Headlines: All Spammers Go to Hell

I have a well-intentioned, not so web-savy, cousin of my wife's that likes to mass email all her relatives. She'll headline something like, "New Type of Cancer Discovered" and then forward a copy of some hyped-up worrisome article to about 100 of her friends and family. She is very religious, sheltered and stubborn.



Yesterday, I got one of these emails. I wrote her back and told her spamming was the unpardonable sin, and that she was going to hell for doing so. (I was joking of course.)



She emailed me back today and informed me that this article was very important and something my wife should be aware of. (Like awareness is something that can be captured by email.) Was this good-intentioned spam or just cheap love? Something to one make the sender feel like they're doing good, when in reality they're doing nothing at best - being rude, self-deceptive and clogging email at worst - certainly not helping anyone.



It reminds me of where James writes to the early church:



"If a brother or sister be naked, and destitute of daily food, And one of you say unto them, 'Depart in peace, be warmed and filled'; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit?"



It's easy to offer up words of advise of "Be clothed and fed." It's akin to shouting at a man in the unemployment line, "Get a job."



The ignorant but good-intentioned queen - Marie Antoinette, when told that the people were out of bread to eat replied, "Then let them eat cake!"



The people revolted and cut off her head for such naiviete.



Maybe spammers really do go to hell.

Writing a proper query...

I came to me desktop this morning (Monday) to find my "note to self" on how to start where I left off Friday (I'm a software programmer by trade). My note was:



// ***************************************

// build sql string and insert here

// ***************************************



which essentially means "do all the proper thinking to frame the question into understandable syntax". And I realize that this is not what I'm good at - posing the question well. If I could do that I could get good answers.



It seems life for me has just been one long attempt to just get the question right. Somehow naively, I'm convinced that if I can just get the question right, then I can get the answers to everything I want to know and understand - about God, the universe, our histories, our destinies and the meanings of life.



Gee, am I a nit-wit or what?



Instead of programming (this stupid computer), I go and read some of Josh's great blogging with

links to depressing articles about how creative people we admire are really just 8th grade educated automatons of idiotic cults.



Again, I'm almost convinced that I may never be able to phrase up the questions properly - and even worse - that it probably doesn't matter.



Does anybody out there know how to write a proper query?

Zapping Myself and Buying Groceries with Famous People

I've got my copper wires and gadetry set-up like the lady in the blog entry below described. This is supposed to zap internal parasites in my body and cleanse my liver. The author says I'll poop out these lumpy green deposits. I hope this works so I can get back to drinking beer again. I'll let you know how it all comes out.

Oh, by the way, I was standing in line at the grocery store the other day and low and behold standing next to me was Robert Earl Keen, the Texas famed singer-songwriter. He was shuffling around with a People magazine (which he bought) trying not to get noticed. I had to have a price check on my dozen limes I was picking up for Adena to brew up margaritas so I let him go ahead of me so I could chit-chat.

I mentioned to him what I was doing, kind of happy that my evening was going to be fun. As he put down his few groceries which included a bundle of "instant" fireplace logs (I could see he was in for a dull evening) he turned to me and in a kinda sad poetic voice just murmured, "Yeah .... the things we do. The things we do."

Let's Rewrite History: "Abraham Lincoln was just another evil white rascist"

I was reading through the African-American magazine Ebony the other day (while sitting in my Spanish-speaking-only barber shop waiting to get a haircut.) I came across a full page advertisement declaring that the secret racism of Abraham Lincoln is now revealed in the book Forced into Glory: Abraham Lincoln's White Dream!



The remainder of the claims in the ad were blatantly offensive to me (a white guy from Illinois, a history buff, and an admirer of Lincoln). The claims in fact were slanderous, stupid and an obvious attempt to rewrite history and all the known facts about Abe Lincoln.



After googling this book though, I found several reviews giving this book undue respect.



I found one reasonable review - "Forced into Glory" Book Review by Edward Steers, Jr. that addresses the books more obvious political, not historical, agenda.



I'm just amazed at how revisionist history like this can be popularized and then presented in full-page magazines geared towards blacks only under the disguise of scholarly research. Its has the full intention of only causing anger, hatred, and resentment.



