Part of being a good citizen of the blogosphere is visiting, reading and, most importantly, taking the time to leave a comment on other’s blogs. It’s all about the conversation. In the interest of setting an example I’ve decided to link to those blog posts that have compelled me to leave a comment.

1559 Gun Show
1553 Pulled Pork Barbecue
0925 The American Love Affair with Romance
0816 Did you catch this part?

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.

Scenario: Johnny takes apart leftover firecrackers from the 4th of July, puts them in a model airplane paint bottle, blows up a red ant bed.

1973 – Ants die.

2006 – BATF, Homeland Security, FBI called. Johnny charged with domestic terrorism, FBI investigates parents, siblings removed from home, computers confiscated, Johnny’s Dad goes on a terror watch list and is never allowed to fly again.

(For the record, I graduated from Warren High School in 1973 and I have no doubt that this is true.

My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.

This is a passage I copied from Thrillers: Genesis and Structure of a Popular Genre by Jerry Palmer.

… the thriller formula… is competition and conspiracy. p. 3

It’s been a busy week in Wally World: the Universe’s source of cheap plastic crap. On The Writing On The Wal — the blog USA Today says should be on its readers’ radar — Jonathan Rees, Robert Feinman and I continue our work dedicated to drawing back the curtain on the Bentonvile Behemoth’s corporate disinformation and other flackery.

PREPARE TO BE BOARDED…! I wonder which advertising account executive is responsible for this. In the Navy when we would have error pile on top of error the whole service would stand down for a day so everyone from the lowest seaman recruit to the admirals could take stock, get a grip. Keep reading…

CAN”T EARN IT…? BUY IT…! That has always been the motto of the rich and disaffected. You”re so lame that people won”t hang out with you? Just buy an entourage. Can”t get a girl to go with you to the Junior Senior Prom? Hire a model for the evening. Money solves everything. Right? Keep reading…

WAL-MART DROPPING GPS SALES…? Now this is a strange tale. According to DigiTimes, Wal-Mart is considering dropping Global Positioning System devices from its retail sales. Vendors in Taiwan speculate it”s because Wal-Mart has a 40 percent return rate on the electronic devices. Keep reading…

MORE ROBO CALLS… Is there anyone out there who thinks that telemarketing is a good thing? Have you ever met a person who told you that they wait by their phone for telemarketers to call because they love talking with strangers about vinyl siding? Me neither.Keep reading…

COMPETE…! DAMN IT…! Reader Jack Hunt is precisely right. Wal-Mart”s decision to eliminate what it obviously views as a low-profit center in its stores is the perfect Petersonian opportunity to Wallop Wal-Mart by opening locally owned fabric stores across America. Keep reading…

SMALLER WAL-MARTS…? The prototype for a small-box Wal-Mart neighborhood store opened this week in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The 39,000 square foot store (yes, that is small for Wal-Mart) take a cue from Britain”s Tesco, which plans to enter U.S. markets later this year. Keep reading…

AT THE WALLY PLEX… There are sound stages on Hollywood”s back lots smaller than Bentonvile”s behemoths, so it”s no surprise that budding video talent has been sneaking cameras in at odd hours. And now for the midnight show at the Wally Plex featuring cberr724. Keep reading…

TEXAS DOESN”T WANT THE BANK OF WAL-MART… Texas joins Nebraska, Colorado, Kansas and Maine in introducing legislation that would prohibit Wal-Mart from opening bank branches. Since 2005 Wal-Mart has sought permission to operate its own bank to just process credit and debit cards. Keep reading…

COMMUNITY-FRIENDLY WAL-MART OPENS… No comment. Keep reading…

SLIDING DOWN THE SLIPPERTY SLIMEY SLOPE… Last week Jonathan pointed us to photographs taken inside a Wal-Mart. The slideshow is pretty disgusting. Now Digerati Life thinks there”s a direct connection between those photos and the course that Wal-Mart”s stock is on. Keep reading…

DID YOU LEAVE THE SUITCASE…? NO, DID YOU…? I was all set to write about how Wal-Mart was being unjustly targeted for bombing hoaxes and real attacks and that the people who do such things deserve no sympathy. But then I learned that this threat was either a matter of healthy caution or paranoia. Keep reading…

WELL, SEX DOES SELL, RIGHT…? Wal-Mart is was selling pornography. No, really. I”m not kidding. Honest to god real porn. If Wal-Mart executives thought they got grief over the whole support for Gay and Lesbian businesses thing, I”m predicting that they haven”t seen anything yet. Keep reading…

