Association Fallacy

All men with gold ties are exactly like this guy!

After Trump and Roof, I've noticed a disturbing logical fallacy being perpetrated by the white nationalist followers of Donald Trump and Fox News.

Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, a criminal, murdered a woman in cold blood in San Francisco.   Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez is an illegal alien, in the United States illegally.  Fox News has been pressing this story very hard because, since Lopez-Sanchez is an illegal alien, Trump must be right.  

The logical fallacy is called Association Fallacy.  Its where you say all members of a group are alike to one example because of some characteristic.

Bob has black hair.  Bob is a plumber.  Therefore, all men with black hair are plumbers.

My dog has four legs.  My cat has four legs.  Therefore my dog is a cat.

Lopez-Sanchez is a murderer.  Lopez-Sanchez is a Latino.  Therefore Trump is right and all "mexicans" are evil.  

Bernie Madoff is a Jew.  Bernie Madoff committed a financial crime.  Therefore the Nazis were right and all Jews are money grubbing swindlers.

See where we're going with this?

The scary thing is that white nationalists and Fox News are trying to use this story and this fallacy to further drum up anti-Latino feeling in the United States.  This one crime, and it is a heinous crime, is not proof that all Latinos are drug users and rapists.  However, it seems that a great section of the far right is trying to get people to come to that very incorrect conclusion.

Advice for the Fictional Character

How'd the grey haired one survive so long?

I’ve noticed something, especially in Science Fiction shows.  If you’re a fictional character, possibly in a red shirt, and something is described as a “routine patrol”, run away quickly.  All hell’s about to break loose!

Mr. Trump, you're going to need a bigger army...

Be careful whose feelings you hurt!

Oh dear, the escaped Mexican Drug Lord, El Chapo, is gunning for Donald Trump.  I'm sure anyone who even remotely knows about Latino people know that its a really really bad plan to piss them off.  Especially when said Latino person is the biggest Drug Lord in Mexico.

So, El Chapo seems to be thinking of having a little tete-a-tete chat with The Donald regarding some cultural misinterpretations, possibly over some coffee cake or cheesecake.    Fearing this, El Trumpo has gone running to the FBI. 

The Donald better read up on how the U.S. Federal Government stopped Pancho Villa.  Oh wait... they never did.  Pancho Villa was never caught although he did end up being killed by a political rival.   But no Federales, General Pershing or the FBI, never got him.

Oh, and El Chapo won't forget either.  He might not get Trump tomorrow or in a week, but he's not going to give up.  Trump's 70 years old so maybe he'll die before El Chapo's men get him. 

Seriously, just to get racist for a moment, The Donald can never let a Latino person within pistol shot range of himself from now on.  Neither employees on his golf courses nor anyone working in his casinos, because one of these days, one of those "boys" he barks an order at is going to look up and deliver a message from El Chapo.  It will basically translate "You're Fired!"

Normal people?

I was just walking by a TV with Fox News on and a Fox presenter said 

"You don't raise minimum wage because it makes food more expensive for normal people!"

Normal people?  I guess Fox News does not consider people who work and earn minimum wage to be "normal."  Now, I've been lucky.  Most jobs that I've ever had, I've earned much more than minimum wage.  However, there are lots of people that have to live on minimum wage, its all they can get.  I don't think these people are not "normal."

I suppose Fox News only considers you "normal" if you earn more than six digits a year.   By their definition, I'll never be normal!

World War 2 Discussion Podcast

Hello everyone out there!  I thought I'd try my hand at another audio podcast type thingy.  One of my interests is history, in particular, World War 2 history about which I've read quite a number of books over the years.  I'm definitely an "armchair historian" of the period, or, to use a purloined Japanese term, I'm a WW2 Otaku!

The way I did it is I found some study questions about World War 2 online to guide my discussion and picked three of them to talk about today:

*  What did Hitler achieve in his first two years in office?
*  What is the definition of fascism?  Why do you think Hitler was able to amass so much power so quickly?
*  What was the role of technology during World War II?  Did it fundamentally affect the outcome of the war?

The podcast starts off a little slow in the first couple of minutes as I warm up.  I don't do a lot of talking to myself, at least, not into a microphone but I get better as it goes on!  Its just over 28 minutes long.  The podcast is stored on Chirbits and you can listen to it at the link below:

World War 2 Discussion Podcast

Hope you find it interesting.  I'd like to do more discussions like this since I recently got a fancy new microphone.  Thanks for listening if you did!

Brownface vs. Brownshirts

One issue that often comes up in matters of cultural and "racial" relationships is the issue of insult and taking offense.  People who've been reading my blog probably think I'm a hair-trigger Latino Nationalist who takes offense if a leaf blows the wrong way.  Now, I do have a temper at times but, seriously, I do realize that sometimes, to quote Sigmund Freud, "a cigar is just a cigar."

