Teh Rapture?

Hm.

Judgment Day 5-21-2011: Harold Camping on the... by 21mai2011

Mister Brother Harold Camping, The Man In The Chair, he of vast agedness and Fulsome Biblical Scholarship has repeatedly predicted End Time Are A-Coming. Prepare Ye the Way of the Lord.



But the Rapture never comes.

"Rapture" is in fact non-Biblical and non-Scriptural. It's a funny thing, and I've been puzzled where the concept comes from, because it is not in the Bible and not in the Teachings of the Church through history.

It seems to have arisen some time in the 19th Century, perhaps around 1830, probably somewhere in the United Kingdom, through the agency of a Presbyterian minister by the name of Irving and a delusional Scottish woman by the name of Margaret Macdonald.

The concept rapidly spread throughout the English Speaking World, finding a fertile host in the United States of America, always a welcoming home to batshit insane religious theory and doctrine.

And of course, every bit of the origin of the Rapture Doctrine can be and has been disputed.

The point is that it is not Biblical and it is not part of the historical teaching of the Church or any denomination thereof prior to 1830.

Consequently, we can assume that Rapture Doctrine is heretical on its face and has nothing to do with Christianity or the Return of Christ to judge the quick and the dead, leading to Heaven and/or Hell, with various stops in Purgatory along the way.

It's simply a fantasy.

But one that is a powerful driving force among certain segments of the religiously susceptible population, particularly among those who speak English or are influenced by those who do.

So I wonder if there is something in British culture, lore and legend that can account for the origin and persistence -- and nearly unique belief -- among English speakers.

This is a kind of Exceptionalism that needs further examination, not from a religious standpoint but from the deepest levels of society.

What gives rise to it? And why is it pretty much confined to people who speak English?

How Fares Teh Revolution?

The Raiders and Reactionaries are sure throwing one titanic hissy fit over the Debt Ceiling "issue." The Rs have dug in their heels and asserted that there will be no lifting of the debt ceiling on their watch (ie: in the House), no sir, no way, not unless there are massive cuts in the 2012 budget -- approximately cutting a third of total expenditures, with no cuts to the military, in fact, increases to the military.

The only way to do that, of course, is to eliminate Federal programs, shut down agencies, bureaus and whole departments, and have a "Closing, Going Out of Business" sale. The Raiders and Reactionaries would actually require cuts in the neighborhood of 50% to 100% in domestic non-military spending.

THAT is Revolutionary. Even talking about it is wildly Revolutionary. The Markets are threatening dire consequences if there is a Default on Debt obligations, or even if there is consideration of defaulting. The Raiders and Reactionaries are saying there will be no default. But if they get their way, of course there will be a default on Treasuries, just not the ones that bond coupon clippers hold. The default, apparently long planned, is to be on the Social Security and Medicare Treasuries, thus forcing cuts in funding of those programs and forcing additional costs (with no additional income) onto seniors, the disabled and the poor.

Sounds like a plan, eh?

The Democrats, liberals and "progressives" simply wring their hankies and say, "Oh dear, no!" as one draconian Rightist Revolutionary proposal after another is enacted. "Oh dear, no!" is considered a brave and bold (and deeply Realistic) approach to the Revolutionary Demands of the Raiders and Reactionaries, the purpose of which is to preserve what can be preserved of the Status Quo while the Revolution reverts the nation's government to some kind of fantasy of what it was supposed to be had there been no Civil War.

Radical, reactionary, and Revolutionary, all wrapped up into one. And in the Modern World, it's a grossly anachronistic vision.

It's as if there were a revival of the Soviet Union under Stalin. The world has moved on, yet there are former Soviets who pine for the days of Stalin just as there are Americans who pine for the Antebellum Era when Everything Was Beautiful.

Except it wasn't, of course.

The key here is that the world has moved on, and the reversionaries, the reactionaries, the raiders and the (actual) Revolutionaries in our midst -- not from the Left -- don't want to move on because they can't keep up. They see the Past -- or at least their little version of it -- as a fine and permanent space to be in.

If they can only get rid of the devilish 'programs' that force us Forward, what a Paradise it would be! Except it wouldn't be any such thing.

Meanwhile, The Man in the Chair, Mister Brother Harold Camping, Loon, has declared the End of Time to occur tomorrow (well, actually, it begins today in New Zealand with earthquakes and rending the Earth asunder, just you wait).



So what's to worry?

"And shall we take Our Next Call Please, WELcome to Open Forum."

That's all for now!

On Death Squads, Wet Work, and the Expansion of Mercenary Recruitment and Armies

Donald Rumsfeld really seemed to be the one who kick-started the current Imperial fashion for blitzkrieg, death squads, and armies of mercenaries roaming the world, killing and destroying at will, insinuating themselves with established governments, overthrowing and replacing uncooperative ones, and generally making mincemeat of such old fashioned and quaint concepts as "law" and "Nuremberg" and "stability" and such.

As Condoleeezzzzaaa Rice put it, "It's the birth pangs of the new...." Well, she said the New Middle East, but it's really an overturning of and replacement of the previous world order with something else again, something nastier, far more brutal, and vastly uglier than any set of rules we've lived under since, oh, I don't know, the late 19th Century-early 20th.

It is a New Imperium, of course.

When I hear or read people say we are witness to the decline or the death of the American Empire, I have to laugh somewhat morbidly. No, that's not what we're witnessing I point out. What we've been seeing is the decline and death of the Republic.

The Empire is fine; the Republic is being extinguished before our very eyes. This is the course of governance we've been on since the installation of George W. Bush on the White House Throne, completely without basis in the Constitution and Law. It was a straight out usurpation by the Supreme Court under the guidance of rightist -- indeed fascist -- ideology through Scalia's influence and that of the Government's "sponsors."

That isn't you and me. That is a select group of mostly cranky and in some cases insane billionaires who have bought and paid for this government and believe they have the absolute right to direct it to their preferred purposes.

Which obviously include War, Empire, and unbridled predation on the whole wide world.

You and I are at best merely impediments.

At worst, we are nothing but parasites to be disposed of as quickly and efficiently as.... disease organisms.

As more and more Americans wake up to this reality, they simply don't know what to do about it -- if anything can be done about it.

We fret quite a bit about the seemingly endless string of Imperial wars of aggression our government has launched or been engaged in since the advent of the Busheviks on the Throne, but we tend to ignore or forget about the now almost routine employment of Death Squads in the form of JSOC and Navy SEALS (among others) -- hailed as Heroes of course for their recent liquidation of The Devil Himself (and some others) in Pakistan -- the continuing Wet Work of our dauntless drones and their long-distance pilots, and the employment and deployment of mercenaries, paramilitaries and quasi-governmental forces everywhere.

All of which has become Doctrine, as the Whole Wide World is the Battlefield, and all peoples are potential insurgents to be put down, or failing that to be engaged profitably and productively for both sides... forever.

Forever and a day.

The Imperial Wars of Aggression are actually punctuation marks in the ongoing -- forever -- campaign of global murder and destruction that has become The Way of Modern America. It's a bloody form of expansionism that's been a hallmark of The American Way from the beginning, but has now become global in extent. There is no limit to the sights set by our Imperial Overseers, no sense of constraint. When Everywhere is The Battlefield and All Peoples are potential Enemies, there is no end -- there can be no end -- to expansionism.

Unless it is brought to an end by an outside force, rather like the British Empire ground to a halt and then went into precipitous reverse thanks to the Outside Force of two world wars as well as the determination of their subject peoples to be free of British control and the determination of their domestic population not to be further exploited to pay for their Betters' overseas adventures.

That's the thing. Any Imperial expansion is ultimately paid for by both the exploitation of colonial and the domestic populations.

