Asheville

Blaire and I visited Asheville this past weekend. We had a really great time; we drove along the Blueridge Parkway and checked out the Asheville downtown (along with a few of the really nice restaurants there). The selection of vegetarian food in Asheville is extensive and excellent.

There’s something nice about being up that high. I’m not sure what it is, exactly — maybe it’s the quality of the air, but being in the mountains makes the mind clearer. Perhaps the cuisine helped. Either way, we enjoyed ourselves. I always enjoy myself when I’m with her.

UFO’s and Little Green Men

I’ve always been guilty of being hooked on the History Channel. Sometimes, shamefully, I sit transfixed by the glowing TV. Armed with snack-food and more free time than any preacher might approve of, I have been known to watch the History Channel for stretches of greater than six hours before.

At any rate, they’ve been airing a lot of UFO shows recently and it got me thinking — how much evidence would be required to convince the public that extra-terrestrials have visited (or do visit) our planet? I’m not saying they actually have or actually do. However, I find the question extremely interesting.

There have been countless sightings, not only by toothless cow farmers, but also by highly trained (and hopefully reliable) military personnel from many countries (including the U.S. and, notably, including virtually all ranks — all the way up to Generals). There have been incidents such as the Phoenix Lights incident where thousands of people witnessed a UFO for extended periods of time. Additionally, there are more ex-government workers and ex-military personnel blowing the whistle on this issue than on practically any other out there. What I mean to say is — there are a whole bunch of UFO sightings around, and many of them are from trained personnel whose jobs are to observe accurately (many of the personnel in question were stationed at facilities that housed nuclear warheads at the time of the sightings — these are people we’d like to think are reliable both in their observational faculties and in their moral natures).

I’m not saying little green men are visiting our planet; clearly, however, something is happening that is causing these people to see things. Here’s an interesting idea, though: suppose the reports are true. What level of evidence would the public need to believe them? For example: if the Phoenix Lights incident was truly caused by extra-terrestrial visitors, then it seems like clear-as-day evidence of this has been completely ignored by the public. When people don’t believe the Phoenix Lights were aliens, they don’t believe it based on the evidence or the government’s explanation of it. An unreliable government comprised of habitual liars claimed that the lights were caused by flares dropped in military training exercises. The full range of phenomena reported by people could not be explained by flares. Therefore, people do not reject the report based on any strong reason, and they do so, perhaps, in spite of the evidence.

I talked to my dad about this some today and he made a point I’ve heard quite a lot. What he said was the following: “how could a government that can’t keep any secrets at all keep such a huge secret as this for multiple decades?” The only answer I had for him is “they haven’t been able to keep it secret at all.”

Whether the reports of alien visitors are true or not is beside the point — you can’t claim that the government has been able to keep anything silent at all in these cases. If aliens really have been visiting us, then the government has done an awful job keeping it quiet; there have been way too many whistle-blowers running around trying to sell their stories.

The government hardly needs to keep anything secret at all, in fact. People buy the ridiculous explanations they give for hard-to-explain UFO sightings (swamp gas, weather balloons, mass hallucinations, flares, etc). People who claim to see UFO’s are deemed mentally unstable or liars out to gain attention or make a buck (although this is true in many cases, why should we automatically assume each case is like this?).

I have no idea how much evidence would be required to convince myself or the public at large that aliens are afoot. Perhaps something like a government admission and declassification of UFO footage would do the trick. The Mexican government did this with footage of 11 UFO’s taken by one of its aircraft, and the British government is supposedly declassifying a bunch of UFO documents this coming year. Even then, however, will people be convinced? Will I? I’m still skeptical on both counts.  All of it’s pretty hard to swallow.

The Jesus-Pimp

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/12/23/huckabee-unapologetic-for-religious-tone/

The gist of this news story: Presidential hopeful Mike Huckabee name-drops Jesus into a televised “Merry Christmas” message to score some easy points with the evangelical right-wing base.

Here’s what Huckabee’s message said:

“Are you about worn out by all the television commercials you’ve been seeing, mostly about politics? Well, I don’t blame you. At this time of year sometimes it’s nice to pull aside from all of that and just remember that what really matters is the celebration of the birth of Christ and being with our family and friends. And I hope that you and your friends will have a magnificent Christmas season. And on behalf of all of us, God Bless and Merry Christmas. I’m Mike Huckabee and I approved this message.”

After drawing a fair amount of heat for the message, here’s how he responded during his campaign-stop at Cornerstone Church:

“I got in a little trouble this last week because I actually had the audacity to say ‘Merry Christmas.’ Isn’t that an odd thing to say at this time of year?”

Gee Mike, maybe people aren’t angry that you had the audacity to say “Merry Christmas”. Maybe they’re angry that you had the audacity to pimp out Jesus Christ for political capital. Did that thought ever cross your mind?

I don’t recall Huckabee sending out televised Merry Christmas messages in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina before he started campaigning for president. Also the choice of states is quite interesting given the “non-political” nature of the spot.

It’s all-in-all sickening. How this sort of thing fails to offend most Christians escapes me. The fact that I would want to protect and respect Christ’s memory more than somebody who actually thinks that he is God baffles me.

War imagery in our society

This is just a brief observation on my part — there have probably already been studies on this, and if not, there should be. War imagery in our society is especially prevalent; people desire to identify themselves as part of a harsh, violent struggle, either figuratively or literally.

Some salient examples: the perceived “War on Christmas”, the “War on Drugs”, the “War on Poverty”, the “Culture War” (along with Bill O’Reilly’s book Culture Warrior), the “War on Terror”, the popular hymn “Onward Christian Soldiers”, and so on and so forth. There are probably plenty more examples than that. People are proud to be a part of a fight, a struggle, and beyond that, a good old-fashioned war. It’s as if wanting to start a war over something is the highest mark of seriousness an issue can achieve in this country.

It’s easy to associate this phenomenon solely with conservatives, but I think that simplifies the issue — the trait seems to be an overall American trait. Take the “War on Poverty” for instance. It’s as if liberals have to say “look, our cause is as important as yours … important enough to be a war, even!” as if it were a good thing.

I wish peace were more of a virtue. I mean, even proposed programs at ending poverty are identified as part of a “war” effort. How sad.

First post.

Here’s a place to write, something I desperately need. I keep starting blogs and stopping them — hopefully this time it’ll be different (or so I keep telling myself). Either way, I need a place to write a little bit every day; I’ve had a hard time maintaining any skill with writing whatsoever as I don’t stay in practice.

Anyway — here’s something I’ve been doing lately: reading The Ultimate Hitchhiker’s Guide, which is a volume containing the entire Hitchhiker’s Guide series by Douglas Adams. There have been a million reviews on these works by a million people, so writing out my full opinion thus far as not a wise use of time. However, this is my second time through the series, and I have to say it’s extremely fun (even the second time through). I’m currently unwinding after a hard semester at grad school, and a fun read like this is just what the doctor ordered. It’s a fast read and takes little effort to get through, but it’s fun, silly, witty, and Adams knows how to make his readers smile. All in all: quality.