The Bitter Orange of Sweet Jesus: A Brief Parable on Giving

'Twas the late 1980s in Paris, the plaza at Beaubourg facing the Centre Pompidou. I was hanging out, crowd-watching; people relaxing on a sunny day in Paris. My shoes were worn. I suppose I was scribbling in my journal as any proper moveable feast American in Paris does. Jugglers, tourists, painters, punks.

And Jesus, sweet Jesus, walked among the crowd, silently blessing the masses. He is American, it turns out after all. Dressed in a white robe and sandals with a rope for a belt. He looked just like his pictures - a ruggedly handsome white man with long hair and a beard. No halo, but his steps were light, his compassion visible.

I watched Jesus. He slowly moved towards a couple of German tourists, two girls in hiking boots having their lunch while seated on the cobblestones of the plaza. Some quiet words were exchanged and one of the girls reached up to Jesus and handed him one of their oranges. Jesus accepted the fruit delicately, as if taking an infant into his arms.

Now the white-robed figure glided patiently through the crowd with the bright orange in his hands. He approached two punks clad in official leather, chains, and torn jeans outstretched on the ground in heroin-induced spittle-bliss. These were the days in Europe when public displays of heroin use were treated like one would treat urban pigeons.

Jesus stood over the two punks, the sun glowing at his back. He reached out his hand to the punks, holding the orange as an offering and said, "please accept this fruit." They responded slowly, bewildered at the unusually life-like divine productions of the smack, and squinted up at Jesus. Jesus looked down upon his children, "please accept this fruit."

One of the punks managed with great effort to raise an arm more naturally attached to the ground. He gave the arm a small wave, a "go away" movement. The arm relayed the message to Jesus. Jesus responded, the golden manna in his palm, "please accept this fruit."

The other punk became angry, but couldn't stand up. He tried. But there was great difficulty raising his head. He uttered a word or two, which can be translated here roughly as, " no... ungh...."

"Please accept this fruit," Jesus again asked from his place in the infinite stream of cosmic time.

"Uungh! Blrrp...."

"Please accept this fruit."

"Noooooo...." And the angry punk tried clumsily to swing at Jesus. Neither of the punks could get off the ground. But their will not to accept the bright fruit remained impressive.

"Please accept this fruit."

Frustrated by the divine presence's eternal patience and their inability to move, the punks began to cry. They tried covering their ears. They tried rolling away. They tried to give each other comfort. All failed. They were left with crying.

"Please accept this fruit...."

Needing to move on to a rare appointment, I left Jesus, the orange, and the two punks, a crèche-like scene of Jesus and his lambs that grew smaller as I walked on. As I turned the corner out of sight, the drama was still playing out.

What was the outcome, I do not know. I suppose that Jesus broke the punks' will and ultimately gave the gift he sought to give.

Black Sites

A decent article today in the WaPo providing an insider's account of the CIA's "black sites" and the practice of disappearing in the US "war on terror."

Sun City Girls

Charles Gocher, the drummer of a great, wild, and relatively unsung band, Sun City Girls, died last week. Treat yourself to some pre-post-avant-rock here at The Record Robot.

Snow Melt DC

Photo with the cellphone camera by Helmut

Phronesisaicalitidiousnessolation

A little weary of blogging recently, I'm thinking of lighting the place on fire with a name change. What do you think about "Phronesisaicalitidiousnessolation"?

I'll also consider "Phronelope Cruz."

Poliblogging

Our blogger-pal Lindsay Beyerstein at Salon, explaining why she turned down an offer to work for the Edwards campaign. Read on.

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. A bunch of Internet staffers with private blogs sounded like a disaster waiting to happen.

Whose DNA matches Jesus'?

Quote of the day:

...The findings also suggest that Jesus and Mary Magdalene might have had a son called Judah, it said on its website -- claims that Kloner ridiculed as impossible to prove.

"You would have to do DNA checks and see if the DNA of the bones found in the cave, which allegedly belong to the son of Jesus, match with God's DNA!" he said, referring to the Christian belief that Jesus was the son of God.