The relentless campaign of the Rs to substantially reduce the standard of living of most Americans has as its primary objective paying for the Cause of Empire -- after all, the "defense and security" budget increases, doubles and redoubles, while the People's Budget is incrementally squeezed and reduced under current plans. There is no limit to the amount of treasure that can and will be devoted to the Cause of Empire, but strict limits must be imposed on the People's well-being to pay for it. Simple.

It happens under every Imperial regime.

The exploitation of the colonial peoples is even worse, of course, and they pay for the Imperial Adventure not only in treasure and dignity but in their own and their children's blood. Endless rivers of it.

Erik Prince, after all, has set up a new bloody shop in Abu Dhabi and is forming his mercenary Colombian and South African troopers into a force capable of countering the supposed expansionism of the Other Devil, Iran.

The Government of the United States is on an Imperial path and can't seem to get off. The People are on a very different path and can't seem to influence the Government sufficiently to force it to change course.

The Government is hardly even bothering to sell its path to the People any more; it simply imposes its Will, and the People be Damned. It's shocking but hardly unusual.

And of course The Shock is the mechanism through which domestic rule by the Imperial faction is to be maintained. It works.

We are left to ponder what can be done about this state of affairs. Or rather if anything should be done about it. We rail and fuss about it and we ignore it and try to get on with our lives under diminished circumstances, but Americans don't rise up in any large-scale and sustained manner, and except for a tiny fringe minority, there is no general call to "Restore the Republic."

To his credit, Obama from his Throne has actually tried to restore the Congress to its rightful position of authority under the Constitution, but the results have been mixed at best. For one thing, the Throne is not about to relinquish its authority to conduct its various forms of bloody diplomacy as it sees fit. On the other hand, Congress has shown neither a propensity nor an ability to utilize its authority (whether inherent or granted from On High) for positive -- or shall we say "progressive" -- ends. This is the continuing flaw in representative democracies. The Government and the People grow farther and farther apart and as their interests diverge, the ability of the People to interfere with the Government's desires is extinguished. The forms of representative self-government may remain in place, but the reality is that Government is transformed into an Autocracy, and it follows its own path, not that of the People.

That's basically what happened to Rome all those centuries ago. Thanks to the efforts of Augustus, the forms of the Republic remained in place for centuries after they ceased having a serious function. Nevertheless, elections continued uninterrupted, the Senate still met and debated, and many of the political positions of the Republic were maintained, even as they were either irrelevated or they were absorbed into the Imperial orbit.

As far as the People were concerned, it didn't really matter. Their situation did not improve no matter what happened in the cloisters and the palaces of the Empire, and for some, no doubt, the advent and invasions of the Barbarian Hordes from the East were less unwelcome than we might imagine. At least it was something different, and who knew, it might just be "better."

That's the path we're on. Whether We the People can actually influence it -- let alone change it -- or not is still in dispute.

If Our Rulers have any say in the matter, we won't.

Impressive

Our congressman in New Mexico is Martin Heinrich, a former mayor of Albuquerque and a generally progressive representative in Congress. He's decided to go for the open Senate seat being vacated by Jeff Bingaman, a generally reliable Democrat, but not, I would say, all that "progressive."

In fact, Heinrich has really impressed me while he's been in Congress for outstanding constituent services, even though a considerable part of his district is not inclined to support Democrats. Well, they're ranchers. Cowboys. They don't cotton to pussy-footing pissants.

New Mexico State Senator Eric Griego announced his intention to run for Martin Heinrich's House seat last month, and the announcement caused a great deal of excitement. I was only marginally familiar with him before -- he's tangled with Susana Martinez, the not-quite-insane Republican governor of New Mexico -- but the ad posted above is really quite impressive.

If he's elected -- and I suspect he will carry Albuquerque easily, but he may run into resistance in among the cussed independents of the East Mountains -- I think he could be a remarkable presence in the House.

Of course, with Howie Klein's support through Blue America, there's no chance of failure. Is there?

Down to the Basics

The sorry thing is that we have gone so far off track -- or at least our governing class has -- that even the most basic concepts are no longer operative.

Falsehood reigns.

There's a post up over at dKos that gets into the Basics of job creation, correctly observing that in a dynamic consumer economy, jobs are created by consumer demand. Not by the "Rich."

This is so fundamental that you would think it wouldn't even require repetition.




And yet our rulers do not know this fundamental truth.

It is beyond their comprehension. They have all read Atlas Shrugged and that is all they need to know:

• there are two classes of people: producers and parasites.
  
  
• taxes are punishment and theft
  
  
• producers owe nothing to parasites
  
  
• parasites drain the life from producers
  
  
  
  

It's a crock. And yet our rulers are in thrall to this pernicious garbage, so much so that even the Progressive Caucus in Congress cannot shake it off. Like Russ Feingold when he was in the Senate, they may talk real pretty, but when it comes to doing the deed, they cannot perform.

They go along with whatever the prevailing "wisdom" happens to be.

In the case of the Randian bullshit that passes for ideology among the Ruling Class, they go along with the worst possible policy prescriptions and then wonder why the People don't love them enough.

Well....

Sometimes the obvious is just a little too freaky I guess.

How Fares Teh Revolution?

Taking Stock?

Well. That seems to be the case anyway.

The Ruling Class has been very busy with its various neo-liberal plots and plans to take over the country, to take over the world, and they have been steadily gaining ground in spite of the fact that every now and then the People rise from their torpor and say, "WTF?" before sinking back into passive non-resistance.

Teh Revolution to halt their progress has barely been a bump in their road, at least so far. It lost its steam -- such as it was -- when the matters at issue in Wisconsin and elsewhere wound up as a dispute in court over process, not a matter of policy. Even if the case is won by the Revolution in the end, it will be a Pyrrhic victory at best. The policies continue on.

Right now the big deal is over "changes to Medicare and Medicaid" which the Republicans are "demanding" as a condition for acquiescing to the need to raise the debt ceiling by sometime in July-August.

"Changes in Medicare and Medicaid" that are not specified, of course, but one assumes they would require the eventual end of the government health care program for the elderly, the disabled, and the poor. That's the goal Republicans have had on their agenda since the inception of the programs.

What they say they want is a private health care system, not a public one, that provides a declining amount of "premium support" to Medicare "customers" and provides states with financially capped block grants to partially pay for medical care to the indigent. Or not. As they so determine.

I'm pretty sure that's not actually what they want, but that's what they say for the purposes of argument. Basically, what they want is all the money now in the System diverted to their private portfolios. Same as with Social Security.

The standard response has been to argue their points, issue by issue. They are so "wrong" about this or that, and the standard opposition position is to support the status quo against their radical changes to the System.

For me, that's a real problem because the System is pretty fucked up when you get down to it. It "works" after a fashion, but because it has been under relentless assault by those who want all the money in the System diverted to their private portfolios, it costs far more than it should and it provides far less medical care than it should, while simultaneously requiring doctors and hospitals to over-prescribe, over-test, and over- or under-treat patients.

Rather than use the opportunity to make the System better -- and take the reins from the Reactionary Party of Theft and Greed -- all the oppositional energy is concentrated on keeping things the way they are.

Well, things the way they are suck.

Rs want to make it worse -- "Ha-ha, Suckers!" -- whereas Dems and most "progressives" don't want any changes at all.

And so it goes.

Is it any wonder the Rs and their radical reactionary sponsors continue to make substantial gains in their relentless quest for their brass rings whereas everyone else is the loser? It's not just a political struggle. It's a social and economic struggle that really only they are engaged in.

Practically everyone else is... passive in the face of their onslaught, or they are arguing the finer points of custom and law in hopes of protecting parts of the status quo. Or, praise be, continuing to marvel at the ignorance and arrogance of Alan Simpson.

Yes, well. Not surprisingly, the Radicals and Reactionaries are thundering forward.

The rebellions in the Midwest earlier this year did not succeed in thwarting the nefarious plots and plans of the Minions of Reaction, but they weren't entirely unsuccessful. They certainly raised a bit of consciousness, and they demonstrated that the vast majority of people are not at all inclined to agree with the Rs slash and burn tactics.