Lincoln himself was an amazing non-racist human being and suffered more pain and agony over his fight against the evils of slavery than most any of us today could dare imagine. It's a real shame and an embarassment to me that a present day black author would try to systematically dismantle Lincoln's character to the black American populace today.

America Was Not Founded Upon Christianity

My son, who's presently working in Bagdad, sent me a good, honest article, refuting the false notion that America was founded by Christians upon Christian precepts - of which I agree with (and already knew perfectly well).



Great quotes by Ben Franklin: "I believe in one God, Creator of the universe. That he governs it by his providence. That he ought to be worshipped." and "As for Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think his system of morals and his religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see."



Of course these were very scientific men from the "age of Enlightenment" and they did not generally believe in the divinity of Jesus or the miracles in the Bible. In the normal sense of the word they were not "Christians", but they were educated men who believed generally in a life after death and a supreme being who created the universe.



Even Voltaire concludes, "Well, to what dogma do all minds agree? To the worship of a God, and to honesty. All the philosophers of the world who have had a religion have said in all ages: 'There is a God, and one must be just.'"



George Bush probably is a true believer of the more fundamentalist versions of Christianity, but I think he is mindfully just as he seeks freedoms for "muslims, infidels, christians, and jews" like the founding fathers themselves did.



I think Bush might agree hand-in-hand with Jefferson who gave his reason for going to church as, "...no nation has ever yet existed or been governed without religion. Nor can be. The Christian religion is the best religion that has been given to man and I as chief Magistrate of this nation am bound to give it the sanction of my example."



(I thought it most interesting to find though that the "Under God" in the pledge of allegience wasn't implemented till the McCarthy era of the '50s.)



Thanks for the article, Brandon.

The Cure For All Diseases

The Cure For All Diseases

"Electricity can now be used to kill bacteria, viruses and parasites in minutes, not days or weeks as antibiotics require.

If you have been suffering from a chronic infection or have cancer, or AIDS, learn to build the electronic device that will stop it immediately. It is safe and without side effects and does not interfere with any treatment you are now on."

Now this is what I'm talking about.... I'm gonna hook myself up to a couple of batteries and shock the bujeebees outta myself... that oughta kill somethin' bad inside of me...

This online book really is facinating... like what Walker Percy said about Catholicism, "It's just crazy enough, it might be true." I am goin' try this as soon as I can get the copper and the batteries.

Cecil Peel - American explorer, 1915-2005

I was rummaging through some old newspaper clippings during one of my wife's many vintage items collection sprees back in the dusty hills of Kendall County in a small run-down home that was hosting this particular garage sale. I came across a dusty, yellowed hand-written eight pages of notebook paper entombed in a Ziploc baggy hidden between the also dusty 50's and 60's 'Old West' and 'True Detective' pulp magazines lying in a corner amongst the other dusty and abandoned books in this nearly abandoned home - or storage shed - I couldn't tell which.



The pages began with, "I was born in Dripping Springs, Texas in 1915."



I bought the manuscript along with some books and the pulp magazines for $2.50. My wife bought a vintage '50s couch for $5 which we hauled back to our barn in Wimberley, Texas.



After reading this manuscript, I went back to the garage sale and asked for a picture of the now deceased man who used to live here - who had owned these books, and had written his life's tale of important events, and who now was having his few belongings sold by neighbors and purchased by strangers passing through like myself.



Cecil Peel traveled the world. Cecil Peel loved archeology. Cecil Peel once got lost in the Saudi Arabian desert and nearly died. Cecil Peel criss-crossed much of the United States, building pipelines while searching for pre-historic sites. Cecil Peel, as a child, saw his first automobile and paved road from his bed in the back of a covered wagon while en route with his family to Oklahoma to bury his grandfather in 1922.



Cecil Peel once had an article written about him by a popular columnist in the San Antonio Express-News with a picture featuring him in his swanky cowboy hat and jeans. Cecil Peel was a bit of a celebrity - at least for a while.



I am amazed that we die. I am amazed that we die, and so easily return to dust. Us, our belongings, our memories so easily sit in the dusty corner of a dusty house and are discarded or bought - for $2.50.



I am amazed. And I wonder and am forced to accept, that yes, my days too will end like this.



God rest your soul, Cecil Peel.