Take for instance this following pic:

 

Again, a clanger from Paula Deen.  Her son is supposed to be Desi Arnaz and has had his eyebrows made up and dark make-up applied to his face to make him look darker (although Desi Arnaz was a rather pale skinned Cuban and I don't think he was as dark as this fellow here).

Yes, blackface and "brownface" is not very complimentary.  It all goes back to the long history of "blackface" such as the Black and White Minstrels and the fact that non-whites used to not be allowed to appear in motion pictures.  Charlie Chan happened because it was impossible at the time to consider casting an Asian for the part.  

However, say compared to Donald Trump's latest racist admission, the above, to me, is just stupid.  It makes me roll my eyes.  Yes, its kinda insulting to a Latino but its more along the lines of "gimmie a break" sort of irritation.  Its clearly done because someone wanted to be a goof and had a major brain fart.  A watermelon joke about African-Americans would be worse than this.   Flying off into a rage of insult and wanting rebellion for this picture would be a major overreaction.

On the other hand, Donald Trump's comment is a good example of when to take offense.  Categorizing all Mexicans, and by extension, all non-whites of Latin and South America as druggies and rapists, is beyond the line.  Trump's comment was obviously motivated by racism and stated with a wish to instill racism into the general white population.  My own amateur and ham-fisted analysis of the Trump comment hardly begins to scratch the surface of just why Trump's comment is "fighting words."

Paula Deen and her son in this picture are just idiots who don't think.  Trump is a racist.  I wish I was astute enough to be able to paraphrase for you the difference in some snappy and pithy statement.  I'll just leave you with my comments though for you to cogitate on.  One took a picture thinking it was going to be cute and its not.  The other comment from a Presidential candidate wants to whip up hatred and loathing against a group seen as inferior and non-human.   Paula Deen's use of the N-word qualifies as over the line as well for similar reasons.  The usage is meant to whip up hatreds and violence against a target group.

My anger is reserved for Trump.  My head, banging on the desk in a groan of annoyance, is reserved for Paula Deen and her son.  Take off the make-up, dude, you look like an idiot.

Will Donald Duck? Trump's Sexual Fear.

With satanic joy in his face, the black-haired Jewish youth lurks in wait for the unsuspecting girl whom he defiles with his blood, thus stealing her from her own people.

-Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler

Donald Trump, the racist megalomaniac, recently dropped a clanger when he said:

"They're bringing drugs, they're bringing crime, they're rapists," he said, adding, "and some, I assume, are good people." 

Now, its obvious that Mr. Trump is a racist, certainly against Latinos and probably other non-white groups as well.  That goes without question.  But what I find the most interesting about his quote is the inclusion of rapist.  Sound familiar?  The psycho shooter Dylann Roof recently used similar language during his attack on a African-American church in Charleston, South Carolina.  Screaming that you rape our women! he opened fire and killed nine people.

This is not a new charge from racists that members of the out-group, be it African-Americans, Jews, or even Hispanics, are rapists.  The belief is that these non-white peoples are literally hunting for white women to rape.  

Nazis and White Nationalists have often admitted that there is one area in which they are not superior to all other people on the planet, sexual prowess.  They have stated from the days of Ostara in 1920s Germany that the White man, the Aryan, had better things to do than go around having sex.   There was and is no way that the white nationalist feels he can compete with the bestial sexuality of the 'lesser' races that he hates.  

The response is, of course, to add this to the long list of reasons to hate these non-white groups.  They are beasts.  They are subhuman.  Their sexual appetites prove that they are not sentient, not members of homo sapiens.  So-called Aryans have seen this as a true challenge because the lower bestial races are seen as more potent than their superior betters.

Along with this view is a particularly ancient and patriarchal view of women.  The white women, in these views, is not a person who will demand her rights nor assert herself sexually.  The white woman is seen as an ideal of purity, of motherhood, of the keeper of house and home.  The white woman is not intelligent and does not comprehend the threat to superior White genes that the non-white brings.  She is very susceptible to the money of the Jews, the large penises of the Blacks, and the overall animal-like virility of the non-white.

When Trump says that Mexicans are all out to rape [white] women or Dylann Roof murders innocent African Americans because they rape our women, part of the mentality is that they are defending their women.  Women who need defending.  They are defending precious White genes from corruption by non-white blood.   The lower races must not pollute, through interbreeding, the rich blood of the higher races (D. Skylar, 1977)

Some white nationalists, and the German Nazis, believed that even sexual intercourse with non-whites was enough to soil, permanently, any white or aryan woman.  Christian Identity believers to this day believe that the worst crime a white woman can commit is to just have sex with a non-white, let alone marry or have children from them.  It all stems from an idea that the immortal soul of the white person is bound up in their blood and body.  Soiling the body with non-white contact can literally soil the soul and make it unworthy.