Bogus Intelligence

Once again.

Although international concern is growing about Iran's nuclear program and its regional ambitions, diplomats here say most U.S. intelligence shared with the U.N. nuclear watchdog agency has proved inaccurate and none has led to significant discoveries inside Iran...

"Since 2002, pretty much all the intelligence that's come to us has proved to be wrong," a senior diplomat at the IAEA said. Another official here described the agency's intelligence stream as "very cold now" because "so little panned out."...

American officials privately acknowledge that much of their evidence on Iran's nuclear plans and programs remains ambiguous, fragmented and difficult to prove.

Colombia Scandal

This is not really news if you're in Colombia, but it has finally dribbled out into the US press.

The widening probe linking dozens of political allies of Colombia's president, Álvaro Uribe, to the country's right-wing death squads and drug traffickers has started to erode support on Capitol Hill for Colombia, the biggest recipient of US aid outside the Middle East and Afghanistan...

"Who have we staked all of our political capital on in Latin America? Uribe," said Adam Isacson of the Center for International Policy, a think tank in Washington. "If this scandal engulfs him or his armed forces, it will be a devastating blow to the whole design of US policy."

The "para-political" scandal burst open last fall, when a computer seized from paramilitary leader "Jorge 40" revealed the names of dozens of politicians who supposedly collaborated with paramilitaries in intimidating voters, seizing land, and kidnapping or killing labor unionists and political rivals. Other revelations followed, including secret documents signed by officials pledging moral support or kickbacks to the illegal militias.

Strange Sea Creatures

Including a "psychedelic octopus," they say. There was a 1960s Brazilian band with a similar name. This has definitely got to be territory, however, for coming up with environmentally-conscious indie band names. I'm fond of the The New Crustacean.

Friday Dinner Party Conversation Stopper

It is a strange world in which the conception of the real has to be corroborated by reference to that the reality of which is made dubious by the conception.
- John Dewey, The Quest for Certainty

They're Not Going to Take It Any More

You knew it would come to this.

Chimpanzees living in the West African savannah have been observed fashioning deadly spears from sticks and using the hand-crafted tools to hunt small mammals -- the first routine production of deadly weapons ever observed in animals other than humans...

Using their hands and teeth, the chimpanzees were repeatedly seen tearing the side branches off long straight sticks, peeling back the bark and sharpening one end, the researchers report in today's on-line issue of the journal Current Biology. Then, grasping the weapon in a "power grip," they jabbed into tree-branch hollows where bush babies -- small monkey-like mammals -- sleep during the day.

After stabbing their prey repeatedly, they removed the injured or dead animal and ate it.

This is really quite astonishing. Simple tool-use has long been documented among nonhuman species. But we're talking about quite complex tool-use here involving fashioning found objects into a more workable form.

Young Jackfruit

George

A day late, but worth it. From Balkinization:

"Should any American soldier be so base and infamous as to injure any [prisoner]. . . I do most earnestly enjoin you to bring him to such severe and exemplary punishment as the enormity of the crime may require. Should it extend to death itself, it will not be disproportional to its guilt at such a time and in such a cause... for by such conduct they bring shame, disgrace and ruin to themselves and their country."

- George Washington, charge to the Northern Expeditionary Force, Sept. 14, 1775

And What's Al Qaeda Up To?

Global Guerillas has some thoughts on the matter:

In leaks to reporters, intelligence officers voiced concern that al Qaeda's leadership has reconstituted in Pakistan's Waziristan tribal areas. This area is now considered a temporary autonomous zone (TAZ) due to a truce that Pakistan signed with local leaders (and by extension the Taliban) last year (see "Our Man in Pakistan" for more on the details).

