Ralph Sevush, all around good guy, wrote the following short essay which he calls “The Cultural Divide.” I thought it was an interesting take on the current status of things and decided to close out political blog entries for a bit with it:
Regarding the cultural divide
This morning, I woke up thinking…
… that, as Spalding Gray observed, I live on an island off the coast
of America;
… that we should have just let the south secede when they wanted to;
… that perhaps we could consider a new form of secession, a Northern
secession;
… that if Canada could just give up a strip of land along the northern
border of North Dakota and Montana, we could build a “Freedom Trail”
with an “underground railroad” that connected the northwestern corner of
Minnesota to the northeastern corner of Washington state, thus creating
an independent, contiguous nation consisting of the Northeast, the Great
Lake region, the northern midwest, and the westcoast (plus Hawaii) with
full autonomy from the United States;
… that we could then forge a union with Canada, and become the
Federation of North American States (FONAS);
… that we would then be Fonasians, with access to Canada’s national
health care, with religious and ethnic diversity and tolerance,
relationships with the rest of the world, economic justice, individual
freedoms, and great hockey teams;
… that we would then have a nation composed of the cultural, financial
and industrial centers of the former US, and have Canada as our farmland
and ranch, and still have great vacation spots in the south pacific;
… that we could learn a lesson from Israel and build a massive wall
along our southern border that would separate us from the belligerent,
imperialistic, crypto-Fascist military theocracy that continues to grip
the US government, as it presides over a small-minded citizenry steeped
in religious zealotry who love only their god, themselves, their first
cousins and their sheep, and whose leading export to the world is death;
… that I should just roll over and go back to sleep. Perhaps I’ll
dream of Fonasia, in repose on my island off the coast of America.
But when I wake up, I’ll still be here.
Shìŧ.
Did you ever have one of those mornings?
– by Ralph Sevush, Esq.
(a card-carrying member of the ACLU and the MMMS)
• 
While “month” may indeed be a derivation of “moon,” neither of those links suggest that the calendar is based around the lunar cycle. Rather, it’s solar.
It’s a combination of the two. As for the Babylonians, they named the days after the seven planets that they knew of, but that wasn’t the only reason that they choose to make a week seven days long.
generic viagra
We can bet on Viagra now? Great! 🙂
Oh fooey, the post got removed, so now nobody will have a clue as to what I’m talking about. 😉
I didn’t include the Old Testament because I figured it was irrelevant, since the OT doesn’t consist of gospels written by different people recounting the same events. You don’t have the Books of Moses, Abraham, Isaac and Jacob each describing what went down in Eden.
It is not, as I infer from your question, from a belief that the OT is somehow intrinsically more right or better than the NT. It’s just that since the question involved the various Apostles describing the career of Jesus and whether there were contradictions, I focused the search to address that.
PAD
Okay, I’ll accept that explanation, but I was under the impression that the person you were responding to had said there were no contradictions “from Genesis to Revelations”. Since you excluded the Old Testament from your search without explanation, it suggested that you did indeed have a deeper reverence for the Old Testament.
Den, your last post was more helpful. I had to do some research on my own this time…
To recap, waaaaaay up above, before whatshisname was shrouded, someone posted that there was no basis for a 7 day week outside of scripture. Den responded that it was roughly 1/4 of al unar cycle, and that was the basis outside scripture.
Thus ensued a discussion that has expanded to include not just the week, but the entire calendar, days, months, and year.
Latest from Den: “‘While “month” may indeed be a derivation of “moon,” neither of those links suggest that the calendar is based around the lunar cycle. Rather, it’s solar.’
It’s a combination of the two. As for the Babylonians, they named the days after the seven planets that they knew of, but that wasn’t the only reason that they choose to make a week seven days long.”
Then there’s this link:
http://www.takeourword.com/Issue104.html
Without checking into the accuracy of it, it sounds pretty well supported. The Bablyonian week had nothing to do with a lunar cycle…it was a mathamatical repeating progression that lead to the naming of the 7 days, not a lunar cycle. My point that, with the lunar cycle being 27.5 days, your week would deviate 2 days from the lunar cycle every 4 months. Meaning, if the 4th Monday was supposed to be the full moon, in 4 months, the full moon would be occurring on the third Saturday. Your system of trying to track the lunar cycle through the week would be horribly useless.