The sexual fear of non-whites using rape is also portrayed in films made for propaganda.  The most heinous example is the Nazi film Jud Suss, in which a German woman is raped by an Jewish man mainly just for the evilz.  And it is a sexual fear.  This propaganda, used by Dylann Roof and continued with Donald Trump, is to be used to dehumanize the "enemy," i.e. non-white people in general and Latinos and African-Americans in particular.  

Donald Trump wants white people to feel okay about the need for machine-gun turrets and huge walls, with forced deportation, internment, and murder.  After all, these "people" are here to rape our women, aren't they?  It would be okay to treat them badly.  That's what Trump's propaganda is all about.  Whipping up the sexual fear of a mass of white people who already feel threatened by and inferior to the rapacious sexual appetites of the non-white subhuman.    Trump, as president, wants a country where only the white person is human.  The others are beasts of the field to be controlled, kept out, and killed.

I'm going to go buy a confederate flag!

If they do get outlawed, they're going to become major collector's items!  Most companies have stopped selling them already.  I'd buy one, keep it in the original wrapping and take it to Pawn Stars in a few years! :-D

You will be assimilated... NOT!

One topic that I have been constantly reminded of over my lifetime is the desire of "mainstream" white America demanding that everyone else "assimilate" to their norms, language and custom.  The idea is that, if only these non-whites would assimilate, everything would be peachy keen jellybean.

I am living proof that this is not the case.  I was born in the late 1960s and grew up in a small "hick" town in Oregon in the 1970s.  I am a Latino of Californian and Sonoran decent. 

Back then Oregon was more conservative than the deep south, there were neo-nazis everywhere, and cross burnings were a way of life in some areas.  People in small towns would refer to Brazil nuts as N****r toes.  Chinese people were barely allowed to walk the street when I came to live in Oregon.  It was not a place to be non-white in those days.

In consequence, my family assimulated.  It also helped that I had been born a military 'brat'.  I never learned to speak Spanish.  We never practiced or discussed any of our cultural heritage or practices.  I speak proper standard English, fuss over grammar, and learned to use all the norms and customs of the white people I was around.  I still profusely say please and thank you to this day and speak very politely to anyone that I do not know well.  These were the rules of white society in days gone by.  I would have used "ma'am/sir" as well if that had been the custom.

Did any of this help?  No, not at all.  I was still a "Mexican" to the whites of McMinnville, Oregon growing up there, including one D. Bundy who tried to run me over with his car.  I was still a "Mexican" in High School and whenever anything happened, my brother or I were the first to be dragged in as the "usual suspects."  I was still a "Mexican" not to be hired at Hewlett-Packard in the 1990s.  I was still the object of the we don't need another Mexican around here at that recent job site in 2013, where I was the only Hispanic and only person not hired of four temp to hires (the others being white and all of us being qualified and promised to be hired).  

I was still one of the "mud races" to racists in Arkansas when I lived there.  To that one guy at NCR, when I worked there, I was still the alien invader that needed to be destroyed even though I was born in the U.S. and had done everything I could to "fit in."  I was still a horrible creature to Virginia Alderson, an ancient woman who would threaten me with her "G-Man" husband [I think it was a sort of accusation of being an illegal alien], and give me long lectures on how come you people don't assimilate?  Latinos are still dinged in job interviews for failing to make serious and constant eye-contact even though Whites have been told again and again that constant eye-balling eye contact is considered rude and threatening in Hispanic cultures.


These days, ethnic groups and immigrants no longer have to assimilate, which is a good thing.  Because, even if you do it, it will do you no good.  You will never be accepted.  I wish I had been raised in my culture and learned to speak fluent home-Spanish.  I wish I had not been raised to try and "fit in" with the "mainstream" white people who still despised me as one of the "mudslide" invading from the south.  Resistance isn't futile.  Assimilation is.  If you're thinking of it to try and "fit in", don't.  Neither they nor your future self will thank you for it. 

Book Review: Gods of the Blood by Mattias Gardell

Required reading in the subject

A bit of personal background before I review this book.  I grew up in Mc Minnville, Oregon, during the 1970s and early 1980s.  I was probably the only Latino in the school system at that time.  Oregon at that time was very white and racist.  There was a huge skinhead movement in Portland and it was only recently that the laws against Asians other non-whites had been repealed.  When I was a freshman in High School, a white guy named D. Bundy pinned me against the door of the firehouse with his car in a racist attack.  When I reported it to the police (around the corner in fact), they got "right on it" (read: didn't do a thing).   A teacher of mine in sixth grade (last name Prewitt) kept his classroom segregated with the Asians and the single black student sitting on a table of their own (which he never went to).  Somehow I got to sit on the center table in those days but not with the blond hair and blue eyed four students he put on the head table.  