On the other hand, the Rs relentlessness in pursuit of their objectives has the effect of chipping away at resistance and opposition, and the generally positive media coverage the Rs have been receiving, despite the radical nature of what they are doing and what they want, is shaping opinion in their favor.

While marching and carrying signs is all well and good, and we need much more of it, unless the protest movement can provide a Better Solution Than the Status Quo, it is ultimately doomed to failure.

Plus ça change

I was tooling around in online issues of Popular Mechanics ("Written So You Can Understand It") and came across a July, 1918 article about the War in Yurp called "Boomerangs". It featured the "shooting bayonet" and the "tower of ivory" -- ie: the mushroom cloud featured above.

This was, of course, a kind of presage of the nuclear mushroom clouds at the end of WWII. Paging through history, you find this phenomenon fairly often: the inexplicable phenomenon during one era becomes quite understandable in a future era, frequently to the horror of witnesses.

In the case of the WWI mushroom cloud, the troops on the ground were amazed and dumbfounded by it. They did not know what this "tower of ivory" was, only that it was generated somehow by the Enemy. Sometimes it would dissipate in the air, other times it would collapse back on the ground.

According to one report, narrated in the story excerpt above, the cloud left the unmistakable stench of phosphorus gas in its wake, so it was assumed that the cloud was an experimental means of delivering poison gas in the field of battle.

Perhaps.

The point was that it was meant to, and apparently did, inspire terror and dread in the expeditionary troops of WWI who had never seen anything like it.

Now, of course, the image is familiar to all, so much so that during the Bushevik years, Rummy was inclined to go around declaring nuclear war "survivable." Well, yes. Some do survive nuclear annihilation.

Build enough bunkers, all kinds of people might survive.

Then they can fight among themselves for Ultimate Dominance.

Funneee~!

Headline from Mother Jones:

Huckabee Adviser: Obama is a Soviet Spy

Need we say more?

I laughed till I cried, then I threw up a little in my mouth.

Relentless

They say the Rs are shelving the Ryan Plan to Gut Medicare for the time being, while -- of course -- "quietly" continuing their campaign to gut government funding of social services. As the states encounter more and more budgetary limitations, funding for social programs is inevitably cut. Federal support is also being cut somewhat more gradually right now, but the cuts are growing, and ultimately they will be draconian.

Rs will get their way. They always do in the end.

They are relentless.

And that's the key to the current situation. No matter what happens, the Rs find that events and circumstances always justify what they've done and what they want to do. Cutting taxes, regulations, and services are what they want to do, and they pursue that goal without deviation no matter what.

And they succeed.

They succeed with the sometimes shockingly active collaboration and cooperation of the Democrats, their ostensible political opposition. But as we have learned over the years, the Rs and the Ds are not really opposition parties; they are essentially two phases of one Government Party, both essentially bought and paid for by a shrinking but devilishly wealthy Ownership Class whose interests and demands are the primary focus of the political system.

As was the case generations ago, so it is now: the Government exists to serve the interests and needs of the Owners, no one else.

Unfortunately, this condition is built in to our anachronistic Constitution, and so long as we are governed by that Constitution -- even if only in theory -- so long will Government of, by and for the Rich in opposition to the People endure.

So it was at the beginning, so it is now, so it will be forever unless the People take into their own hands the means and methods of forming a government in their interests.

Unless the People become as relentless in pursuing their interests -- which are going to be in opposition to those of the Ruling Class, there's no way around it -- the consolidation of rule in the hands of a tiny minority of the Rich will continue without let up.

The Rs (with their D collaborators) will continue to succeed, even if it takes them a little bit longer to reach their goals than they originally decreed.

The People must resist.

[AND come up with viable alternatives -- that aren't simply futile attempts to maintain the status quo... ]

How Bizarre

That the question of torture is once again being "debated" in this country.

According to the Bright Lights of the Republican Party, at any rate, torture is OK with them, and if it is OK with them, then the question must be raised and engaged extensively in the media -- all media, including the New Media (ie: Blogistan) as if it were some Important Discussion to Have.

Bizarre and crazy.

Here's the thing: torture is illegal, and torture is used. Those who use torture -- for whatever reason -- face legal consequences, though generally speaking those consequences are mitigated based on the circumstances of the torture employed.

That's the way it is, and it is the way it has always been. Torture is -- and has long been -- used for a variety of state/official purposes (set aside "torture for pleasure" for the time being), and those who use torture may face legal consequences in the by 'n' bye. More likely, though, they will not -- if they are torturing in service to the state.

The "debate" hardly ever deals with those facts, and it almost never starts from that perspective.

It's like the notion that Law Enforcement Officers are not allowed to shoot unarmed, non-resisting suspects. Hello! It happens all the time. LEO's almost never face legal consequences when they do it. It's basically a judgement call on their part -- whether to use force against suspects, and what kind of force to use, up to and including lethal force. Their judgement is almost always ratified by Authority in the end. Whether or not the suspect is armed and/or resisting. It doesn't matter. What matters (generally) is whether the officer believed s/he was under "threat." Which can literally encompass any emotion or situation at all.

Just so, it is a judgement call on the part of interrogators whether or not to torture a captive. And whatever the interrogator decides to do will ultimately almost always be ratified by Authority, post hoc or as necessary.

The Osama Thing seems to have revived the "torture debate" because of certain claims that information that led to his liquidation in Pakistan was gained through "harsh interrogation methods" -- though there is dispute about it based largely on Party lines. Whether information was gained through torture or not is beside the point. Torture remains illegal, and those who engage in it are potentially subject -- at least in theory -- to legal consequences. That's the only thing that needs to be said about it.

On the other hand, from current reports it would seem that Osama was in fact summarily executed when encountered in his bedroom in the Bilal Town Compound. Summarily executed with the well-known "double tap." Supposedly, summary executions are illegal as well, but they have been employed relentlessly throughout our many overseas Imperial wars of aggression, and they are a feature of JSOC and Navy SEAL operations, widely celebrated and cheered. They call it Wet Work.

It is what Death Squads do.

It's as illegal as hell, but it goes on relentlessly, and our Armed Forces and their mercenary auxiliaries wouldn't know what to do without recourse to a whole suite of otherwise frowned upon or outright illegal techniques.

The debate we should be having is whether this is the kind of society and world we want. And if it isn't, what do we have to do to change it?

Considering Yet Again "What to Do?"

[Jean-Jacques Rousseau, philosophe)

Yes. Well.

The Osama Thing has certainly thrown a spanner in the works. Of course, Goldstein/Osama could have been liquidated at any time, anywhere at all. The fact that he was done to death in Pakistan at a compound near the capital, in the midst of any number of Pakistani military installations is evocative to be sure, but of what is still a mystery.

There are those who will maintain that Osama/Goldstein actually died of his kidney disease in 2002, and he's only been "kept alive" as a Monstrous Image of Hate for the convenience of The Powers That Be.

If the reports are to be believed, some kind of Death Dealing was done at the Compound in Bilal Town, some number of men and at least one woman were "taken out" as they say and some sort of new-fangled Stealth Helicopter was left in ruins in the courtyard and hanging on the wall of the place (as if to advertise it's presence and peculiarity.) Whether the Devil Himself, Mister Osama was there and was dealt the "double tap" that is now in the descriptions of the Incident -- one to the head, one to the chest to make sure he's good and dead -- who knows?

Since no physical evidence of his death by Navy SEAL gunfire in Pakistan is to be forthcoming, much as there was no physical evidence of his existence on this Earth after late 2001, we are unlikely to know what really happened with this man, or when, or where.

Does it matter?

For historians and recorders of the Past, most certainly. For the Future, not so much.