THAT TOOK LONGER THAN I EXPECTED… Kengo Yonekura”s Pink Sniper is gone from Wal-Mart. I have to say that I expected the pornographic comic product to have disappeared more quickly, but what with all the personnel changes going on in Bentonvile, folks were just too busy to watch the store. Keep reading…

FROM AAA TO XXX… Well, Wal-Mart got rid of Pink Sniper, but it has yet to take care of Little Butterfly, Country Boys, Yuri Monogatari, Eternal Temptation, J-Boys and The Tyrant Falls In Love. The list just goes on and on. Or not. Keep reading…

I’m hoping that someone is planning a study on reading and attention spans because intuitively I think what this librarian has to say is true. I see this kind of frustration in my students all the time. They have a complete inability to focus on anything for longer than about 10 minutes. From The Washington Post:

I recently spoke with a junior who was stressed about her decreasing ability to focus on anything for longer than two minutes or so. I tried to inspire her by talking about the importance of reading as a way to train the brain. I told her that a good reader develops the same powers of concentration that an athlete or a Buddhist would employ in sport or meditation. “A lot out there is conspiring to distract you,” I said.

She rolled her eyes. “That’s your opinion about books. It doesn’t make it true.” To her, the idea that reading might benefit the mind was, well, lame.

As my friend Molly would observe, when did the thoughts of experts become just opinions?

The New York Times yesterday published an examination of the psychology of magical thinking. The article itself is interesting, but I think Benedict Carey stopped short of asking the real question: is there a dividing line between magical thinking and religion or spirituality? I think there is, but it’s not where you’d expect it to be.

I’m still following the Andrew Sullivan/Sam Harris discussion and I think this inquiry is central to that discussion: why is your faith better than the other guy’s superstition?

Because your parents told you so.

Children exhibit a form of magical thinking by about 18 months, when they begin to create imaginary worlds while playing. By age 3, most know the difference between fantasy and reality, though they usually still believe (with adult encouragement) in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. By age 8, and sometimes earlier, they have mostly pruned away these beliefs, and the line between magic and reality is about as clear to them as it is for adults.

It is no coincidence, some social scientists believe, that youngsters begin learning about faith around the time they begin to give up on wishing. “The point at which the culture withdraws support for belief in Santa and the Tooth Fairy is about the same time it introduces children to prayer,” said Jacqueline Woolley, a professor of psychology at the University of Texas. “The mechanism is already there, kids have already spent time believing that wishing can make things come true, and they”re just losing faith in the efficacy of that.”

If the tendency to think magically were no more than self-defeating superstition, then over the pitiless history of human evolution it should have all but disappeared in intellectually mature adults.

There is a classic psychology experiment where a rat is placed in a cage with individually wired metal plates that can be electrified. As long as there is an order to which plates are charged, the rat quickly learns where to step and not step. But if the plates are randomly electrified, something very different happens: the rat curls up in the corner and won’t move.

Humans aren’t that much different.

Magical thinking is most evident precisely when people feel most helpless. Giora Keinan, a professor at Tel Aviv University, sent questionnaires to 174 Israelis after the Iraqi Scud missile attacks of the 1991 gulf war. Those who reported the highest level of stress were also the most likely to endorse magical beliefs, like “I have the feeling that the chances of being hit during a missile attack are greater if a person whose house was attacked is present in the sealed room,” or “To be on the safe side, it is best to step into the sealed room right foot first.”

“It is of interest to note,” Dr. Keinan concluded, “that persons who hold magical beliefs or engage in magical rituals are often aware that their thoughts, actions or both are unreasonable and irrational. Despite this awareness, they are unable to rid themselves of such behavior.”

On athletic fields, at the craps table or out sailing in the open ocean, magical thinking is a way of life. Elaborate, entirely nonsensical rituals are performed with solemn deliberation, complete with theories of magical causation.

“I am hoping I do not change my clothes for the rest of the season, that I really start to stink,” said Tom Livatino, head basketball coach at Lincoln Park High School in Chicago, who wears the same outfit as long as his team is winning. (And it usually does.)

The idea, Mr. Livatino said, is to do as much as possible to recreate the environment that surrounds his team”s good play. He doesn”t change his socks; he doesn”t empty his pockets; and he works the sideline with the sense he has done everything possible to win. “The full commitment,” he explained. “I”ll do anything to give us an edge.”

Richard Dawkins argues in his latest book The God Delusion that teaching children to believe in a god is a form of child abuse. If the result of that kind of education produces a college graduate who sincerely believes that not changing his socks will influence his team’s performance on the basketball court, you have to at least consider that Dawkins could be right.