Luckily, this is as bad as I experienced in the racism of old time America, however, it left me with a lifelong interest, almost obsession, to 'keep an eye' on White Supremacists which were people who's avowed purpose in life was to kill me and everyone who looked like me.  

I have since learned that most of these folks are plain lunatics and have little power to carry out their threats, and when they do go "lone wolf", they usually attack randomly. 

Anyway, since those days, I have read voraciously on The Third Reich and about radical right movements.  This book was one that I've been meaning to read for some time, but only just got around to it.  

Gardell's book is simply required reading for anyone interested in neo-nazis, white separatism, and the radical right.  The book is old and therefore dated in the individuals and organizations that are discussed.  However, since the "fearless leaders" in the white movements, as well as the movements themselves, behave pretty much the same now as they did then, Gardell's conclusions are fully relevant.   I would go so far as to say that this book should be read by any and all politicians and law enforcement personnel who may come into contact with white nationalists.

Gardell is coming at his subject from the viewpoint of neo-paganism.  The first half of the book discusses various white nationalists and their movements, but the second half goes into a long discussion of the ideologies of the different neo-pagan movements which influence the radical right. 

The second half of the book, which gets a bit 'heavy' in a scholarly way, goes into detail about various neo-pagan belief systems.  Wicca and Druidism are discussed, however, since these movements tend not to be racially motivated or used for racist motivation (except for a few bad apples), Gardell quickly moves on to other topics.  Satanism, Odinism, Wotanism, and Asatru are discussed, discussing the various levels of radicalism in each. 

Gardell is very level minded and approaches his topic openly, questioning watchdog groups such as the SPLC and the conclusions of other groups about how much of a threat these groups really are.  Gardell is not witchhunting and when he thinks that certain people or movements are 'mostly harmless', he says so.

The last chapter in which he discusses his conclusions are especially important.  Gardell defines white nationalists and puts them into perspective in a precise and intelligent manner.  His conclusions about where the leadership of white nationalism comes from, the interrelationship of non-mainstream beliefs, and how white nationalism is related to an idea of lost 'white privilege' and class standing with the onset of multiculturalism and globalism is conclusive. 

Book Review: Hitler by Ian Kershaw

Hitler 1889-1936 Hubris (1998)
Hitler 1936-1945 Nemesis (2000)
by Ian Kershaw

[Also available as a single volume edition, but I read the two volume edition]

Sir Ian Kershaw (a prominent British historian and a long time expert in matters regarding Nazi Germany and Hitler) wrote this two volume history (later republished in a single volume abridged edition) in order to find a middle ground between the sensationalist tabloid style biographies written on the subject and the more scholarly, dry, and plodding analysis which often include minutae of detail with very little approachable content.

Kershaw also wanted to write about Hitler not as a single personality, the over-personalization, the all powerful dictator, found in the tabloid histories, where everything rides or dies on Hitler's words but portray him more in situ, showing more of the effect of the world around him had on Hitler as well as the other way around.

Kershaw's work does just this.  It shows how Hitler took advantage of the political and social climate of the times, and even "rode the wave" at times.  Hitler, portrayed by Kershaw, was no political astute and, it seemed, blundered into things.  I'm sure that Dr. Kershaw would not like this oversimplification but Hitler was simply "at the right place, at the right time" in his analysis.  

Indeed, Kershaw's Hitler is a buffoon.  He's sort of an evil version of Steve Martin's character in The Jerk, or an evil Forrest Gump.  Someone who is a blundered, shouting, maniac but seems to pop up at the most opportune moment and get propped up by industrial and cultural backers who think they can control him and who think Hitler will serve their purpose.  Of course, in the end, it was totally the other way around.  They served Hitler's purpose, but by the time they realized that, it was far far too late.  

Kershaw, while a major academic character, writes very well.  He writes fluidly and entertainingly.  His language, while academic, is not dry.  I have heard Dr. Kershaw speak in a lecture on Hitler given to the Open University and he is a lively and entertaining speaker.  His writing is similar.  However, he still uses very academic language and his sentences are thickly constructed with meaning, so it will take longer to get through his text than, say, a regular book. 

The book does not totally focus on Hitler, and one can even say that this work is not so much a biography on Hitler but a history of the Third Reich with the focus on Hitler.  Other events and people are discussed in depth; however, attention is always brought back to Hitler, the focus of the narrative is from his point of view or on Hitler himself.  For instance, Rommel is mentioned but this book does not discuss the North African campaign, unless it is to illustrate something about Hitler's actions and reactions.

Kershaw wrote this to be a more accessible but yet fully academic discussion of Adolf Hitler.  Kershaw is a serious historian and, as such, there is no discussion on the occult influences of the early Nazis nor any of the other more fanciful conspiracy theories which surround Adolf Hitler.  He does spend some time on the possibility of Adolf Hitler's Jewish ancestry although Kershaw comes to the conclusion that this was most probably not true.  In the end, Kershaw rules that the area of Germany in which Hitler's ancestors lived had excluded Jews in the mid 19th century so it would have been even more unlikely for one of Hitler's grandparents to have been Jewish.