I did find at least one site that spoke to the scriptural week being lunar cycle based. I really didn’t give it that much credence since it made a statement about mankind using a 7 day week, with the 7th day being one of rest, since Adam and Eve. Since the Babylonian week began with Sunday as day 1, I think that statement pretty much can’t stand up to the facts.
Kingbob,
I’ve already mentioned that the fact that the lunar and solar cycles don’t match up to a whole number of days has been a problem for calendar makers for thousands of years. That still doesn’t change the fact that every calendar has been an attempt to use both solar and lunar cycles in combination to track time.
This is the second time in a week that I’ve really hard to help you out with your reading comprehension problem and I really don’t know what else I can do anyone. I just you try Hook on Phonics.
Wow, Den, given the lack of proper grammar in your response, I’m tempted to try to make some smarmy comment about your reading abilities.
Oh, what the heck…
Funny you should mention reading comprehension
(which, by the way, has absolutely nothing to do with phonics. Phonics only attempts to help those that can’t grasp the English language’s many spelling nuances to be able to sound out words to pronounce or spell them correctly. Reading comprehension is where you have to understand the words used, and how they relate to the words around them)
since you seem to totally not be comprehending much of what I’ve been saying. I never stated anything about the calendar not making sense. And the only thing I’ve mentioned about the year is that it’s based on a solar year, tied to the 4 seasons, and probably agriculturally based.
Which is aprapos of nothing to do with whether there is a non-lunar cycle basis for the seven day week.
I’ll be honest: I don’t know what the Babylonian calendar was trying to do with the YEAR. Why? Because we were only tangentially speaking about the year. What we were discussing was the WEEK, and whether there was some basis outside of scripture (Genesis…is this ringing any bells?) for it. You suggested it was lunar based.
Try to answer this question: If a lunar-cycle based week loses 2 days every 4 months, why use it? It’s totally useless.
The Babylonian week had little, if not nothing, to do with a lunar cycle. They had a 12 hour day followed by a 12 hour night, followed by a 12 hour day, etc. etc. They had 7 visible celestial bodies, which they used to name the hours of each day, sequentially, and repeating. Over a period of 7 days, that hour naming cycle repeats. Thus, they days of the week are names after the first hour of each day.
It’s a mathematically repeating progression that has nothing to do with a lunar cycle.
Comprende’?
Now, where, in my reedin komprehnzon haf I faaled 2 undrstnd U?
Say Matt Adler,
If I remember correctly, you were quite a supporter of the Campaign Finance Reform laws championed by John McCain/ Russ Feingold, a few years ago. I told you then that I had thought of a few loopholes to which you replied that I didn’t know what I was talking about. (Not your exact words, but the basic gist of it). Judging from this past election cycle and the gaping holes in the way the CFR laws were used, Do you still think that CFR was a success?
Well, Kingbob, if the best you can do is make fun of my typos and repeat the same comment I’ve already addressed twice now, fine.
I give up.
No ancient people ever used lunar cycles in calendars. The calendar month has absolutely nothing to do with the phases of the moon or the rotation of the moon around the earth. You are right and every historian and archeologist in the entire world is wrong.
Does that make you happy?
Jeez, some people are just too thick for words.
Den, not to be a jerk, but you fired on me first. I’m not usually one to take a personal shot in a post, but I felt that essentially calling me dense was uncalled for.
One, I’ve never claimed that no ancient calendar was ever an attempt to track lunar and solar cycles. Neither have I spent much, if any, time talking about the MONTH. I’ve been talking about the WEEK. You stated that the week was 7 days because it was 1/4 of a lunar cycle. Point of fact: it’s not. It’s 7 days because the Sumerian/Bablyonian calendar, upon which just about all western calendars are based, was 7 days.
Which is not to say that any culture using that basis for a week (for those that even cared about such things) attempted to shoehorn the astromically based week into a lunar/solar cycle calendar. In fact, without doing any research on the origins of the calendar MONTH, I’d probably agree with you, that they are mostly an attempt to track lunar cycles.
But that was never my point. I know I’m long winded, but I generally think that I’m pretty clear in my meaning.
