The stump speech we'll never hear

[As music of the rock anthem Cum On Feel The Noize by Slade slowly fades]

Thank you all for your energy and support! I look out on this crowd of supporters tonight and see, not just a dazzling diversity of races, ages, genders and classes, but a whole stadium full of people who think just like I do, in lockstep with my agenda. I love that. We certainly don't want any divergent ideas spoiling our celebration, do we?

And yes, you all turned out in record numbers to support our platform of transformation of this country into a nation that will bend to my will. And I'm going to let you know what that is soon, very soon. But for a moment let's just exult in the magic of being together and united by the exhilaration that drives out reasoned thinking and logical questioning. It's actually pretty fun.

You have worked diligently for months canvassing neighborhoods, calling and buttonholing your friends and even perfect strangers in support of our campaign. Most of you are volunteers. I have listened to your complaints about government, your desires for change in Washington and your opinions on policy issues. And I will incorporate your concerns into our program. But I will listen even more carefully to those who donated large amounts of cash to keep this drive going. That's only natural, don't you agree?

My vision for America is based on the values and aspirations we all share. Liberty, equality and peace, among others. I also have my own idiosyncratic take on many of these values that you will slowly and with horror come to realize months and years into my presidency. Don't worry, you'll get used to them. (You'd better, if you want to stay on my team).

And let's not let this moment pass without thanking the Lord of your choice, that Higher Power who has been overseeing our cause from the first. He or She is ever faithful to take particular and almost unbelievably minute interest in every single aspect of our campaign. Let's give God a clap offering right now! (We can put the deity back into it's box after the inauguration).

Sadly, after we lay out our positive vision of America, we must talk about the evil we face, the dark shadow that would extinguish America's great light.

No, I'm not talking about foreign terrorists. I'm talking about my political opponents and their ilk, who would presumptuously vote against us at the polls, work against our programs in Congress and badger us in the media and in those detestable blogs and talk shows. Be assured that as we carry forward our policy of bipartisan progress and unity, we will try at every turn to cripple our political opponents and position ourselves for the next election. And remember, we do it all for you.

Surely the lesson of wise leaders through the ages is that every positive movement needs an evil scapegoat. Promoting paranoia helps, too. We promise to stoke that version of unreality at every opportunity.

Finally my friends, let us redouble our efforts to stifle the bad, old politics of the past and bring in the good old politics of the future. Let's get rid of politics as usual. But let's be sure that it remains politics, whether unusual, new-fangled or just revarnished.

Thank you and God bless.

[Cue recessional Won't Get Fooled Again by The Who]

For a milder version of an all-purpose political speech, listen to this 1895 address read by Scott Simon on NPR 's Weekend Edition. And here's a transcript and comment by a Princeton archivist.


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Forget St. Valentine. What about Adar?

Sure, Valentine's Day is coming up--despite opposition in Saudi Arabia, India and elsewhere.

But did you know we slipped into Adar without even knowing it?

That's Adar, the Jewish month. It's considered the luckiest month in the Jewish calendar because it contains the feast of Purim.

The Talmud says, "Whoever enters Adar increases their level of joy." So... did you feel it?

This year contains a "leap month," creating both Adar I and Adar II . Confused? Jesus wouldn't have been.

The Faithhacker blog over at Jewcy.com points to a succinct explanation of lunar calendar stuff and why Jews just need an extra month sometimes:

On a 12 lunar month calendar, the month of Nissan, which is supposed to occur in the Spring, would occur 11 days earlier each year, eventually occurring in the Winter, the Fall, the Summer, and then the Spring again. To compensate for this drift, an extra month was occasionally added.

Got it now?

[Posted simply for your continuing edumacation]


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'Looking Good for Jesus' no more

The folks who brought us the "Wash Away Your Sins" line of bath products have finally stepped over the line, at least in Singapore.

A cosmetics line that extolls the virtues of "Looking Good for Jesus" has been pulled from stores in Singapore after some Roman Catholics complained the items were disrespectful.

"These products trivialize Jesus Christ and Christianity," Nick Chui, 27, one of the complainants, said. "There are also sexual innuendoes in the messages and the way Jesus is portrayed in these products."

Now those in search of "virtuous vanilla"-flavored lip balm and "Get Tight with Christ" hand and body cream will have to look elsewhere.

Granted, this is all in bad taste. But did anyone notice the business isn't secretly run by Richard Dawkins? They're only out for cheap laughs, not to trivialize Christianity. Blue Q also produces other novelty lines like "Let's Pretend I give a Shit" gum and "Cat Butts" air freshener.

I suppose PETA will be after them next.


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Filling that God-shaped hole

Now that Mitt Romney's dropped out of the primaries, we're left only with the Sturm und Drang of the Democratic contest for entertainment.

ABC's Senior National Correspondent Jake Tapper has two interesting posts on that topic. In one, he explains the biblical allusions in Huckabee's Super Tuesday speech – the widow's mite and the "small, smooth stone" from David and Goliath's battle, "in case you aren't the half of the country that automatically understands Biblical allusions."

Then he wonders at the messianic language used by Barack Obama followers. Quoting Obama supporter Kathleen Geier:

"Excuse me, but this sounds more like a cult than a political campaign. The language used here is the language of evangelical Christianity – the Obama volunteers speak of 'coming to Obama' in the same way born-again Christians talk about 'coming to Jesus.'...So I say, we should all get a grip, stop all this unseemly mooning over Barack, see him and the political landscape he is a part of in a cooler, clearer, and more realistic light, and get to work."