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.

Sometimes name calling isn’t swearing…

I can almost hear the wheels turning in some heads out past the I-271 beltway after they read this story from Atlanta. You can run but you can’t hide from the challenges. But maybe you can just take your ball, bat (and tax dollars), declare yourself another county and avoid the whole nasty issue of what to do with Cleveland. Are you wide awake now?

From the Associate Press:

A potentially explosive dispute in the City Too Busy to Hate is taking shape over a proposal to break Fulton County in two and split off Atlanta’s predominantly white, affluent suburbs to the north from some of the metropolitan area’s poorest, black neighborhoods.

Legislation that would allow the suburbs to form their own county, to be called Milton County, was introduced by members of the Georgia Legislature’s Republican majority earlier this month.

Supporters say it is a quest for more responsive government in a county with a population greater than that of six states. Opponents say the measure is racially motivated and will pit white against black, rich against poor.

“If it gets to the floor, there will be blood on the walls,” warned state Sen. Vincent Fort, an Atlanta Democrat and member of the Legislative Black Caucus who bitterly opposes the plan. Fort added: “As much as you would like to think it’s not racial, it’s difficult to draw any other conclusion.”

If this doesn’t give Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson nightmares, nothing could.

Earlier this week I wrote at length about how damaging fear of the unknown is to our country. This morning the Associated Press offers this cautionary tale that illustrates my point. If you live by Vice President Dick Cheney one-percent doctrine, you’re going to shot first and ask questions later; and make critical mistakes.

Three football players at Guilford College, a school with a Quaker background, face assault and ethnic intimidation charges after an attack on three Palestinian students, authorities said.

The victims were beaten with fists, feet and brass knuckles early Saturday by attackers who called them “terrorists” and used racial slurs, the News & Record of Greensboro reported Tuesday.

School officials believe about 12 people were involved in the altercation, Nic Brown, spokesman for the college in Greensboro, told The Associated Press. Administrators were still trying to determine whether some were fighting or trying to break it up, Brown said.

“We’ve had a very, very unfortunate event, unfortunate conflict among students who actually knew each other, and who had lived and interacted in the same residence hall with no conflict among themselves,” Brown said.

Brass knuckles? What is a college student doing with brass knuckles?

My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.

This is a passage I copied from Thrillers: Genesis and Structure of a Popular Genre by Jerry Palmer.

“My theory is that people who don”t like mystery stories are anarchists,” Rex Stout. p. 1

There is only one true thing: Instantly paint write what you see. When you’ve got it, you’ve got it. When you haven’t, you begin again. All the rest is humbug.” Edouard Manet

[Update — 0743, 25 January — Andrew Sullivan now calls the video a brilliant piece of performance art. So brilliant it illuminates what it satirizes more deeply than any argument could. Maybe so, but I’m still leaning towards it being serious. I’ll just have to wait until someone outs Donnie.]

[Update — 0845, 24 Januray — Don is having a little problem with his message. His wannabe hit single God Hates Fags is still available here.]

First thing Don, drop the Donnie, no one will believe you’re really reformed unless you start calling yourself by a real man’s name. Do think anyone ever refers to our former Secretary of Defense as Donnie? Not in this life. Second thing, Frank Sinatra is a gay musician? Are you out of your feckin’ mind?

Do you realize what the Chairman of the Board would have done to your chubby butt for that slur?

Donnie Davies also thinks the following are bands to watch out for: The Spores, Scissor Sisters, Rufus Wainwright, Merzbau, Ravi Shankar, Wilco, Bjork, Tech N9ne, Ghostface Killah, Bobby Conn, Morton Subotnik, Cole Porter, The String Cheese Incident, Eagles of Death Metal, Polyphonic Spree, The Faint, Interpol, Tegan and Sara,

Erasure, Le Tigre, The Gossip, The Doors, Phish, Queen, The Strokes, Sufjan Stevens, Morrissey (questionable?), The Pet Shop Boys, Metallica, Judas Priest, The Village People, The Secret Handshake, The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Frankie Goes to Hollywood, Man or Astroman, Richard

Cheese, Jay-Z, Depeche Mode, Kansas, Ani DiFranco, Fischerspooner, John Mayer, The Indigo Girls, Velvet Underground, Madonna, Elton John, Barry Manilow, Indigo Girls, Melissa Etheridge, Eminmen, Nirvana, Boy George, The Killers, Lou Reed, Lil’ Wayne, Motorhead, Jill Sobule,

Wilson Phillips, DMX, Lisa Loeb, Dogstar, Thirty Seconds to Mars, Lil’ Kim, kd lang, Frank Sinatra, Hinder, Nickleback, Justus Kohncke, Bob Mould, Clay Aiken, Arcade Fire, Bright Eyes, Corinne Bailey Rae, Audioslave, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Panic at the Disco and Elton John(really gay).