Aw gee, did I hurt your feelings?
Too bad I don’t care.
This thread lately reminds me too much of “Argument Clinic”
No it doesn’t!
Den said “Aw gee, did I hurt your feelings?
Too bad I don’t care. “
Well, no. Were you trying to? ’cause you failed in that, too…
“Okay, I’ll accept that explanation, but I was under the impression that the person you were responding to had said there were no contradictions “from Genesis to Revelations”. Since you excluded the Old Testament from your search without explanation, it suggested that you did indeed have a deeper reverence for the Old Testament.”
Or, eclark, given that the New Testament is shorter, perhaps it just takes less time to look up the contradictions…
In Matthew 27:46-50 and Mark 15:34-37, Jesus’ last coherent words are given as “Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani?”, translated in the New American Standard Bible (Updated Version) as “My God, my God, why have You forsaken Me?” This is then followed, a short time later, by a wordless cry, whose power tears the veil separating the congregation from the Torah Scrolls in the Temple.
Luke 23:46 cites His last cry as, “Father, into Your hands I commend My spirit!”; the veil is torn by this cry. This could be the cry mentioned in Matthew and Mark.
John 19:30, on the other hand, gives His last words as a quiet, “It is finished.” No shouting, no tearing of anything – He just dies.
Somebody’s wrong here…
Or, eclark, given that the New Testament is shorter, perhaps it just takes less time to look up the contradictions…
You know, sometimes you should just leave things alone, Johnathan. I wasn’t accusing PAD of anything. I just wanted to know why he didn’t include the Old Testament in the search. He gave me an answer and I accepted it. As for whether or the search would take longer, I rather doubt the extra 2 1/2 seconds it would have taken to type O-L-D in to the Google search engine would have put PAD out much.
As for the contradictions on Jesus’ last words, yeah, well, that just changes everything for me. Frankly, I find comic book incontinuity more disturbing.
A nice handy summary site for all your calendar needs!
http://www.hermetic.ch/cal_stud/lunarcal/types.htm
Say Matt Adler,
If I remember correctly, you were quite a supporter of the Campaign Finance Reform laws championed by John McCain/ Russ Feingold, a few years ago. I told you then that I had thought of a few loopholes to which you replied that I didn’t know what I was talking about. (Not your exact words, but the basic gist of it). Judging from this past election cycle and the gaping holes in the way the CFR laws were used, Do you still think that CFR was a success?
I think the FEC, a panel of unelected, politically-motivated bureaucrats, is not enforcing it. Which even Bush admitted, when he stated correctly that the law bans 527 groups from many of the activities they have been engaged in. The FEC is charged with taking enforcement action on violations, and they are not, due to their members own connections and interests. When you have a law-enforcement body refusing to enforce the law, do you give up on the law?
I know that conservatives are big on enforcing existing laws, so I’m surprised you’re not more up on this.
Some reading for you:
McCain Applauds President’s Commitment to Rein in 527’s
McCain Applauds Decision Striking Down FEC Regulations
McCain Calls for Overhaul of Election Commission
Jim in Iowa: How does an organism work with what is already there? How did an eye develop? It was not already there? As Michael Behe argues, there are some systems that are quite complex that need to show up in a complete form.
Luigi Novi: And Behe is flat-out wrong.
The eye evolved a single, light-sensitive cell into the complex eye of today through a series of hundreds if not thousands of intermediate steps, many of which still exist in nature (the area around that set of cells could
Luigi Novi: We know from scientific evidence from fields such as geology, astronomy, cosmology, Newtonian physics, etc., that it took far longer than six days to be formed.
Oh yeah, like scientific evidence isn’t flawed? It still isn’t a proven fact that the world took longer than 6 days to form. If it did take longer than 6 days, then prove it beyond any shadow of doubt.
Novafan
Luigi Novi: Maybe because his wife doesn
Luigi Novi: Or bad phrasing. I somehow doubt that he would actually attempt to assert such a blatant lie that he would have to know would be easily debunked. Given how others have twisted his words on Love Canal and Love Story, his attackers deserve far more scorn, particularly since they are not as fair as you to conclude hyperbole rather than outright lying.
