Monday, November 6, 2017
Sunday, November 5, 2017
The Coca-Cola Company 'innocent'? Goodness Gracious, They're Guilty As Sin! (And Not Only For Coming Down like the Proverbial Upon a small-time Wellington Restaurant)
Just what is it anyhow about these sizeable corporations and their seeming readiness, nay eagerness, to wage all-out commercial warfare upon tiny little individual entrepreneurs and the like who're just seeking to eke out a rather meagre living...simply because the latter happen to - inadvertently, in almost every instance, there's little doubt - transgress the letter of the law in terms of (generally name-related) copyright infringements?
Have they nothing better to do with their time, than to end up spending considerable time and energy - and all the rest, including monies - in chasing up and hunting down anyone and everyone, who, however innocently and guilelessly, 'just so happens' to cross the invisible corporate line and stray into their territory?
Are they really so insecure - in themselves, let alone their particular product and franchise - that they actually feel genuinely threatened and intimidated even by some little company or often simply twosome or family concern, who as I say inadvertently strays into their business province, and - horror of horrors - uses a term or phrase, however commonplace in regular company, that just so happens to sound an awful lot like theirs?
It would appear so, for what else could possibly explain an outfit as dodgy as Coca-Cola, now increasingly 'implicated', according to various 'experts', in the global (or at least Western) obesity epidemic, pursuing down a couple who've had the sheer temerity - at least initially, until belatedly stopped in their tracks - to go ahead and name their small restaurant franchise 'Innocent Foods' (or 'the Innocent Restaurant')? Or, more precisely, without even bothering to consult their highnesses, the high-and-mighty Coca-Cola company itself, before doing so? As if they'd even have known to begin with! But that's the world some of these corporates with considerable clout live in, they instinctively feel everything revolves around themselves and their commercial concerns, and are almost more chagrined, I've little doubt, that said 'opposition' didn't even realize CC et al's actual prior possession of such names and distinctives as a point of fact, quite apart from thus being an actual copyright infringement as such.
Who'll be next in their sights, the famous 'Innocent Project' seeking to establish some body, New Zealand- or even Western-worldwide, that'd make it easier for unjustly-convicted individuals to contest their innocence vis-a-vis the particular national authorities concerned? Or those who still believe 'innocent' to be a beautiful word redolent and reminiscent of a gentler, kinder, more peaceable (and less driven and commercially-obsessed) era and world - and thus wholly unfit for the likes of a money-grubbing, health-debasing, truth-rejecting, and otherwise thoroughly objectionable commercial entity such as Coca-Cola to peddle in?
Hey, may they - however belatedly - have the gumption and preparedness to swallow some humble pie by taking a leaf out of the 'portfolio' of another company - itself actually once great - that's long since lowered its own standards and principles in the same regards? Yes, I speak now of none other than (the New Zealand division, anyhow, of) Sanitarium...who have themselves debased themselves over recent months (and perhaps years over this and other matters), to take to 'the cleaners', i.e. the Copyright Authority, a little Timaru-based outfit, evidently haling from Great Britain originally, who themselves dared to try to market their own breakfast cereal here in Aotearoa as 'Weet-abix', evidently just a little too close for comfort, in naming sensibilites, to the aforementioned's longtime market winner Weetbix!
Yes, truly 'nuff said!
(Nevertheless, to be continued.)
Have they nothing better to do with their time, than to end up spending considerable time and energy - and all the rest, including monies - in chasing up and hunting down anyone and everyone, who, however innocently and guilelessly, 'just so happens' to cross the invisible corporate line and stray into their territory?
Are they really so insecure - in themselves, let alone their particular product and franchise - that they actually feel genuinely threatened and intimidated even by some little company or often simply twosome or family concern, who as I say inadvertently strays into their business province, and - horror of horrors - uses a term or phrase, however commonplace in regular company, that just so happens to sound an awful lot like theirs?
It would appear so, for what else could possibly explain an outfit as dodgy as Coca-Cola, now increasingly 'implicated', according to various 'experts', in the global (or at least Western) obesity epidemic, pursuing down a couple who've had the sheer temerity - at least initially, until belatedly stopped in their tracks - to go ahead and name their small restaurant franchise 'Innocent Foods' (or 'the Innocent Restaurant')? Or, more precisely, without even bothering to consult their highnesses, the high-and-mighty Coca-Cola company itself, before doing so? As if they'd even have known to begin with! But that's the world some of these corporates with considerable clout live in, they instinctively feel everything revolves around themselves and their commercial concerns, and are almost more chagrined, I've little doubt, that said 'opposition' didn't even realize CC et al's actual prior possession of such names and distinctives as a point of fact, quite apart from thus being an actual copyright infringement as such.
Who'll be next in their sights, the famous 'Innocent Project' seeking to establish some body, New Zealand- or even Western-worldwide, that'd make it easier for unjustly-convicted individuals to contest their innocence vis-a-vis the particular national authorities concerned? Or those who still believe 'innocent' to be a beautiful word redolent and reminiscent of a gentler, kinder, more peaceable (and less driven and commercially-obsessed) era and world - and thus wholly unfit for the likes of a money-grubbing, health-debasing, truth-rejecting, and otherwise thoroughly objectionable commercial entity such as Coca-Cola to peddle in?
Hey, may they - however belatedly - have the gumption and preparedness to swallow some humble pie by taking a leaf out of the 'portfolio' of another company - itself actually once great - that's long since lowered its own standards and principles in the same regards? Yes, I speak now of none other than (the New Zealand division, anyhow, of) Sanitarium...who have themselves debased themselves over recent months (and perhaps years over this and other matters), to take to 'the cleaners', i.e. the Copyright Authority, a little Timaru-based outfit, evidently haling from Great Britain originally, who themselves dared to try to market their own breakfast cereal here in Aotearoa as 'Weet-abix', evidently just a little too close for comfort, in naming sensibilites, to the aforementioned's longtime market winner Weetbix!
Yes, truly 'nuff said!
(Nevertheless, to be continued.)
Saturday, November 4, 2017
Friday, October 20, 2017
Struck Down During A Noble Quest: Malta's Investigative Journalist of Distinction: Daphne Caruana Galizia
Just to record that yet another journalist 'simply doing her job' has been struck down, in this case seemingly blown to literal smithereens by a car bomb which took her life in one fell blast, apparently just half an hour after she made her final blogpost. Her last words were memorable, well worth noting: "There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate."
Her life's work will thus live on, though her passing may seem but another 'statistic' upon the endlessly-growing ash-heap of investigative reporters and foreign correspondents mown down in their prime. Some occupations are indeed a rather risky 'business'.
Viva Daphne!
Her life's work will thus live on, though her passing may seem but another 'statistic' upon the endlessly-growing ash-heap of investigative reporters and foreign correspondents mown down in their prime. Some occupations are indeed a rather risky 'business'.
Viva Daphne!
Good Riddance to Bad Rubbish (aka Sissii International): Hurrah, hurrah for the Kurdistan Forces/Kurdish People
Simply *celebrating the victory declared two days ago of the Syrian Kurdish forces in finally dislodging Sissii International from its last stronghold in Raqqa (Syria). And to suggest that the sooner this modern-day incarnation of the biblical (Old Testament) **Medo-Persians get their own state, so much the better.
As folk (i.e. the Iraqi Kurds) left in the lurch by George W's Dad, i.e. President Bush Senior (in the aftermath of the 1991 U.N.-authorized Gulf War - Desert Storm) - though they were arguably the staunchest opponents of dictator Saddam Hussein, and so were subsequently subjected to chemical bombing by him and his henchmen - I ***can't think of anyone else more deserving of their own homeland. Never welcome in Turkey, yet with a****sizeable population there, and in Iraq and Syria (and also Iran), they have every reason for a place of their own.
May it come soon - asap. All power to the Kurds/Kurdish people!
*While commiserating with them in being simultaneously repulsed in Kirkuk and across northern Iraq.
**Or rather the first of these people groups, i.e. the ancient Medes, who have been traced to the peoples now constituting the Kurds and the geographical location where the Kurds are now situated.
***Though it's a topic I write about occasionally, even just the other day (about Catalonia/ns in particular) upon my associated blogsite (http://nuffsaid:consideryourself-frombothsidesnow.blogspot.co.nz/(or .com/).
****According to some admittedly older stats, in or around 1985-1986, according to Patrick Johnstone's acclaimed Operation World, the Kurds comprised approximately 16% of the Turkish population; 18% of the Iraqi populace, which people group included the 'ethnically-cleansed' Yezidis, 4% of said total; 6% of the Syrian populace; and 8% of Iran's population.
As folk (i.e. the Iraqi Kurds) left in the lurch by George W's Dad, i.e. President Bush Senior (in the aftermath of the 1991 U.N.-authorized Gulf War - Desert Storm) - though they were arguably the staunchest opponents of dictator Saddam Hussein, and so were subsequently subjected to chemical bombing by him and his henchmen - I ***can't think of anyone else more deserving of their own homeland. Never welcome in Turkey, yet with a****sizeable population there, and in Iraq and Syria (and also Iran), they have every reason for a place of their own.
May it come soon - asap. All power to the Kurds/Kurdish people!
*While commiserating with them in being simultaneously repulsed in Kirkuk and across northern Iraq.
**Or rather the first of these people groups, i.e. the ancient Medes, who have been traced to the peoples now constituting the Kurds and the geographical location where the Kurds are now situated.
***Though it's a topic I write about occasionally, even just the other day (about Catalonia/ns in particular) upon my associated blogsite (http://nuffsaid:consideryourself-frombothsidesnow.blogspot.co.nz/(or .com/).
****According to some admittedly older stats, in or around 1985-1986, according to Patrick Johnstone's acclaimed Operation World, the Kurds comprised approximately 16% of the Turkish population; 18% of the Iraqi populace, which people group included the 'ethnically-cleansed' Yezidis, 4% of said total; 6% of the Syrian populace; and 8% of Iran's population.
Tuesday, October 17, 2017
In Defence of (one-time National Radio, now RNZ National) Morning Report co-host Sean Plunkett - and not the American 'Movie Mogul' Harvey Weinstein, as such...
Get 'im - sic 'im - get out the lynch mob, we'll have us a damn good public flogging...nay, burn us a witch, flay us another heretic... .
Let's get something very straight, so clear and plain in fact that there can be no misunderstanding, by honest-hearted 'souls', anyhow, if not for those who (ever) choose to wilfully misunderstand, misinterpret and malign: I've no brief whatsoever - for anyone (man, woman or even pre-adult) - who meddles with, molests, and otherwise - in far worse, cruel and brutal, humiliating and subjugating, fashion - degrades anyone else, whether sexually or in any other way...-and so no, this is no kind of 'apology' for/defence of, much less public vindication or excusing of the latest public enemy #1...i.e. Harvey Weinstein. No way, Jose.
No, I repeat I'm not - in any way, shape or form whatsoever - seeking to defend, excuse or plead one word even in support of, or to contest the latest object of peoples' new-found ire (via 'Social Media Incorporated' apparently, c/o el regular mainstream media), U.S. film director Harvey Weinstein. I wouldn't really know, actually, neither being a twit nor a facebook persona. No, I'm somewhat (or so I like to imagine, anyway) much more multi-dimensional than that superficiality and dumbing-down of modern-day humanity.
But getting back to my essential point: for some reason this 'movie mogul' is in the sights of Global Women Incorporated, or should I rather say, Modern Media Woman, as if he and he alone is deserving of all the justified pent-up rage and fury that some have been treasuring up, apparently, for just such a moment as this: i.e. when another of the rich and powerful, the influential 'heavyweights' of our era, has been - yet again - shown to have clay feet. (But of course Weinstein's alleged offences go way beyond mere misdemeamours and the like.) And moreover as if it's taken everyone by complete surprise, when point of fact - evidently - is that it was 'Hollywood's Worst Kept Secret' or some such - for literally decades in fact, from the sounds of it. A secret kept as such because some (even many) would-be female actresses were apparently unprepared to expose him publicly - for understandable fear that their future/s in acting would be, ipso pronto, put paid to, apparently because 'no-one would believe them', and HW et al would quickly terminate their budding careers.
All the latter would apparently seem to have a lot of validity, unless and until one considers that all of us have moments - for Yours Truly, in fact, many occasions, sure, far less traumatic that that - when we've/I've had to make just such decisions to maintain my/our own good conscience/s let alone sense of inner integrity... when, yes, forgoing - as Winston Peters once infamously termed it (in a wholly different context) - the showy glitter and tinsel of 'the baubles of office', one *deems a certain principle to be of infinitely greater value than any (mere worldly) recompense one might gain in this life; yes, **even though it cost one entrance into one's chosen profession.
No, it's the ready-made lynch mob mentality and feral witch-hunt, against someone who's both as ugly as sin and grossly obese to boot - and thus an easy target for ****those, I would (respectfully) suggest, too cowardly to take on someone without those particular personal attributes. A campaign, moreover, that's been conducted by all and sundry ever since Weinstein was effectively 'outed' only a week or so ago, and long since been given the judge and jury treatment, though still awaiting the executioner and being hung, drawn and quartered. Treated thus, as we're all constantly reminded, for his odious/appalling/criminal sexual harassment/assaults/rapes, over many decades, apparently, of innumerable actress colleagues. */**Fair enough, far as that goes, many would reasonably argue.
But what I happen to find rather sickening - if infinitely predictable in our present-day soundbite-driven media landscape - is the unseemly fashion in which the gutless wonders referred to in previous paragraphs are not only ganging up one after another to pile invective upon invective and calumny upon calumny onto an already deeply sullied reputation, but are moreover bending over backwards (forwards, and every other which way) to - apparently - not only uncover but forthwith cite every last conceivable hanging offence
for the 'man'.
So what's such a big deal, the guy's obviously as guilty as sin and much more, you readily counter? And so you do indeed legitimately suggest. Yes, I'll concede that much, anyhow. So what exactly is my real beef?
Well, you'll just have to wait - a little while (but hopefully not as long as we've been awaiting a new government in God's Own)...Shuteye beckons, and I must hearken to her gentle but oh so persistent pleading...
To Be Continued - asap.
*/**Though as I would suggest (now, immediately below) I happen to have a somewhat differing perspective.
*For Christians, like Moses upon 'bec[oming] of age, refus[ing] to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter' (and thus next in line for the throne), 'choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin'...esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt', '...look(ing) (instead) to the reward' for the faithful, tried and ultimately true. Hebrews 11: 24-26 (Scripture taken from the [The Holy Bible]: New King James Version. [Copyright] 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.)
**At least, that is, in the short term or immediate future. For apparent roadblocks and obstacles, one has well said, are really but the steps to one's eventual success (in any chosen field); and surely, if one's heart is set upon a particular calling or line of work, nothing will ultimately prevent one - even devils in human form.
***Postscript: Perhaps the most succinct yet perceptive remark upon the topic came after my writing the foregoing, upon Jim Mora's esteemed Panel, as guest John Barnett of South Pacific Films, alongside high-profile lawyer Mai Chen, joined host, fill-in Christchurch City Councillor Ali(sp?) Jones, today (4.50 p.m.ish) upon New Zealand's RNZ National. Barnett made reference to what (I believe) he deemed an obscure Old Testament 'custom' (or suchlike) to a/the 'scapegoat', which biblical scholars like myself know is located in Leviticus 16, arguably the most important chapter in that Book of the Torah, in which the Jewish Day of Atonement, otherwise known as Yom Kippur, is detailed. In 'awful' brevity that passage essentially posits an annual day upon which sacrifice and atonement is made and forgiveness proffered for each and every last sin committed by any Israelite over the previous year, and how two goats are thus presented 'before the Lord' on behalf of said Israelites; the 'Lord's goat' being offered (and then killed) as a sacrifice of atonement, and then the 'live goat', deemed 'the scapegoat', has those selfsame sins transferred onto itself, and it is then sent off into the wilderness to bear those sins forever. The Holy Bible.
Obviously there's no time here, as already alluded to, to get into my own denomination's understanding of how the former represented and represents The Lord, in particular as Jesus Christ upon Calvary's Cross, and the latter His arch-nemesis, 'the great dragon...that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world...the accuser'. And where the former thus bore said 'sins of the whole world' upon His lonesome (for time and eternity), bearing God's wrath for the same, and being prepared even to die eternally on behalf of each and every last 'son of Adam and daughter of Eve' (as the Narnians in C S Lewis' brilliant allegorical The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe' characterized it) if that was what it took to appease God's wrath; and arguably that was what He fully believed would happen as He cried out "My Father, My Father, why have You forsaken Me?" Whereas 'the slanderer', Satan, symbolically has selfsame sins finally, ultimately, eternally imputed unto him (only!) at the end of the thousand years, the biblical Millennium, and thus (again, symbolically) the devil is attributed ultimate and complete responsibility for having himself been the instigator and cause of every last sin ever committed by anyone on earth (or in the entire Universe even). Revelation 20:2; 12:9/10; Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34 etcetera. The Holy Bible (ibid.)
Sure, it's quite true that no-one will ever be able to shake their fist at God on That Great Day and accuse Him of unjust dealing, arguing 'the devil made me do it', but just as surely, in the very real sense that sin originated in Paradise with the one, Lucifer, the Light-Bearer and 'anointed cherub who covers', who was 'the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty', and was moreover 'perfect in [his] ways from the day [he] was created, till iniquity was found in [him]', that thus as the author of sin, he has been the ultimate instigator of every last sin ever committed, whether by direct agency (himself or one of the third of heavenly angels ejected alongside himself to this earth), via the tempting world all round us, or even c/o our own sinful human natures which ever, unregenerated, incline us to satisfy our legitimate needs in (an endless array of) sinful ways...since his successful temptation (of our forefather and 'fore-mother') in 'Eden, the garden of God' thus turned human nature from essentially sinless to sinful, thus inclining us to sin and sinful desires, attitudes, thoughts, ways and words as our inherent (if subconscious) modus operandi or pivot point at all times and in all places...though admittedly - thanks be to God - we don't ever and always so choose to order our lives thus. Ezekiel 28:12-15. Revelation 12:4. The Holy Bible (ibid.)
Enough for a pithy, brief, short and succinct summary I earlier indicated I had no time or space to pursue here and now...
****No, I don't include here those actually raped or otherwise sexually assaulted by Mr Weinstein, only those now belatedly jumping on the bandwagon, many of whom were most probably somewhat 'in the know' about said allegations in years gone by, but without the personal gonads or intestinal fortitude then, unlike now, to come forward and put themselves, their livelihoods and their reputations on the line for a greater cause and moreover on behalf of the vulnerable victims for whom their hearts are apparently now bleeding.
Reminding me once again of James Russell Lowell's memorable and inimitable 'Once to Every Man and Nation', in which verse two especially (and verse one, to some extent) sum up the aforementioned with wonderful aptness:
'Once to ev-ery [wo]man and na-tion Comes the mo-ment to de-cide,
In the strife of truth with false-hood, For the good or e-vil side;
Some great cause, God's new Mes-si-ah, Of-fering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by for-ev-er 'Twixt that dark-ness and that light.
Then to side with truth is no-ble When we share her wretch-ed crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and prof-it, And 'tis prosper-ous to be just;
Then it is the brave [wo]man choos-es, While the cow-ard stands a-side,
Till the mul-ti-tude make vir-tue Of the faith they had de-nied.
(Hyphenation already supplied - in Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal (SIGNS PUBLISHING, Warburton, Australia, 1985), and included so one (myself, anyhow!) can sing along. Bold highlighted letters supplied by me.)