It appears that TPTB are actually moving relatively quickly to turn the page, to end the Era of Osama once and for all and Move On. This may or may not lead to a withdrawal from Afghanistan and an end to the highly discriminate -- but often erroneous -- bombing of civilian targets (alleged to be "Taliban") in the Wild Areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. My own suspicion is that there will be no withdrawal as such, but there may well be a return to base such as has taken place in Iraq, in which troop numbers in the field are reduced and their actions restricted, their presence keyed much lower than before. But they're still there. Ready.

There is an Empire to consolidate and preserve after all. And that won't suddenly go away.

Another Goldstein will arise now that the former one is at the bottom of the Arabian Sea, or is it the Persian Gulf? Somewhere under the ocean They say. But They Say a lot of things, and much of what They Say is lies.

They're so used to getting away with it, all this huffing and puffing at skeptics that's coming out of the White House is more than a little amusing. It's partly Show, of course, but there are genuine reasons for skepticism that have nothing to do with political persuasion. They have to do with bitter experience of... lies.

The important question is not about how Awful the Government is, nor whether an when another Goldstein will arise. The important question is what to do about it. What can we do about it? Should we do anything about it?

I've reached pretty much the limit of my endurance of people who simply want to complain about the Awful Government and its many minions, who make a career of mocking the powdered and perfumed courtiers who pass for American Mass Media -- yet who seem to desperately want to become part of that exclusive class of servants and minions.

Yes, we know. The Government is Awful. All governments, by their very nature, are Awful. They lie. Their minions are craven. Yadda, yadda, yadda. Yes. That is the way it is. Now what do we do about it?

Yammer incessantly?

Some time back, I pointed out that the period we are in resembles that of Louis XV, not Louis XVI, in that there is much anxiety and much grumbling, and there are occasional outbreaks of unrest, but there is no real revolutionary fervor, not yet, not among the People. What we have right now is the Revolt of the Rich and their refusal to be taxed to pay for the many wars and other indignities they insist must be forced on the rest of us.

The Rich revolt first, then the People revolt against the Rich. Or so it goes.

Of course, the political Revolution that established the United States grew directly out of the English Civil Wars of the century before, which had nothing to do with "the People" (as if there were any such concept at the time) and what motivated the American revolutionaries politically was quite different than the motivations for the French Revolution which came after the American one, but not long after, and there were numerous and close relationships between France and the interests of the French Government in the New World, and between French philosophers and American revolutionaries. Some of the American revolutionaries were educated in France or in French Flanders. But the French influence on the Revolution in what would become the United States would occur primarily during the long reign of Louis XV; by the time his grandson, Louis XVI, got to the French Throne, the revolutionary pattern had already been set in America, and its French connections were setting the stage for Revolution in France in due time.

But why did these revolts and revolutions take place at all? Arguably, things weren't so bad in either France or Britain's American colonies that Revolution was a necessity. No, things weren't good enough, government was corrupt and craven, popular representation was limited or non-existent, and force was being employed to "secure the realm" from... some kind of evil.

The educated middle class was restive, the proletariat was apathetic, and the aristocracy was rotten to the core.

The monarchies in both Britain and France were tottering institutions, with a Mad King on the Throne in Britain, and an ineffective one in France.

The situation was ripe.

Not so much now and in the short term at any rate, Americans are working overtime to throw away the Enlightenment -- out of which so much Revolutionary fervor, for good and ill, was generated. Instead of progress, the culture, thought, and future of the Nation seems to be reverting to some sort of superstitious Neo-Feudal ideal. Those in Revolt in other words, are headed backwards.

They openly desire to go backwards, they reject the very ideas and ideals that inform the present, and they yearn -- some desperately -- for a "return" to a theocratic autocracy such as they imagine ruled in Biblical times.

While the current revolt is headed in that direction, and would be doing so whether or not there was a Goldstein figure to Hate, and it's not the Revolution yet.

That is still to come. And no matter how we get there, constant complaining about the way things are won't do it.

-------------------------------

For review: The Social Contract

The North Africa, Mid-East, Arabian Peninsula Business

Fallujah, Iraq -- 2004


Misrata, Libya -- 2011

Things have been bloody and awful for many throughout the Rebellious Lands of Libya, Syria, and the Yemen for months now. This isn't like 1989 at all. No Prague Spring here, I think.

No, this is down and dirty, autocratic regimes "killing their own people."

Yet the descriptions of the attacks by the dictators' armies on rebel enclaves read astonishingly like the American attacks on Fallujah (some may remember that one), or the episode at Najaf, both in Iraq.

In other words, what the dictators are doing apparently follows the Siege Protocols that were handed down by the Americans. You cut off electricity and water, set up sniper posts, kill randomly, bomb and rocket at will, use whatever "unconventional weapons" you like (white phosphorus being one of the most popular among Americans and Israelis) and you cause as much havoc and destruction among the population as you can. The objective being to punish and crush all resistance.

That's how it's done.

And when the Arab Dictators do it, it is a violation of Human Rights, Laws of War, etc, etc. And when the Americans and Israelis do it, it is a sign of Valor and Manhood.

As long as that's understood.

Plus ça change

The Big Scary Boogey Man Monster is said to be dead, taken out, they say in an "operation" in Islamabad Abbottabad, Pakistan, where he was apparently known by the US to be resident of a mansion/compound on the outskirts in the middle of town at least since last August -- if not quite a bit longer. His Serenity, the President, ordered his liquidation yesterday. Or was it the day before?


[Click image to embiggen]

[UPDATE: The military has released aerial pictures of the bin Laden Compound in Abbottabad, and they are nothing like any of the locations pinpointed on the Google Map of the area linked above. Hm. The site in the picture from Google Maps that I posted is one of several sites identified as "bin Laden's compound" on the map, and I decided to use it because it was so close to the Army College which has been referenced repeatedly in the "News" as being within 1000 feet of the Compound. That is not the Compound in the military's release. Well. How about that. Something to keep in mind, however, is that the military does not tell the truth. They lie.]

[SOME FURTHER NOTES ON "THE COMPOUND": Well, turns out the Osama Compound in Abbottabad where he was captured and/or killed, is this one:

[Clicking the picture will embiggen it]

...which as you can see is in quite a rural area of the Abbottabad district called "Bilal Town." What you can't see in this crop is that it is some distance from one of what I assume are several unmarked military installations in the Abbottabad area, but they do not appear to be the "Pakistani West Point."

No doubt you could walk from this site to the Army Burnall College, which is seen in the satellite crop I initially used, but it would be a goodly hike, several kilometers.

Since the Narrative has been ever-changing, the actual location of the Osama Hideout vis a vis other landmarks is not all that important. It's simply a data point for future reference and consideration.]



And there was dancing. Dancing in the streets of New York and DC now.



Well. Yes. I suppose.

Is bloodlust sated now? Can the Nation's military machine stop killing Arabs and other Muslims for a while? Or does this mean we "must move on" to the next target, the Persian Horde under the Devil Ahmadinejad?

Plus ça change, n'est-ce pas?

Once on a killing jag, they say, it's hard to get off, and what with the unfolding events in North Africa, there are plenty of signs that the Slaughter of the Infidel is far from done.

I'm reminded for some reason of the extraordinary Warrior Scenes found emblazoned on many of the grave goods in Tutankhamen's Tomb, these Warrior Scenes of the Boy Pharaoh at Slaughter, doing in Egypt's Traditional Enemies with the arrow, sword and lance, tying the pitiful survivors into slave coffles and hauling them off to perpetual servitude.



Over and over and over again.

Every Pharaoh had his Battle Scenes, every Pharaoh smote his Traditional Enemies, the Enemies of the Two Lands, the Enemies of Mankind. It's what they did, it's who they were, whether or not there was any protective need or reason to Smite the Foe, or even if they actually ever smote them, the Pharaohs of yore were always depicted doing so.

So. The liquidation of bin Laden, if it is real -- or even if it is not -- will not necessarily have any effect on the perpetual smiting of Enemies, real or not. "Protection" from our enemies, whoever they are, wherever they might be, has become the primary public role of the Presidency, a Presidency that has morphed into an Imperial Autocracy right before our very eyes.

