LANDMARK

The Funtopia site (to the right) just logged its 20,000th hit. Which makes me irrationally happy. It almost happened once before, but then the counter malfunctioned and ran it back to 14,000. I know porno sites do the same traffic in a day, but what the hell?

NEW EMAIL
I have a new email address that is good for now and the future – byron4d@msn
Note it if you need it. The old on will die around Tuesday.

YOU WANT ICE 9 IN THAT?

Munz forwarded the lengthy thoughts of Kurt Vonnegut from In These Times. I ran a couple of chunks yesterday and here are two more tomorrow. http://www.inthesetimes.com/

“Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” A lot of people think Jesus said that, because it is so much the sort of thing Jesus liked to say. But it was actually said by Confucius, a Chinese philosopher, 500 years before there was that greatest and most humane of human beings, named Jesus Christ.
The Chinese also gave us, via Marco Polo, pasta and the formula for gunpowder. The Chinese were so dumb they only used gunpowder for fireworks. And everybody was so dumb back then that nobody in either hemisphere even knew that there was another one.But back to people, like Confucius and Jesus and my son the doctor, Mark, who’ve said how we could behave more humanely, and maybe make the world a less painful place. One of my favorites is Eugene Debs, from Terre Haute in my native state of Indiana. Get a load of this:
Eugene Debs, who died back in 1926, when I was only 4, ran 5 times as the Socialist Party candidate for president, winning 900,000 votes, 6 percent of the popular vote, in 1912, if you can imagine such a ballot. He had this to say while campaigning:
As long as there is a lower class, I am in it.
As long as there is a criminal element, I’m of it.
As long as there is a soul in prison, I am not free.
Doesn’t anything socialistic make you want to throw up? Like great public schools or health insurance for all?
How about Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes?
Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the Earth.
Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called the children of God. …
And so on.
Not exactly planks in a Republican platform. Not exactly Donald Rumsfeld or Dick Cheney stuff.
For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes. But, often with tears in their eyes, they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that’s Moses, not Jesus. I haven’t heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.
Blessed are the merciful” in a courtroom? “Blessed are the peacemakers in the Pentagon? Give me a break!

SCAREY
And here’s one fearsomely fucked up web-site courtesy if some girl.
http://www.blackwaterusa.com/

CRYPTIQUE – Smile when...