Let's get something very straight, so clear and plain in fact that there can be no misunderstanding, by honest-hearted 'souls', anyhow, if not for those who (ever) choose to wilfully misunderstand, misinterpret and malign: I've no brief whatsoever - for anyone (man, woman or even pre-adult) - who meddles with, molests, and otherwise - in far worse, cruel and brutal, humiliating and subjugating, fashion - degrades anyone else, whether sexually or in any other way...-and so no, this is no kind of 'apology' for/defence of, much less public vindication or excusing of the latest public enemy #1...i.e. Harvey Weinstein. No way, Jose.
No, I repeat I'm not - in any way, shape or form whatsoever - seeking to defend, excuse or plead one word even in support of, or to contest the latest object of peoples' new-found ire (via 'Social Media Incorporated' apparently, c/o el regular mainstream media), U.S. film director Harvey Weinstein. I wouldn't really know, actually, neither being a twit nor a facebook persona. No, I'm somewhat (or so I like to imagine, anyway) much more multi-dimensional than that superficiality and dumbing-down of modern-day humanity.
But getting back to my essential point: for some reason this 'movie mogul' is in the sights of Global Women Incorporated, or should I rather say, Modern Media Woman, as if he and he alone is deserving of all the justified pent-up rage and fury that some have been treasuring up, apparently, for just such a moment as this: i.e. when another of the rich and powerful, the influential 'heavyweights' of our era, has been - yet again - shown to have clay feet. (But of course Weinstein's alleged offences go way beyond mere misdemeamours and the like.) And moreover as if it's taken everyone by complete surprise, when point of fact - evidently - is that it was 'Hollywood's Worst Kept Secret' or some such - for literally decades in fact, from the sounds of it. A secret kept as such because some (even many) would-be female actresses were apparently unprepared to expose him publicly - for understandable fear that their future/s in acting would be, ipso pronto, put paid to, apparently because 'no-one would believe them', and HW et al would quickly terminate their budding careers.
All the latter would apparently seem to have a lot of validity, unless and until one considers that all of us have moments - for Yours Truly, in fact, many occasions, sure, far less traumatic that that - when we've/I've had to make just such decisions to maintain my/our own good conscience/s let alone sense of inner integrity... when, yes, forgoing - as Winston Peters once infamously termed it (in a wholly different context) - the showy glitter and tinsel of 'the baubles of office', one *deems a certain principle to be of infinitely greater value than any (mere worldly) recompense one might gain in this life; yes, **even though it cost one entrance into one's chosen profession.
No, it's the ready-made lynch mob mentality and feral witch-hunt, against someone who's both as ugly as sin and grossly obese to boot - and thus an easy target for ****those, I would (respectfully) suggest, too cowardly to take on someone without those particular personal attributes. A campaign, moreover, that's been conducted by all and sundry ever since Weinstein was effectively 'outed' only a week or so ago, and long since been given the judge and jury treatment, though still awaiting the executioner and being hung, drawn and quartered. Treated thus, as we're all constantly reminded, for his odious/appalling/criminal sexual harassment/assaults/rapes, over many decades, apparently, of innumerable actress colleagues. */**Fair enough, far as that goes, many would reasonably argue.
But what I happen to find rather sickening - if infinitely predictable in our present-day soundbite-driven media landscape - is the unseemly fashion in which the gutless wonders referred to in previous paragraphs are not only ganging up one after another to pile invective upon invective and calumny upon calumny onto an already deeply sullied reputation, but are moreover bending over backwards (forwards, and every other which way) to - apparently - not only uncover but forthwith cite every last conceivable hanging offence
for the 'man'.
So what's such a big deal, the guy's obviously as guilty as sin and much more, you readily counter? And so you do indeed legitimately suggest. Yes, I'll concede that much, anyhow. So what exactly is my real beef?
Well, you'll just have to wait - a little while (but hopefully not as long as we've been awaiting a new government in God's Own)...Shuteye beckons, and I must hearken to her gentle but oh so persistent pleading...
To Be Continued - asap.
*/**Though as I would suggest (now, immediately below) I happen to have a somewhat differing perspective.
*For Christians, like Moses upon 'bec[oming] of age, refus[ing] to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter' (and thus next in line for the throne), 'choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God than to enjoy the passing pleasures of sin'...esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt', '...look(ing) (instead) to the reward' for the faithful, tried and ultimately true. Hebrews 11: 24-26 (Scripture taken from the [The Holy Bible]: New King James Version. [Copyright] 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.)
**At least, that is, in the short term or immediate future. For apparent roadblocks and obstacles, one has well said, are really but the steps to one's eventual success (in any chosen field); and surely, if one's heart is set upon a particular calling or line of work, nothing will ultimately prevent one - even devils in human form.
***Postscript: Perhaps the most succinct yet perceptive remark upon the topic came after my writing the foregoing, upon Jim Mora's esteemed Panel, as guest John Barnett of South Pacific Films, alongside high-profile lawyer Mai Chen, joined host, fill-in Christchurch City Councillor Ali(sp?) Jones, today (4.50 p.m.ish) upon New Zealand's RNZ National. Barnett made reference to what (I believe) he deemed an obscure Old Testament 'custom' (or suchlike) to a/the 'scapegoat', which biblical scholars like myself know is located in Leviticus 16, arguably the most important chapter in that Book of the Torah, in which the Jewish Day of Atonement, otherwise known as Yom Kippur, is detailed. In 'awful' brevity that passage essentially posits an annual day upon which sacrifice and atonement is made and forgiveness proffered for each and every last sin committed by any Israelite over the previous year, and how two goats are thus presented 'before the Lord' on behalf of said Israelites; the 'Lord's goat' being offered (and then killed) as a sacrifice of atonement, and then the 'live goat', deemed 'the scapegoat', has those selfsame sins transferred onto itself, and it is then sent off into the wilderness to bear those sins forever. The Holy Bible.
Obviously there's no time here, as already alluded to, to get into my own denomination's understanding of how the former represented and represents The Lord, in particular as Jesus Christ upon Calvary's Cross, and the latter His arch-nemesis, 'the great dragon...that serpent of old, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world...the accuser'. And where the former thus bore said 'sins of the whole world' upon His lonesome (for time and eternity), bearing God's wrath for the same, and being prepared even to die eternally on behalf of each and every last 'son of Adam and daughter of Eve' (as the Narnians in C S Lewis' brilliant allegorical The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe' characterized it) if that was what it took to appease God's wrath; and arguably that was what He fully believed would happen as He cried out "My Father, My Father, why have You forsaken Me?" Whereas 'the slanderer', Satan, symbolically has selfsame sins finally, ultimately, eternally imputed unto him (only!) at the end of the thousand years, the biblical Millennium, and thus (again, symbolically) the devil is attributed ultimate and complete responsibility for having himself been the instigator and cause of every last sin ever committed by anyone on earth (or in the entire Universe even). Revelation 20:2; 12:9/10; Matthew 27:46; Mark 15:34 etcetera. The Holy Bible (ibid.)
Sure, it's quite true that no-one will ever be able to shake their fist at God on That Great Day and accuse Him of unjust dealing, arguing 'the devil made me do it', but just as surely, in the very real sense that sin originated in Paradise with the one, Lucifer, the Light-Bearer and 'anointed cherub who covers', who was 'the seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty', and was moreover 'perfect in [his] ways from the day [he] was created, till iniquity was found in [him]', that thus as the author of sin, he has been the ultimate instigator of every last sin ever committed, whether by direct agency (himself or one of the third of heavenly angels ejected alongside himself to this earth), via the tempting world all round us, or even c/o our own sinful human natures which ever, unregenerated, incline us to satisfy our legitimate needs in (an endless array of) sinful ways...since his successful temptation (of our forefather and 'fore-mother') in 'Eden, the garden of God' thus turned human nature from essentially sinless to sinful, thus inclining us to sin and sinful desires, attitudes, thoughts, ways and words as our inherent (if subconscious) modus operandi or pivot point at all times and in all places...though admittedly - thanks be to God - we don't ever and always so choose to order our lives thus. Ezekiel 28:12-15. Revelation 12:4. The Holy Bible (ibid.)
Enough for a pithy, brief, short and succinct summary I earlier indicated I had no time or space to pursue here and now...
****No, I don't include here those actually raped or otherwise sexually assaulted by Mr Weinstein, only those now belatedly jumping on the bandwagon, many of whom were most probably somewhat 'in the know' about said allegations in years gone by, but without the personal gonads or intestinal fortitude then, unlike now, to come forward and put themselves, their livelihoods and their reputations on the line for a greater cause and moreover on behalf of the vulnerable victims for whom their hearts are apparently now bleeding.
Reminding me once again of James Russell Lowell's memorable and inimitable 'Once to Every Man and Nation', in which verse two especially (and verse one, to some extent) sum up the aforementioned with wonderful aptness:
'Once to ev-ery [wo]man and na-tion Comes the mo-ment to de-cide,
In the strife of truth with false-hood, For the good or e-vil side;
Some great cause, God's new Mes-si-ah, Of-fering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by for-ev-er 'Twixt that dark-ness and that light.
Then to side with truth is no-ble When we share her wretch-ed crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and prof-it, And 'tis prosper-ous to be just;
Then it is the brave [wo]man choos-es, While the cow-ard stands a-side,
Till the mul-ti-tude make vir-tue Of the faith they had de-nied.
(Hyphenation already supplied - in Seventh-day Adventist Hymnal (SIGNS PUBLISHING, Warburton, Australia, 1985), and included so one (myself, anyhow!) can sing along. Bold highlighted letters supplied by me.)
Tuesday, October 10, 2017
Oh, How Exceedingly INtolerant are the 'tolerant'; or, let's give each and every - conceivable - religion (and religious understanding) its corner in the religious arena, except of course Christianity!
C.S.Lewis, the distinguished Oxford University scholar/professor/Christian author and apologist - and all the rest - would be wincing/squirming/turning in his grave, this very day, could he have foreseen what his beloved 'alma mater' *has just done...i.e. apparently, according to the British correspondent upon this morning's 'Mike Hosking' Newstalk ZB radio segment (around 6.50 a.m.), deeming the Christian religion alone effective persona no grata and thereby **'disbarred' from being able to operate upon said campus. And why, you understandably ask? Well, for obvious reasons: for being (at least in its evangelical incarnation, anyhow) politically incorrect to a fault. Or, in the allegation of those **'disbarring' it, for [promoting/instilling/circulating - my words and paraphraseology] homophobia and neocolonialism.
Without even deigning at this stage to dignify such slanderous, no doubt even ****libellous accusations against Christianity (as a religion) and Christians themselves (as the 'practitioners' thereof), let me simply point out the supreme irony of the particular time juncture upon which said esteemed learning institution has chosen to issue such an edict: apparently, from a wholly unrelated news item this morning upon BBC World Radio - which, interestingly and oddly enough (though perhaps I missed something earlier or later), carried no mention of this - cited the formal induction (if I'm not mistaken) this selfsame day of the famed Pakistani teenager *****Mahalai ******Yousseff into selfsame university. For her outspokenness in upholding religious freedom within a (national, i.e. Pakistani) context/atmosphere of religious intolerance.
Oh, the supreme irony of the juxtaposition of these two easily overlooked pieces of news...which together speak volumes, even tomes, about the point to which we have now - long since - well and truly arrived in the (one time) 'free world'. But then didn't that old sage, former British P.M. Tony Blair's distantly related relative, Eric Blair - better known to one and all as George Orwell - 'prophesy' just such idiomatic and vocabulary shenanigans in his own 1984 version of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Or, as the animals upon the farm in GO's equally brilliantly Animal Farm might have expressed it - if we can rephrase the sentiment in modern lingo (to adequately characterize the situation we see today in/at Oxford University): non-Christian religions and adherents (all invariably) good; Christianity and Christians bad. Or alternatively: all religions and their adherents are equal, but some are more equal than others.
'Nuff said!
*Or rather, the 'student union' thereof (far as I can gather at this stage anyway).
**Admittedly a term strictly relating to the law, and signifying ***'expel[ing] from the bar'.
***Once again, according to my ever trusty Chambers Concise Dictionary (1988), although I used to ever studiously consult my Grandma's equally tried and trustworthy Concise Oxford Dictionary (of a similar vintage, but even earlier, I believe 1980).
****Because surely the university 'edict' involved was issued in actual writing, whether physical or 'virtual'.
*****About whom I've previously written - and in highly eulogistic terms - upon this or, more likely, my other blogsite.
******Trusting my spelling is a-ok, but desiring to get this 'out there' ipso pronto...
Without even deigning at this stage to dignify such slanderous, no doubt even ****libellous accusations against Christianity (as a religion) and Christians themselves (as the 'practitioners' thereof), let me simply point out the supreme irony of the particular time juncture upon which said esteemed learning institution has chosen to issue such an edict: apparently, from a wholly unrelated news item this morning upon BBC World Radio - which, interestingly and oddly enough (though perhaps I missed something earlier or later), carried no mention of this - cited the formal induction (if I'm not mistaken) this selfsame day of the famed Pakistani teenager *****Mahalai ******Yousseff into selfsame university. For her outspokenness in upholding religious freedom within a (national, i.e. Pakistani) context/atmosphere of religious intolerance.
Oh, the supreme irony of the juxtaposition of these two easily overlooked pieces of news...which together speak volumes, even tomes, about the point to which we have now - long since - well and truly arrived in the (one time) 'free world'. But then didn't that old sage, former British P.M. Tony Blair's distantly related relative, Eric Blair - better known to one and all as George Orwell - 'prophesy' just such idiomatic and vocabulary shenanigans in his own 1984 version of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Or, as the animals upon the farm in GO's equally brilliantly Animal Farm might have expressed it - if we can rephrase the sentiment in modern lingo (to adequately characterize the situation we see today in/at Oxford University): non-Christian religions and adherents (all invariably) good; Christianity and Christians bad. Or alternatively: all religions and their adherents are equal, but some are more equal than others.
'Nuff said!
*Or rather, the 'student union' thereof (far as I can gather at this stage anyway).
**Admittedly a term strictly relating to the law, and signifying ***'expel[ing] from the bar'.
***Once again, according to my ever trusty Chambers Concise Dictionary (1988), although I used to ever studiously consult my Grandma's equally tried and trustworthy Concise Oxford Dictionary (of a similar vintage, but even earlier, I believe 1980).
****Because surely the university 'edict' involved was issued in actual writing, whether physical or 'virtual'.
*****About whom I've previously written - and in highly eulogistic terms - upon this or, more likely, my other blogsite.
******Trusting my spelling is a-ok, but desiring to get this 'out there' ipso pronto...
Monday, September 18, 2017
A Brief Tribute To A Holocaust Surviver:Edith Egar
Just to note the twice-'Trending Now' radio interview of R(adio) N(ew) Z(ealand) National Nine To Noon host Kathryn Ryan with the wonderful (post-traumatic stress disorder psychotherapist, I believe) Edith Egar. This elderly holocaust survivor - one of few still alive, evidently - in few and pithy words and statements, is such a wonderful exemplar of true Christian values in a present-day world on so many levels and in so many instances and places forlorn of values, genuine Christianity and truth. Her September 8th interview is well worth a (good and careful, prayerful, considered) listen to sometime.
Whatever you happen to think of my blogposts, this lady is succinct in word and effervescent (in an extremely modest, self-effacing way and manner, mind you), simply overflowing with helpful, enriching and unique 'tips' and insights upon life in the shadow of trauma and victimhood...don't miss it!
Whatever you happen to think of my blogposts, this lady is succinct in word and effervescent (in an extremely modest, self-effacing way and manner, mind you), simply overflowing with helpful, enriching and unique 'tips' and insights upon life in the shadow of trauma and victimhood...don't miss it!
Thursday, August 31, 2017
Yes, the man of our nation - and not only 'Big Labour' - was indeed 'Our Big Norm'...
On this day wherein the much-fabled Princess Diana is given her (inordinate) share of media attention, may many of us also reflect upon the (at least public) life of a person who left an indelible mark of his very own, in this case upon the New Zealand body politic, for time and futurity... .
Yes, another who died upon August the 31st, 43 years ago today, was a man and political leader many of us - from all shades and hues and dyes of political colours - still remember fondly and dearly...and whose death upon that fateful night, even, we still vividly remember. As the September All-Time Bulldog Band held forth with their unforgettable, irrepressible classic, 'Big Norm', we were 'humoured' with the wonderful verse (in particular) that declared, to one and all, that not only was 'the man of Big Labour...our Big Norm', but that he was moreover 'our great National figure', 'the man of Social Credit', and (something I presently cannot recall, but I think) 'the man of [kiwi] Values' (or some such thing)... . And who, watching Studio One (I believe it was) that memorable occasion, can forget how Norman Kirk phoned in from his hospital bed, where he was dying (and within hours about to meet his very death), to congratulate the guys (and gals) of the band upon their song...fully 'taking the mickey' and all (and moreover of P.M. Kirk himself!), as we say here in kiwi-land?
So let's here hear it once more for 'the man of big labour...our great national hero', Prime Minister Norman Kirk...*cut down in his very prime, while doing ever so much for the rest of us, no doubt 'simply' not taking sufficient care of himself, of his own health. He was someone who made so many of us proud to be kiwis, who strode astride on the world stage, and thus left an unforgettable impression upon any and all who dealt with him... . A politician in his very own league, someone we'll never again see the likes of surely...one who'll long be sorely missed.
Norman Kirk was someone moreover who had absolutely no truck whatsoever with the trendy as social liberalism that his own political party has subsequently embraced with its very heart and soul, and thus jettisoned the very heart and soul of a once great party led by such figures as the legendary Michael Joseph Savage...and Harry Holland (in its beginnings)...political figures who strode astride Aotearoa-New Zealand in the footsteps of the likes of the equally, even more legendary, larger-than-life Liberal Prime Minister 'King Dick' Seddon... .
May Big Norm rest in peace, ever symbolic of real, old, tried and true Labour, not the newfangled, imitation 'lite' version that since 1984 - until Jacinda Ardern, perhaps, God willing? - many of us have long since come to distrust and despise...the version that his modern-day Labourite counterpart, Tony Blair, served up such a watered-down version of that the great British people came to also learn to loathe... .
*Though not all subscribe to that 'simple' idea, the former Labour Party President (from Waitakere, I believe Bob Harvey's the name) 'famously' coming out with his own conspiracy theory a decade-and-a-half or so ago, about the C.I.A.'s (naturally clandestine) involvement in the extremely premature downfall, demise and very soon thereafter death of one of New Zealand's most popular and esteemed prime ministers. And though political figures of the day 'to a man' (and woman) either instantly dismissed outright or pooh-poohed the very idea, I find it more than a little interesting, even concerning/mildly disturbing that yours Truly a little while later - while undertaking educational training in my hometown of Christchurch during 2006 - heard wholly 'by chance' what was undoubtedly **selfsame conspiracy theory, albeit dressed (up) in rather elaborate and moreover highly convincing robes.
Though I recall 'getting in touch' (via phone etc), or at least making some such (reasonable) effort to, with relevant NZ current affairs show makers/producers etc (as a result), there was - as I well expected - no follow-up (let alone interest thereof); though one wouldn't normally expect the very purveyors of many of their own conspiracy theories, if rarely 'dressed up' as such, to be so outrightly dismissive of what was pretty nearly Aotearoa-New Zealand's own equivalent of America's JFK assassination. Of course people tend to follow up their own innate biases in such matters, but for journalists supposedly committed to pursuing truth at all costs to likewise adopt this sort of approach is depressing if not all that unpredictable. Yet, to be fair and reasonable myself, there may well have been other factors contributing to their refusal to investigate further...assuming I did actually get in touch (somehow-or-other) and am not simply guilty of a deluded memory!...such as a previous examination of such (apparently widespread) rumours... .