Without Enemies and their perpetual extermination, what's the point of... well, anything?

Plus ça change...

Question: Are We On the Edge of Another Economic... Shock?

I ask because there appears to be some shuddering in the Economy due to the sharp rise in commodity prices, ie: food and energy. Things that people need, you see.

Just like 2008, when gasoline prices last got this high -- and predictions now are for $6 a gallon by summer, with continuing rises in food prices -- people cut back, stop buying, bring the economy more or less quickly to a halt, and if factors are dire enough, put it in reverse.

Of course an economy that relies on bubbles for "growth" is one that cannot be sustained for very long. Unfortunately, the American Economy has been relying more and more on the Bubble to carry the load ever since the days of Reagan, and it doesn't seem to be working any more.

So are we stuck? Are we going back into reverse? And is there anything to be done about it?

What happens when gas is too expensive and food is too expensive? What do people do?

Millions upon millions of Americans have been forced into poverty since this Endless Recession began and Disaster Capitalism became the operating principle of our rulers. Most of them will never get out of poverty again. Most have already adapted to their new, reduced circumstances, and they've already cut their spending back to the nub. They don't have anything more to be pillaged and plundered by the High and the Mighty.

The effects of higher energy and food prices on them will be severe, because for most of them, there are no options: it is either pay the price or go without, or both. Both is what is happening: they pay for what they must and they go without for everything else. Their physical and emotional situation deteriorates. Their lives become more and more cramped and crabbed, and their sense of despair for the Future becomes consuming. Faith may be some comfort in their distress, but there will likely be no relief for their suffering from the material world.

But there is still a large middle class to plunder, large enough anyway to make the Powers Who Rule Us salivate with the contemplation of the opportunities before them. Thus the persistent and concerted efforts -- rather successful efforts even in the face of massive opposition -- to "curtail" pay and benefits for the largest blocs of the remaining middle class, that is public employees.

And of course we can't neglect to mention the assault on the benefits for the elderly and disabled. Raising the retirement age, when it should be lowered, and cutting Social Security benefits, when they should be substantially increased, is a form of pillage by the Owners. Transformation of benefits that have been pre-paid by their users into partial subsidies to the Marketplace is a form of plunder.

The irony is that this assault on what remains of the social contract and the American Way of Life, if you will, doesn't help the Owners in mid and long term. In fact, it does just the opposite.

They've been busy stealing from one another as a kind of sport for years. Now they're plundering the rest of us, and so far, as each sector has been depleted, they've been able to move on to the next. It's all quite mindless. While there is some actual cruelty involved, mostly it's just automatic behavior. But they are running out of sectors, and once they have taken everything they can grab from everyone else -- including their peers and rivals -- they are left in the condition of Latin American grandees in the 19th Century. "Rich" by comparison to the poverty they have created all around them, but as rotten and backwards as any aristocracy there ever was.

Or think of what happened to Rome when the system of plunder and impoverishment had run its course.

That's the path we're on.

And another Economic Shock will do nothing but accelerate the process.

Individuals will have to take matters into their own hands to stall or reverse the process, and that's a task more and more Americans seem willing to take on.

The results from this application of the Shock Doctrine just might surprise us all. I know I've said that before.

Optimism!

[Traveling today and tomorrow, going back to California after a very active couple of weeks in New Mexico]

Huh. Who'dathunk?

Mark Ames and Yasha Levine drop a bombshell over at Alternet, claiming -- with abundant evidence -- that the whole TSA Porno-Scan and Junk Touching Hysteria last November was manufactured by the Rightist Radicals in charge of the Republican Party so as to... prevent TSA employees from unionizing.

Hm.

Who'dathunk?

Those People would do a thing like that? How could it be?

Of course Ames and Levine are notorious for probing deep and long into the machinations of the Oligarchy in this country, just as they were notorious for doing so in the Oligarchic Russian Federation. Their probes got their Russian publication, the Exile, shut down by the Putinist Authorities. So now they operate on line, and... it's a Good Thing.

That the Oligarchs who rule us would go to such elaborate lengths to stymie efforts to organize TSA workers borders on the insane when you think about it. But when a kind of inverted "liberationist" ideology takes hold, as it has among so much of the Ruling Class, insanity is the rule not the exception.

"Liberation" yes, but only for the Rulers. The ruled -- that would be the rest of us -- are to submit... or, at least in theory, perish.

What Ames and Levine have put together about the hysterics over TSA Porno Scans and Junk Groping last year is a fascinating read. There's always something else again going on behind the scenes, and it makes one wonder at just how easily Americans can be duped. Even the most highly educated, informed, and educated.

The Truth May Be Out There, but in the meantime Believe Nothing.



What a way to live.


There's got to be a better way....

So, How Fares Teh Revolution?

Stalled again?

I would despair, except that this his kind of how these Revolution thingies go in this country. Historically and such.

The Founding Revolution, for example, was hardly a case of overthrow of the existing regime, eighteen days and we're done. No, it went on and on and on, with sporadic fighting and sputtering "progress," for years. 1776 (well, it started well before that) to 1783, with periodic renewals by the British until at least 1814. Its predecessor in Britain, the various English Dynastic and Civil Wars, lasted well more than a century.

The Civil Rights Movement in this country took forever and a day to accomplish its main objectives, and the other liberationist movements before and since (Suffrage Movement, anyone?) seemed to get nowhere -- forever. But the key was persistence, dogged determination, and not a little gall.

So the slow-down and near stoppage of the revolt against the Midwest Misrulers is to be expected. Yes, Misrule is Triumphant for now, and some of what has been done will not soon be undone. In the meantime, however, righteous anger combined with determination to succeed has made the Rebels a force to be reckoned with, sadly but necessarily somewhat like the TeaBaggers were back in the day.

The TeaBag Rebels demonstrated that a loud and vocal minority, an obnoxious bunch of malcontents, can be assembled at almost a moment's notice (the TeaBag Rebellion began on essentially the day after Obama won the Presidency) and can be motivated to press policy changes favorable to an even tinier minority. The Ruling Class in a word.

The TeaBag Rebels also demonstrated that almost all the rebellious spirit in this country is concentrated on the right. I know I've been making that point for many years, through the entire Bush Regime, and prior to that, during the Gingrich Revolution. This has been a Radical Rightist dominated period the like of which we haven't seen since the close of the Civil War.

The corporatist triumph then was as absolute as anything today, moreso perhaps, because there were so few remedies, none at all in many cases, to the abuses of the Rightists and Corporatists who ruled the roost.

What there was then, and there isn't now, is an escape valve: the West. The Westward Push after the Civil War was the basic survival plan for many of those who either were pushed out of or couldn't stand the miserable exploitation of life Back East.

So. Be a Pioneer. Go Out West. Make your way and make your fortune, and many millions did.

Yeah, the Indians and the buffalo lost, but someone gained. And that was the main thing. I sometimes wonder what would have happened if there had been no West to relieve the pressure on the Ruling Class in the East.

Something tells me there would have been more and ever more revolutionary movements to redress the very real grievances of the working classes under the corporatists and capitalists of the day. The escape valve of the West prevented that from happening, even though there were many, many Workers' Movements prior to (and even some after) the Progressive Revolution that succeeded in the early 1900's and consolidated under FDR -- and that is now being unraveled.

As it is, we feel pangs of sorrow for the suffering of previous generations, though it is hard for us to imagine just what their lives were like, and what and how they fought their condition. Or did they submit?

I'm old enough -- and my parents were old enough -- to have heard stories of what went on from the 1870's into the 1940's, and what my parents and their parents did (if anything) to redress their political/economic grievances. As I think I've said, both my parents were dyed in the wool Democrats, neither of them necessarily revolutionaries, but both of them instinctive rebels against the Ruling Class (although my father could, I think, be considered part of the Ruling Class. Just not an important part!) My mother was from the Working Class. Very much so.