Of course not, why would you or liberals in general think that a fellow liberal whould tell a blatant lie. I bet you would go so far as to say liberals never lie, it’s only conservatives twisting their words.
Luigi Novi: And remember, guys, that Novafan. Not Luigi Novi. 🙂
See, now there you go. You have to point out something over and over again. You would beat on a dead horse wouldn’t you? Bah!
Luigi Novi: If the flawed reasoning you offered above to rationalize the Isaiah passage is an example of what you consider
Luigi said For what it
Novafan: Oh yeah, like scientific evidence isn’t flawed?
Luigi Novi: In what way is it flawed? Tell me your problems with it.
Novafan: It still isn’t a proven fact that the world took longer than 6 days to form.
Luigi Novi: We know from physics, geology, and various dating methods that planetary material cannot coalesce and cool in 6 days.
Novafan: I never said Peter was going to Hëll.
Luigi Novi: I didn
I know that conservatives are big on enforcing existing laws, so I’m surprised you’re not more up on this
I believe that if the FEC had supported the existing laws before CFR was reformed and that politicians were abiding by the laws that they helped write, there wouldn’t have been a NEED for CFR in the first place.
The simple fact that the FEC refused to act on a number of complaints due, as the courts call it, to “misinterpretation” of the law confirms that I was right and there are loopholes in CFR. All the court battles are nothing more than an after the fact attempt to plug a few holes. They’ll find others.
uigi Novi: Personally, I would not have known one way or the other. May I ask, Peter, what observation or evidence you have for this? (Just curious.)”
Purely anecdotal. Any number of times, people have referenced conservative sites and blogs. And for grins and giggles, I’ve read message boards and comments in both places. And basically what I’ve seen is bunches of conservatives excoriating liberals and liberal thinking, blaming everything from the spiralling national debt to 9/11 on the Clintons…
…and no liberals responding.
Now as I said, purely anecdotal. Perhaps there are days where liberals show up in force at conservative bastions. But it’s nothing that I’ve seen myself.
PAD
You should have been at Lucianne.com up to the day of the election–lots of liberals gloating over the impending demise of the Evil Regime Of Smirky McChimp.
Stangely, they’ve been more quite of late.
My own anecdotal account would be that the conservative blogs I’ve seen tend to have one or two persistant site pests who have adopted the site as their own little street corner to stink up–basically, liberal Dee or Novafans.
Of course, it’s no surprise that your site has a solid core of people who disagree with your politics since the thing that brings most people here is something other than politics. Enjoyment of good writing tends to cut across political lines.
I’d wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving, but I don’t want to be accused of trying to push my religion down anyone’s throat.
Ðûmbášš, eclark.
Thanksgiving isn’t a religious holiday.
Happy Native American Oppression Day, everyone!
🙂
Bill Mulligan said My own anecdotal account would be that the conservative blogs I’ve seen tend to have one or two persistant site pests who have adopted the site as their own little street corner to stink up–basically, liberal Dee or Novafans.
Oh, so now I’m a site pest. Nice one Bill. Does anyone else have anything nice to say to me?
Come on, why hold back. Let me know how you really feel Bill and everyone else for that matter.
Go more generic with the holiday greetings…
“Happy Whatever-the-Hëll-You-Freaks-Celebrate!”
Site pest, or an unflushable, both work for you
The simple fact that the FEC refused to act on a number of complaints due, as the courts call it, to “misinterpretation” of the law confirms that I was right and there are loopholes in CFR.
So if, for example, a police department chose to interpret the law as allowing them to receive bribes, you would blame the law for having loopholes, rather than the police for not upholding it?
“Let me know how you really feel Bill and everyone else for that matter.”
Well, for starters, you’re something of a masochist and/or just desperate for attention. You’ve alienated/irritated just about everyone here regardless of political persuasion. I know it’s fashionable to say something like “If you’ve outraged everybody you must be doing something right!” but that was always a bogus bromide. Usually when you’ve managed to outrage everyone you have merely suceeded in being outrageous which, even in this ever more jaded world, is a lot easier than folks make it out to be.
And, in fairness, you’re no Dee. I’ll take that back. Bringing up PAD’s family was a mistake though, even if you did not mean anything malicious. Bringing up a guy’s family to score a point is tricky and likely to backfire (see Kerry, John).