He also quotes Time columnist Joe Klein, who notes "something just a wee bit creepy about the mass messianism" he sees in Obama's Super Tuesday speech.

"We are the ones we've been waiting for," Obama said. "This time can be different because this campaign for the presidency of the United States of America is different. It's different not because of me. It's different because of you."

Says Klein: "That is not just maddeningly vague but also disingenuous: the campaign is entirely about Obama and his ability to inspire. Rather than focusing on any specific issue or cause — other than an amorphous desire for change — the message is becoming dangerously self-referential."

And James Wolcott in Vanity Fair writes that "(p)erhaps it's my atheism at work but I found myself increasingly wary of and resistant to the salvational fervor of the Obama campaign, the idealistic zeal divorced from any particular policy or cause and chariot-driven by pure euphoria."

Actually this all seems to fit together.

Haven't the Democrats been looking or a counter balance to the values-voting evangelicals of the Religious Right? As Tapper points out, half the country is starved for meaningful spiritual allusions. Obama could fill that God-shaped hole in their hearts. A new messiah who, perhaps, gets "crucified" by defeat at the Democratic convention, could be the start of a powerful mythic storyline for secularists in need of a reason for being.

This will all last until Obama reveals himself as a mere mortal, which should come any day now. (See previous post on The Year of the Rat).


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The Year of the Rat Fink

Is it not fitting that the presidential race has really started rolling just as the Year of the Pig ends and the Year of the Rat begins?

According to Feng shui master Raymond Lo, quoted in an Agence France-Presse story, the rodent is seen as a "flower of romance," which means the year will stimulate romance, but also sex scandals.

(How would this be different from any other year?)

Lo says this year "will see the earth element sitting atop water, suggesting an outward solidity built on sliding foundations."

Uh-Huh. I can sort of sense that. Yeah.

Lee Sing-tong, a third-generation feng shui master, said there would be a big change in Hillary Clinton's health and career but that doesn't necessarily mean she will hold political power.

In contrast, Barack Obama, "has an in-born talent for leadership and is expected to be in an extraordinary political position in the next 10 years."

Crystal clear.

OK. We might all be hoping for a Ratatouille or even a Mrs. Fisby and the Rats of NIMH kind of Year of the Rat. I'd even settle or a Big Daddy Roth Rat Fink Year. But it could be a Willard version, or even -- horrors-- a year of the MAUS.

Brace yourselves. There's no cheese up this tunnel.


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The number of the candidates

Amid the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat during the Super Tuesday primaries, let's not forget some uncomfortable information provided recently by the Beastie Machine.

Some months ago, we examined Sen. Barack Obama for any hint of association with the Beast spoken of in the Book of Revelation:

First, notice the strangeness of his name. It sounds almost foreign. Sure enough, “Barack” means “blessed” in Swahili. And that's not all. It means the same thing in Arabic. Ditto in Hebrew. It is also a Sufi term referring to a sense of "divine presence" or "charisma."

Charisma? Uh-oh. Already he's sounding like a certain Carpathian character in those Left Behind books.

And we also took a hard look at Sen. John McCain. We found some disturbing facts. For instance:

The name "John McCain" has embedded within it the cursed appellation of history's first recorded murderer: Cain, the elder son of Adam and Eve.

In the case of both these candidates, we fed their names into our Beastie Machine and found the numerical values correspond closely with 666, the number of the Beast.

Don't worry. We'll examine the other candidates soon.

We post this merely as a public service announcement. Please return to your post-primary celebrations.

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Pancake flap upstages Super Tuesday

Well, IHOP would like to make you think so, anyway.

The pancake house chain was alarmed to discover that the 2008 Super Tuesday primaries were set for Feb. 5, a date that coincides with Shrove Tuesday — arguably the most important date in the pancake calendar!

(I didn't realize there was a pancake calendar, but then, why shouldn't every foodstuff have its own way of marking time?)

This isn't just a marketing gimmick for IHOP. Throughout the British Isles and in many other countries, the day before Ash Wednesday is commonly known as Pancake Day.

Ah, Pancake Day! In Ireland housewives run through town, each carrying a skillet with a large, very thin pancake. The idea is for the women to race to the finish line, tossing their pancakes as they run.

There's even a fertility angle. If the eldest unmarried daughter in a household is able to toss a pancake into the air and catch it again in the skillet, she will be married within a year. But if it doesn't flip or she drops it, she'll remain single.

See, this is what people did before Lost. Needless to say, the ladies of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary's "holy homemaking" graduate degree program would have this competition nailed.

In what is being billed as a compromise, IHOP says it will celebrate on Feb. 12 instead. Several state governors have agreed to proclaim Feb. 12 as "National Pancake Day." Lent, apparently, will proceed as usual despite the controversy.

To celebrate Shrove Tuesday, you can watch this video clip featuring an automated "confessional," even though the clip's been out for a while.

(Also, so sorry for the delay in finishing my review of the Picturing the Bible: The Earliest Christian Art exhibit. The subject got me pondering the definition and meaning of art itself, the place of the artist in the body of Christ, one thing led to another, and, well, when I've dug out from under all the research, I'll let you know what I've found out in Part II.)

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