**(#1)What I was told by a fellow who, however otherwise level-headed and decent, nevertheless subscribed - like my younger sister - to a fairly unorthodox view of ***astrology (in his case traditional Western, in my sister's Chinese), at least for a biblical Christian...was 'something else altogether', as they say...and was it what!
***'Speaking' here as someone who had determined to become a professional astrologer, fully convinced in every which way of the accuracy of the constellations of the Zodiac and their uncanny influence(s) upon all things earthly and especially human, up until my unexpected conversion upon November 4th, 1982...mere months evidently after the equally unexpected and tragic accidental death of evangelical singing sensation, the inimitable and brilliant Keith Green, in a flying accident in a small plane with his kids, in the U S of A. .Yes, well aware of the oddity of adhering to such beliefs in our preeminently scientific, rationalistic age, let me simply add that anyone who knows anything substantial and meaningful upon the matter is equally well aware that what passes for 'astrology' - aka the well-known and oft-consulted weekly (magazine) and daily (newspaper) columns (at least Western) worldwide that pass for such, that purport to deliver day-to-day, everyday astrological (prophetic, future forth-telling) advice to one and all - ain't remotely the real thing!
What really matters is one's innate characteristics, temperament and personality makeup and tendencies as prefigured and predetermined by precisely which particular planets, (Earth's) moon(s) and 'local' solar system's sun were in the ascendancy, culmination and/or 'descendancy' at and upon the very moment one ****'arrived' upon this temporal globe.
****Though far as I know Western astrology doesn't subscribe - as perhaps Chinese astrology might well do - to the eastern religious idea that human beings, and 'other' fauna (i.e. animals) here, are simply born and reborn in an endless cycle - and moreover recycle! - of births and rebirths...much less have I ever done so.
**(#2)(At the wrong order of Asterisking Inc. I well know, but I've left the best - or worst (depending upon one's perspective) - for last: to simply 'say' that you'll have to stay tuned (in) for what that theory actually amounted to. It'll be - especially for me - exceedingly short, if not terribly sweet!
To Be Continued...
Yes, another who died upon August the 31st, 43 years ago today, was a man and political leader many of us - from all shades and hues and dyes of political colours - still remember fondly and dearly...and whose death upon that fateful night, even, we still vividly remember. As the September All-Time Bulldog Band held forth with their unforgettable, irrepressible classic, 'Big Norm', we were 'humoured' with the wonderful verse (in particular) that declared, to one and all, that not only was 'the man of Big Labour...our Big Norm', but that he was moreover 'our great National figure', 'the man of Social Credit', and (something I presently cannot recall, but I think) 'the man of [kiwi] Values' (or some such thing)... . And who, watching Studio One (I believe it was) that memorable occasion, can forget how Norman Kirk phoned in from his hospital bed, where he was dying (and within hours about to meet his very death), to congratulate the guys (and gals) of the band upon their song...fully 'taking the mickey' and all (and moreover of P.M. Kirk himself!), as we say here in kiwi-land?
So let's here hear it once more for 'the man of big labour...our great national hero', Prime Minister Norman Kirk...*cut down in his very prime, while doing ever so much for the rest of us, no doubt 'simply' not taking sufficient care of himself, of his own health. He was someone who made so many of us proud to be kiwis, who strode astride on the world stage, and thus left an unforgettable impression upon any and all who dealt with him... . A politician in his very own league, someone we'll never again see the likes of surely...one who'll long be sorely missed.
Norman Kirk was someone moreover who had absolutely no truck whatsoever with the trendy as social liberalism that his own political party has subsequently embraced with its very heart and soul, and thus jettisoned the very heart and soul of a once great party led by such figures as the legendary Michael Joseph Savage...and Harry Holland (in its beginnings)...political figures who strode astride Aotearoa-New Zealand in the footsteps of the likes of the equally, even more legendary, larger-than-life Liberal Prime Minister 'King Dick' Seddon... .
May Big Norm rest in peace, ever symbolic of real, old, tried and true Labour, not the newfangled, imitation 'lite' version that since 1984 - until Jacinda Ardern, perhaps, God willing? - many of us have long since come to distrust and despise...the version that his modern-day Labourite counterpart, Tony Blair, served up such a watered-down version of that the great British people came to also learn to loathe... .
*Though not all subscribe to that 'simple' idea, the former Labour Party President (from Waitakere, I believe Bob Harvey's the name) 'famously' coming out with his own conspiracy theory a decade-and-a-half or so ago, about the C.I.A.'s (naturally clandestine) involvement in the extremely premature downfall, demise and very soon thereafter death of one of New Zealand's most popular and esteemed prime ministers. And though political figures of the day 'to a man' (and woman) either instantly dismissed outright or pooh-poohed the very idea, I find it more than a little interesting, even concerning/mildly disturbing that yours Truly a little while later - while undertaking educational training in my hometown of Christchurch during 2006 - heard wholly 'by chance' what was undoubtedly **selfsame conspiracy theory, albeit dressed (up) in rather elaborate and moreover highly convincing robes.
Though I recall 'getting in touch' (via phone etc), or at least making some such (reasonable) effort to, with relevant NZ current affairs show makers/producers etc (as a result), there was - as I well expected - no follow-up (let alone interest thereof); though one wouldn't normally expect the very purveyors of many of their own conspiracy theories, if rarely 'dressed up' as such, to be so outrightly dismissive of what was pretty nearly Aotearoa-New Zealand's own equivalent of America's JFK assassination. Of course people tend to follow up their own innate biases in such matters, but for journalists supposedly committed to pursuing truth at all costs to likewise adopt this sort of approach is depressing if not all that unpredictable. Yet, to be fair and reasonable myself, there may well have been other factors contributing to their refusal to investigate further...assuming I did actually get in touch (somehow-or-other) and am not simply guilty of a deluded memory!...such as a previous examination of such (apparently widespread) rumours... .
**(#1)What I was told by a fellow who, however otherwise level-headed and decent, nevertheless subscribed - like my younger sister - to a fairly unorthodox view of ***astrology (in his case traditional Western, in my sister's Chinese), at least for a biblical Christian...was 'something else altogether', as they say...and was it what!
***'Speaking' here as someone who had determined to become a professional astrologer, fully convinced in every which way of the accuracy of the constellations of the Zodiac and their uncanny influence(s) upon all things earthly and especially human, up until my unexpected conversion upon November 4th, 1982...mere months evidently after the equally unexpected and tragic accidental death of evangelical singing sensation, the inimitable and brilliant Keith Green, in a flying accident in a small plane with his kids, in the U S of A. .Yes, well aware of the oddity of adhering to such beliefs in our preeminently scientific, rationalistic age, let me simply add that anyone who knows anything substantial and meaningful upon the matter is equally well aware that what passes for 'astrology' - aka the well-known and oft-consulted weekly (magazine) and daily (newspaper) columns (at least Western) worldwide that pass for such, that purport to deliver day-to-day, everyday astrological (prophetic, future forth-telling) advice to one and all - ain't remotely the real thing!
What really matters is one's innate characteristics, temperament and personality makeup and tendencies as prefigured and predetermined by precisely which particular planets, (Earth's) moon(s) and 'local' solar system's sun were in the ascendancy, culmination and/or 'descendancy' at and upon the very moment one ****'arrived' upon this temporal globe.
****Though far as I know Western astrology doesn't subscribe - as perhaps Chinese astrology might well do - to the eastern religious idea that human beings, and 'other' fauna (i.e. animals) here, are simply born and reborn in an endless cycle - and moreover recycle! - of births and rebirths...much less have I ever done so.
**(#2)(At the wrong order of Asterisking Inc. I well know, but I've left the best - or worst (depending upon one's perspective) - for last: to simply 'say' that you'll have to stay tuned (in) for what that theory actually amounted to. It'll be - especially for me - exceedingly short, if not terribly sweet!
To Be Continued...
Prophetic Words from a Very Secular Man: Princess Diana's Larger Than Life Death Two Decades On
Part One: Setting the Scene: A Death Unlike Any Other - 'Modern', Anyhow
As 'everyone' remembers precisely where they were, so we are told, when an assassin's bullet (or several) ripped through the frame of America's 35th president, and thus finished off 'Camelot' and with it the budding career of America's much-adulated, idolized and popstar-like President "JFK" (as he has been 'immortalized' ever since), who can possibly forget the day/eve(ning) of August 31st, 1997, when in an altogether different manner, but with the ultimate same result, 'the world' 'awoke' to the news that the youthful, famous, adulated and idolized Princess Diana met her own tragic death within a tunnel in Paris. No-one of my acquaintance, of my 'generation', anyhow. No, it was a moment in time never to be forgotten in days, weeks, months, years and decades to come.
Did that necessarily mean that each one of us then held the selfsame attitude towards or viewpoint of the cinderella swept up by a royal suitor, of the 'ugly duckling' (in the sense of 'commoner') 'plucked' from obscurity and (metaphorically) replanted in the palace of the (reigning) Queen, or, more precisely, miraculously transplanted into the (figurative) antechamber of the (putative) future king? Not necessarily, and indeed not at all from this pleb's perspective. Yet something was definitely at work.
That something - to my way of thinking (and reflecting) - was crystallized in and through a number of disparate events and occurrences that transpired over coming weeks, some seemingly utterly unrelated: the much-loved pop-song, the chart-busting hit chosen (within days) to be reworked into the funereal strains of an immemorially-beloved dirge to the Princess' memory and sung by the co-songwriter himself at her state funeral; the unforgettable speech of Diana's brother, giving the paparazzi in particular and (British) tabloid media in general a right royal serve to the proverbial, at selfsame service; the relative glare of publicity (or rather, lack thereof) given to another equally famous woman who likewise passed away, exactly one week on - in altogether different circumstances - on literally the other side of the globe; plus of course the remarkable, even extraordinary melodrama(s) subsequently played out across the Western world (especially) as crowds of adulators, well-wishers, and the deeply grieving turned out in literal hordes to give their own personal respects to the memory of a person who had - via the all-enveloping tentacles of the modern media - long since been embraced to their very 'bosoms' as their very own 'Princess Di'(ana) - as a modern-day reincarnation as it were of the goddess Diana so beloved of the Gentile masses the New Testament's preeminent Apostle Paul 'encountered' as he criss-crossed the then known (pre-European) world of his day.
Indeed as I reflect upon that time (and event) there are literally so many indelible memories surrounding those events and others in their temporal vicinity, including some intensely personal (and grief-wracking in and of themselves), as well as apparent synchronicities, 'coincidences', felicities and other such things that I not only can hardly contain myself from sharing, feeling metaphorically close to exploding therewith, but it's quite literally hard to know where to even begin; so, in an ironic twist, I'll leave off here for the present...
Many Apologies That I've Only Now Re-continued This Savagely Abridged Blogpost At the Very End of August 31st, 2017 - U.K. (i.e. Greenwich Standard Mean) Time...but such is life, as they say.
Part Two: A Prophet Without Knowing It
I'm choosing to resume here at what might appear an odd point, but it ties in with much of the rest that I'm due to share: a beloved old, classic LP, Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's much-acclaimed and well-selling 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road'. For, one simply couldn't have written a better 'introduction' to the untimely demise of Elton's good friend Diana than appears in the first three songs on side A of that classic two-record LP. It's almost - to my way of thinking - beyond (normal) belief, in fact, so eerily and unmistakably do those three songs point not only to Lady Diana Spencer's death but to Elton John's own - and the Western world-at-large's - reaction to that tragic passing.
So, you rightly query, how so? Well, song number one is the incredibly-titled 'Funeral for a Friend', and did EJ perform a special item to the memory of his long-time friend at Diana's state funeral, or what? And sure, he was invited, or rather requested, to alter the graphic imagery of another of his songs (chronologically, #3) from that LP - his one-time chart-topping hit, 'Candle in the Wind' (about 'Norma Jean', aka the famous actress and mistress of JFK himself, Marilyn Monroe) - thus reconfiguring it as 'England's Rose', to make it acceptable to a general audience at said occasion, yet it was still effectively that classic Candle in the Wind whose memorable lyrics resounded as a background echo in the ears of many TV (and on-site) listeners/viewers, (as with myself), I've no doubt whatsoever.
And on that particular score, I find it personally equally fascinating, intriguing again beyond belief or everyday 'coincidence' that that classic song (of Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's) was the very one which came - completely unsought - to my own mind, within mere days after Diana's death and certainly prior to media report being made that EJ had been even touted as a possible special guest, let alone officially chosen to perform his unique musical item at her funeral service. (Curiously I can even remember exactly where I was when that thought first came to me, driving my Mum's (and at one time my own) 'old' Toyota Starlet just up from the Roslyn shopping centre!)
And after Funeral for a Friend Taupin/John then feature the little-known accompaniment (to Funeral for a Friend) known as 'Love Lies Bleeding'. "What?", you understandably exclaim, barely able to credit the irony yourself. I can only add: "I fully agree; with knobs on, to boot!" Need I full out the relevant detail? I mean, really?
And so side A of Elton John's (and Bernie Taupin's) undisputed greatest (as in most popular and generally-acclaimed) LP, 'Beyond Yellow Brick Road', itself contains an almost prophetic/'forth-telling' outline of the very scenario which ultimately played out on the fateful day of August 31st, 1997. Yes, at a funeral for a very close friend, the 'legendary' Princes Diana Spencer, whose own generally and much-lauded love for the world (and especially its unfortunates, whether aids' victims at home or land mine victims abroad) now both metaphorically and literally lay bleeding in a limousine within a Parisian tunnel...as it came to an untimely and tragic end not of its own making...Diana's one-time friend Elton John sang a song, 'England's Rose', *which captured the very spirit of her life and times and personality and character, to a world-at-large in equal measure of grief which could only echo within their own hearts a sense of 'Right on, buddy; right on!' You've nailed it down to a literal 't'.
*Most of whom perhaps, like myself, held within themselves the actual lyrics of the original song, Candle in the Wind, whose very words themselves so vividly and graphically and unmistakeably painted a verbal portrait of the person whose life was so abruptly cut short upon that fateful day.
To Be Continued...
Saturday eve (September 2nd) NZ time
Part Three: Reading the Hearts of the Self-Appointed Critics As An Open Book
Having thus dealt extensively with the main (and, it seems to me, rather unique) 'thing' that struck me at the time, let me now 'posit' some additional observations: some (involving Diana's brother Earl Spencer, as well as another famous woman on the world stage) 'hitting' me powerfully mainly 'then and there'; another (vis-a-vis the seemingly unprecedented mass outpouring of grief) both then and thereafter; and the last occurring to me the other day as I viewed (at a thankfully earlier time slot, the second occasion shown within a week or so) a special new two-hour documentary featuring some 'exclusive' reflections of sons (and princes) William and Harry in particular, alongside the likes of then famously popular new British Prime Minister Tony Blair and others in the wider royal 'entourage' and community.
The special funeral highlight for this (free-lance) journo and longtime close media watcher and critic - though Tony Blair's rendition of the famous New Testament 'love' chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, and Elton John's 'performance' of his reworked Candle in the Wind, 'England's Rose', constitute pretty close seconds - was a brilliant, incisive and bitterly scathing speech by Diana Spencer's South African-based brother, Earl. Transitioning almost seamlessly and without further ado from a deeply moving, from the depths of the heart eulogy to his sister's character and lifework, Earl launched into a full frontal assault upon initially (and primarily) the paparazzi - who'd arguably literally chased and hounded Diana to her death in the French tunnel - through to the tabloid press who'd dogged her steps for literally decades; making her life a virtual misery, affording both her and her beloved kids no real privacy whatsoever, so constantly and incessantly and unremittingly did they bedevil her/their steps and every move. Finally, in a finishing 'flourish' perhaps more addressed to the media in general, or at least 'royal commentators', he left some of us speechless with amazement as in one pithy, poignant sentence he summed up his 'beef' in a nutshell, in the process arguably embracing modern-day journalism and media in one fell swoop (in spirit, anyhow, even if his literal words could hardly be transposed in their entirety to fit all situations without adjustment).
Earl Spencer, wielding his verbal sword, *concluded by firstly mentioning how his sister hadn't, indeed could never understand why said media always sought to put some negative connotation upon, to give some less than flattering interpretation to, the good works and deeds she habitually engaged in. But she - and he - finally were simply unable to avoid the inescapable realization and conclusion that "those [habitually] in the moral gutter were simply unable to understand those at the opposite end of the moral [continuum]". Needless to say, the service was scarcely over before selfsame media readily turned their sights upon a new-found target, Earl Spencer himself, adopting those selfsame methods and modus operandi in a newly-fashioned determined to now discredit him, sadly eventually seemingly succeeding therein as, after the soon breakup of his own marriage, they proceeded to drag his name through the mud in a wretchedly successful attempt to wreak utu (Maori for revenge or vengeance) upon the man who'd presumed, who'd had the sheer audacity to question the moral judgement, the very ethics and character, of these self-appointed 'guardians' of 'the truth'. And sadly, by their very silence on the one hand, and readiness to propagate such titillating scandal against Earl Spencer's good name and reputation on the other, the Western media-at-large subsequently joined in the hate fest at his expense, proving yet again - as if it had been necessary - the original veracity of his frankly unanswerable critique.
Some words of Scripture come uninvited now to my mind, and I'm glad they do, they sum up the aforementioned situation perfectly, in so many ways. Firstly the words of Jesus' beloved Apostle John, who after detailing Jesus' private audience with Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish Supreme Court, the Sanhedrin, then concludes with some remarks Jesus then made:
And this is the condemnation [judgment], that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth [practiseth] evil [bad things] hateth the light, neither cometh to [unto] the light, lest his deeds should be reproved [detected]. But he that doeth [worketh] truth cometh to [unto] the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God." (The Newberry Bible: John 3:19-21)
And in words that I've long since used as both the title, and indeed the entirety of my message, in another blogpost, the 'gospel prophet' of the Older Testament, Isaiah, gives a strong warning to all those, like our modern-day media, who so often venture upon such forbidden ground themselves:
"Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; That put darkness for light, and light for darkness." (The Newberry Bible: Isaiah 5:20)
I don't believe Princess Diana's brother Earl could have put it better himself.
*My profuse apologies to Earl Spencer for of necessity paraphrasing his words somewhat liberally here, but I'm sure I've contained the great gist of his denunciatory remarks and moreover their cutting tone and spirit.
To Be Continued...
Sunday (Father's Day, NZ time) September the 3rd
Part Four: So What Made All the Difference - Between Princess Diana's Death and Some Others; In Particular, Between That of the 'Queen of Hearts' and That of the 'Missionary to the Poor'?
Perhaps I was one of the few to notice, and moreover note the fact, that the then two most well-known and respected women of that time died within a literal week of each other. *Incredibly - and perhaps the reason for my so observing this - was the fact that the death of my much-beloved Grandma two months earlier itself occurred precisely one week before the death of my then closest friend's own Mother. As I reflected upon this, and then heard almost exactly my own thoughts then echoed by a **talkback host, then a fairly rare breed (bring back the day!), a day or two later, my thoughts naturally turned to considering/assessing just what really had made all the difference. The conclusions I came to were actually pretty simple, even obvious, but nevertheless I felt and still feel worthy of note.
I realized that Mother Teresa, whose death did actually result in a state funeral also, I believe - or at least one broadcast 'simulcast' to the world-at-large, and certainly attended by some fairly high-ranking, prestigious dignitaries (of both church and state, from both India and elsewhere) - differed majorly from Princess Diana's in just two essential but very significant respects: the relative lack of publicity and fuss 'n bother, of 'big-noting', given to the 'saint to the guttermost', alongside the comparative absence of the sort of unstinted outpouring of grief so evident (at least Western) worldwide with Diana; and the particular characteristics of the two women that evidently caused this to be.
