACCIDENT, n. An inevitable occurrence due to the action of immutable
natural laws.

ACCOMPLICE, n. One associated with another in a crime, having guilty
knowledge and complicity, as an attorney who defends a criminal,
knowing him guilty. This view of the attorney's position in the
matter has not hitherto commanded the assent of attorneys, no one
having offered them a fee for assenting.

ACCORD, n. Harmony.

ACCORDION, n. An instrument in harmony with the sentiments of an
assassin.

School of Rock is a most excellent example of the kind of film of which it is... and Jack Black is a force of nature... and Mike White is just cool...

Giambattista Vico... born today, 1668... from the eternally useful Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Vico consciously develops his notion of scienza (science or knowledge) in opposition to the then dominant philosophy of Descartes with its emphasis on clear and distinct ideas, the most simple elements of thought from which all knowledge, the Cartesians held, could be derived a priori by way of deductive rules. As Vico had already argued, one consequence and drawback of this hypothetico-deductive method is that it renders phenomena which cannot be expressed logically or mathematically as illusions of one sort or another. This applies not only most obviously to the data of sense and psychological experience, but also to the non-quantifiable evidence that makes up the human sciences. Drawing on the verum factum principle first described in De Antiquissima, Vico argues against Cartesian philosophy that full knowledge of any thing involves discovering how it came to be what it is as a product of human action and the 'principal property' of human beings, viz., 'of being social'

o i never said... back at the carmelite meeting... during cocktails before dinner that tuesday... nelson said we should have a website for carmelite poets... because i was standing there not drinking a beer because i was going to drive... and al was sitting there who has written and published his things here and there... but i said the people who read my stuff would not want to read al's and vice versa... of course... and al said o you write poetry? can you tell me one? and i could not... sadly true... i explained because once i write them i move on... they are quick moments... not exactly disposable but not memorable either or worth the memorization... maybe i wish they were... but they aren't... worth the effort of memory... mattie stepanek died yesterday...

call Elephant artsy-fartsy if you want... but i don't need the norm they seem to need at the cineplex... so this works for me... the dread is palpable... i didn't know it won the big one at cannes last year... that's nice... read some reviews (via mrqe)... afterward...

all rainy yesterday i had a mini movie binge... er... a mini-binge of normal-length movies... rented four... watched three: that ethan hawke/nyc Hamlet... that jim sheridan In America... that tarantino Kill Bill, vol 1...

liked them all... a common element: the (re)presentation and use of other media within the film...

hamlet's constant self-video making/viewing (& all the other electrical communication... very apt, i thought, as mode of brooding on an inescapable self)...

the kid's camcorder (voiceover) lending struc(tex)ture... spliced in all over (represeting now and then and now becoming then)

tarantino's anime inserts... seems to say/remind that none of this extravagant violence is real... even when we shift back to "live action"

this morning i started reading The Tale of Genji... without much headway... soon i'll watch movie #4... Elephant by gus van sant...

Essential Questions

Essential Questions

Essential questions

Backward Design

Themes & Essential Questions

Good essential questions have some basic criteria in common:

· They are open-ended and resist a simple or single right answer

· They are deliberately thought-provoking, counterintuitive, and/or controversial

· They require students to draw upon content knowledge and personal experience

· They can be revisited throughout the unit to engage students in evolving dialogue and debate

· They lead to other essential questions posed by students

Ithaka - Greek, Crete cultural immersion, foreign study abroad

Bob Dates - 2004 Tour Guide

'The Bob Dylan Show' to Play in 22 Minor League Baseball Parks on Summer Tour With Willie Nelson and The Hot Club Of Cowtown...

According to Bob Dylan, "What we aim to do with this tour is hit the ball out of the park, touch all the bases and get home safely."

i believe this parenthetical: Thomas Berry (brother of farmer, philosopher, writer Wendell Berry) is a once Catholic monk who lives in a southern Appalachian monastery of one... is just plain wrong. WB's brother is named John.

which makes me wonder why i have been ignoring ::: wood s lot ::: "the fitful tracing of a portal"... such a subtle resource for all things artsy and wonderful on the web... i think that long ago i felt it took too long to load via my dial-up... but now i'm used to slow slow loading everywhere... so wood s lot might as well become a regular destination.. i owe it to myself don't ya think...

do we dare read Ulysses: One Page Every Day (via wood s lot)

Paul Goodman

Paul Goodman became one of the most influential social critics of the 1960s after he published Growing Up Absurd, which looked at the problems of youth in the 'organized system' of modern American society. He wrote on many subjects, criticizing the failings of our organized technological society, and making practical proposals to create a modern society on the human scale.

(via phaneronoemikon)