And the good bands? Well the list is much shorter, but the safe bands include: UnderOath, Cyndi Lauper, Falling Up, Flyleaf, THE TURNING, Disciple, P.O.D, By The Tree, Scott Reed, Michael W. Smith, Jars of Clay, DC Talk and Danielson.

Andrew Sullivan doesn’t know whether to consider Davies horrifying or sublime. I’ll cast my vote for the former and take solace in the fact that the old school industrial punk Modern Sceamo band Beaf isn’t on the safe list.

My time on active duty in the Navy was under first President Gerald Ford and then President Jimmy Carter. My recollection (at least in the nuclear Navy where I served) was that President Carter was a respected Commander In Chief. As Secretary of Defense Robert Gates tells in his biography, he felt the same way.

From The Washington Post:

Of all the presidents he worked for, Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates is particularly supportive of one — but it isn’t, as might be expected, Ronald Reagan, the first President Bush or even Gerald R. Ford.

Rather, in his memoirs, the new Pentagon chief leaps repeatedly to the defense of Jimmy Carter, the sole Democrat for whom he worked, who was often seen as weak on the Soviet Union and taken by surprise when it invaded Afghanistan in December 1979.

Gates’s 1996 book, “From the Shadows,” is now being combed for insights into the new defense secretary’s thinking, how he might run the Pentagon and what he’s had to say about his past bosses.

When it comes to Carter, it isn’t that Gates, a career Sovietologist who rose to become CIA director, is a closet dove. Rather, he thinks Carter was far tougher on Moscow than is generally recognized.

“I believe the Soviets saw a very different Jimmy Carter than did most Americans by 1980, different and more hostile and threatening,” Gates writes. In both conventional weaponry and in the nuclear arena, he argues, Carter would “provide a strong foundation for Ronald Reagan to build upon.”

Carter? Tough? I can just hear all the Neocon gears stripping. Gawd, do I love that sound.

Word of Mouth blogger Kelly Boyer Sagert has posted Sanctuary and Sanctuary 2, her tales of growing up in a funeral home. I’ve loved Six Feet Under (with what may possibly be the best final seven minutes in television) but the real thing is always better. My favorite is the tale of Mr. Gray.

CPT B. Tupper: The streets, the fields, the Market Bazaar, everything as far as the eye could see was covered in a coat of pure white. Overnight a snowstorm had passed through our corner of Paktika, dropping just enough snow to cover all the mud and dirt and garbage that paints the landscape of the town. I stood on the main road of the normally bustling Bazaar, in an…

Make sure you press the play button.

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.

My name is Jeff Hess and I’m a biblioholic. I own hundreds of books. Not valuable books, mostly Science Fiction paperbacks and text books, tomes rescued by the bag from library book sales. A few years ago, in the interest of not burying myself, I began reading more books from the library and taking notes. My electronic chapbook was born.

This is a passage I copied from Tomato Blessings and Radish Teachings: Recipes and reflections by Edward Espe Brown.

“The uses of cleverness are soon exhausted, while the apparently simple is infinitely interesting.” Chinese proverb. p. 165

Part of being a good citizen of the blogosphere is visiting, reading and, most importantly, taking the time to leave a comment on other’s blogs. It’s all about the conversation. In the interest of setting an example I’ve decided to link to those blog posts that have compelled me to leave a comment.

1532 Winter driving safety
0844 Starting (Over)

I could never bring myself to forward all the email jokes, cartoons and other Internet comedy that land in my inbox. But then I started posting the ones my dad sends me. Judging from my comments and emails, my dad has become one of my greatest blogging assets. So for your morning blog chuckle I present: From My Dad.

Scenario: Pedro fails high school English.

1973: Pedro goes to summer school, passes English, goes to college.

2006: Pedro’s cause is taken up by state politcal party. Newspaper articles appear nationally explaining that teaching English as a requirement for graduation is racist. ACLU files class action lawsuit against state school system and Pedro’s English teacher. English banned from core urriculumC. Pedro given diploma anyway but ends up mowing lawns for a living because he can’t speak English.

(For the record, I graduated from Warren High School in 1973 and I have no doubt that this is true.