Ian Kershaw's greatest contribution to Nazi Germany studies is the Working Towards The Fuhrer concept.  Basically, Hitler didn't have to micromanage Germany because everyone around him, desperate to please him, ran off and did stuff that they thought Hitler wanted done.  Kershaw came to this conclusion trying to explain why, given that Hitler was essentially a lazy dictator who did very little real "work" from day to day, got people to do so much stuff in his name.  It also helps to explain the most horrible of his deeds, the Holocaust.  Hitler did not need to go into elaboriate detail on paper or in speeches about exterminating the Jews, he just had to keep insinuating to Himmler and other goons how much he hated them.  These satraps then ran off and, wanting to work toward the Fuhrer, do something to get in good with Hitler and please him, progressed to the mass murder of the Jews as well as millions of other "undesirables."  Rather a case of "who will rid me of this turbulent priest!" with an equally ghastly outcome.  Except that Hitler didn't feel bad at all afterwards.

There have been hundreds and hundreds of books written about the Third Reich and Adolf Hitler.  Some of these books have been written by giants in the field, famous historians and figures.  But Ian Kershaw's Hitler is right up there at the top of the list.  This work is simply required reading for anyone who claims to study Hitler or the Third Reich, either officially or as an "armchair historian" like me.  

Councellor Deanna Troi

I'm certainly glad that the character of Deanna Troi in Star Trek the Next Generation was fleshed out and developed as time went on.  Oh sure, she stayed the "ship's bike" and pretty much all male guest stars could count on a tumble with the Hellenic beauty, but she was really just unintentionally goofy at the beginning.

For instance, the Enterprise would find itself in some threatening situation, surrounded by Romulan warbirds or something, and Troi would bleat out:

"I sense stress..."

No shit, Sherlock!  Yeah, she was about as interesting as paint drying in those days.  I recently watched "First Contact" and Troi was seriously interesting and amusing (her drinking contest with Cocrane and the interaction with Riker afterwards are just wonderfully classic ).   

Its rare that a character can be saved from the complete dross they started out as, but they did it with Troi.  On the other hand, so did most of the males in the Alpha Quadrant!

Catstory 101: Mandy 2001-2013

Mandy c.2009

Mandy 2001-2013

Mandy the Cat hailed from Gentry, Arkansas.  She started out as my girlfriend Val's cat and was about three months old when she adopted Val.  Apparently, she lept up on Val's chest while Val was babysitting and slept there.  Val took her home with her. 

Mandy went through a lot of movement in her life, including a move from Arkansas to Oregon in 2009.  Mandy was somewhat fierce and could be wild at times (especially in her younger years when she would run around crazy at night and climb into high inaccessible places) but after Tikki, all other cats seem tame by comparison.  She was a very loud cat and loved to yowl at night.  She also loved to eat, something that caused her a few medical problems in her time.

I first met Mandy in late 2001 when I observed her trying to get out of a bedroom with a door ajar.  There was a ferret living with her in the house and, after pawing at the door and not being able to figure it out, the ferret literally shoved Mandy out of the way and opened the door to get out.  It was sort of a defining moment of Mandy's personality and abilities.  And she never did learn how to paw open doors.

Mandy was a very loyal cat, sleeping on Val's head at night and very attached to her daddy (me).  She grew very large later in life and at one point had to be put on a diet.  On the other hand, her bulk came in handy when she would throw herself on a string to capture it! 


Her first years were spent around the ferret and a Doberman and I always thought that Mandy identified as a dog.  She didn't know she was a cat.  

We've been told that Mandy had a very expressive cat face and I think the veterinarian we took her to wanted to cat-nap her! :-) 

One interesting bit of trivia - having lived in Arkansas for almost ten years, living through extraordinary violent
Midwest thunderstorms, Mandy was never afraid on Fourth-of-July night with all the fireworks.  Even in Oregon, she would run to the window to look out, probably thinking the commotion was another big thunderstorm. 

In the latter part of her life, Mandy was on a pure wet-food diet because of her weight.  Dry food is okay for cats, but contains a lot of grains they don't really need.  If your cat is overweight, try to avoid feeding them dry food.

Mandy was released to the universe after a long fight with cat leukemia in 2013.  

Catstory 101: Tikki 1978-1996

Tikki in 1980

Tikki 1978 - 1996

Yes, that is correct, Tikki lived to 18 years old.   Tikki was a feral cat from the hills around Sheridan, Oregon.  She was loud, she was fierce, she took a long time to domesticate and tame to a level where she could be kept as a pet!  Although my mom went and got her after Sampson died, I like to believe that she was very much my cat and we were very close.   Tikki was named after the Kipling character Rikki-Tikki-Tavi, and she certainly lived up to the ferocity and combativeness of her namesake.

