In a similar Vein

Radical Chic. Bingo!

Just Watch

The bit with the Chinese man at the end breaks my heart. The guy comes here expecting the land of freedom, and instead he finds more Mao-worshippers everywhere.

The most useless stastitic I heard today...

In an otherwise excellent lecture on animal abuse, the lecturer was talking about a study that compared hundreds of convictions for domestic abuse, looking at what predictors there might have been. She said:

"They found that convictions for animal abuse were a better predictor of future convictions for domestic assault than were convictions for murder, arson, and firearms crimes."

So, what's the big problem with that finding?

Something I Never Knew

I'm surprised. The word "gullible" isn't in the dictionary.

Learn sumthin' new every day.

Bad News for Whales

I really don't know what to say.

"Blue whales' capacity to communicate has been reduced by 90 percent," she said."

This scares me. Does this person, this "Legal expert for the International Fund for Animal Welfare," know what it means to say, "...has been reduced by 90 percent?" Somehow, I doubt it. If you are dumb, is that what you become? A legal expert for an animal welfare group?

Luke is 21!

Happy Birthday to the most recent Murphy Grown-up!

"Why Are We Here"

"Plastic, assholes!



While I don't care for his misanthropy, Carlin gets the rest of this right. Above all, he's a terrific performer. It's seven minutes long, but seven minutes of laughs.

What hard times really mean

Florence Owens Thompson was 32 years old and the mother of seven children when Dorothea Lange photographed her in a camp for migrant workers in California in 1936. The picture became an iconic image of the Great Depression. (Read that again. Look at the lines in her face and the expression in her eyes. She was 32 years old.)

Lange, who was photographing migrant workers at the time for the Resettlement Administration, remembered the photograph this way:

"I saw and approached the hungry and desperate mother, as if drawn by a magnet. I do not remember how I explained my presence or my camera to her, but I do remember she asked me no questions. I made five exposures, working closer and closer from the same direction. I did not ask her name or her history. She told me her age, that she was thirty-two. She said that they had been living on frozen vegetables from the surrounding fields, and birds that the children killed. She had just sold the tires from her car to buy food. There she sat in that lean- to tent with her children huddled around her, and seemed to know that my pictures might help her, and so she helped me. There was a sort of equality about it. (From: Popular Photography, Feb. 1960)."

CNN recently interviewed one of the children in the photograph. Katherine McIntosh was four when the famous photograph was taken. She is now 77. She remembers the migrant camp where the picture was taken. There was no food. "They lived in tents or in a car. Local kids would tease them, telling them to clean up and bathe. 'They'd tell you, "Go home and take a bath." You couldn't very well take a bath when you're out in a car [with] nowhere to go."

She adds, "We'd go home and cry."

Now, she cleans houses for a living. She's proud that she has kept a job and a roof over her head throughout her life. "Even today, when it comes to cleaning, I make sure things are clean. I can't stand dirty things," she says with a laugh.

I wonder what that New York Times mother, the lady who believes that hard times mean postponing the purchase of designer jeans so that she can buy "stuff" for her daughter, would think of Florence Owens Thompson. And even more, I wonder what Florence would think of her.

Similarly

Written by Elvio, a clsssmate of Uncle Don's:

In 1969-70, Don Murphy's mother was shopping in a variety store in Northampton, MA when she saw a jig saw puzzle featuring the CG Academy. She looked more closely at the picture on the box and thought the cadet leading the company in review might be her son. To be safe, she bought two puzzles and upon assembling the puzzle at home confirmed that the Company Commander leading the troops was, in fact, her son. After looking at the assembled puzzle, Don's father also recognized the Executive Officer marching behind his son as Elvio "because he recognized my long nose". The puzzles were assembled and framed with Don's parents keeping one and Don the other. I was not aware of the existence of this puzzle until just recently. Don e-mailed me and explained that his mother was moving into an assisted living facility and didn't have room for the puzzle and would I want it. Of course I did. Don and Judy Murphy stopped by this past Sunday and presented me with one of the puzzles. It's in great shape and I have an empty wall in my den for hanging it. Upon looking closely, I also recognize Tony Alejandro, Ron Mers and Alex Blanton as the Platoon Commanders. As far as I know, this puzzle was not offered for sale in the Cadet Store or other Academy venues. The photo was obviously taken by a professional photographer but why F-troop? Maybe the reputation of "Fabulous Foxtrot" for military bearing and precision was the deciding factor. Why was this puzzle being sold in Don Murphy's home town? Due to Don's Mom chance encounter I think it is a touching story and worthy of "Believe It or Not"

Marching with the Colors

From the Rochester NROTC website.