The development of the TAZ in Waziristan and the reconstitution of a semblance of al Qaeda's previous organization means that larger attacks can and will be launched. These attacks will come in two forms, based on an analysis of al Qaeda's evolving strategy. The first type, reflects the recognition by al Qaeda that systems disruption has been extremely effective in Iraq. These attacks will likely be against the global oil system -- although rather than take the many small attacks approach used so successfully over the last three years, it will probably be focused on large events like the attempt on Abqaiq in early 2006. The second type might be another symbolic attack against the US like 9/11. With all indications that the US is in withdrawal, a new attack is likely needed to propel the US back into aggressive action (see "Al Qaeda's Grand Strategy: Superpower Baiting" for more on why).

See: "Al Qaeda Chiefs Are Seen to Regain Power" Mark Mazzetti and David Rohde, The New York Times, February 18. 2007 for the original leaked information.

Oil

Digby:

...Tony Blankley let the cat out of the bag, however, when he said that the US will be in Iraq for 20 years. When challenged about the difference between American combat troops on the ground an an American "presence" he (angrily) said this:

The fact is that when the oil is challenged in the Saudi oil fields and the Straights of Hormuz are closed, we'll be fighting even by your definition.

Right. They aren't even pretending anymore.

I think the great public intellectual and conservative philosopher Ann Coulter said it best:

"Liberals are always talking about why we shouldn't go to war for oil. But why not go to war for oil? We need oil.

Two Can Play That Game

The official invited representatives of the United Nations, Human Rights watch and other international bodies to dispatch envoys to Iran to observe the available documents and proofs substantiating involvement of the Untied States and Britain in the recent terrorist attacks, including the blast and shootout on Wednesday.

"The US and Britain, which allege to be pioneers in the campaign against terrorism, are themselves actually defending the terrorists, training them and providing them with the needed media and financial supports and facilities," he added.

Headline of the Day

Bush has 2 moles removed from temple

A Message from Jürgen Habermas

Just a little reminder:

The universal validity claim which binds the West to its 'basic political values,' that is, to the procedure of democratic self-determination and the vocabulary of human rights, must not be confused with the imperialist claim that the political form of life and the culture of a particular democracy - even the oldest one - is exemplary for all societies...

It was precisely American pragmatism that made insight into what is in each case equally good for all parties contingent on reciprocal perspective taking. The 'reason' of modern rational natural law is not instantiated by universal 'values' that one can own like goods, and distribute and export throughout the world. 'Values' - including those that can count on winning global recognition - do not float in mid-air, but acquire binding force only within the normative orders and practices of particular cultural forms of life.

The Divided West, 2006

Torture Collection

Paula Luttringer, photographer.

“I went down about twenty or thirty steps and I heard big iron doors being shut. I imagined that the place was underground, that it was big, because you could hear people’s voices echoing and the airplanes taxiing overhead or nearby. The noise drove you mad. One of the men said to me: so you’re a psychologist? Well, bitch, like all the psychologists, here you’re really going to find out what’s good. And he began to punch me in the stomach. MARTA CANDELORO WAS ABDUCTED ON JUNE 7, 1977 IN NEUQUEN. SHE WAS THEN TAKEN TO THE DETENTION CENTER, ‘LA CUEVA’.” From the series, El Lamento de los Muros, 2000-2005. Digital print on fine arts paper.

I've just finished editing the proofs on the torture collection (thus, the low level of posting recently). It's first being published as a special issue of the very fine journal, South Central Review. It'll soon afterwards come out as a book. The journal will be out by March, I believe, while the book will be somewhere around late spring or early summer.

Reading through it again I've realized just how good it is. Each author did something terrific, thoughtful, difficult. And the cover photo is by the great Argentinean photographer, Paula Luttringer, who was herself "disappeared" during Argentina's dirty war. She kindly allowed me to borrow it for the collection.

I'll be shamelessly promoting it once the collection appears in print, but for now here's the lineup of contributors and Paula's cover photo.

Stephanie Athey
Christopher Britt Arredondo
Pilar Calveiro
Carlos Castresana
Ariel Dorfman
Barbara Ehrenreich
Michael Hatfield
Thomas C. Hilde
Alphonso Lingis
Adi Ophir
Darius Rejali
Margarita Serje
Eduardo Subirats
Tzvetan Todorov
Rebecca Wittmann