Being feral, Tikki was a high difficulty cat. She would scratch and bite and when she did, she meant it.  Seeing other cats through the window would send her into a boiling ear-shattering rage in which she would throw herself against the window to attack.  I once got in the way of one of these rages and was severely scratched.  After that attack though, Tikki glued herself to me as if to show she was sorry as she was in the middle of a berserker rage when it happened. 

Tikki was very loud.  One of her sobriquets (and she had many) was Tikki the Wawool, named after a catlike creature in a 1970s Star Trek comic.  The Wawool's yowling was so loud and bizarre that it would literally drive people insane.  Tikki's yowling was similar.   My sister's fiance was tasked with feeding Tikki when we were out on vacation one day.  He had to enter the lair of the beast, alone, unarmed, and leave food.  Somehow, he survived and escaped with his life.  It was his initiation test and to this day he still remembers the horror!

Actually, Tikki was a very loving and loyal cat, to me and my mother.  She would sleep in bed with me, usually at my feet and was very cuddly with those she adopted as her cat slaves.  But she never could hold back her attacks as she had never learned to 'play', anytime she fought a toy or a stuffed mouse, it was for real.  She's been the most aggressive cat I have ever seen while playing with cat toys.  She knew the proper attacks and would always do the 'neck snap' maneuver on any string or cat toy she could find the neck on.   Having been raised a feral, once her nails were out, she had to draw blood.  She was like a Klingon cat!

Tikki had a calico type coat with a huge prominent black spot on her back.  I could swear that the black spot got larger in the winter and smaller in the summer but I probably was just imagining it. 

I wasn't home when her end came.  I hear that she just got more and more frail, more and more sick until she finally died. She was buried under a tree in Forest Grove, Oregon on a farm my mother lived on.  Perhaps, on nights of the full moon, the yipping of the coyotes is answered by the loud warbling full-throated yowl of a cat who has no fear of anything, certainly not a pack of coyotes!

Catstory 101: Sampson 1968-1978

Sampson in 1978

Sampson the Cat: 1968 - 1978

Sampson and I grew up together!  Really, I was born in 1968 and Sampson joined the family in the same year.  I am not sure where he came from and I, sadly, have few memories of him.   I'm not even sure how he died.  One day I came home from school and found out that my mother had taken him to the vet.  He died soon after.   Apparently, he had had a heart attack and was being kept alive on drugs but my mother decided to let him go and they put him to sleep.

Sampson is in one of my earliest childhood memories though.  I was bathing in the tub and Sampson leaped in with me.  He was cat-knee deep in water and just froze.  I'll never forget the look on his face.  Something like "I can't believe I just did that..."  In one terrific move, he leaped back out of the tub and ran off, to dry himself and hide in embarrassment.  

Sampson was an outdoor cat for the first years of his life and another story I've been told about him is the day he leaped through the window with a bird in his mouth as a gift for my mother.  My mom has a phobia about birds (especially dead ones), so of course she screamed bloody murder.  Sampson, grabbing the bird, leaping back out through the window.

I don't remember much about his behavior or whether he meowed a lot.  But I can tell you one creepy thing.  After he died, I had a reoccurring dream in which I was playing chase with him in the upstairs of this old creepy house we lived in.  Running to catch him, arms outstretched, he'd vanish right before I could catch him.  

Urusei Yatsura vs. Ah My Goddess!

 

(I wrote this geeky article on an anime forum awhile back.  Reposting it here on my own blog just cuz...)

Hello fellow UY fans!  I've been an anime watcher for years and years and years but only started watching Urusei Yatsura during this last year.  It's amazing!  I've seen gifs/pics of the characters around and always wondered what all the fuss was about.  Now I know!  I also know where most the gags seen in later anime came from... and what certain really bad anime like Trouble Chocolate were trying to rip off.   

SPOILER ALERT

SPOILER ALERT: I'm just going to go ahead and talk openly about events in two episodes of anime (Ah My Goddess "Everyone has a Destiny" and UY #157 "I love Darling's Sincerity") so if you think you want to watch either some day and haven't, and don't want any spoilers whatsoever, turn back now!  

Anyway, I was watching "I love Darling's Sincerity" (ep #157) and it struck me as very similar to the Ah My Goddess anime episode "Ah! Everyone Has a Destiny!"  No, I'm not saying they ripped off UY but the stories are very similar.  In AMG, Keiichi Morisoto comes across a "shinentai" of a young girl, a ghost reminant, who wanted to date his grandfather but couldn't because she died before he could come back to her.    Keiichi makes it up to her by being nice to her and taking her for a motorbike ride.  