Right now, it seems that historians will look back at this period and wonder at the surprising acquiescence of the masses to the increasingly harsh rule of the Plutocrats and Oligarchs. Yet this sort of thing is common enough in United States history, let alone the history of the World.

Fighting back is the anomaly, not the rule at all.

But there was a rebellion in the Middle Western States earlier this year, one that is not by any means concluded. Right now the matters at issue are submitted to the courts and in the by and bye will be submitted to the voters in recall and other elections throughout the region. The polls are showing very little popular support for the depredations under way in the states and in Congress, so little support in fact that the only way the Ruling Class can realistically have its way is by main force -- the way they did back in the post-Civil War period.

But we have seen little of that so far. The Cossacks remain stabled for the time being.

So, we can only await developments, publish our samizdat, and engage in what minor acts of resistance and sabotage we can.

While Teh Revolution is On Hold.

Nicho de Santos

Above is a picture of our Nicho de Santos in what we call "The Jesus Room" in New Mexico.

I was up before dawn coloring eggs, and then at dawn I lit candles in front of the nicho as a sign of respect for the sacrifice Jesus and the Resurrection.

Being of the Highly Lapsed Persuasion, I should be embarrassed to say any such thing. I can hear the cat-calls of "Hypocrite!" loud and clear.

Yeah, well. Faith is not really about following the dictates and strictures of the Holy Catholic Church -- or any church for that matter. I have posted before on my belief that the practice of Organized Religion -- no matter the denomination -- is a matter of predators and prey. Predatory behavior is built in to the power structure of Organized Religion. There is no way to separate it out. And those of us who don't want to -- or perhaps can't -- play that way would be hypocrites to stay within the Bosom of the Church, whatever Church one might choose.

That doesn't mean I necessarily disrespect people of faith, priests and holy men and women, or the laity in faith. In fact, I have a very high regard for most of them and have said so. I consider myself a Person of Strong and Abiding Faith, despite my inability -- or is it refusal -- to bend to the will of the Church.

The Nicho de Santos is a feature of many private houses in New Mexico, often in the case of adherents to the Santa Fe Style (which we've been discussing tangentially for some time now) as a matter of "style" rather than Grace. The "style" is to have Santos in your home, bultos or retablos or preferably both, hand carved by the Most Famous Santeros and to display them proudly with your Crucifixes decorated with the most intricate patterns in straw, and so on and so forth. Whether you're Catholic or not, whether you're lapsed or not.

Newer Santa Fe Style houses have one or more plaster nichos where anything at all may be displayed -- or nothing at all, as the case may be. Authentic "old" New Mexico houses typically have deep nichos built into the adobe (as the one in our house is) with carved wooden doors to close them when not in use. In fact, the nicho in our house was once a window -- the window itself is still there -- but it was covered over about fifty years ago when the siding was put on over the crumbling stucco on the exterior. Given that it is on the north side of the house and the room where it is I suspect was once the kitchen, I have little doubt that this nicho was intended to be and was used as a refrigerator back in the day.

Why not?

Later, what had been a fairly substantial kitchen was subdivided into two bedrooms and various closets and storage areas. In addition to the nicho, what we now call "The Jesus Room" also has a built in wooden cabinet with a drawer that was probably once used for storing kitchen supplies. It is clearly home-made and charmingly primitive.

Whether this nicho was ever used previously for the storage and display of santos I have no idea. I wouldn't be surprised though.

The santos that we have collected over the years are varied, to say the least. In fact, none of them are "New Mexican." No works by Famous Santeros. Not a one. In fact, I've resisted acquiring any -- though I love the look of them -- because they are essentially "style" notes. Any sort of santo will do to remind one of faith. It doesn't have to be stylish.

Perhaps the chief santo in our house and our lives is that of St. Francis of Assisi that graces the front porch. We do love our animals! I'd like to get one of St. Clare, but so far, have not had any luck. We do have a ceramic light-up version of Mission Santa Clara in California. Not the same, I know.

In The Jesus Room, though, there are lots of curious santos, including paintings, bas reliefs, plates, prints, and small statues. There's a deep-relief pressed tin image of Our Lady of Lourdes in her Grotto that is quite spectacular. A paint by numbers picture of Jesus in the Garden. There's a photo of the very statue of Our Lady of Lourdes that stands in her Grotto, crowned, that was taken when the statue went on an American tour some years back. Many images of the Virgin and Child. Some of St. Joseph, some of Mary. There is a delightful tin multi-picture -- it's cleverly formed so that when looked at straight on, it is an image of the Virgin of Guadalupe, while from one side it is the Annunciation, and if seen from the other side it is the Resurrection. There's a huge Last Supper in an elaborate gold frame, and there is a much smaller one in a plain wooden frame. There are numerous Jesuses, most of them not "Catholic." There are crucifixes, but only one shows Christ on the Cross, and it's for a reason that I won't get into here. There are way too many Catechisms.

And anyone could see this display and scream "Hypocrite!!!!". And yet every bit of it is there as a reminder of faith. A Catholic friend who came to visit said, "Where's your kneeler?" Well, it's in storage. There isn't room for it in this tiny space!

This is a day of joy. And our santos are meant to help us express that joy.

And our Christmas tree is up and lit all year long, too.

The Journal of a Mud House, a continuation --4

[Illustration from "The Journal of A Mud House" by Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant, Harper's Magazine, April 1922]

Like many other areas where the Spaniards went a-conquering, New Mexico is blessed with an abundance of penitentes who go about on pilgrimage, flagellating themselves, praying, and at one time nailing one another to crucifixes in imitation of the Passion of Christ. (Rumor has it, they still do that in their secret rites, but I wouldn't know.)

In fact, I'm not much into the Passion. It's a frankly ugly story that relies on credulity and faith to be transformed into... "beauty." Yes, yes, I understand about suffering and redemption and all that. Taking on the sins of the world, forgiveness, resurrection, choirs of angels at the right hand of the Father. Yes, yes, yes.

But what has happened with this story is that the Suffering of Christ to Redeem Mankind has been used as a sort of global justification for Believers (not just Catholics by any means) to impose such suffering as they wilt on Believers and Non-Believers alike if not in Imitation of Christ, then certainly in His Sacred Honor.

And that's disgusting. Immoral. Wrong.

It was this Imposition of Suffering -- by Men of God as well as civil authorities -- that in due time led to the Pueblo Revolt in 1680 here in New Mexico, the only time Indians successfully rebelled against the Conquest. Not only did they successfully rebel, they expelled the Spanish colonists and their hypocritical, devilish priests.

Of course, there was a Reconquista, there always is, isn't there? But in returning, the Spanish, wonder of wonders, were chastened and chastised and they promised to reform. Strangely enough, they weren't lying. They wanted to make peace with the Indians, promised to respect them and their culture, promised further that the Church would be restrained, the burdens of conversion lightened, encomienda ended, and cooperation between the peoples ensured. And so, more or less, it was.

Because of this rebellion and change of heart, both the Spanish and the Indians were surprisingly successful in maintaining their cultures here, while intermingling all the time, right up to the American Conquest.

And when the Americans came, they didn't know what to make of what they found here.

Americans had been coming down the Santa Fe Trail for a generation before the conquest, and most of those who made the trek were inclined to tolerate if not exactly favor the ways of the strange peoples who lived along the Rio Grande Valley, if only for the money they could make from them. Well, money such as it was.

These were poor people. Even the Grandest of Grandees in New Mexico was a poor man by American standards; even by Mexican standards. This was a backwater where people had to do for themselves or do without. They lived as simply as possible, sufficient unto their needs first and foremost, but within that stricture, they were surprisingly creative, artistic, and -- at least from time to time -- happy.

