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There may be a greater than usual need for release this year. For fun. So if Halloween has gone anywhere for the past few years, I think it's back.

Lot of college kids walking around in costume today. And some borderline cases. When you don't have all the cultural references it can be hard to tell who's wearing a Halloween costume and who just has unusual fashion sense. That's cool too, though.

I had coffee at a place where one lady behind the counter was dressed as the joker. I use the lower case "j" because with her jester's hat and big rosy circles of rouge she didn't look like the Batman villain. Instead she looked like the figure on a wild playing card. Or maybe she was Mr. Punch, but her posture seemed too good.

What a quartet

 

I just got Gene Wolfe's Free Live Free from the library and I haven't started reading it yet. I dearly love the cover, though. As with most of Wolfe it's a science fiction book but the art style looks much more like a 1970s reprint of a 1940s mystery novel. The jacket copy describes the four main characters as "a private detective, a witch, a salesman, and a prostitute." So let's see.

The witch, a definite Liz Taylor type in plunging neckline, is doing a perfect "raise the roof" move. While it's probable that she's supposed to be in a different scene, the prostitute appears to be checking her out. She also looks much more inviting than the vast majority of prostitutes.

Of the two men, I'm not sure which is supposed to be the salesman and which is the private detective. The guy on the left combines a sharp city slicker suit with a mustache that yells "yee-ha!" The guy on the right, in the tan overcoat, seems like the artist ("Enric") modeled him on William Holden but is a dead ringer for what Tom Hanks looks like today. That's serendipity for you.

Nothing but a pack of cards

Once again our government has chosen to prove its valor in the Middle East. And once more there's a hostile watch on people Not With The Program. But if anything things have gotten stupider since the early 2000s. Stupider and meaner. And the fact that we're coming off two or three moral panics from the other side of the political spectrum (sort of) makes it hard to know whom to trust.

The air of censoriousness comes so close to being amusing in the case of Greta Thunberg. The twentysomething eco-activist is an annoying scold, to be sure. But the post that got her in trouble was the most anodyne kind of protest, if Israel hawks could accept any kind of protest as inoffensive, that is. As to the supposedly well-known history of the octopus as an antisemitic symbol, well, first of all her octopus was a little plushie whose "tentacles" were the size of a pinkie knuckle. Also when I think of sinister octopi I associate it with the Spirit's nemesis. Does that mean Will Eisner was a raging antisemite? Huge if true.

Perhaps a more serious development is the University of Florida's shutdown of students for Justice in Palestine. According to Chancellor Ray Rodrigues the school system will use “all tools at our disposal to crack down on campus demonstrations that delve beyond protected First Amendment speech into harmful support for terrorist groups.” Is there more than a semantic difference between the former and the latter? Some of the group's materials regarding 10/7 are suspicious enough to possibly justify extra scrutiny, but the law is pretty clear on rights of speech and association.

On Sports Night the boss character, Isaac, had a good speech where he said, "If you're dumb hire smart people. And if you're smart, hire smart people who disagree with you." This ties into what may be Ron DeSantis's great failing as a leader. As he's launched his ambitions he seems to have shrunken his circle of advisors to true believers only. If you're DeSantis then someone like Chris Rufo isn't an internal critic, he's your id made manifest. This might be satisfying, but it's not always helpful.

Our oldest companion

Alfred, Lord Tennyson is the one who coined the phrase about naturing being "red of tooth and claw." Since then it's been used to illustrate the point about nature being cruel. It certainly is true that living beings in the wild can fall prey to any number of awful fates. And our own violent natures―more pronounced in men―has evolutionary roots.

Still, there's another side. The consolations of nature are constant. Rain remains rain, and continues to have that soothing sound. Different types of birds sing us to sleep and sing us awake. We can count on the different winds of the four seasons. 

In the end I think we live in a world that loves us and forgives us.

RIP Liberal Blogosphere: c. 2001-2016

Not long ago I figured I'd peruse the remaining liberal blogs to see what they had to say about the current sitch in the Middle East: Hamas atrocities, Israel leveling Gaza, and whatnot. It all had to give them something to talk about, right?

Except apparently it didn't. I saw a post Alicublog that made passing mention, but that's it. Nothing as far as I could tell on Lawyers, Guns & Money or the Rude Pundit. It just didn't register. Same with big liberal social media accounts.

There was a time when I might have attributed this to Islamophobia―a term I might deconstruct in a future entry―or kowtowing to same. But that's really not it. 

The truth is that "issues" aren't really the blogosphere's thing anymore. There have been other public matters like the East Palestine spill, Lahaina, Ukraine. Areas where someone in the left-to-center-left could make their mark and maybe change some minds. But they're just left sitting on the table. 

It was a long process of decay, but the election of Donald Trump was probably the final blow. When the unthinkable happened the world was cleaved into Left and Right. In practice, though, that just meant Democrat and Republican. So now with some sui generis exceptions like columnist/cartoonist Ted Rall―who very much does address issues of substance―they can only focus on Benny Hill-level stuff like the GOP tossing out the House Speaker and failing to select a new one. In a year no one will even remember, which seems to be part of the point.

A Tale

 

One Howard Phillips Lovecraft of Providence, Rhode Island, runs down the street of a strange city, a haunted look on his angular face. He comes to a structure of stone and glass, a building he has never seen before, except perhaps in an obscure dream. Finding the door unlocked, he enters and rides the lift to the top floor.

Once ascended, he walks down the corridor and comes upon a door. The one word inscribed on the door which his weary mind can comprehend is "agent." This is good. A man of action is exactly what his situation requires. He knocks. Sounding put out, a man inside bids him enter.

The man, balding and Hebraic, gazes at him in puzzlement. Could he really be the confidant Lovecraft requires? But there is no choice, no time left. He ignores the dubious splendor of the office and speaks.

"I must tell you of the goings on I have seen in Arkham, Massachusetts and elsewhere."

"Go on," the agent prods him.

"Fiendish rituals, held by the seemingly respectable in conjunction with the obviously base. The chanting of blasphemous and obscene hymns, some in a language never meant for human tongue. Hideous beings are brought forth. There are gods that have been sleeping since before the dawn of time, and they are hungry. As their time renews, ours becomes ever more tenuous."

The agent rises to his feet, intrigued.

He whistles. "That sounds like a hell of an act. What do you call it?"

Lovecraft claps his hands in sheer delight.

"THE ARISTOCRATS!"

Who you calling a liar?

This song was originally by Argent, a hard rock band formed by former members of the Zombies. I like Three Dog Night's version. It's catchy, and Danny Hutton's raspy growl suits the lyrics well.

The visuals are quite the time capsule. Full-fledged videos were still rare at this time, especially in America. So you get largely live performances, but with this weird blue screen acid trips going on in the background. .It's a relief when the band isn't washed away by it.