So what really made all the difference in how media treated the two, or reacted to their deaths? Well, excuse my 'tactlessness', but whereas Diana was youthful (though rapidly aging - like all of us), rich, and possessing much (worldly) power and prestige/influence, ***plus of course glamour (that intangible element of 'charm'), Teresa lacked all of the above...to the nth degree. Yes, while I do accept and readily concede that the response could easily be explained in terms of the obvious fact that whereas Diana died awfully young, and so of course hugely prematurely, Mother Teresa had lived a very long life, and so was nearing her end anyhow. Yes, fair enough on that particular score.
But Teresa was not only getting on in years, she was poor as the proverbial church-mouse, and utterly lacking in personal or political power and prestige, not to mention superficial charm, glamour and glitter Yes, let's just say she lacked the 'good looks' and personal 'sexiness' so extolled to the rafters these days; especially by a media totally enmeshed in and fixated upon the 'wonders' of the female physique and moreover its attractions to the other half of humanity. Quite frankly, nothing else could possibly account for the relative 'treatment' of these two female ****'icons' of recent generations, though they were both undeniably women whose lives had a tremendous impact in their relative spheres upon those of their fellow human beings in our modern (pre-'9/11') world. That much is surely incontestable.
*Even more incredible to me was that all four deaths - of significant women (in our various lives) - occurred, I believe, if I remember rightly, upon Saturdays and/or Sundays (depending upon one's hemispherical location).
**Perhaps it was a fellow named John McDonald, long since having moved on from his then position with Newstalk ZB to the then Radio New Zealand frequency.
***Though as I reflect in depth I cannot help but include one additional quality, one which, whether truly possessed by Diana or otherwise, was widely perceived as so being. This 'quaint' quality of 'innocence', I at least firmly believe, was undoubtedly one of the greatest secrets of her popularity and/or universal appeal.
****Perish the awful cliche-ridden term!
Monday/Tuesday September the 4th/5th
Part Five: Dianaphilia Runs Rampant: How the Phenomenon of Dianamania Became A Global Pandemic
We now approach the very heart of this blogpost, a 'thing' I've deemed dianamania - or dianaphilia; both newly-minted terms, as far as I know, anyhow...and both seeming - to my way of thinking - to accurately, even graphically, describe the phenomenon under consideration/examination...and in a way nothing else either does or even can. For within minutes, even moments after the news got out - was spread abroad - we suddenly had what can only be deemed a psychological phenomenon, whereby people throughout the world - Westerndom, anyhow - were being reduced to grief previously unknown, certainly virtually unheard of. And grief moreover for someone - however (superficially) beautiful/attractive, glamourous, charming - whose involvement in our own personal, day-to-day lives had ever been only vicarious, mediated for us through that beloved 'icon' of modernity variously known as the idiot box, the kiddie manager, or simply the television set, or TV. That is, for the great majority of onlookers, anyhow, - i.e., all those (the vast majority of us) who'd never ever personally known Diana - beyond perhaps a cursory crowd glance or word, or at most a handshake.
People were quite literally stopped in their tracks, and within a short time became obsessed (with), even seemingly 'possessed' by this happening...as if they'd quite literally taken leave of their senses; thus suspending all normal, proper, rational judgment. That someone they'd (generally) never even met, much less personally known - except vicariously, c/o the ubiquitous 'idiot box' - should somehow have the innate/inherent power to mold and reshape their lives and emotions...and moreover cause deep-seated grief and heartfelt, incapacitating mourning - spoke veritable volumes, if not encyclopaedia!
And so, when, as the very latest documentary-makers upon the death of Diana have cited, various individuals and couples were randomly approached and interviewed over days (and weeks) subsequent to the Princess' death, very strange reactions were cited, such as where one 'wag' later stumbled upon divulged he hadn't even had such intensity of grief for his very own wife when she'd died! Such types of responses were obviously far more befitting the deaths of close personal relatives and friends, and grief reactions thereto which one would certainly expect from those closest and dearest to them; but not the sort of responses one would normally have to the death of total strangers, leastwise from folk who'd never even known them to begin with! But of course this was precisely what we saw upon Diana's death - all across the world.
It was a phenomenon whereby the vast majority of not only ye average Jane and Joe Bloggs, but supposedly rational, serious commentators even - to virtually a man and woman - seemed completely 'taken in', 'under the spell' of intoxication, infatuation, bewitchment, hypnosis; dispossessed, however momentarily, of their own free wills; swept up in a global obsession, addiction, even dare I say it, mania. Well, I dare do so, despite myself admittedly also being carried off, carried away by this obsession, this mania, which I'd now like to term 'dianamania' or 'dianaphilia'. But I was not the first or necessarily the most insightful or perceptive, to notice let alone name or identify it; that distinction seems to have belonged to one very *courageous individual alone, even if he was perhaps accompanied, either then or subsequently - however unbeknownst to myself - by many other opinion writers and the like.
That person was well-known New York-based socio-political critic Christopher Hitchens. He was, as I say, and far as I'm aware, the first person to both identify this new concept and moreover 'call it out' for the dangerous psychological phenomenon it undoubtedly had become, and just as - in fact even more - importantly, to subject it to the sort of critique for which he is famous; and for that he deserves full credit, though much more so for being prepared to hang out on a limb with virtually the whole world against him.
To say that with Princess Di's unexpected demise people were suddenly caught up in a chord of public sentiment previously unknown is clearly an indisputable truism. It was indeed one in which (summing up all I can still recall of Hitchens' observations and analysis) people globally, or at least 'Westernwide', for the moment took leave of their rational faculties and were swept up in pure, unadulterated emotionalism. Something Hitchens understandably considered a dangerous thing, no doubt vividly recalling how similar outbreaks of mass hysteria throughout the previous 20th-Century had seen masses of people in various places caught up in socio-political movements, and, in 'temporarily' even losing possession of their rationality and higher reasoning powers, had become a prey for tyrants and megalomaniacs alike, great oppressors who had used and exploited these folks' naivete and gullibility to further their own often diabolical ideological agendas.
Yes, such mass movements, however initially innocent-seeming, had oftentimes, even regularly morphed into something much more sinister, and, like the mass hysteria with which sports fans and fanatics at times have 'lost their senses' in utter pandemonium, 'harmless' emotion' and well-meaning sentiment have quickly, rapidly transmogrified into what can only be described as rebellious, chaotic anarchy engendered by mass brainwashing or crowd-induced hysteria; whereby died-in-the-wool loyalty to one's beloved, be it a sports team, a political party, a nation, a popstar or the like, or even a special family member or friend whom one has **put upon such a pedestal as to esteem as almost godlike, can simply do no wrong.
It is a 'condition' whereby one becomes possessed by a kind of reverse anthropomorphism, and instead of a 'conception or representation of a god as having the form, personality, or attributes of man; ascription of human characteristics to what is not human', as my ever handy Chambers Concise Dictionary defines 'anthropomorphism' itself, the definition (in Dian's unique case) here becomes reworked as follows: the conception or representation of a human being as having the form, personality, or attributes of a god/dess; ascription of god/desslike characteristics to what is not a god/dess. Need I say more?
Yes, just as Earl Spencer noted at Diana's funeral, whereby "the one (i.e. Diana) with the name representing 'the huntress' [of ancient Greek mythology] herself eventually became 'the hunted' ", people in our day [i.e. during that mysterious period of universal grief back in 1997] became - if unwillingly and unknowingly, even subconsciously - themselves wrapped up in that selfsame phenomenon; a mania, as recorded in the annals of the Book of Acts in the New Testament, which also apparently struck the crowds in an amphitheatre in the great Apostle Paul's day. No, just as 'we all' didn't do what the hateful ***paparazzi got up to, ultimately pursuing, virtually hounding and harassing Diana to her very death, the Greek multitudes at that time themselves got wrapped up in the selfsame thing we encountered back in 1997, in which, for three long hours, nothing could be heard over the ongoing shout of the spectators: "Great is Diana of the Ephesians!" Her godlike status simply could not be questioned; it was a cardinal principle of that society, and anyone in any way seeming to challenge it was (literally) shut out, as if their view of matters was irrelevant; unwanted it most assuredly was!
Yes indeed, Princess Diana's death was a singular event, a psychological study in human nature, worthy of a varsity paper even - a snapshot in time, now enshrined for time immemorial in peoples' hearts. Yet what a light it cast, it shone - and continues to shine - upon modern-day (Western) humanity, a 'people' having summarily eschewed anything and everything making pretense to Godlike status while actually eagerly, desperately seeking solace in anything and everything which will effectively substitute for such in their hearts and lives; living in conscious denial of a reality they really inwardly crave and cannot live without!
The very severity/intensity of peoples' grief responses/reactions were simply out of all proportion to both the importance of the event to both life and the universe in general and to their own lives in particular. Nothing else can account for let alone explain this except to label it indeed as a singular psychological phenomenon; and one unparallelled in most of our lifetimes. It was an event whereby the mass of (at least Western) humanity was caught up in a wave of mass hysteria more associated with extreme ideologies and sports fanaticism, and surely better befitting a ****more worthy object.
*Because to remark that Mr Hitchens was, almost from word go, subjected to intense and at times even vituperative, public criticism and moreover opprobrium as a result of his singular critique, is to considerably understate matters.
**For a singular treatment of this phenomenon, i.e. of cultish 'groupthink' - although unavoidably, inevitably that very (latter) term of course instantly 'conjures up' [conveys as if from the dead by a necromancer] George Orwell, celebrated author of not only 1984 but the equally brilliant and epochal Animal Farm, since he, by first utilizing and skillfully employing this very term - far as I know - has pretty well singlehandedly brought this phenomenon into widespread public awareness - one likewise cannot go wrong by also referring to C S Lewis' equally brilliant The Four Loves, where he unveils all the many and various dangers inherent in it.
***According to my Chambers Concise Dictionary, the correct word is 'paparazzo': 'a photographer who specializes in harassing famous people in order to obtain photographs of them in unguarded moments.'
****By this last comment I intend no reflection upon Diana Spencer personally, only to signify that such adoration and indeed adulation has traditionally been seen as not only wholly inappropriate for mere mortals, for everyday, fallible human beings, but likewise only truly appropriate for a Being considered to be God. It was verily something Earl Spencer and other eulogizers at Diana's funeral, moreover, readily conceded about her, indeed a major part of her appeal, enabling multitudes to personally identify with her through all her very many human failings and foibles.
To Be Continued...
September 12th, 2017
Part Six: Afterthoughts on A Life Lived In The Public Spotlight: Expectations of British Royals' Attention To 'Duty' Vis-a-vis Grief
*On this other day (Northern Hemisphere Time, Anyway) upon which 'everyone' graphically remembers exactly where they were and what they were doing when another major international 'incident' occurred, i.e. '9/11' as it will ever be 'immortalized', it seems appropriate (if more by chance than intentionally) to wrap up with some curious, but significant, reflections upon the royals' own **reminiscences of that decisive day back in 1997 in which their own lives were irreversibly altered.
Essentially the dynamic of the conundrum involved, for on the one hand Queen Elizabeth herself, and on the other for the two young royal princes, William and Harry, was between their own understanding of their rights to personal grief or otherwise as opposed to public expectations of their duty (or even grief) at such a time. And thus 'Queenie' was essentially panned/pilloried 'from pillar to post' for not showing sufficient grief and/or the sort of emotions 'everyone else' was experiencing, and thus it was accordingly both expected, indeed positively demanded of the Monarch herself and British Monarchy Incorporated, that she likewise, effectively not be allowed to grieve - or not/otherwise - i.e. in her own, private, personal, self-chosen way.
Meanwhile, in a position that can only be described as the polar opposite of the dilemma facing Elizabeth, William and Harry confessed in this latest close-up, in-depth doco that though wanting to grieve away from the public eye (as their own personal, private emotions seemed to best dictate) - indeed as any kids prematurely deprived of a very beloved mother would naturally be expected to want to do - without any recriminations whatsoever, they pretty soon realized (as with Queen Elizabeth the Second) that this would be ultimately unacceptable to the British public, and so eventually resolved to 'bite the bullet' and shun emotion in favour of duty.
And thus the two young princes' genuine, legitimate emotional responses were effectively shelved (for the time being) in favour of (their expected) public duty, whereas the Queen's right to attend to her own private duties (embracing personal grief in her own time and way out of the public eye if so be it) were required/ demanded to take second-place to the public emotions she was expected to evidence...and that no matter how personally unnatural such (grief-stricken) 'emotionalism' might well have been to the Queen irrespective of the close relative who'd died, and obviously especially so in view of her own well-documented ever-so-fraught personal relationship in times past with Princess Diana.
Yes indeed, the things we do for (and to secure) 'peace' with one and all, and so as to avoid any undue offence or upset, even thus effectively denying who we really are, of putting on a mask/public persona and pretending to be someone we're really not. The way, indeed, that sales representatives and the like are so often encouraged nowadays to 'fake it until you make it', for example acting as if one believes something until by so doing long and enthusiastically enough one ultimately comes to believe the very sort of thing/s one once did not. But just as we are told that 'all is fair in love and war', so the ever-incessant demand these days to please public sensibilities no matter how personally antithetical to one's very being and/or anathema to one means that anyone seeking 'to thine own self be true' has to either ultimately be just that or compromise with and effectively give in to the sort of persona that the public-at-large would prefer to see. And thus and so the royal family were obliged to be untrue to themselves 'in the greater public interest'.
Yet the question will ever remain - as an inescapable backdrop against that unforgettable 'scene' and snapshot in time, in vividly-remembered shared world history: is it, indeed can it ever be the right thing to put on an ever-so-accepted public persona when by so doing one thus effectively denies one's very being? For surely - no matter who is involved, for this is a far larger conundrum than one merely facing members of a quaint old institution many today regard as a relic of a bygone era - to thus act a lie is surely the first step on a very slippery slope to such evils as duplicity, deception and deceit, which as 'we all' well know, have ever led to such grave and awful consequences in world history. For, as I suggest, once one sets foot upon that sorry path there is simply no way of knowing where one - and one's fellows, loyally and dutifully following in one's stead - will ultimately end up. And history is surely littered with testaments to that... .
*As a sidenote - and in connection with Part Five (above) - it's interesting to me that upon the very day I wrote (that aforementioned section) Prince William and Kate won their lawsuit against their own present-day equivalent of those erstwhile paparazzi, for photographing a topless Kate while they were sojourning on a tropical Pacific isle. Indeed in court they cited their personal remembrance of that tragic day back in 1997, the newly-minted contemporary paparazzi's actions thus serving to resuscitate bad memories of their own mother's untimely, tragic death; something which will naturally ever remain raw in their very beings.
**As revealed in historical/archival film footage and close-up interviews in a special documentary recently released in New Zealand.
As 'everyone' remembers precisely where they were, so we are told, when an assassin's bullet (or several) ripped through the frame of America's 35th president, and thus finished off 'Camelot' and with it the budding career of America's much-adulated, idolized and popstar-like President "JFK" (as he has been 'immortalized' ever since), who can possibly forget the day/eve(ning) of August 31st, 1997, when in an altogether different manner, but with the ultimate same result, 'the world' 'awoke' to the news that the youthful, famous, adulated and idolized Princess Diana met her own tragic death within a tunnel in Paris. No-one of my acquaintance, of my 'generation', anyhow. No, it was a moment in time never to be forgotten in days, weeks, months, years and decades to come.
Did that necessarily mean that each one of us then held the selfsame attitude towards or viewpoint of the cinderella swept up by a royal suitor, of the 'ugly duckling' (in the sense of 'commoner') 'plucked' from obscurity and (metaphorically) replanted in the palace of the (reigning) Queen, or, more precisely, miraculously transplanted into the (figurative) antechamber of the (putative) future king? Not necessarily, and indeed not at all from this pleb's perspective. Yet something was definitely at work.
That something - to my way of thinking (and reflecting) - was crystallized in and through a number of disparate events and occurrences that transpired over coming weeks, some seemingly utterly unrelated: the much-loved pop-song, the chart-busting hit chosen (within days) to be reworked into the funereal strains of an immemorially-beloved dirge to the Princess' memory and sung by the co-songwriter himself at her state funeral; the unforgettable speech of Diana's brother, giving the paparazzi in particular and (British) tabloid media in general a right royal serve to the proverbial, at selfsame service; the relative glare of publicity (or rather, lack thereof) given to another equally famous woman who likewise passed away, exactly one week on - in altogether different circumstances - on literally the other side of the globe; plus of course the remarkable, even extraordinary melodrama(s) subsequently played out across the Western world (especially) as crowds of adulators, well-wishers, and the deeply grieving turned out in literal hordes to give their own personal respects to the memory of a person who had - via the all-enveloping tentacles of the modern media - long since been embraced to their very 'bosoms' as their very own 'Princess Di'(ana) - as a modern-day reincarnation as it were of the goddess Diana so beloved of the Gentile masses the New Testament's preeminent Apostle Paul 'encountered' as he criss-crossed the then known (pre-European) world of his day.
Indeed as I reflect upon that time (and event) there are literally so many indelible memories surrounding those events and others in their temporal vicinity, including some intensely personal (and grief-wracking in and of themselves), as well as apparent synchronicities, 'coincidences', felicities and other such things that I not only can hardly contain myself from sharing, feeling metaphorically close to exploding therewith, but it's quite literally hard to know where to even begin; so, in an ironic twist, I'll leave off here for the present...
Many Apologies That I've Only Now Re-continued This Savagely Abridged Blogpost At the Very End of August 31st, 2017 - U.K. (i.e. Greenwich Standard Mean) Time...but such is life, as they say.
Part Two: A Prophet Without Knowing It
I'm choosing to resume here at what might appear an odd point, but it ties in with much of the rest that I'm due to share: a beloved old, classic LP, Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's much-acclaimed and well-selling 'Goodbye Yellow Brick Road'. For, one simply couldn't have written a better 'introduction' to the untimely demise of Elton's good friend Diana than appears in the first three songs on side A of that classic two-record LP. It's almost - to my way of thinking - beyond (normal) belief, in fact, so eerily and unmistakably do those three songs point not only to Lady Diana Spencer's death but to Elton John's own - and the Western world-at-large's - reaction to that tragic passing.
So, you rightly query, how so? Well, song number one is the incredibly-titled 'Funeral for a Friend', and did EJ perform a special item to the memory of his long-time friend at Diana's state funeral, or what? And sure, he was invited, or rather requested, to alter the graphic imagery of another of his songs (chronologically, #3) from that LP - his one-time chart-topping hit, 'Candle in the Wind' (about 'Norma Jean', aka the famous actress and mistress of JFK himself, Marilyn Monroe) - thus reconfiguring it as 'England's Rose', to make it acceptable to a general audience at said occasion, yet it was still effectively that classic Candle in the Wind whose memorable lyrics resounded as a background echo in the ears of many TV (and on-site) listeners/viewers, (as with myself), I've no doubt whatsoever.
And on that particular score, I find it personally equally fascinating, intriguing again beyond belief or everyday 'coincidence' that that classic song (of Elton John's and Bernie Taupin's) was the very one which came - completely unsought - to my own mind, within mere days after Diana's death and certainly prior to media report being made that EJ had been even touted as a possible special guest, let alone officially chosen to perform his unique musical item at her funeral service. (Curiously I can even remember exactly where I was when that thought first came to me, driving my Mum's (and at one time my own) 'old' Toyota Starlet just up from the Roslyn shopping centre!)
And after Funeral for a Friend Taupin/John then feature the little-known accompaniment (to Funeral for a Friend) known as 'Love Lies Bleeding'. "What?", you understandably exclaim, barely able to credit the irony yourself. I can only add: "I fully agree; with knobs on, to boot!" Need I full out the relevant detail? I mean, really?