In UY 157, a similar thing happens when a sickly girl spies Ataru Moroboshi from her hospital window every day and falls for him (not knowing he's the biggest lecher this side of... anywhere!)  "Darling's Sincerity" is one of those rare episodes of UY which are done "straight" and its very poignant and sad.  Still has some humor in it, as when Nozomi (the ill girl) keeps asking her mother who this strange boy she likes is, and the mother keeps ignoring her because she knows all about Ataru!

The similarities in the shows made me compare the two.  I often think deeply on things, usually trivial things that have little or no bearing to anything in real life... :-)  I was thinking of how simular it was that Ataru and Keiichi approached the situation.   Now, for anyone unfamiliar with Keiichi Morisato of AMG fame, he's a total goodie.  He's the epitome of the Lawful Good, goodie-two-shoe, clean-cut, never a bad word or bad thought character that you'll ever come across.  You could not get more opposite of Ataru in almost any way.  Keiichi is so saintly that half the time i watch him, I can't stand the perfect little jerk! lol.

This made me think of C.S. Lewis, one of my favorite authors.  In one of his books, he wrote on how he considered it "better" or more moral when someone who has lots of problems does their best to be good and righteous (or honorable or nice or whatever you think of as "good") than when someone who already is like that behaves that way.  Even if the flawed person fails, CS Lewis considers their effort as more praiseworthy than the goodie who just is that way automatically. 

Considering this, this is why I made that subject line the way I did.  In "Everyone has a Destiny", of course Keiichi is going to be nice to the ghost girl.  He can be no other way.  Of course he's going to be kind, considerate, still worried how it will effect Belldandy... etc.  Its just how he is, he could run the whole episode on autopilot.  There's no _effort_ on his behalf to do the right thing (something I think CS Lewis would point out as the difference).  There's no effort for Keiichi to be the knight in shining armor and see this poor girl's spirit to the afterlife.

Meanwhile, Our Ataru has a few more challenges.  And he's given more challenges than Keiichi as well!  Nozomi's a ghost, which takes him a moment to get over, but he's okay with that.  She's kind of cute and he can live with it.  But it turns out she knitted him a scarf and mittens... and a woolen hat.  He.. um... after Sakura smacks him around some and reminds him of how he's doing a good thing for this poor girl's spirit, he can wear them, even in the hottest part of summer. 

Then Nozomi pulls out a sweater... she died at Christmas time.  By this time, you're pretty sure Ataru is just going to either throw in the towel or have to be poked the whole way by Sakura.  However, Ataru puts the sweater on, even when it turns out its not finished!  Then he happily plays along with the whole situation!  He gets into it so much that he even begins to flip Lum's jealousy meter and the lightning begins to build.   At another point, Sakura asks him if he's hot in all that winter gear and Ataru hisses to her that, of course, he's dying, but he's making a very bold face on it.  The day goes on, they go for rides and watch fireworks.  In the end, Nozomi's spirit moves on, happy, able to go on.  Ataru walks off in melancholy, keeping the sweater and accessories on even after Sakura reminds him he can take them off now.

That is why Ataru wins over Keiichi Morisato in my book.  Keiichi never really had an obstacle while Ataru really did.  Also, Ataru is one of us.  He's a young man, he's a person.  He lusts after as many girls as he possibly can.  He doesn't want to be inconvenienced.  He doesn't want to wear hot clothes in summer.  He doesn't necessarily want to drop everything to help some ghost girl that just happened to get a crush on him.  But he does.  He does the right thing and, in the end, I think he's glad that he did. 

Ataru had to work at doing the "right thing," its not really an automatic part of his nature.   That's why my applause is for Ataru and not Keiichi in this situation.  He had to rise above himself to do it, challenge himself to be better.  

Heil You-Know-Who!

Looks like Rodger Debris' Hitler from "The Producers" but he's not...

Recently I was able to watch this German movie (with subtitles.)  Controversial, its one of the first time that a movie made in Germany and in the German language has portrayed Hitler and the Nazis.  This is very controversial stuff in Germany where swastikas and even talking about The Third Reich is literally illegal.

The movie is supposedly a comedy, but European comedy is not like American comedy.  Don't expect a happy ending.  Well, not that you would with a movie about Hitler, but even for the Jewish "speech therapist", there's no happy ending even though this was supposed to be a lighthearted romp.

The movie has also been compared to "The King's Speech" (which I have also seen) in that Hitler is a broken mess and Goebbels sends for a famous actor to teach him to give a great speech during the final dark days of the war.  The actor turns out to be a Jew who's languishing in a concentration camp. 

Okay, the movie is no "Producers."  The main problem is that the movie doesn't really know what it wants to be.  The Jewish family and their subplot are played straight.  They are taken from a concentration camp... a real concentration camp with tortures and threats.  The Jewish characters are all played straight, this is not a Mel Brooks world of thumb-to-nose silliness.   The Nazis are nasty and evil, just as they should be, but not the "bwahahaha" type of villainy where they rub their hands together but the nasty racist "torture you to death in hideous ways rather than look at you" way that most of the inner elite of the Nazi party truly were.

