They're baa-ack! "Balloon Animal Jesus can't save you. He only died for balloon animal sins." I've missed Fafblog. * * * * * Blogger ethics, a case study The paper now has a partnership with eHarmony. That makes some sense. If you accept the somewhat puzzling notion that an online newspaper needs to or ought to offer an online dating service, then it makes sense to subcontract out that service to someone with more expertise. And eHarmony has such expertise,... Read more
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has reportedly been killed. "Reportedly" is the ultimate journalist's weasel-word, translating roughly into "somebody said this, heck if I know if it's true or not." I'm fairly confident that this morning's good news is true, but there's also good reason for skepticism. The officials reporting this news have a dubious track record. For example, you may recall that "Chemical" Ali Hassan al-Majid was reportedly killed several times back during the early weeks of the invasion of Iraq.... Read more
The 30-year mortgage rate is now 6.66%. This news arrives on D-Day +62 years — 6/6/06 — and thus will be greeted as portentous by those obsessed with seeking portents, such as the authors and fans of the Worst Books Ever Written. It's hard to know what these folks would make of this news, actually, since the rapture-maniacs all claim that they expect the world to end long before a 30-year mortgage would ever come to term. I could link... Read more
What was the girl with the snake skins' name? Been doing the "random 10" thing for a while. Problem with it is it gives you no way of identifying gaps and oversights. Alphabetical lists are also basically arbitrary, but let the reader play along by recommending songs that ought to be included, but aren't, of which I am sure there are many. So here's the non-random 10 (starting, for reasons nearly explained in the previous post, immediately following "Pancho and... Read more
So the paper isn't just a paper anymore, but rather a "24/7 news organization." I could go on here about the future of the newspaper business and all of the opportunities and potentialities and pitfalls of newspapers online, but I won't because: A) that conversation sounds a bit too 2001 (not as in "A Space Odyssey" but as in five years ago); and because B) none of the people planning this transition to a "24/7 news organization" seem to be... Read more
Left Behind, pp. 213-217 (take two) Stories of religious conversion — or "testimonies," as we evangelical types call them* — can be tricky. The convert wants to tell this story because she is convinced that it is important. Very important. But also deeply personal and, at some level, ineffable. Attempts to convey the ineffable often come across as kind of effed up. I noted earlier (see "Explicit Content") how this mix of the transcendent and the intimate can lead conversion... Read more
So the health beat reporter at the paper does a nice piece on Westside Health Center and the other clinics that serve Delaware's un- and underinsured, and it prompts a letter to the editor: As I read about Westside health clinics, the word "underserved" was used quite a few times. I have yet to find a community health center outside the city limits. I don't know of any in the suburbs of New Castle County. I would say the underserved... Read more
Sheesh. Another accidental, unannounced weeklong hiatus. Lately it seems Ryan Adams is putting out new albums more often than I'm updating this blog. At least this time the most-recent post growing stale on the page wasn't about my new shower curtain. (And speaking of unannounced absences from the blogosphere, I was really starting to get worried about Fafnir, Giblets and the Medium Lobster, whom we hadn't heard from since April 4. Fafnir did say, in their comments thread: "Don't panic,... Read more
Or, "Why Do Christians Hate Sex?" (part 2) There's a lovely song from Hedwig and the Angry Inch called "Origin of Love." It's a retelling of the Platonic myth of the genesis of human sexuality. That myth tells of a time when mortals were once whole creatures until the gods cut us in half and we became what we are now, divided selves striving to be made whole. It's a beautiful story, a beautiful expression of longing and desire and... Read more
"Write what you know," the adage says, which is one of many good reasons why I don't write about sex much. I do, however, write about American politics and American Christianity, and about the intersection of American politics and American Christianity, and these days it's awful hard to write about any of that without also writing about sex. What's up with that? How did our privates become so very public? And why, in particular, do American Christians seem so very... Read more
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