And so side A of Elton John's (and Bernie Taupin's) undisputed greatest (as in most popular and generally-acclaimed) LP, 'Beyond Yellow Brick Road', itself contains an almost prophetic/'forth-telling' outline of the very scenario which ultimately played out on the fateful day of August 31st, 1997. Yes, at a funeral for a very close friend, the 'legendary' Princes Diana Spencer, whose own generally and much-lauded love for the world (and especially its unfortunates, whether aids' victims at home or land mine victims abroad) now both metaphorically and literally lay bleeding in a limousine within a Parisian tunnel...as it came to an untimely and tragic end not of its own making...Diana's one-time friend Elton John sang a song, 'England's Rose', *which captured the very spirit of her life and times and personality and character, to a world-at-large in equal measure of grief which could only echo within their own hearts a sense of 'Right on, buddy; right on!' You've nailed it down to a literal 't'.
*Most of whom perhaps, like myself, held within themselves the actual lyrics of the original song, Candle in the Wind, whose very words themselves so vividly and graphically and unmistakeably painted a verbal portrait of the person whose life was so abruptly cut short upon that fateful day.
To Be Continued...
Saturday eve (September 2nd) NZ time
Part Three: Reading the Hearts of the Self-Appointed Critics As An Open Book
Having thus dealt extensively with the main (and, it seems to me, rather unique) 'thing' that struck me at the time, let me now 'posit' some additional observations: some (involving Diana's brother Earl Spencer, as well as another famous woman on the world stage) 'hitting' me powerfully mainly 'then and there'; another (vis-a-vis the seemingly unprecedented mass outpouring of grief) both then and thereafter; and the last occurring to me the other day as I viewed (at a thankfully earlier time slot, the second occasion shown within a week or so) a special new two-hour documentary featuring some 'exclusive' reflections of sons (and princes) William and Harry in particular, alongside the likes of then famously popular new British Prime Minister Tony Blair and others in the wider royal 'entourage' and community.
The special funeral highlight for this (free-lance) journo and longtime close media watcher and critic - though Tony Blair's rendition of the famous New Testament 'love' chapter, 1 Corinthians 13, and Elton John's 'performance' of his reworked Candle in the Wind, 'England's Rose', constitute pretty close seconds - was a brilliant, incisive and bitterly scathing speech by Diana Spencer's South African-based brother, Earl. Transitioning almost seamlessly and without further ado from a deeply moving, from the depths of the heart eulogy to his sister's character and lifework, Earl launched into a full frontal assault upon initially (and primarily) the paparazzi - who'd arguably literally chased and hounded Diana to her death in the French tunnel - through to the tabloid press who'd dogged her steps for literally decades; making her life a virtual misery, affording both her and her beloved kids no real privacy whatsoever, so constantly and incessantly and unremittingly did they bedevil her/their steps and every move. Finally, in a finishing 'flourish' perhaps more addressed to the media in general, or at least 'royal commentators', he left some of us speechless with amazement as in one pithy, poignant sentence he summed up his 'beef' in a nutshell, in the process arguably embracing modern-day journalism and media in one fell swoop (in spirit, anyhow, even if his literal words could hardly be transposed in their entirety to fit all situations without adjustment).
Earl Spencer, wielding his verbal sword, *concluded by firstly mentioning how his sister hadn't, indeed could never understand why said media always sought to put some negative connotation upon, to give some less than flattering interpretation to, the good works and deeds she habitually engaged in. But she - and he - finally were simply unable to avoid the inescapable realization and conclusion that "those [habitually] in the moral gutter were simply unable to understand those at the opposite end of the moral [continuum]". Needless to say, the service was scarcely over before selfsame media readily turned their sights upon a new-found target, Earl Spencer himself, adopting those selfsame methods and modus operandi in a newly-fashioned determined to now discredit him, sadly eventually seemingly succeeding therein as, after the soon breakup of his own marriage, they proceeded to drag his name through the mud in a wretchedly successful attempt to wreak utu (Maori for revenge or vengeance) upon the man who'd presumed, who'd had the sheer audacity to question the moral judgement, the very ethics and character, of these self-appointed 'guardians' of 'the truth'. And sadly, by their very silence on the one hand, and readiness to propagate such titillating scandal against Earl Spencer's good name and reputation on the other, the Western media-at-large subsequently joined in the hate fest at his expense, proving yet again - as if it had been necessary - the original veracity of his frankly unanswerable critique.
Some words of Scripture come uninvited now to my mind, and I'm glad they do, they sum up the aforementioned situation perfectly, in so many ways. Firstly the words of Jesus' beloved Apostle John, who after detailing Jesus' private audience with Nicodemus, a member of the Jewish Supreme Court, the Sanhedrin, then concludes with some remarks Jesus then made:
And this is the condemnation [judgment], that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. For every one that doeth [practiseth] evil [bad things] hateth the light, neither cometh to [unto] the light, lest his deeds should be reproved [detected]. But he that doeth [worketh] truth cometh to [unto] the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God." (The Newberry Bible: John 3:19-21)
And in words that I've long since used as both the title, and indeed the entirety of my message, in another blogpost, the 'gospel prophet' of the Older Testament, Isaiah, gives a strong warning to all those, like our modern-day media, who so often venture upon such forbidden ground themselves:
"Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; That put darkness for light, and light for darkness." (The Newberry Bible: Isaiah 5:20)
I don't believe Princess Diana's brother Earl could have put it better himself.
*My profuse apologies to Earl Spencer for of necessity paraphrasing his words somewhat liberally here, but I'm sure I've contained the great gist of his denunciatory remarks and moreover their cutting tone and spirit.
To Be Continued...
Sunday (Father's Day, NZ time) September the 3rd
Part Four: So What Made All the Difference - Between Princess Diana's Death and Some Others; In Particular, Between That of the 'Queen of Hearts' and That of the 'Missionary to the Poor'?
Perhaps I was one of the few to notice, and moreover note the fact, that the then two most well-known and respected women of that time died within a literal week of each other. *Incredibly - and perhaps the reason for my so observing this - was the fact that the death of my much-beloved Grandma two months earlier itself occurred precisely one week before the death of my then closest friend's own Mother. As I reflected upon this, and then heard almost exactly my own thoughts then echoed by a **talkback host, then a fairly rare breed (bring back the day!), a day or two later, my thoughts naturally turned to considering/assessing just what really had made all the difference. The conclusions I came to were actually pretty simple, even obvious, but nevertheless I felt and still feel worthy of note.
I realized that Mother Teresa, whose death did actually result in a state funeral also, I believe - or at least one broadcast 'simulcast' to the world-at-large, and certainly attended by some fairly high-ranking, prestigious dignitaries (of both church and state, from both India and elsewhere) - differed majorly from Princess Diana's in just two essential but very significant respects: the relative lack of publicity and fuss 'n bother, of 'big-noting', given to the 'saint to the guttermost', alongside the comparative absence of the sort of unstinted outpouring of grief so evident (at least Western) worldwide with Diana; and the particular characteristics of the two women that evidently caused this to be.
So what really made all the difference in how media treated the two, or reacted to their deaths? Well, excuse my 'tactlessness', but whereas Diana was youthful (though rapidly aging - like all of us), rich, and possessing much (worldly) power and prestige/influence, ***plus of course glamour (that intangible element of 'charm'), Teresa lacked all of the above...to the nth degree. Yes, while I do accept and readily concede that the response could easily be explained in terms of the obvious fact that whereas Diana died awfully young, and so of course hugely prematurely, Mother Teresa had lived a very long life, and so was nearing her end anyhow. Yes, fair enough on that particular score.
But Teresa was not only getting on in years, she was poor as the proverbial church-mouse, and utterly lacking in personal or political power and prestige, not to mention superficial charm, glamour and glitter Yes, let's just say she lacked the 'good looks' and personal 'sexiness' so extolled to the rafters these days; especially by a media totally enmeshed in and fixated upon the 'wonders' of the female physique and moreover its attractions to the other half of humanity. Quite frankly, nothing else could possibly account for the relative 'treatment' of these two female ****'icons' of recent generations, though they were both undeniably women whose lives had a tremendous impact in their relative spheres upon those of their fellow human beings in our modern (pre-'9/11') world. That much is surely incontestable.
*Even more incredible to me was that all four deaths - of significant women (in our various lives) - occurred, I believe, if I remember rightly, upon Saturdays and/or Sundays (depending upon one's hemispherical location).
**Perhaps it was a fellow named John McDonald, long since having moved on from his then position with Newstalk ZB to the then Radio New Zealand frequency.
***Though as I reflect in depth I cannot help but include one additional quality, one which, whether truly possessed by Diana or otherwise, was widely perceived as so being. This 'quaint' quality of 'innocence', I at least firmly believe, was undoubtedly one of the greatest secrets of her popularity and/or universal appeal.
****Perish the awful cliche-ridden term!
Monday/Tuesday September the 4th/5th
Part Five: Dianaphilia Runs Rampant: How the Phenomenon of Dianamania Became A Global Pandemic
We now approach the very heart of this blogpost, a 'thing' I've deemed dianamania - or dianaphilia; both newly-minted terms, as far as I know, anyhow...and both seeming - to my way of thinking - to accurately, even graphically, describe the phenomenon under consideration/examination...and in a way nothing else either does or even can. For within minutes, even moments after the news got out - was spread abroad - we suddenly had what can only be deemed a psychological phenomenon, whereby people throughout the world - Westerndom, anyhow - were being reduced to grief previously unknown, certainly virtually unheard of. And grief moreover for someone - however (superficially) beautiful/attractive, glamourous, charming - whose involvement in our own personal, day-to-day lives had ever been only vicarious, mediated for us through that beloved 'icon' of modernity variously known as the idiot box, the kiddie manager, or simply the television set, or TV. That is, for the great majority of onlookers, anyhow, - i.e., all those (the vast majority of us) who'd never ever personally known Diana - beyond perhaps a cursory crowd glance or word, or at most a handshake.
People were quite literally stopped in their tracks, and within a short time became obsessed (with), even seemingly 'possessed' by this happening...as if they'd quite literally taken leave of their senses; thus suspending all normal, proper, rational judgment. That someone they'd (generally) never even met, much less personally known - except vicariously, c/o the ubiquitous 'idiot box' - should somehow have the innate/inherent power to mold and reshape their lives and emotions...and moreover cause deep-seated grief and heartfelt, incapacitating mourning - spoke veritable volumes, if not encyclopaedia!
And so, when, as the very latest documentary-makers upon the death of Diana have cited, various individuals and couples were randomly approached and interviewed over days (and weeks) subsequent to the Princess' death, very strange reactions were cited, such as where one 'wag' later stumbled upon divulged he hadn't even had such intensity of grief for his very own wife when she'd died! Such types of responses were obviously far more befitting the deaths of close personal relatives and friends, and grief reactions thereto which one would certainly expect from those closest and dearest to them; but not the sort of responses one would normally have to the death of total strangers, leastwise from folk who'd never even known them to begin with! But of course this was precisely what we saw upon Diana's death - all across the world.
It was a phenomenon whereby the vast majority of not only ye average Jane and Joe Bloggs, but supposedly rational, serious commentators even - to virtually a man and woman - seemed completely 'taken in', 'under the spell' of intoxication, infatuation, bewitchment, hypnosis; dispossessed, however momentarily, of their own free wills; swept up in a global obsession, addiction, even dare I say it, mania. Well, I dare do so, despite myself admittedly also being carried off, carried away by this obsession, this mania, which I'd now like to term 'dianamania' or 'dianaphilia'. But I was not the first or necessarily the most insightful or perceptive, to notice let alone name or identify it; that distinction seems to have belonged to one very *courageous individual alone, even if he was perhaps accompanied, either then or subsequently - however unbeknownst to myself - by many other opinion writers and the like.
That person was well-known New York-based socio-political critic Christopher Hitchens. He was, as I say, and far as I'm aware, the first person to both identify this new concept and moreover 'call it out' for the dangerous psychological phenomenon it undoubtedly had become, and just as - in fact even more - importantly, to subject it to the sort of critique for which he is famous; and for that he deserves full credit, though much more so for being prepared to hang out on a limb with virtually the whole world against him.
To say that with Princess Di's unexpected demise people were suddenly caught up in a chord of public sentiment previously unknown is clearly an indisputable truism. It was indeed one in which (summing up all I can still recall of Hitchens' observations and analysis) people globally, or at least 'Westernwide', for the moment took leave of their rational faculties and were swept up in pure, unadulterated emotionalism. Something Hitchens understandably considered a dangerous thing, no doubt vividly recalling how similar outbreaks of mass hysteria throughout the previous 20th-Century had seen masses of people in various places caught up in socio-political movements, and, in 'temporarily' even losing possession of their rationality and higher reasoning powers, had become a prey for tyrants and megalomaniacs alike, great oppressors who had used and exploited these folks' naivete and gullibility to further their own often diabolical ideological agendas.
Yes, such mass movements, however initially innocent-seeming, had oftentimes, even regularly morphed into something much more sinister, and, like the mass hysteria with which sports fans and fanatics at times have 'lost their senses' in utter pandemonium, 'harmless' emotion' and well-meaning sentiment have quickly, rapidly transmogrified into what can only be described as rebellious, chaotic anarchy engendered by mass brainwashing or crowd-induced hysteria; whereby died-in-the-wool loyalty to one's beloved, be it a sports team, a political party, a nation, a popstar or the like, or even a special family member or friend whom one has **put upon such a pedestal as to esteem as almost godlike, can simply do no wrong.
It is a 'condition' whereby one becomes possessed by a kind of reverse anthropomorphism, and instead of a 'conception or representation of a god as having the form, personality, or attributes of man; ascription of human characteristics to what is not human', as my ever handy Chambers Concise Dictionary defines 'anthropomorphism' itself, the definition (in Dian's unique case) here becomes reworked as follows: the conception or representation of a human being as having the form, personality, or attributes of a god/dess; ascription of god/desslike characteristics to what is not a god/dess. Need I say more?
Yes, just as Earl Spencer noted at Diana's funeral, whereby "the one (i.e. Diana) with the name representing 'the huntress' [of ancient Greek mythology] herself eventually became 'the hunted' ", people in our day [i.e. during that mysterious period of universal grief back in 1997] became - if unwillingly and unknowingly, even subconsciously - themselves wrapped up in that selfsame phenomenon; a mania, as recorded in the annals of the Book of Acts in the New Testament, which also apparently struck the crowds in an amphitheatre in the great Apostle Paul's day. No, just as 'we all' didn't do what the hateful ***paparazzi got up to, ultimately pursuing, virtually hounding and harassing Diana to her very death, the Greek multitudes at that time themselves got wrapped up in the selfsame thing we encountered back in 1997, in which, for three long hours, nothing could be heard over the ongoing shout of the spectators: "Great is Diana of the Ephesians!" Her godlike status simply could not be questioned; it was a cardinal principle of that society, and anyone in any way seeming to challenge it was (literally) shut out, as if their view of matters was irrelevant; unwanted it most assuredly was!
Yes indeed, Princess Diana's death was a singular event, a psychological study in human nature, worthy of a varsity paper even - a snapshot in time, now enshrined for time immemorial in peoples' hearts. Yet what a light it cast, it shone - and continues to shine - upon modern-day (Western) humanity, a 'people' having summarily eschewed anything and everything making pretense to Godlike status while actually eagerly, desperately seeking solace in anything and everything which will effectively substitute for such in their hearts and lives; living in conscious denial of a reality they really inwardly crave and cannot live without!
The very severity/intensity of peoples' grief responses/reactions were simply out of all proportion to both the importance of the event to both life and the universe in general and to their own lives in particular. Nothing else can account for let alone explain this except to label it indeed as a singular psychological phenomenon; and one unparallelled in most of our lifetimes. It was an event whereby the mass of (at least Western) humanity was caught up in a wave of mass hysteria more associated with extreme ideologies and sports fanaticism, and surely better befitting a ****more worthy object.
*Because to remark that Mr Hitchens was, almost from word go, subjected to intense and at times even vituperative, public criticism and moreover opprobrium as a result of his singular critique, is to considerably understate matters.
**For a singular treatment of this phenomenon, i.e. of cultish 'groupthink' - although unavoidably, inevitably that very (latter) term of course instantly 'conjures up' [conveys as if from the dead by a necromancer] George Orwell, celebrated author of not only 1984 but the equally brilliant and epochal Animal Farm, since he, by first utilizing and skillfully employing this very term - far as I know - has pretty well singlehandedly brought this phenomenon into widespread public awareness - one likewise cannot go wrong by also referring to C S Lewis' equally brilliant The Four Loves, where he unveils all the many and various dangers inherent in it.
***According to my Chambers Concise Dictionary, the correct word is 'paparazzo': 'a photographer who specializes in harassing famous people in order to obtain photographs of them in unguarded moments.'
****By this last comment I intend no reflection upon Diana Spencer personally, only to signify that such adoration and indeed adulation has traditionally been seen as not only wholly inappropriate for mere mortals, for everyday, fallible human beings, but likewise only truly appropriate for a Being considered to be God. It was verily something Earl Spencer and other eulogizers at Diana's funeral, moreover, readily conceded about her, indeed a major part of her appeal, enabling multitudes to personally identify with her through all her very many human failings and foibles.
To Be Continued...
September 12th, 2017
Part Six: Afterthoughts on A Life Lived In The Public Spotlight: Expectations of British Royals' Attention To 'Duty' Vis-a-vis Grief
*On this other day (Northern Hemisphere Time, Anyway) upon which 'everyone' graphically remembers exactly where they were and what they were doing when another major international 'incident' occurred, i.e. '9/11' as it will ever be 'immortalized', it seems appropriate (if more by chance than intentionally) to wrap up with some curious, but significant, reflections upon the royals' own **reminiscences of that decisive day back in 1997 in which their own lives were irreversibly altered.
Essentially the dynamic of the conundrum involved, for on the one hand Queen Elizabeth herself, and on the other for the two young royal princes, William and Harry, was between their own understanding of their rights to personal grief or otherwise as opposed to public expectations of their duty (or even grief) at such a time. And thus 'Queenie' was essentially panned/pilloried 'from pillar to post' for not showing sufficient grief and/or the sort of emotions 'everyone else' was experiencing, and thus it was accordingly both expected, indeed positively demanded of the Monarch herself and British Monarchy Incorporated, that she likewise, effectively not be allowed to grieve - or not/otherwise - i.e. in her own, private, personal, self-chosen way.
Meanwhile, in a position that can only be described as the polar opposite of the dilemma facing Elizabeth, William and Harry confessed in this latest close-up, in-depth doco that though wanting to grieve away from the public eye (as their own personal, private emotions seemed to best dictate) - indeed as any kids prematurely deprived of a very beloved mother would naturally be expected to want to do - without any recriminations whatsoever, they pretty soon realized (as with Queen Elizabeth the Second) that this would be ultimately unacceptable to the British public, and so eventually resolved to 'bite the bullet' and shun emotion in favour of duty.
And thus the two young princes' genuine, legitimate emotional responses were effectively shelved (for the time being) in favour of (their expected) public duty, whereas the Queen's right to attend to her own private duties (embracing personal grief in her own time and way out of the public eye if so be it) were required/ demanded to take second-place to the public emotions she was expected to evidence...and that no matter how personally unnatural such (grief-stricken) 'emotionalism' might well have been to the Queen irrespective of the close relative who'd died, and obviously especially so in view of her own well-documented ever-so-fraught personal relationship in times past with Princess Diana.