The story of the Spanish Conquest of these parts is complicated. Coronado came through in 1540 or so, and he made an unholy mess on his travels in search of the Seven Cities of Gold. Murder, rape, pillage, plunder, disease and destruction were all integral to his exploratory technique. The Coronado Monument up by Bernalillo is a pretty good representation of what his expedition left in its wake. It's a ruined pueblo on the banks of the Rio Grande, obviously a very fine place at one time. There is little left of it but some tumbled walls and a mural-painted kiva that astonished archeologists who excavated the ruin in the 1930's.

The theory is that Coronado stopped here in 1540, demanding supplies, killing and plundering at will, taking hostages and women, and otherwise behaving like a rampaging beast. The Indians were not amused.

Soon after Coronado moved on, perhaps as soon as the next spring, so the theory goes the pueblo was abandoned and fell to ruin. Where the people went is hard to say, but there were many other pueblos along the Rio Grande and elsewhere, so there was no lack of potential destinations. Eventually, the ruin was "discovered" and became what it is today.

In 1598, Don Juan de Oñate went on an expedition of Conquest, during which (as was the style of the Spaniards of the day) he committed numerous atrocities, perhaps the most egregious of which was the amputation of one foot from each of the adult male survivors of his reduction and conquest of the Pueblo of Acoma.

This was but one of his atrocities, but it came to symbolize just who these Spaniards were, and what they would do if they didn't get what they wanted.

It took some time to get over the shock, but more to the point, it took time to adapt the Spanish new arrivals to the rhythms and patterns of living in this harsh but beguiling land. As they adapted they imposed their own spiritual rhythms -- a very harsh form of Catholicism built from the practices of the Church Militant during the Reconquista of Spain from the Moors -- on the local Native Peoples. Up to a point, the Native Peoples were willing enough. But when the Church Militant commenced to destroy all the Native spiritual elements, as was their common practice throughout the conquered realms, the Indians resisted and eventually rebelled. Successfully.

Coronado was bad, Oñate was bad, the Padres could be horrible.

And at least in my view, much of their badness was a result of their peculiar understanding of religious faith and what it justified them to do.

It took centuries and centuries to correct.

In the meantime, plenty of peculiar practices became inculcated into the Ways of the People in these parts, one of them being the Penitente Pilgrimages at Easter time.

Here we are.

And you know, as long as they don't try to impose their beliefs and practices on others, there is no problem and their should be none. But it took so many centuries for the notion of Live and Let Live to penetrate the minds of many Euro-Americans.

I was clearing brush this morning, specifically a frost bitten thorny pyracantha, and I thought for a time over saving some of it to make a Crown of Thorns in remembrance of Good Friday.

But what would I do with it?

The Journal of a Mud House, a continuation --3

[Illustration from "The Journal of a Mud House" by Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant, Harper's Magazine, March, 1922]

The Edge of Santa Fe, hm? It still looks something like that -- the Edge is just farther out than it was in 1922 or whenever that picture was taken. The houses are probably fancier, though not necessarily (depending on which Edge you're looking at), and the area will probably be criss-crossed with telephone and electric lines. Other than that? Not a whole lot has changed.

I'm not sure exactly where this picture was taken, but while her house in Tesuque was being renovated -- or at least made habitable -- Sergeant and her "pardner" (as she was referred to by José who did much of the work on the Tesuque house) Gertrude lived in what sounds like a furnished casita on the Camino del Monte Sol, which runs more or less north and south from Canyon Road to the Old Santa Fe Trail. It is full of historic compounds, some of them dating back to the 18th Century, many of them very luxurious now. The picture above may have been taken from or just above Sergeant's digs in Santa Fe.

I remember the first time I was in Santa Fe, 1982, it was opening of Opera season, and there were many parties going on, all of them seemingly at guarded adobe walled compounds, armed guards no less in some cases. The compounds generally consisted of a main house and one or more guest houses, scattered at random over the property -- of perhaps an acre or so -- where very luxurious people lived (sometimes only in the summer) and entertained their guests. And this was "in town."

Many of these luxurious Opera lovers owned exquisite art and artifacts, much of it, of course, Native American, but certainly not all. There was plenty of contemporary work by artists who lived and worked in the area, there were paintings by some of Los Cinco Pintores and others from the early days of the Taos and Santa Fe artists colonies, and there was more than a smattering of Impressionist landscapes from as far away as such exotic locales as California and France.

When an artist friend moved out to New Mexico from California around 1990 he settled first in Albuquerque because he said he couldn't take the pretensions of the Santa Fe art patrons -- to say nothing of their petty obsessions and rivalries and feuds. Well. Yes. Where do you think you are?

He was eventually convinced to resettle in Santa Fe when some of his patrons found him appropriate digs -- a really nice though rather cramped compound not far from the Plaza -- where he could entertain the way he wanted to, which was very open, unguarded, and absolutely (well, maybe not absolutely) without pretension. He was a Native American artist (but of completely, and sometimes hilariously, mongrel ancestry) and he grew up living very simply. Even when he became Famous, he always stayed grounded in simplicity. He found, I think, the underlying simplicity of Santa Fe living, much as many artists before him had done and many still do, and he could watch -- and even play with -- the pretensions of the High-Style Art Lovers who proliferate in New Mexico to this day.

I've mentioned that Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant was part of the Taos Artists Colony which was spreading toward Santa Fe (actually, it had started from Santa Fe) when she was working on her little Mud House in Tesuque. But Santa Fe was then, as it had been for hundreds of years, a working town, not an Art Haven at all, and though it was the Capital of Nuevo Mexico under the Spanish and the Mexicans, and then under the Americans Capital of the Territory and later the State of New Mexico, its political status had little impact on most of the people who lived and worked there. In those days, Tesuque, which is now a suburban enclave for the very fancy indeed, including some of those (like the Stedmans) who regularized and popularized and continue the Santa Fe Style in the 1920's and '30's and now, when Sergeant was re-doing her Mud House, it was as it had long been a ranching outpost, a Spanish village and an Indian Pueblo. All of that heritage is still there, but it is overlain now with much of what Sergeant and others from Back East brought with them: a deep admiration for arts and letters and an abiding sense of Place, as in: This is the Place.

I've also mentioned that people in New Mexico have private libraries (we certainly do!) and they read. Many write, too. In addition to the plethora of visual artists, performing artists, and would-be artists, Santa Fe, Taos and other parts of New Mexico boast all kinds of literary artists. The stories that this place has to tell! Well, the tales, anyway.

I think "true fiction" was invented here in New Mexico. I could be wrong of course. Much of Elizabeth Sergeant's story rings absolutely true, for example, and then parts of it don't. You just don't know. And the locals are well-known for, shall we say, "embroidery." Why not? There's no real harm done, and the record can always be corrected later. If need be.

In Sergeant's day, Santa Fe was a working town as it had been for hundreds of years, and as it still is in parts. The Santa Fe Trail, of course, terminated at the Santa Fe Plaza, and it was along the Santa Fe Trail that "America" and this distant, exotic land communicated with one another commercially and socially. Prior to the American Conquest, it was a somewhat limited communication, as the Spanish and later Mexican authorities were not particularly kindly disposed to Anglo penetration, but after the Conquest, there was a huge increase in traffic and penetration from the East. Well, "huge." Comparatively speaking.

New Mexico was still very much a backwater until the railroad came, and that wasn't until the 1880's; the Santa Fe itself never did get to Santa Fe, stopping 18 miles short at Lamy on the excuse that it was just too difficult to lay track to the ancient capital. But a spur was eventually built, the trains started arriving, and Modernity arrived. With Modernity came the Artists.

Ever since, the two have wrapped tightly around one another to create the contemporary spirit of New Mexico. It is deeply and permanently ground in the Past -- a Past which is ever-present. The Pueblos and their peoples are still here -- though the ones nearest me were abandoned centuries ago, their residents simply moved over the mountains. Their descendants still live in the Rio Grande Pueblos or the ones further West; or they live in the towns and cities round about or elsewhere in the country or the world. Wherever they live, they carry the spirit of the place they're from with them.