Bill said You’ve alienated/irritated just about everyone here regardless of political persuasion.
Oh, how so. I’d really like to know which one of my posts irritated you so. I don’t recall hearing you whine before, unless I missed it and forgot.
Why do you wait until a guy is down to kick him? The one thing I like about liberals is they let you know exactly how they feel right away, they don’t wait until someone’s being beaten down by someone else to open up their mouth.
Big Thumbs up to liberals there.
So if, for example, a police department chose to interpret the law as allowing them to receive bribes, you would blame the law for having loopholes, rather than the police for not upholding it?
Well, yeah, wouldn’t you? I mean there has to be some ambiguous language in there that allows them to interpret the law that way. Now if you’re saying they’re taking a law like : Murder is illegal”, and interpreting it to mean “Hey we can take bribes!”, you have a bigger problem than police not upholding the law.
I mean, come on Matt, let’s take a look at the Patriot Act, for example. It’s a pretty benign law, design to help catch terrorists and save lives. So why are people so afraid of it? Because they’re afraid of the people who use it abusing the law and their civl rights. So is anyone talking about keeping the police from abusing the law? No, they’re talking about either weakening the law drastically or scrapping it all together.
I think any law or policy that allows the groups that use it to self-supervise themselves opens itself up to abuse by that group.
Bladestar:
Ðûmbášš, eclark.
Thanksgiving isn’t a religious holiday.
For God’s sake, Bladestar, read a history book, man! Then think about recent court rulings.
Bladestar said Site pest, or an unflushable, both work for you
I love you man. :0)
Bill said liberal Dee or Novafans
BTW, it’s Novafan without the s. If you’re going to slam me, at least get it right.
Sheesh.
Novafan (Bill’s masochist and/or just desperate for attention getter)
there has to be some ambiguous language in there that allows them to interpret the law that way.
Not necessarily. Saying someone misinterpreted something doesn’t imply that the misinterpretation was reasonable. Someone can blatantly and deliberately misinterpet something that is otherwise perfectly clear, just to suit their own ends. People frequently do.
And in the case of CFR, if the law was ambiguous enough to allow for their interpretation, the court would not have ruled their interpretation invalid. Their ruling is basically saying “The law clearly says one thing, and you did something else.”
Bladestar, whom I really hope was trying to make a joke, called someone else a dûmbášš and wrote, Thanksgiving isn’t a religious holiday.
Thanksgiving? To whom or what do you suppose that the thanks is to be given? There is a definitive answer to this question, from the origin of the holiday. Abraham Lincoln, in establishing an annual Thanksgiving beginning in November 1863, declared, “I do, therefor, invite my fellow citizens in every part of the United States, and also those who are at sea and those who are sojourning in foreign lands, to set apart and observe the last Thursday of November next as a day of thanksgiving and praise to our beneficent Father who dwelleth in the heavens.” (quote courtesy of wikipedia)
Al-Zarqawi Lieutenant Arrested in Mosul
Thank goodness. Hopefully his boss will be rooted out and found soon.
A poster wrote:
“Peter,
If you’re feeling very short-fused or even actively not enjoying the blog…know that taking a day, a few, a week, etc. and shutting it down for a break or stepping a way to relax from it is not only OK…but your perogative. Not saying that you should, just saying you could.”
No! Really?! What a service, taling a beloved and best-selling writer that HE can actually shut down HIS blog if HE wants to.
Of all the arrogant, smug, condescending posts. What a know-nothing kiss-ášš.
Matt Adler,
“I would venture a guess that the people who come here for the political debates rather than discussing your work, have little or no interest in your work.”
I disagree. First, I feel most of the people who come here actually are fans of PAD’s work to begin with. Judging from the posts i’ve read from people in the ten months I’ve been consistently visiting this blog, I’m pretty sure that’s correct, although only PAD and Glenn would know for sure.
“I’m sure you remember that guy on the AOL board who freely admitted as much.”
One person who helps support your statement is hardly enough to make it correct.
“Basically, just think the politics stuff attracts all the wrong sort of people.”
Really? And what sort of people might they be. We have teachers, writers, and all sorts of people from all walks of life that post on this blog.