Yes indeed, the things we do for (and to secure) 'peace' with one and all, and so as to avoid any undue offence or upset, even thus effectively denying who we really are, of putting on a mask/public persona and pretending to be someone we're really not. The way, indeed, that sales representatives and the like are so often encouraged nowadays to 'fake it until you make it', for example acting as if one believes something until by so doing long and enthusiastically enough one ultimately comes to believe the very sort of thing/s one once did not. But just as we are told that 'all is fair in love and war', so the ever-incessant demand these days to please public sensibilities no matter how personally antithetical to one's very being and/or anathema to one means that anyone seeking 'to thine own self be true' has to either ultimately be just that or compromise with and effectively give in to the sort of persona that the public-at-large would prefer to see. And thus and so the royal family were obliged to be untrue to themselves 'in the greater public interest'.
Yet the question will ever remain - as an inescapable backdrop against that unforgettable 'scene' and snapshot in time, in vividly-remembered shared world history: is it, indeed can it ever be the right thing to put on an ever-so-accepted public persona when by so doing one thus effectively denies one's very being? For surely - no matter who is involved, for this is a far larger conundrum than one merely facing members of a quaint old institution many today regard as a relic of a bygone era - to thus act a lie is surely the first step on a very slippery slope to such evils as duplicity, deception and deceit, which as 'we all' well know, have ever led to such grave and awful consequences in world history. For, as I suggest, once one sets foot upon that sorry path there is simply no way of knowing where one - and one's fellows, loyally and dutifully following in one's stead - will ultimately end up. And history is surely littered with testaments to that... .
*As a sidenote - and in connection with Part Five (above) - it's interesting to me that upon the very day I wrote (that aforementioned section) Prince William and Kate won their lawsuit against their own present-day equivalent of those erstwhile paparazzi, for photographing a topless Kate while they were sojourning on a tropical Pacific isle. Indeed in court they cited their personal remembrance of that tragic day back in 1997, the newly-minted contemporary paparazzi's actions thus serving to resuscitate bad memories of their own mother's untimely, tragic death; something which will naturally ever remain raw in their very beings.
**As revealed in historical/archival film footage and close-up interviews in a special documentary recently released in New Zealand.
Tuesday, August 22, 2017
A Belated Obituary to singer extraordinaire Glen Campbell: his kind will most assuredly not pass this way again; no, not ever
How it's taken me a full two weeks (exactly, I believe) to get around to this is a sad reflection upon my state of being at present, but be that as it may...
Glen Campbell's death - though long expected, including by myself, even only a couple months if that previously, when mention of him by the esteemed Jim Mora of Radio New Zealand National immediately distressed me into thinking he'd died then - shouldn't really have taken any of us by surprise, as he'd struggled with the gruesome and progressively worsening Alzheimer's Disease for well on half a dozen years or so. Yet when it finally 'arrived' two Tuesdays ago (I think) it carried an ironic and somewhat bitter twist for me.
You see, I'd long determined...though as a chronic procrastinator, or more accurately and aptly, a lifelong over-committer, I simply hadn't *gotten around to it...to having a special gospel LP played at my own funeral (on my behalf, whenever that so happened to be/transpire), throughout the 'event'; but simply have never gotten onto adding that 'proviso' to a long-intended update in my will. Said album contains half a dozen songs per side, the timeless GC-versions of Standing on the Promises, What A Friend We Have In Jesus, Softly and Tenderly, Sweet Hour of Prayer, I Surrender All, and The Lord's Prayer upon side A, and tall Oak Tree, Sweet By And By, I See Love, Farther Along, In The Garden, and Suddenly There's A Valley, on side B (in that particular order). At least side one could be played through in its entirety from start to finish...yes, that much is this 'testator's' own wishes, let one and all be well assured!
His hits - sure, invariably (pretty much all I believe) written by others, especially the brilliant Jim Webb, became his own masterpieces, as if he'd created them entirely himself...though perhaps that's more a reflection upon how the visible one gets all the glory...and the one toiling on his or her lonesome in the background invariably gets little of the limelight, much less the deserved glory... . Our (i.e. Aotearoa-New Zealand's) Government's cheerleader-in-chief, the narcissist par excellence known as Mike Hosking of Newstalk ZB and Seven Sharp infamy and shameless self-promotion, nevertheless - though in an entirely unrelated context - tonight summed up the scenario I'm seeking to convey by stating, in a little verbal interchange with his co-host Toni Street, that "if you can't do something yourself, then get someone else to do it for you". Which of course is what the likes of Jim Webb and Bernie Taupin did with heir respective hits which Glen Campbell and Elton John respectively have carried on to heights of fame and fortune.
Yes, America's inimitable Glen Campbell sang all these (aforementioned gospel greats) with passion and commitment, with melody and harmony, with grace and poise, with style and uniqueness - a brand all his very own. And as for his myriad of celebrated hits/hit singles, it'd literally be hard, well-nigh impossible even, to list them all...were one that way so inclined...and as my readership well knows by now, on a better day (at a much earlier time of the day), I well might - I wouldn't put it past myself, anyway, let's say...
Nevertheless let's try - a little - anyhow...though upon second thoughts, with shuteye well-and-truly not only beckoning, but veritably screaming at me now, I'll forgo that little luxury, except to say that, though like many I very enjoyed the likes of Wichita Lineman, Where's the Playground, Susie, and Galveston - and even the sometimes pilloried Rhinestone Cowboy - my all-time favourites were GC's state-of-the-art versions of three songs in particular: He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother; (From) Both Sides Now; and topping even those two, or at least the former...Try A Little Kindness...which simple but profound song I recall singing loudly on various occasions as my way of 'getting my own back' upon the injustices and moreover the particular perpetrators thereof that I've occasionally found my footsteps dogged and my life bedeviled by. Preaching at such folk as if to tell them there's a way of life much better and higher and more noble and glorious way up beyond the petty, insular and self-serving spheres in which they themselves seem to continually operate.
A disclaimer I must inevitably bring myself to make here, lest I somehow thus (even seem to) align myself with a style of music that quite frankly I normally don't even have the time of day...much less night - for, is that I've never - at least consciously, let's concede (for the record) - even remotely been a fan of country music per se... . And yet for me Glen Campbell - and John Denver, for that matter - raised that particular musical genre to an art form and position of greatness only equalled (in my lowly estimate) in other musical spheres by, on the one hand, kids' songs of special memory and cherishing such as Flick the Fire-Engine, HR Puf 'n Stuff, Puff the Magic Dragon, The Magnificant Men in Their Flying Machine, and yes, even - shock, horror - Snoopy's Christmas, on another by such classic 'operatic' love songs as Oliver's I'd Do Anything and Where is Love, the Sound of Music's Edelweis, and Mary Poppins' Feed the Birds, on another by Ed Ames' Love of The Common People, and - last but certainly not least - by that grand duo of yesteryear Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon. Oh yes, and Jules Riding, Randy Stonehill and Keith Green - and Amy Grant.
Yes, enough again already - I know. Though in concluding I really can't help myself in noting the predictable way in which Glen Campbell's passing was barely noted in the media - in comparison, that is, with such other celebrated singer-songwriters as David Bowie (and even the insubstantial Minneapolis' 'Prince') awhile ago ...let alone such overrated singer-songwriters as the idolized-to-the-rafters Michael Jackson, who I'll concede did in his tender youth compose and make famous the beautiful 'Ben'...I used to play on the family piano. . No, as with (on a much more modest scale, please understand) the way in which Mother Teresa's death was passed over in a once over lightly fashion by Western media - but certainly not in her new-found home of India where she was given a state funeral - a week after Princess Diana's shock death brought the Western world pretty well to a standstill; so the youthful Jackson and 'Prince' - like other songsters who've died very young, 'before their time' - were doted on by media for days on end, the fourth estate verily feeding off the entrails and carrion of their lives much like the proverbial vultures devouring a carcass choice morsel by choice morsel, contrasted with the way in which GC also was treated to a once over lightly and asap by selfsame media.
No, the relative alacrity with which Glen Campbell's unique genius vanished into obscurity, the 'clean-cut conservative' of simple, old-fashioned values not really being or representing the sort of person our contemporary culture esteems as worthy of very much (remembrance let alone celebration), except for the briefest of reviews as already described, was 'el usual media' treatment eminently unbefitting of GC's special brand of greatness...which simply flowed out of the sort of decent and God-fearing human being he ever was...
But be that as it may, and indeed as Diana's brother Earl Spencer himself noted (or at least in my own paraphrase thereof) - among many other equally memorable things - in his simply unforgettable if highly controversial obituary speech at her funeral, the truly great don't actually need others' acclamations and plaudits to add any lustre to their greatness...for, to all who will (have ears and eyes to hear and see) it's patently clear and evident anyhow... .
So good-bye Glen, and thank you to his family - and moreover Maker - for lending him to us for awhile...he not only won't pass this way again, but I somehow doubt we'll see his kind again...ever. More's the pity.
*Cf my oldest sister's unforgettable t-shirt (or whatever, I can't quite remember) emblazoned with that memorable phrase 'a round tuit'.
Glen Campbell's death - though long expected, including by myself, even only a couple months if that previously, when mention of him by the esteemed Jim Mora of Radio New Zealand National immediately distressed me into thinking he'd died then - shouldn't really have taken any of us by surprise, as he'd struggled with the gruesome and progressively worsening Alzheimer's Disease for well on half a dozen years or so. Yet when it finally 'arrived' two Tuesdays ago (I think) it carried an ironic and somewhat bitter twist for me.
You see, I'd long determined...though as a chronic procrastinator, or more accurately and aptly, a lifelong over-committer, I simply hadn't *gotten around to it...to having a special gospel LP played at my own funeral (on my behalf, whenever that so happened to be/transpire), throughout the 'event'; but simply have never gotten onto adding that 'proviso' to a long-intended update in my will. Said album contains half a dozen songs per side, the timeless GC-versions of Standing on the Promises, What A Friend We Have In Jesus, Softly and Tenderly, Sweet Hour of Prayer, I Surrender All, and The Lord's Prayer upon side A, and tall Oak Tree, Sweet By And By, I See Love, Farther Along, In The Garden, and Suddenly There's A Valley, on side B (in that particular order). At least side one could be played through in its entirety from start to finish...yes, that much is this 'testator's' own wishes, let one and all be well assured!
His hits - sure, invariably (pretty much all I believe) written by others, especially the brilliant Jim Webb, became his own masterpieces, as if he'd created them entirely himself...though perhaps that's more a reflection upon how the visible one gets all the glory...and the one toiling on his or her lonesome in the background invariably gets little of the limelight, much less the deserved glory... . Our (i.e. Aotearoa-New Zealand's) Government's cheerleader-in-chief, the narcissist par excellence known as Mike Hosking of Newstalk ZB and Seven Sharp infamy and shameless self-promotion, nevertheless - though in an entirely unrelated context - tonight summed up the scenario I'm seeking to convey by stating, in a little verbal interchange with his co-host Toni Street, that "if you can't do something yourself, then get someone else to do it for you". Which of course is what the likes of Jim Webb and Bernie Taupin did with heir respective hits which Glen Campbell and Elton John respectively have carried on to heights of fame and fortune.
Yes, America's inimitable Glen Campbell sang all these (aforementioned gospel greats) with passion and commitment, with melody and harmony, with grace and poise, with style and uniqueness - a brand all his very own. And as for his myriad of celebrated hits/hit singles, it'd literally be hard, well-nigh impossible even, to list them all...were one that way so inclined...and as my readership well knows by now, on a better day (at a much earlier time of the day), I well might - I wouldn't put it past myself, anyway, let's say...
Nevertheless let's try - a little - anyhow...though upon second thoughts, with shuteye well-and-truly not only beckoning, but veritably screaming at me now, I'll forgo that little luxury, except to say that, though like many I very enjoyed the likes of Wichita Lineman, Where's the Playground, Susie, and Galveston - and even the sometimes pilloried Rhinestone Cowboy - my all-time favourites were GC's state-of-the-art versions of three songs in particular: He Ain't Heavy, He's My Brother; (From) Both Sides Now; and topping even those two, or at least the former...Try A Little Kindness...which simple but profound song I recall singing loudly on various occasions as my way of 'getting my own back' upon the injustices and moreover the particular perpetrators thereof that I've occasionally found my footsteps dogged and my life bedeviled by. Preaching at such folk as if to tell them there's a way of life much better and higher and more noble and glorious way up beyond the petty, insular and self-serving spheres in which they themselves seem to continually operate.
A disclaimer I must inevitably bring myself to make here, lest I somehow thus (even seem to) align myself with a style of music that quite frankly I normally don't even have the time of day...much less night - for, is that I've never - at least consciously, let's concede (for the record) - even remotely been a fan of country music per se... . And yet for me Glen Campbell - and John Denver, for that matter - raised that particular musical genre to an art form and position of greatness only equalled (in my lowly estimate) in other musical spheres by, on the one hand, kids' songs of special memory and cherishing such as Flick the Fire-Engine, HR Puf 'n Stuff, Puff the Magic Dragon, The Magnificant Men in Their Flying Machine, and yes, even - shock, horror - Snoopy's Christmas, on another by such classic 'operatic' love songs as Oliver's I'd Do Anything and Where is Love, the Sound of Music's Edelweis, and Mary Poppins' Feed the Birds, on another by Ed Ames' Love of The Common People, and - last but certainly not least - by that grand duo of yesteryear Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon. Oh yes, and Jules Riding, Randy Stonehill and Keith Green - and Amy Grant.
Yes, enough again already - I know. Though in concluding I really can't help myself in noting the predictable way in which Glen Campbell's passing was barely noted in the media - in comparison, that is, with such other celebrated singer-songwriters as David Bowie (and even the insubstantial Minneapolis' 'Prince') awhile ago ...let alone such overrated singer-songwriters as the idolized-to-the-rafters Michael Jackson, who I'll concede did in his tender youth compose and make famous the beautiful 'Ben'...I used to play on the family piano. . No, as with (on a much more modest scale, please understand) the way in which Mother Teresa's death was passed over in a once over lightly fashion by Western media - but certainly not in her new-found home of India where she was given a state funeral - a week after Princess Diana's shock death brought the Western world pretty well to a standstill; so the youthful Jackson and 'Prince' - like other songsters who've died very young, 'before their time' - were doted on by media for days on end, the fourth estate verily feeding off the entrails and carrion of their lives much like the proverbial vultures devouring a carcass choice morsel by choice morsel, contrasted with the way in which GC also was treated to a once over lightly and asap by selfsame media.
No, the relative alacrity with which Glen Campbell's unique genius vanished into obscurity, the 'clean-cut conservative' of simple, old-fashioned values not really being or representing the sort of person our contemporary culture esteems as worthy of very much (remembrance let alone celebration), except for the briefest of reviews as already described, was 'el usual media' treatment eminently unbefitting of GC's special brand of greatness...which simply flowed out of the sort of decent and God-fearing human being he ever was...
But be that as it may, and indeed as Diana's brother Earl Spencer himself noted (or at least in my own paraphrase thereof) - among many other equally memorable things - in his simply unforgettable if highly controversial obituary speech at her funeral, the truly great don't actually need others' acclamations and plaudits to add any lustre to their greatness...for, to all who will (have ears and eyes to hear and see) it's patently clear and evident anyhow... .
So good-bye Glen, and thank you to his family - and moreover Maker - for lending him to us for awhile...he not only won't pass this way again, but I somehow doubt we'll see his kind again...ever. More's the pity.
*Cf my oldest sister's unforgettable t-shirt (or whatever, I can't quite remember) emblazoned with that memorable phrase 'a round tuit'.
Monday, June 5, 2017
Yes, What the - our - World needs now is Love, sweet love..it's the only thing...not just for some, but for everyone
But never one to end on a negative note, I cannot but quote this memorable, lasting refrain from another childhood singer(-songwriter, was it Ed Ames?),...as I/we witness the awful carnage in London...'copycatted', it's certainly true, throughout much of the Middle East upon an almost weekly and even daily basis; invariably targeting the innocents of this world, ever easy targets for the sick and depraved who carry out such dastardly deeds.
While a kiwi (Christchurcher) surnamed Dowling received nasty, near life-threatening wounds, we were also 'treated' to Australian Mum Verena Hunniford's expressing an admirably calm and composed, serene and seemingly unruffled spirit as she told TV reporters this evening - apparently having only just heard the news - how her daughter's guardian angels must have been there surrounding her as she miraculously managed to survive the knife-wielding assassins (wreaking their apparently random and sporadic mayhem and carnage, firstly by running down folk on London Bridge then by entering some pubs and bars in the vicinity. But of course many another person there was not so 'lucky'/blessed/supernaturally protected (from injury, or even death).
[Postscript: What a wonderful 'example' of indomitable human spirit and fortitude and family love and loyalty: the interview just now seen on TVNZ's Sunday with the Hedge family, Candace the daughter (and beloved/fiance of Luke) critically injured in the London pub attacks (by three knife- and machete-wielding assailants), and her Australian father Ross and sister Amber, recently reunited by (the now recovering and discharged) Candace's side in London. Sadly two Aussie nurses ('Zara' from Brisbane and 'Kirsty' from Adelaide) were not so 'lucky', though Candace expressed a beautiful empathy, wondering aloud in vulnerable and admirable honesty about who could really say as to whether she or they were ultimately so blessed; but she was looking at things positively, grateful simply to be alive (and surrounded with such loyal family love).]
Yes, Randy Stonehill says it all when he talks about 'all the innocent ones...born into a world they can't [?avoid]'...and our hearts should 'bleed' as his does for just such ones. Indeed, One did once do precisely that...and indeed experienced infinite suffering and sacrifice for each and every last one of us...both innocent and guilty...once for all time, it but awaits our heartfelt acceptance and resulting life- transformation...for our Maker and Redeemer has given each and every one of us that ultimate essence of true love: the freedom to embrace His unconditional love in responsive, grateful adoration...or to reject that love and turn away forever.
While a kiwi (Christchurcher) surnamed Dowling received nasty, near life-threatening wounds, we were also 'treated' to Australian Mum Verena Hunniford's expressing an admirably calm and composed, serene and seemingly unruffled spirit as she told TV reporters this evening - apparently having only just heard the news - how her daughter's guardian angels must have been there surrounding her as she miraculously managed to survive the knife-wielding assassins (wreaking their apparently random and sporadic mayhem and carnage, firstly by running down folk on London Bridge then by entering some pubs and bars in the vicinity. But of course many another person there was not so 'lucky'/blessed/supernaturally protected (from injury, or even death).
[Postscript: What a wonderful 'example' of indomitable human spirit and fortitude and family love and loyalty: the interview just now seen on TVNZ's Sunday with the Hedge family, Candace the daughter (and beloved/fiance of Luke) critically injured in the London pub attacks (by three knife- and machete-wielding assailants), and her Australian father Ross and sister Amber, recently reunited by (the now recovering and discharged) Candace's side in London. Sadly two Aussie nurses ('Zara' from Brisbane and 'Kirsty' from Adelaide) were not so 'lucky', though Candace expressed a beautiful empathy, wondering aloud in vulnerable and admirable honesty about who could really say as to whether she or they were ultimately so blessed; but she was looking at things positively, grateful simply to be alive (and surrounded with such loyal family love).]
Yes, Randy Stonehill says it all when he talks about 'all the innocent ones...born into a world they can't [?avoid]'...and our hearts should 'bleed' as his does for just such ones. Indeed, One did once do precisely that...and indeed experienced infinite suffering and sacrifice for each and every last one of us...both innocent and guilty...once for all time, it but awaits our heartfelt acceptance and resulting life- transformation...for our Maker and Redeemer has given each and every one of us that ultimate essence of true love: the freedom to embrace His unconditional love in responsive, grateful adoration...or to reject that love and turn away forever.