Literature based in New Mexico has had a profound impact on America's sense of the West, more so perhaps than any other Western genre, including that of my own California. In fact, California and New Mexico have long been linked through their shared remote-Spanish culture. But there are other linkages too, including the one of Perpetual Promise. Though linked, the Spirit of the two Places is not the same.

D. H. Lawrence and Frieda came out here in the early '20's and stayed with Mabel Dodge Luhan up in Taos for a season, then set out for a more remote location at what is now the D. H. Lawrence Ranch., a National Historic Site. Aldous Huxley came to call -- after all, these Anglos stick together, especially if they're British! Huxley was profoundly influenced by his sojourn in the remoteness of New Mexico, as can be easily seen in his contrasting perspectives of the Future in "Brave New World." I think he was struck, as so many are, by the sense of permanence of the Pueblos compared to the harried, hurried impermanence of "civilization."

More than anything, Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant seemed to be struck by the people she met here, people she'd been "told about" -- in the characteristic superior/inferior context of the day, but what she found was quite different than what she was told to expect from the Natives. That's the way it goes.

What you find, if you are open to it, is not what you imagine, not what you expect. It's not perfect, far from it. People still come from Back East trying their damnedest to make "perfection" here, but my question is always "why?" Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant found she didn't have to push for "perfection" in New Mexico. The reality and the Spirit of the Place was perfectly good enough.

But then, what do you want perfection for?



[Click image to embiggen text]

There you are then.

The Journal of a Mud House, a continuation --2

[Illustration from "The Journal of a Mud House", Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant, Harper's, May, 1922]

As you can see from the photo above, Ms Sergeant did get her Mud House into habitable condition before she had to leave Tesuque that summer, whatever summer it was, when she bought a couple of acres and its ruined adobe to have a place to stay out in the country.

The wing to the left is her new kitchen that was added to the original three room house at her direction. Well, it was built then torn down then built again because the adobes were set wrong by her main worker, José, who was quite a character if her descriptions are in any way accurate -- which I'm sure they are.

Building and tearing down and building again is fairly routine in parts of New Mexico. It's just what you do, assuming you have the time and the inclination to do something like that in the first place.

Building and abandoning the project is not unknown, either.

Or building and staying a while, then abandoning the project...

You get the picture.

Got to get those ruins to renovate somehow.

Our own project took ten months to get the house into more or less complete enough condition to move in to, quite a good deal longer than Elizabeth Sergeant's project which only took a couple of months over a summer. But then, she only had three rooms plus one added. So it wasn't that much of a job.

Except...

It can be hard to get stuff here, which she found out over and over again. I look around this house today, and I consider what it must have been like for the pioneers who built it originally starting right around 1900 when this section of the East Mountains was opened for settlement.

(The court battles over ownership of the land went on and on, and finally, if I recall correctly, the court ruled none of the claimants had a valid claim, so it was open for homesteading. Whoo-hoo! But even then, people knew it wouldn't be easy.)

There was a railroad spur, though, the remnants of which are still visible, and a little town was laid out, and a handful of settlers moved in and built their scattered adobes, most of which are still standing... more or less. Some are ruins.

From the railroad, of course, you could get things to build with. And so it was. Much of what could be got through ordering it from Back East is still visible in our house -- the doors for example as well as some delightful cabinetry in one of the halls (that I'm sure was built on site but from finish lumber that was ordered in); quite likely the floors were made from pine lumber brought in by rail. The baseboards in some of the rooms, and the window casings -- though not the windows themselves in most cases -- also date from the early period and are obviously made of fancy finish lumber from elsewhere. But when I went up in the attics, I found rather randomly placed joists and beams made of rough finished pine which I figured came from more or less local sources, and their rather casual disposition is perfectly "New Mexico" in my view.
This house is obviously self-built, and some of the details are quite fancy. On the other hand, it's quite primitive, too. There was no indoor plumbing originally, no gas for heating (there are holes in the ceilings for the chimneys of wood stoves that would have been in each room though.)

Of course there was no electricity early on, but some of the wiring clearly dates from very early 20th century, and it appears that there was a wind-powered generator on top of what's now the garage.

Over the years, the house was expanded, most of the extensions built with adobe, and sometimes I think of expanding it again by finishing the attics and perhaps adding a new wing on the north to serve as a living room and transforming the current fairly cramped living room into a rather large dining room cum library. I've also thought about reconfiguring the two west side bedrooms (now used as small library and small workroom) into one larger room with a new bathroom. Adding portals.

But not changing the basic Victorian style of this house into a "Northern New Mexico" version of the Santa Fe Style.

That's the thing. Though this is an Old Adobe ranch house, it is frankly and forthrightly in the Late Victorian (simplified) Style, and so it sometimes strikes visitors as an oddity -- because it doesn't follow the conventions of Santa Fe Style, which -- to circle back to our story -- Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant was in the process of helping to create with her renovation of a ruined adobe (that she figured dated from the 1870's) in Tesuque in the early 1920's.

It took ten months to get our place into good enough shape to move into in part because our contractor had so much trouble with his workers. Yes. Understood. They were mostly residents of the East Mountains, too, though the contractor himself lived in Albuquerque. Nevertheless, they all complained constantly about having to go clear out to our place to work on the house. It was so far, don't you know. Travel time took up so much of their day so they could only get so much done. Worse, it was so hard to get materials and supplies out there, and we such demanding owners, constantly wanting "authentic this or that" instead of what could be found or scrounged locally. In fact, I had to order quite a few things online or purchase them in California and have them sent out to New Mexico because there was nothing available locally that would fit the style of the house.

The things I wanted just weren't available locally. Picky, picky, picky!

Also, I was working in California most of the time the renovation was going on, only making periodic flights out to New Mexico to check on progress and get the contractor paid. So ten months was good time under the circumstances.

I have found since then that indeed a lot of things you might take for granted elsewhere aren't easily available in New Mexico, and if you can get or find them, they cost a lot more than they do wherever you're from. Local materials aren't necessarily cheap; in fact, sometimes they are a good deal more costly than "imports." Thus, for example, there are considerable quantities of East Indian imported building materials available -- doors and columns and quaint things of all kinds -- and they are used as substitutes for Old Spanish stuff (which can be had either as antiquities or contemporary re-creations) because they are considerably less expensive than the "authentic" Spanish materials.

It's quite a sight to see a brand new Santa Fe Style house built with and full of East Indian antiquities. But it would cost a third more or even half again as much to build or renovate your adobe with "authentic" Spanish and/or Spanish style materials. So people go with the East Indian substitutes, which are quite nice in their own right, but seem somehow... foreign!

Elizabeth Shepley Sergeant would never even have thought of doing that. In her day it was possible, "even for a woman" (which was part of what she was writing about) to renovate a house in the truly authentic style of New Mexico, using local labor and materials, and adapting what was needed to what was on hand. She needed adobes, she got adobes -- from a building that had fallen to ruin. Her renovated roof was new-fangled asphalt instead of the piled-on dirt and debris that had been put on top of the authentic vigas and latillas back in the day. She had windows put in, casements no less, still the Style around these parts but harder to get now than they were then. She had a kitchen built and a cast iron stove put in. She furnished her house with locally made furniture and objects, much of it inexpensive by her standards. Anything like it now would cost a fortune.

She had -- and apparently needed -- no electricity, no indoor plumbing, and no heat except for the corner "kiva" fireplaces that were already part of the house when she bought it, and the wood burning cook stove she installed in her new kitchen. But it sounds like she only intended to use the house in summer, and though there might be rain, it's not cold in the summertime in Tesuque. Up in Taos, though, it would be frigid as the North Pole in the wintertime. As the locals there found out again -- if they didn't remember -- when the gas supplies failed during the coldest part of the winter this year.

But her story is about so much more than the house she renovated.




And that's the thing. Ultimately, it's a spiritual journey.

To Be Continued