I think that was one of the worst problems with the movie, for me.  I know European tastes are vastly different than standard American tastes, especially in comedy.  But this isn't even a "dark comedy", its just a twisted drama with a couple of attempts at cheap laughs thrown in. 

The subject matter is very limiting as well.  We know that Hitler was ultimate evil, so its just not possible to have character development (although he gets it anyway) or some sort of "realization" or heel-face turn.  There's not even come-uppance as the end of the movie doesn't end with him blowing his brains out.  It ends with someone else getting their brains blown out.  No, the Jewish family doesn't get away on a stolen U-Boat or steal a plane and escape to Switzerland.  No happy endings in European comedies, remember?

There's a couple of other very disturbing moments in the film as well.  Hitler himself is portrayed as a neurotic mess.  But he's a mess because of his abusive father and sucky childhood.  Hitler cries.  He wets the bed, not because he's crazy, but because his father beat him so much.  He whimpers.  

Oh, and he confides in his Jewish instructor that he never really wanted to exterminate the Jews, that was Himmler's idea.  Hitler just wanted to send them away to Madagascar or somewhere to live with the penguins.   This line in itself might not be too bad, but its one of the opening lines of holocaust deniers and neo-nazis like David Icke and others.  I'm even suprised they got away with putting the line in the movie.  Maybe no one noticed.

Other scenes may have been amusing to the German audience, but are old jokes to US and British audiences.  There's the obligatory "Heil Hitler" scene at the beginning where one guy says "Heil Hitler" and the others have to say it too.  On and on, repeating, until they finally run out of 'heils' and calm down... then someone runs up and says 'heil hiter' again sending them all off again.  This joke couldn't have been shown in German cinema until recently but US and British audiences have seen it since Hogan's Heros and Monty Python and its old.  Fingernails on chalkboard old.

To give the movie its due, the acting is very very good though.  The doomed and anguished Jewish actor is played superbly with pathos.   Hitler is played so well that you might forget who this is that you are meant to be feeling sorry for.  Goebbels, while not humorous at all, is played with such sickeningly accurate evil that this actor should have got an award for it.  

Fantasy Nation Building: The Nation of Avalis

Avalis

Head of Government: Briave Curma

Head of State: Emed Erer

Government Type: Social Conservatism.

Government Ideology: Social Conservatism.

            Avalis did not have an easy passage into the early modern era.  The industrial and social revolutions of the last century, as well as the Wars of Revolution on the continent, deeply divided Avalisian society.  The monarchy was overthrown and the nobility abolished.  There was sporadic, low-level, but never ending violence throughout the country for many decades.  Much of the violence was internecine, personal, dividing families, and pitting communities against each other.  Out of this chaos, two major political parties arose.  Both parties believing that government should be strongly involved in social and economic matters but with radically different approaches in their beliefs.

Politics:

            The Free Unionist Movement (FUM) are social liberals who seek to find a balance between individual liberty and social justice.   Going further than classical market liberals, the FUM also believes the legitimate role of the government includes addressing economic and social issues such as poverty, health care and education.  Up to 49% of the population support the FUM (called FUMblies by their opponents) and the party is able to use its power to force through many policies.   At present, the FUM is led by Eovix Markyl, who has made no secret that he seeks to be the next Head of Government (with a FUM Head of State as well).

            The Unified Loyalist Movement (ULM) is the social conservative movement of Avalis.  Many of the early ULM members were royalists who had to change their stripes after the fall of the Avalisian monarchy.  Most of the membership of the ULM is also members of the Church of Avalis, which espouses very traditional social and political beliefs.  The ULM looks back to the last century and wants to keep ancient religious and cultural beliefs as government policy and law.   They are led by Eorin Bude, a church leader, and controlled 35% of the vote in the last elections.  In these last elections, the ULM leveraged support from minor parties and coalitions, as well as appealing to the piously religious among the population, and won.  Briave Curma and Emed Erer are both members of the ULM, as well as practicing members of the Church of Avalis. 

            The friction of a majority of the FUM in the Elective Legislature (the main governing body) with almost half the population in support, and ULM heads of state and government (as well as most of the ministers) is the source of the majority of the political struggles in Avalis today.

            The only other party of note in Avalis is the Progressive Loyalist Party (PLP).  They are social democrats.  They call for a universal welfare state and collective bargaining schemes but yet still support a capitalist economy.  Strong socialist underpinnings among the PLP have kept it from gaining more ground in a country strongly divided between a religious right (The ULM) and a liberal but yet capitalist left (The FUM).  The PLP only garnered 9% of the vote in the last election and are led by the Cotta Grila, leader of the Transport Seaport United (TSU) union.