If you really look at this tread, there is a heck of a lot of hard information there and some thought-provoking (if somewhat hot at times) opinions.
Look at all the topics covered here: Creationism, the role of religion in government, validity of the election, to what extent one should question the government, gay marriage as a civil rights issue and a lot of other stuff. Most of it has been discussed and debated inteligently.
What you may see as nastiness, I see as an interesting, scintillating discussion. In all my time here, there is only one consistent poster who I consider to be a douchebag. That’s a pretty good ratio.
“The people who are interested in your work will continue to come here and hear about it, or even just to hear your thoughts on related entertainment subjects.”
Seeing as how can only speak for myself, let me say that in my case you are incorrect.
As PAD stated, look at how many more posts his political threads garner. This particular thread has been going strong for an incredible THREE WEEKS!
So I – and others – keep coming back to it. In the process we see a thread about “Fallen Angel” or “Madrox” and remember to go there.
I find some of these political discussions positively addictive. They are, for the most part, far more reasonable and knowledgeable and though-provoking than conversations I have with many of my POLITICAL friends, let alone the Joe Sixpack I run into at the neighborhood pub.
But another reason the political threads get so much more hts than the ones concerning PAD’S work, I feel, is obvious.
Since the majority of us that come here are fans of PAD’s work, when a thread about his latest issue/novel comes out, the opinions are – with some exceptions – likely to be uniform. If it’s a new issue of “Fallen Angel”, for example, most people who bother to post on the thread are those who have read it. Chances are they are going to like it. So there is little disagreement or give and take.
If the thread is about that a book PAD is writing is being cancelled, well, again, since the vast majority of the posters are PAD’s fans, they will be upset about it. They may post once stating that, and that’s it.
But when the subject centers on a political topic, all of us who are united by our fondness for PAD’s work suddenly have divergent opinions. There is debate, give and take, and sometimes the conversation will morph into another topic and the debate will start again.
I see nothing wrong with this, and find this blog both enjoyable and informative.
And, as PAD has stated, it does help his sales. I, for example, though I own and have read almost all of PAD’s comics and novels, I did not like the first three issues of “Fallen Angel” and dropped it.
But since i found myself continuously drawn to this site for the political discussions, would inevitably click on his many threads regarding “Fallen Angel”. Seeing his obvious passion to keep the book alive in these threads, which I would not have bothered to seek out if I weren’t coming back almost every day to see the political threads, I decided I had to give this book another shot.
So I now have issues #12-17, and don’t plan on stopping until the book ends. Even though it’s still far from my favorite, it’s gotten a lot better (in my opinion) and I feel the passion PAD shows for it should be rewarded and is definitely worth my three George Washingtons every month.
Thanks, PAD!
Matt Adler and eClark,
I personally feel CFR is an abomination. If we take a step further and obliterate the 527s, then we are letting the politicians, the press and the parties control the message.
People SHOULD be able to listen to and read material from everyone from the Swift Boat Vets to MoveOn.Org and everyone else and take the time to weigh it all.
CFR is such a crock, since it limits the ability for people to question their government.
Novafan says:
“Bill said You’ve alienated/irritated just about everyone here regardless of political persuasion.
Oh, how so. I’d really like to know which one of my posts irritated you so. I don’t recall hearing you whine before, unless I missed it and forgot.
Why do you wait until a guy is down to kick him? The one thing I like about liberals is they let you know exactly how they feel right away, they don’t wait until someone’s being beaten down by someone else to open up their mouth.
Big Thumbs up to liberals there.”
Ok, say the above in a real whiney Eric Cartman voice and you may have an idea of what I’m talking about. And knock off the “poor poor pitiful me” routine. As my grandpappy said when I fell out of the pecan tree and broke both my legs, “Take two toughen ups, boy, and call me in the morning!”
Bill said And knock off the “poor poor pitiful me” routine.
You’re the worst kind of Conservative. The kind that has no backbone. I’ve yet to see a post from you that makes people go out of their way to respond. At least several of my posts have sparked many debates. What have you done to act as a catalyst?
Next time I make a post that ruffles your feathers, speak up and say something. Or, just shut your mouth until WAY after the fact as you just recently did and prove the no backbone comment. I’m finished with you.
’nuff said
Novafan