When One's Admiration Turns To Dust & One's Deepest Respect Is Betrayed
I cannot leave off recording on this 'day of all days', i.e. Queen's Birthday (weekend), both in Aotearoa-New Zealand and the United Kingdom - and perhaps even throughout the British Commonwealth itself, I don't actually know - in the aftermath of the horrific scenes and sounds we've 'all' witnessed on our TV screens and radios (and no doubt innumerable other modern devices and computer gadgetry)...emanating out of London, England over the last 36 or so hours...
...that my one-time 'faith in' or at least deepest respect for a former (musical/lyrical genius) 'hero' of mine has all of a sudden taken a dive... .
Or let me immediately correct that: over the past two weeks (I can't quite recall exactly when) I learnt something which may well - permanently - change my view of a certain major 'popstar' irrevocably and forever. Sadly I heard it mentioned (upon Jim Mora's esteemed weekly afternoon 'Panel' on RNZ Radio in God's Own) that a singer-songwriter I'd loved and admired for decades (probably three-quarters/four-fifths plus of my entire life depending obviously upon when I first 'encountered' him in my childhood years) has a shameful 'secret' in the past; though evidently it's 'on the public record' so its actual 'secrecy' may be a moot or contested point. Irrespective, it was a real shock to my system as it were to hear that my hero has feet of clay - to put it nicely (and as tactfully as possible).
Though I owe it to him (as with any figure, whether personally known or only admired at a (great) distance) to check out all the ins and outs of this public 'revelation', I've little doubt, from the person (i.e. the aforementioned Mr Mora, no doubt also and equally a fan of this 'gentleman' his whole life long) the info came down the grapevine through, that it's factual...at least in essence (though the context involved is perhaps less certain or up for debate or interpretation). Essentially being such a species of unwelcome knowledge I'd managed to thus far successfully push it back into the recesses of my consciousness. But on as I say this 'day of all days', and in light of what's just 'gone down' once again in the U.K., it has sprung back - involuntarily - into my conscious awareness. And so repress or suppress the matter I can no longer do - to my deepest regret.
So who is the individual I'm alluding to, and thus far successfully and circumspectly avoiding 'naming' (and therefore shaming, if only in my own small way)? I'll keep you guessing a little longer, by adding that - for some reason or t'other, *unbeknownst even to me, quite frankly - I've generally lived up to only one half of my blogsite mandate. That is, I've freely bestowed bouquets 'with favour toward none', but have desisted bestowing brickbats 'with fear of none'. Well, today that tendency must of necessity be deviated from.
Yes, upon this day of days of British nationalism and patriotism, of loyalty and pride - though I well realize that some of the former are veritably oftentimes the 'refuge of a scoundrel', and the latter can be confused with one's own mistaken biases and prejudices - all I can do is state that anyone who sanctions in any way, shape or form the killing of innocent people in the name of religion (or any ideology), or even 'merely' 'justifies' the aforementioned by refusing to condemn it when given more than adequate opportunity, thereby offers his (or her) own stamp of approval to that death decree. Just as those on British streets (and no doubt elsewhere, especially the Middle East) publicly demanding the deaths/killing of the Danish cartoonists (and their supporters) back in 2005 for creating/publishing/reading/circulating and approving of cartoons generally considered insulting to the Islamic religion or more correctly its founder 'Mohammed' were likewise guilty of.
So who has apparently done such a thing? In this instance, who has publicly (in some form or other) lent his own rather weighty (as in very influential) support to such a death edict, to wit one imposed by the Islamic Republic of Iran back in the late eighties (I believe) upon the person of well-known British writer Salman Rushdie? By effectively - if indirectly - apparently asserting that his adopted religion has every right to pursue death upon the grounds of blasphemy of any such person determined to have insulted that religion, my childhood (and lifetime) musical hero (I've always found 'icon' distasteful) Cat Stevens, now going by his new Muslim name of Yusuf Islam, has apparently done just that. And we're all the losers. Shame upon you CS/YI...if that is indeed verily what you did say, and still maintain.
*Except perhaps (if only subconsciously) I like to focus upon the positive in people, and find doing the opposite somewhat distasteful - unlike some radio talkback hosts (and assorted other political/ideological partisans) I'm quite familiar with!
...that my one-time 'faith in' or at least deepest respect for a former (musical/lyrical genius) 'hero' of mine has all of a sudden taken a dive... .
Or let me immediately correct that: over the past two weeks (I can't quite recall exactly when) I learnt something which may well - permanently - change my view of a certain major 'popstar' irrevocably and forever. Sadly I heard it mentioned (upon Jim Mora's esteemed weekly afternoon 'Panel' on RNZ Radio in God's Own) that a singer-songwriter I'd loved and admired for decades (probably three-quarters/four-fifths plus of my entire life depending obviously upon when I first 'encountered' him in my childhood years) has a shameful 'secret' in the past; though evidently it's 'on the public record' so its actual 'secrecy' may be a moot or contested point. Irrespective, it was a real shock to my system as it were to hear that my hero has feet of clay - to put it nicely (and as tactfully as possible).
Though I owe it to him (as with any figure, whether personally known or only admired at a (great) distance) to check out all the ins and outs of this public 'revelation', I've little doubt, from the person (i.e. the aforementioned Mr Mora, no doubt also and equally a fan of this 'gentleman' his whole life long) the info came down the grapevine through, that it's factual...at least in essence (though the context involved is perhaps less certain or up for debate or interpretation). Essentially being such a species of unwelcome knowledge I'd managed to thus far successfully push it back into the recesses of my consciousness. But on as I say this 'day of all days', and in light of what's just 'gone down' once again in the U.K., it has sprung back - involuntarily - into my conscious awareness. And so repress or suppress the matter I can no longer do - to my deepest regret.
So who is the individual I'm alluding to, and thus far successfully and circumspectly avoiding 'naming' (and therefore shaming, if only in my own small way)? I'll keep you guessing a little longer, by adding that - for some reason or t'other, *unbeknownst even to me, quite frankly - I've generally lived up to only one half of my blogsite mandate. That is, I've freely bestowed bouquets 'with favour toward none', but have desisted bestowing brickbats 'with fear of none'. Well, today that tendency must of necessity be deviated from.
Yes, upon this day of days of British nationalism and patriotism, of loyalty and pride - though I well realize that some of the former are veritably oftentimes the 'refuge of a scoundrel', and the latter can be confused with one's own mistaken biases and prejudices - all I can do is state that anyone who sanctions in any way, shape or form the killing of innocent people in the name of religion (or any ideology), or even 'merely' 'justifies' the aforementioned by refusing to condemn it when given more than adequate opportunity, thereby offers his (or her) own stamp of approval to that death decree. Just as those on British streets (and no doubt elsewhere, especially the Middle East) publicly demanding the deaths/killing of the Danish cartoonists (and their supporters) back in 2005 for creating/publishing/reading/circulating and approving of cartoons generally considered insulting to the Islamic religion or more correctly its founder 'Mohammed' were likewise guilty of.
So who has apparently done such a thing? In this instance, who has publicly (in some form or other) lent his own rather weighty (as in very influential) support to such a death edict, to wit one imposed by the Islamic Republic of Iran back in the late eighties (I believe) upon the person of well-known British writer Salman Rushdie? By effectively - if indirectly - apparently asserting that his adopted religion has every right to pursue death upon the grounds of blasphemy of any such person determined to have insulted that religion, my childhood (and lifetime) musical hero (I've always found 'icon' distasteful) Cat Stevens, now going by his new Muslim name of Yusuf Islam, has apparently done just that. And we're all the losers. Shame upon you CS/YI...if that is indeed verily what you did say, and still maintain.
*Except perhaps (if only subconsciously) I like to focus upon the positive in people, and find doing the opposite somewhat distasteful - unlike some radio talkback hosts (and assorted other political/ideological partisans) I'm quite familiar with!
Yes, Methinks Milady (i.e. the 'Iron Lady') Was Right All Along...Upon 'Europe', anyway; or Part Two (of my June 22nd, 2016 blogpost): So What Did the Iron Lady Have Right, if not the Might to enact/enforce?
Instalment #1 (Post-Brexit-Decision 2016)
As a follow-up to a blogpost I did way back in 2017 upon the very heels of the United Kingdom's European Union referendum, may I immediately apologize for one of my obscurest posts ever...though it did begin well! Meandering off as it quickly did into covering some fascinating 'stuff', but on a wholly unrelated topic, i.e. the breakup of the Soviet Empire both 'at home' (i.e. vis-a-vis the USSR's now 15 independent ex-republics) and abroad (i.e. throughout one-time Eastern Europe). Again, my apologies, and especially for failing to rectify the problem (i.e. the deviant post) at the time.
I will return in subsequent days to take up where I initially left off, and explain how I came to 'embrace' a politician I had previously learned to 'loathe'(intellectually, that is, if not emotionally).
Instalment #2 (Post-Election 2017, and the 'fire of London')
[Following the Brexit referendum and now British Prime Minister Theresa May's calamitous snap election - and the revenge of the Bremain-desiring 'Y Generation' (if I'm not mistaken and confusing my generations) c/o Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and *his resurgent Labourites.]
And so, before this becomes well and truly, wholly outdated, let me 'simply' record a few observations on 'Brexit' and one particular bugbear of many 'Britishers' vis-a-vis 'Europe' and/or the European Union, one that is thought (by many professional commentators and others) to have been/proven decisive in carrying the decision to leave the EU 'across the line': the spectre (and seeming reality) of 'endless' immigration, i.e. the seemingly never-ending influx into the United Kingdom of especially ex-European arrivals.
Personally I refuse to accept that the majority of (politically informed/concerned Englishmen and women, anyway) are patently racists, narrow-minded 'bigots' and the like, or even that that was the only major reason people in England and Wales especially voted to leave the European Union - sure, by a statistically 'small' but I'd maintain nevertheless numerically significant margin and sheer number. No, there were numerous other issues/reasons/causes, not least the ever-increasing and progressively impinging loss of sovereignty over their own affairs that folk throughout the U.K. were increasingly not just suspecting but actually witnessing - in many areas of their daily lives in fact; as European laws framed and legislated in continental European corridors of power were given effect throughout the European Union. But these 'other factors' I will put to one side for the present, and hopefully return very soon and give you the guts of my personal assessment in my third and major instalment.
*Though Mr **Corbyn himself, like his one-time fellow veteran left-wing standard-bearer Tony Benn, hwas actually long (if not always and ever) a Euroskeptic (usually in a distinct minority in the British Labour Party) - of/for wholly different reasons, 'for struth', from many Conservative Party and UKIP supporters and politicians - a whole lot of the proverbial liquid stuff has now long since passed under ye average (very English) moat, so to speak.
** 'Corban' is interestingly a word used exclusively by the Master in a Scripture containing pointed and stern rebuke of the scribes and Pharisees, appearing in two identical gospel passages in both Matthew 15 and Mark 7: meaning, according to my beloved 'ole Newberry Bible, 'a consecrated gift' and/or 'an offering to God', in this instance one devoted exclusively to Him as opposed to supporting one's (probably frail, vulnerable and elderly) parents.
As a follow-up to a blogpost I did way back in 2017 upon the very heels of the United Kingdom's European Union referendum, may I immediately apologize for one of my obscurest posts ever...though it did begin well! Meandering off as it quickly did into covering some fascinating 'stuff', but on a wholly unrelated topic, i.e. the breakup of the Soviet Empire both 'at home' (i.e. vis-a-vis the USSR's now 15 independent ex-republics) and abroad (i.e. throughout one-time Eastern Europe). Again, my apologies, and especially for failing to rectify the problem (i.e. the deviant post) at the time.
I will return in subsequent days to take up where I initially left off, and explain how I came to 'embrace' a politician I had previously learned to 'loathe'(intellectually, that is, if not emotionally).
Instalment #2 (Post-Election 2017, and the 'fire of London')
[Following the Brexit referendum and now British Prime Minister Theresa May's calamitous snap election - and the revenge of the Bremain-desiring 'Y Generation' (if I'm not mistaken and confusing my generations) c/o Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and *his resurgent Labourites.]
And so, before this becomes well and truly, wholly outdated, let me 'simply' record a few observations on 'Brexit' and one particular bugbear of many 'Britishers' vis-a-vis 'Europe' and/or the European Union, one that is thought (by many professional commentators and others) to have been/proven decisive in carrying the decision to leave the EU 'across the line': the spectre (and seeming reality) of 'endless' immigration, i.e. the seemingly never-ending influx into the United Kingdom of especially ex-European arrivals.
Personally I refuse to accept that the majority of (politically informed/concerned Englishmen and women, anyway) are patently racists, narrow-minded 'bigots' and the like, or even that that was the only major reason people in England and Wales especially voted to leave the European Union - sure, by a statistically 'small' but I'd maintain nevertheless numerically significant margin and sheer number. No, there were numerous other issues/reasons/causes, not least the ever-increasing and progressively impinging loss of sovereignty over their own affairs that folk throughout the U.K. were increasingly not just suspecting but actually witnessing - in many areas of their daily lives in fact; as European laws framed and legislated in continental European corridors of power were given effect throughout the European Union. But these 'other factors' I will put to one side for the present, and hopefully return very soon and give you the guts of my personal assessment in my third and major instalment.
*Though Mr **Corbyn himself, like his one-time fellow veteran left-wing standard-bearer Tony Benn, hwas actually long (if not always and ever) a Euroskeptic (usually in a distinct minority in the British Labour Party) - of/for wholly different reasons, 'for struth', from many Conservative Party and UKIP supporters and politicians - a whole lot of the proverbial liquid stuff has now long since passed under ye average (very English) moat, so to speak.
** 'Corban' is interestingly a word used exclusively by the Master in a Scripture containing pointed and stern rebuke of the scribes and Pharisees, appearing in two identical gospel passages in both Matthew 15 and Mark 7: meaning, according to my beloved 'ole Newberry Bible, 'a consecrated gift' and/or 'an offering to God', in this instance one devoted exclusively to Him as opposed to supporting one's (probably frail, vulnerable and elderly) parents.
Sunday, June 4, 2017
A superficial observer might well imagine, with events of recent days, that London Bridge is - literally - 'falling down', but, whatever befalls: "Je Suis England/Great Britain"
Once again, as 'Mother Shipton' so eerily prophesied those many centuries ago, whoever 'she' may indeed have been (composite of a whole lot of true prophets, or just one lone prescient 'soul'):
'England shall at last admit a foe, the world to an end shall come'!
But - thank God - not before she has time to hear and heed God's vital, merciful last-day message of a loving Saviour, Who looks down upon His scattered tribe of Ephraim with longsuffering mercies and lovingkindness.
"Whosoever will, let him - and her - hear!"
'England shall at last admit a foe, the world to an end shall come'!
But - thank God - not before she has time to hear and heed God's vital, merciful last-day message of a loving Saviour, Who looks down upon His scattered tribe of Ephraim with longsuffering mercies and lovingkindness.
"Whosoever will, let him - and her - hear!"
Wednesday, May 10, 2017
Equal Opportunity Offender (to both sides of the mainstream American political divide): In Defence of James Comey, A True Independent and Now-Former F.B.I. Director/Special Investigations' Prosecutor
As so-called 'fate' would have it, I'd intended posting this a few days ago, but procrastination got the better of me, as it oftentimes tends to; yet now events have overtaken me, with today's sudden dismissal of the Honourable James B Comey, Junior by the/his Dismisser-in-Chief, U.S President Donald Trump. Every time one views/hears (a video/audio recording of) the now former F.B.I. Director speaking, his voice/manner/ demeanour implicitly carries 'the ring of truth' (much as that 'ole New Zealand Colgate toothpaste ad ever memorably did in those far-flung days of my kiwi youth). A ring of truth about him that just 'rings true', if you'll *'scuse my appalling **doubled down metaphor...something somewhat anathema to today's partisan political rookies, whether (in the United States' context) of the Democratic Party or Republican Party persuasion/s.
But here methinks Mr Comey's suggesting - off his own bat, regarding his own 'last-minute' intervention prior to Presidential Election 2016 - that if indeed that had somehow turned/determined the result, the thought made him "somewhat nauseous": that that was the actual trigger-point, the thing which made President Trump's spirit snap and effectively made up his mind - to dismiss Comey (from his privileged post). I.e. the very idea, the sheer nerve of James Comey's thus suggesting that Trump's election had left a bitter aftertaste in Comey's gullet, which, to an Egoist and Egotist Extraordinaire such as Donald Trump, was not simply unable to be stomached (yes, again pardon the clear and unadulterated pun) but was veritably unfathomable, incomprehensible, off the radar screen. The very idea that anyone would not regard Trump's election as a celebration fete for time and immemorial, world without end...and then some. No, Comey had well and truly crossed the line, the threshold of acceptable commentary for an Administration official, and Trump was having none, or rather no more of it; full-stop; end of story.
Or rather, this served as a suitable justification/excuse/rationalization/incontrovertible raison d'etre for something Trump'd long since been seeking a convenient pretext for. And former 'The Apprentice' celebrity host has ever espied a good opportunity when he sees it staring him in the proverbial. So, like the ready cat, he instantly jumped upon his mouselike prey. Or, to use a metaphor dear to my own heart, like 'Smaug the Magnificent, the Chiefest of Calamities' in JRR Tolkien's inimitable children's classic The Hobbit (and its latter-day filmic trilogy adaptation) in relation to Bilbo 'Bagginses the Thief', flattery would've gotten Mr Comey everywhere with Trump; but this especial offering, this succulent and tasty trifle the former F.B.I. investigator was simply unwilling to give him. He was too much a person of integrity to stoop that low.
No, such in-your-face treachery, such "Treason!" as New Zealand's own long-serving Prime Minister and wannabe United Nations' Secretary-General Helen Clark herself once accused then TV3 current affairs' host John Campbell of showing her (during NZ's own Corngate scandal in the run-up to the 2002 General Election), and as Clark's own 'spiritual' forbear ***Queen Athaliah (of ancient Israel) herself, shouting "Treason! Treason!", accused her fellow Israelites of showing her as they unceremoniously deposed her from her usurped position, was not simply unconscionable, it was tantamount to the ultimate crime in Trump's newfangled America. And would not - under any circumstances whatsoever - be seen to be countenanced, by simply turning the other way and pretending it hadn't occurred. No, punishment swift and sure needed to be meted out, and the Commandant-in-Chief intended doing just that - and yesterday!
The ****sheer gall of Mr Comey's thus, if rather backhandedly and inadvertently, even suggesting that President Donald J Trump's America was not the best thing since wheat grain was transmogrified into our daily bread itself, and moreover wasn't headed by America's equivalent of North Korea's 'Great Leader' himself! Again, much like the proverbial mythological Dragon &/or Rooster of Chinese Horoscope fame whose essential nature and characteristics Mr Trump seems to have perfected to an art-form, Trump was brooking no opposition, he was broaching no disloyalty, certainly not from amidst the Governmental apparatus itself - or more precisely the apparatchiks themselves! Or at least this too served as an oh-so-convenient pretext for Trump's well-known real rationale: getting rid of a man whose oh-so-inconvenient investigations are getting just a little too close to the bone, and increasingly liable to lead to impeachment and indeed blowing the Trump Presidency quite literally out of the water altogether. 'The Russian Connection' vis-a-vis Presidential Election 2016, that is. Or at least that pertaining to his also-former Secretary of State Michael Flynn.
James Comey's voice (and strictly non-partisan approach, equally upsetting political partisans on all sides of America's mainstream political equation) *****'will [yet] speak' (despite Comey's, now effectively) 'being dead' (in terms of public role, anyhow)..and will yet serve, I've little doubt, as a footnote, a milestone signifying the beginning of the end in D J Trump's already unprecedented presidency, or at least in the infamy he manages to accrue to himself however long he manages to maintain and even literally cling for dear life to said office, come hell or high water.
