Mercy and rain

I always thought there was something particularly appropriate about Shakespeare's linking of mercy and rain in those famous lines from The Merchant of Venice:

The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath.

It's been a hot and dry stretch around Goat Rope Farm until yesterday. The word drought was crossing my mind. The creek, which for me is a barometer of the state of the world, was drying up and, while it had water here and there, no longer flowed continuously. The Spousal Unit even rescued some stranded minnows.

Then yesterday, the rains came. Mostly slowly, off and on, 20 minutes here, 30 there, with an occasional cloudburst through the night. Then, as unlikely as it seemed a day or so before, the creek was back. So may it always be.

PRISON REFORM. The state of WV has contracted with the Justice Center of the Council of State Governments to study and make recommendations about dealing with prison overcrowding. Here's hoping it leads to action.


MAGICAL THINKING. Everybody does it.


COOL RANT. Here's another great post on the politics of coal  from last week at Ken Ward's Coal Tattoo holding forth on the latest from WV's junior senator.


GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Another proof

Some people are convinced of the generosity of the universe. They believe that everything was pretty much put there for their convenience. As a pretty strict Darwinian, I have my doubts.

But there is someone on Goat Rope Farm who has no doubts whatsoever. That would be Arpad, our (sort of) Great Pyrenees and general security chief. Arpad is about as close as you can get to a canine incarnation of the Dude on The Big Lebowski.


He abides.

And he is utterly convinced that the universe set things up just for him. In his mind, further proof, if any were needed, came in the form of yet another  partial deer skeleton he he found in the woods which appeared at the proper time.

I really wish he was right about this.

FIGS. Here's the latest edition of the Rev. Jim Lewis' Notes from Under the Fig Tree.

JUST SOS YOU KNOW. More Americans believe in witchcraft than agree with the Supreme Joke's...I mean Supreme Court's Citizens United decision.

BUT WHAT DID IT LOOK LIKE? An amateur paleontologist in Ohio found a weird sea beast.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Nothing or interesting

Deer season in West Virginia came in last week. While I'm not exactly on the hunting varsity team, I did spend a bit of time in the woods.

Even though no deer came my way, I find there's a lot to be said for sitting quietly in the woods and just watching and listening. In my case, there were plenty of squirrels raising hell and lots of woodpecker action.

I also used the time on the hill to re-read another book of my old pal Nietzsche, The Gay Science, sometimes also known as The Joyful Wisdom. If someone asked what the book was about, I'd be hard pressed to answer except to say "all kinds of things."

Nietzsche is the master of the one liner or short epigram. Here are a few that caught my eye this time around:

After a great victory.--What is best about a great victory is that it liberates the victor from the fear of defeat. "Why not be defeated some time, too?" he says to himself; "Now I am rich enough for that.

Always in our company.--Whatever in nature and in history is of my own kind, speaks to me, spurs me on, and comforts me; the rest I do not hear or forget right away. We are always only in our own company.

Against many a defense.--The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments.

Against embarassment.--If you are always profoundly occupied, you are beyond all embarassment.

I especially like this one:

Dreams.--Either we have no dreams or our dreams are interesting. We should learn to arrange our waking life in the same way: nothing or interesting.

A BETTER WAY. The Economic Policy Institute, Demos, and The Century Foundation have come up with an alternative for dealing with deficits and the recession.

GOT SPINE? Here's a call for progressive backbone in the deficit debate.

CHILD POVERTY. Also from EPI, this snapshot shows that the Great Recession pushed more children into poverty.

MAGICAL THINKING, revisited.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

A cosmic ATM?

The last few days have been devoted, among other things, to giving a shout out to Barbara Ehrenreich's newest book, Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America.

While there's clearly nothing wrong with happiness, being cheerful and having a sense of one's ability to improve things, some versions of this kind of thinking view the universe or God as a kind of cosmic ATM or good fairy, one which has nothing more important to do than to grant the wisher a Hummer, MacMansion, or some other object of conspicuous consumption.

Further, this kind of thinking has permeated a corporate culture in which CEOs are viewed as charismatic visionaries who never allow themselves the luxury of a negative thought. In that climate, anyone a couple of years back, for example, who might have suggested that sub-prime mortgage securities might not be the ideal road to prosperity might well have been dismissed or discharged as a negative person.

Even worse is the kind of magical thinking which views the universe as a projection of one's own mental attitude. In that view, people who are wealthy and powerful are getting what they deserve. Those who are dying of poverty, drowned in a tsunami, languishing without health insurance, or are blown up as collateral damage in warfare are presumably only getting back from the universe the kind of energy they sent out.

I'll pass on that one.

On the other hand, one doesn't need delusional thinking to be grateful for the good things in life. So on that note, happy Thanksgiving!

NO LINKS TODAY. El Cabrero is on a long road trip so no links today other than this earlier post from one of Goat Rope Farm's talking animals, Self Help Guru Rooster.

If anything bad happens between the time this post is written and when it's posted, please accept my condolences.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: POSITIVELY ELEVATED