*For 'excuse', one of my many (personalized) 'wordisms'; though it seems especially appropriate in this post, touching - however briefly, as it will - upon that newly recovered word in American politics - 'recuse'.
**In unintentional but fitting 'mimickry' of Donald J Trump's general political modus operandi.
***Who would've guessed that in the ancient annals, the hallowed halls of the olden time Kingdom of Israel (or rather, Kingdom of Judah in this case - following the divided monarchy upon King Solomon's death), there'd be a female monarch, i.e. a queen (upon the throne, naturally enough); something also the case - and equally unknown to the supposedly 'biblically literate' and non-believing masses alike - with the ages-old Roman Catholic Church hierarchy, the Vatican/Holy See/Papacy. If you find that a little beyond the pale, just a step (or several) way too far, check out re Pope Joan sometime. Unfortunately her evident pregnancy quickly saw the end to her pontificate, with the sort of fate meted out to her as to so many others by that Institution of Institutions!
****Or at the very least Comey's clear and obvious, utterly inexcusable violation of D J Trump Cardinal Rule #1 (in terms of running the United States' Government): "Don't you dare offend my inflated sense of ego...whatever else you do or don't do!; understood?!?!?"
*****See the Holy Bible, Hebrews 11:4.
P.S. The Russkies must be celebrating, even if the cows never quite come home...; and also Hillary Clinton. Perfect evidence if any was yet needed that James Comey's contribution was 'right on the mark': that of a very nonpartisan, non-political 'actor' in a highly politically partisan day and age. His contribution will assuredly and sorely be missed...if not by President Trump! And no, it didn't - wouldn't - couldn't possibly have anything to do with Comey et al's long-running, present-day investigation into illegal Russian involvement in U. S. Presidential Election 2016 - did/would/could it? As our kiwi 'tui billboards' put it so aptly: 'Yeah, right!'
P.P.S. To the question put this afternoon, in the immediate wake of this dismissal, by Larry Williams upon his Newstalk ZB Drivetime show, to another (?former) FBI agent, he responded that he didn't believe anything was lurking in the background, and would be later uncovered about James Comey (detrimental to his character). Quite contrary to the overt and wholly unfounded insinuation in TV3's 6 p.m. News this evening that Comey's previous testimony to the American legislature that there were numerous emails of Hillary Clinton then being investigated was somehow later disproved, and found to be just a couple or few.
P.P.P.S. Interestingly in writing this piece I've 'coincidentally'/serendipitously/fortuitously stumbled upon two previously unknown words which seem to sum up essential aspects of this article. Both taken from my trusty 'ole Chambers Concise Dictionary, they are: 'au courant', signifying 'well up in the facts or situation'; and 'comminate'/'commination', meaning 'to threaten'/'threatening, denunciation: a recital of God's threatenings'. The applicability to the actors in the aforementioned political drama I believe is not lost upon my readership: the former aptly sums up James Comey's ever professional approach to his work, the latter to Donald Trump's reaction to Comey's impeccable impeachable credentials and integrity.
P.P.P.P.S. There are seemingly innumerable 'inconsistencies' in Trump's 'explanation' for Comey Junior's sacking, among them the much-lauded 'intervention' of another of Trump's judicial appointments, ............ ............, conveniently ignoring the obvious ******Gigantisaurus in the room, i.e. that Attorney-General Jeff Sessions this time apparently didn't 'recuse himself', as he sometime ago pointedly did, in relation to the investigations into Russian Government involvement in the last American presidential election; the earlier instance in regards to Michael Flynn, one-time (and soon dismissed) Secretary of State, the latter of course vis-a-vis James Comey's own newly-ramped up and highly inconvenient investigations into that alleged involvement generally. And that - refusal to recuse himself, and moreover associated alleged personal involvement in the decision therefore to sack Comey - is *******so akin to the state of play in 1970s' America with former disgraced president Richard Nixon as to have been metaphorically pulsating neon warning lights and blaring danger signals to Sessions to 'cease and desist', to back off and maintain his sacred oath to, at all costs, maintain the strict neutrality and integrity of his office. It was indeed a litmus test he has blatantly, flagrantly failed - thus displaying his true partisan colours and showing his first allegiance is to his earthly boss (in the White House), and neither the land whose much-vaunted, world-renowned constitution he is pledged to uphold nor the religion of the God of the Bible he has publicly sworn to honour.
******Another newly minted david-edwinism.
*******What would otherwise, in any other circumstances, make this all a comedy of errors, of sheer farce and comedic drama and irony, is that none other than Nixon's own 'right-hand man', Dr Henry Kissinger, was seen entering the White House around the very time the President gave Comey his marching orders - as we all now know, in a way to publicly disgrace and humiliate Mr Comey while 'on the/his President's own business' visiting F.B.I. operatives out West. Someone if only by implication deeply associated with and therefore party to the sort of 'dirty tricks' ever associated with the Nixon brand, if admittedly never implicated in the scandal now immortalized as Watergate. A scandal moreover in which - as now - the President concerned was facing increasingly probable impeachment, ultimately departing before he was pushed. And as any close observer of the present-day American scene is only too well aware, possible (and in the view of many, like myself, both untraceable/unprovable and ********maybe even nonexistent) involvement by the Russians in Election 2016 is only one of almost innumerable ditches into which the Trump Presidency might sink, or, to vertically alter my metaphor, petards upon which it might be ultimately hung out to dry!
********Even were White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders (as per her well-known colleague and fellow femme-in-arms Kelly-Anne Conway) correct in her only too conveniently ready-to-order description of Democratic lawmakers' own previous demanding of Comey's dismissal as the ultimate hypocrisy (in light of their new-found horror at his sacking), what does even that really prove? It most assuredly is hardly a sign, proof or indication of the charges' falsity, rather that 'politicians will (ever and always) be (just that, i.e.) politicians' - on all sides of the political equation; and certainly Democrats in the USA have no monopoly on that! (Though innumerable commentators no doubt would have us believe that.)
Sure - let's give these 'unethical' Senate and House (of Representatives) Democrats their full due, they're political animals (through and through) - just like the vast majority of their Republican counterparts, truth be told - and can tell political blood (on President Trump's hands re that 'Russian involvement in Election 2016' and numerous other instances, and his colleagues' re a whole lot else besides) when they smell it, but then, what else is new (in partisan political hatred and ideological warfare)? Even if such a link cannot ultimately be proven, as well-known security analyst/critic/activist Glenn Greenwald himself readily conceded - as he has in times past - upon New York's award-winning Democracy Now broadcast this morning, what really does matter is that someone who clearly curries no favours with either side of mainstream politics (despite his definite Republican Party background, whilst appointment by a very Democratic President) in the United States (once arguably descriptive of Trump himself until he readily, upon election or at least inauguration, by the nature of his very appointments, jettisoned all semblance of centrism or moderate politics - much less the kind of old-fashioned New Deal Rooseveltian big government liberalism he'd championed in the long-running election campaign), is most definitely, as I've already deemed him, an 'equal opportunity offender' to either/both sides of said political divide, as per my own blogsite's motto, someone renowned for, if not bestowing bouquets and brickbats like Yours Truly, nevertheless '[carrying out his duties] with fear of and favour toward none'. Much in the same mould, incidentally, of his twice-millennium removed selfsame-initialled predecessor, Jesus Christ, Who was *********aptly described by the spies sent out by His enemies just prior to his Passion as One Who was true, Who spoke and taught aright, Who courted no man's favour and did not show personal favouritism. Such a descriptor, if indeed applicable to Comey Junior - as would at least, to all intents and purposes, appear the case - would surely be high praise indeed, however much he might be decried by ideologically partisan and otherwise-motivated political operatives and their hangers-on generally; (those who ever tend to see others through their own oh-so-cynical and jaded politically-partisan eyes.)
*********A personal mix 'n match of the essential substance and wording of Mark 12:14 and Luke 20:21.
But here methinks Mr Comey's suggesting - off his own bat, regarding his own 'last-minute' intervention prior to Presidential Election 2016 - that if indeed that had somehow turned/determined the result, the thought made him "somewhat nauseous": that that was the actual trigger-point, the thing which made President Trump's spirit snap and effectively made up his mind - to dismiss Comey (from his privileged post). I.e. the very idea, the sheer nerve of James Comey's thus suggesting that Trump's election had left a bitter aftertaste in Comey's gullet, which, to an Egoist and Egotist Extraordinaire such as Donald Trump, was not simply unable to be stomached (yes, again pardon the clear and unadulterated pun) but was veritably unfathomable, incomprehensible, off the radar screen. The very idea that anyone would not regard Trump's election as a celebration fete for time and immemorial, world without end...and then some. No, Comey had well and truly crossed the line, the threshold of acceptable commentary for an Administration official, and Trump was having none, or rather no more of it; full-stop; end of story.
Or rather, this served as a suitable justification/excuse/rationalization/incontrovertible raison d'etre for something Trump'd long since been seeking a convenient pretext for. And former 'The Apprentice' celebrity host has ever espied a good opportunity when he sees it staring him in the proverbial. So, like the ready cat, he instantly jumped upon his mouselike prey. Or, to use a metaphor dear to my own heart, like 'Smaug the Magnificent, the Chiefest of Calamities' in JRR Tolkien's inimitable children's classic The Hobbit (and its latter-day filmic trilogy adaptation) in relation to Bilbo 'Bagginses the Thief', flattery would've gotten Mr Comey everywhere with Trump; but this especial offering, this succulent and tasty trifle the former F.B.I. investigator was simply unwilling to give him. He was too much a person of integrity to stoop that low.
No, such in-your-face treachery, such "Treason!" as New Zealand's own long-serving Prime Minister and wannabe United Nations' Secretary-General Helen Clark herself once accused then TV3 current affairs' host John Campbell of showing her (during NZ's own Corngate scandal in the run-up to the 2002 General Election), and as Clark's own 'spiritual' forbear ***Queen Athaliah (of ancient Israel) herself, shouting "Treason! Treason!", accused her fellow Israelites of showing her as they unceremoniously deposed her from her usurped position, was not simply unconscionable, it was tantamount to the ultimate crime in Trump's newfangled America. And would not - under any circumstances whatsoever - be seen to be countenanced, by simply turning the other way and pretending it hadn't occurred. No, punishment swift and sure needed to be meted out, and the Commandant-in-Chief intended doing just that - and yesterday!
The ****sheer gall of Mr Comey's thus, if rather backhandedly and inadvertently, even suggesting that President Donald J Trump's America was not the best thing since wheat grain was transmogrified into our daily bread itself, and moreover wasn't headed by America's equivalent of North Korea's 'Great Leader' himself! Again, much like the proverbial mythological Dragon &/or Rooster of Chinese Horoscope fame whose essential nature and characteristics Mr Trump seems to have perfected to an art-form, Trump was brooking no opposition, he was broaching no disloyalty, certainly not from amidst the Governmental apparatus itself - or more precisely the apparatchiks themselves! Or at least this too served as an oh-so-convenient pretext for Trump's well-known real rationale: getting rid of a man whose oh-so-inconvenient investigations are getting just a little too close to the bone, and increasingly liable to lead to impeachment and indeed blowing the Trump Presidency quite literally out of the water altogether. 'The Russian Connection' vis-a-vis Presidential Election 2016, that is. Or at least that pertaining to his also-former Secretary of State Michael Flynn.
James Comey's voice (and strictly non-partisan approach, equally upsetting political partisans on all sides of America's mainstream political equation) *****'will [yet] speak' (despite Comey's, now effectively) 'being dead' (in terms of public role, anyhow)..and will yet serve, I've little doubt, as a footnote, a milestone signifying the beginning of the end in D J Trump's already unprecedented presidency, or at least in the infamy he manages to accrue to himself however long he manages to maintain and even literally cling for dear life to said office, come hell or high water.
*For 'excuse', one of my many (personalized) 'wordisms'; though it seems especially appropriate in this post, touching - however briefly, as it will - upon that newly recovered word in American politics - 'recuse'.
**In unintentional but fitting 'mimickry' of Donald J Trump's general political modus operandi.
***Who would've guessed that in the ancient annals, the hallowed halls of the olden time Kingdom of Israel (or rather, Kingdom of Judah in this case - following the divided monarchy upon King Solomon's death), there'd be a female monarch, i.e. a queen (upon the throne, naturally enough); something also the case - and equally unknown to the supposedly 'biblically literate' and non-believing masses alike - with the ages-old Roman Catholic Church hierarchy, the Vatican/Holy See/Papacy. If you find that a little beyond the pale, just a step (or several) way too far, check out re Pope Joan sometime. Unfortunately her evident pregnancy quickly saw the end to her pontificate, with the sort of fate meted out to her as to so many others by that Institution of Institutions!
****Or at the very least Comey's clear and obvious, utterly inexcusable violation of D J Trump Cardinal Rule #1 (in terms of running the United States' Government): "Don't you dare offend my inflated sense of ego...whatever else you do or don't do!; understood?!?!?"
*****See the Holy Bible, Hebrews 11:4.
P.S. The Russkies must be celebrating, even if the cows never quite come home...; and also Hillary Clinton. Perfect evidence if any was yet needed that James Comey's contribution was 'right on the mark': that of a very nonpartisan, non-political 'actor' in a highly politically partisan day and age. His contribution will assuredly and sorely be missed...if not by President Trump! And no, it didn't - wouldn't - couldn't possibly have anything to do with Comey et al's long-running, present-day investigation into illegal Russian involvement in U. S. Presidential Election 2016 - did/would/could it? As our kiwi 'tui billboards' put it so aptly: 'Yeah, right!'
P.P.S. To the question put this afternoon, in the immediate wake of this dismissal, by Larry Williams upon his Newstalk ZB Drivetime show, to another (?former) FBI agent, he responded that he didn't believe anything was lurking in the background, and would be later uncovered about James Comey (detrimental to his character). Quite contrary to the overt and wholly unfounded insinuation in TV3's 6 p.m. News this evening that Comey's previous testimony to the American legislature that there were numerous emails of Hillary Clinton then being investigated was somehow later disproved, and found to be just a couple or few.
P.P.P.S. Interestingly in writing this piece I've 'coincidentally'/serendipitously/fortuitously stumbled upon two previously unknown words which seem to sum up essential aspects of this article. Both taken from my trusty 'ole Chambers Concise Dictionary, they are: 'au courant', signifying 'well up in the facts or situation'; and 'comminate'/'commination', meaning 'to threaten'/'threatening, denunciation: a recital of God's threatenings'. The applicability to the actors in the aforementioned political drama I believe is not lost upon my readership: the former aptly sums up James Comey's ever professional approach to his work, the latter to Donald Trump's reaction to Comey's impeccable impeachable credentials and integrity.
P.P.P.P.S. There are seemingly innumerable 'inconsistencies' in Trump's 'explanation' for Comey Junior's sacking, among them the much-lauded 'intervention' of another of Trump's judicial appointments, ............ ............, conveniently ignoring the obvious ******Gigantisaurus in the room, i.e. that Attorney-General Jeff Sessions this time apparently didn't 'recuse himself', as he sometime ago pointedly did, in relation to the investigations into Russian Government involvement in the last American presidential election; the earlier instance in regards to Michael Flynn, one-time (and soon dismissed) Secretary of State, the latter of course vis-a-vis James Comey's own newly-ramped up and highly inconvenient investigations into that alleged involvement generally. And that - refusal to recuse himself, and moreover associated alleged personal involvement in the decision therefore to sack Comey - is *******so akin to the state of play in 1970s' America with former disgraced president Richard Nixon as to have been metaphorically pulsating neon warning lights and blaring danger signals to Sessions to 'cease and desist', to back off and maintain his sacred oath to, at all costs, maintain the strict neutrality and integrity of his office. It was indeed a litmus test he has blatantly, flagrantly failed - thus displaying his true partisan colours and showing his first allegiance is to his earthly boss (in the White House), and neither the land whose much-vaunted, world-renowned constitution he is pledged to uphold nor the religion of the God of the Bible he has publicly sworn to honour.
******Another newly minted david-edwinism.
*******What would otherwise, in any other circumstances, make this all a comedy of errors, of sheer farce and comedic drama and irony, is that none other than Nixon's own 'right-hand man', Dr Henry Kissinger, was seen entering the White House around the very time the President gave Comey his marching orders - as we all now know, in a way to publicly disgrace and humiliate Mr Comey while 'on the/his President's own business' visiting F.B.I. operatives out West. Someone if only by implication deeply associated with and therefore party to the sort of 'dirty tricks' ever associated with the Nixon brand, if admittedly never implicated in the scandal now immortalized as Watergate. A scandal moreover in which - as now - the President concerned was facing increasingly probable impeachment, ultimately departing before he was pushed. And as any close observer of the present-day American scene is only too well aware, possible (and in the view of many, like myself, both untraceable/unprovable and ********maybe even nonexistent) involvement by the Russians in Election 2016 is only one of almost innumerable ditches into which the Trump Presidency might sink, or, to vertically alter my metaphor, petards upon which it might be ultimately hung out to dry!
********Even were White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders (as per her well-known colleague and fellow femme-in-arms Kelly-Anne Conway) correct in her only too conveniently ready-to-order description of Democratic lawmakers' own previous demanding of Comey's dismissal as the ultimate hypocrisy (in light of their new-found horror at his sacking), what does even that really prove? It most assuredly is hardly a sign, proof or indication of the charges' falsity, rather that 'politicians will (ever and always) be (just that, i.e.) politicians' - on all sides of the political equation; and certainly Democrats in the USA have no monopoly on that! (Though innumerable commentators no doubt would have us believe that.)
Sure - let's give these 'unethical' Senate and House (of Representatives) Democrats their full due, they're political animals (through and through) - just like the vast majority of their Republican counterparts, truth be told - and can tell political blood (on President Trump's hands re that 'Russian involvement in Election 2016' and numerous other instances, and his colleagues' re a whole lot else besides) when they smell it, but then, what else is new (in partisan political hatred and ideological warfare)? Even if such a link cannot ultimately be proven, as well-known security analyst/critic/activist Glenn Greenwald himself readily conceded - as he has in times past - upon New York's award-winning Democracy Now broadcast this morning, what really does matter is that someone who clearly curries no favours with either side of mainstream politics (despite his definite Republican Party background, whilst appointment by a very Democratic President) in the United States (once arguably descriptive of Trump himself until he readily, upon election or at least inauguration, by the nature of his very appointments, jettisoned all semblance of centrism or moderate politics - much less the kind of old-fashioned New Deal Rooseveltian big government liberalism he'd championed in the long-running election campaign), is most definitely, as I've already deemed him, an 'equal opportunity offender' to either/both sides of said political divide, as per my own blogsite's motto, someone renowned for, if not bestowing bouquets and brickbats like Yours Truly, nevertheless '[carrying out his duties] with fear of and favour toward none'. Much in the same mould, incidentally, of his twice-millennium removed selfsame-initialled predecessor, Jesus Christ, Who was *********aptly described by the spies sent out by His enemies just prior to his Passion as One Who was true, Who spoke and taught aright, Who courted no man's favour and did not show personal favouritism. Such a descriptor, if indeed applicable to Comey Junior - as would at least, to all intents and purposes, appear the case - would surely be high praise indeed, however much he might be decried by ideologically partisan and otherwise-motivated political operatives and their hangers-on generally; (those who ever tend to see others through their own oh-so-cynical and jaded politically-partisan eyes.)
*********A personal mix 'n match of the essential substance and wording of Mark 12:14 and Luke 20:21.
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