Silenced Majority Portal

Put That in Your Basket

(hat tip to James in Florida)

Storm in US over chocolate Jesus

A New York gallery has angered a US Catholic group with its decision to exhibit a milk chocolate sculpture of Jesus Christ The six-foot (1.8m) sculpture, entitled "My Sweet Lord", depicts Jesus Christ naked on the cross. Catholic League head Bill Donohue called it "one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever".

The sculpture, by artist Cosimo Cavallaro, will be displayed from Monday at Manhattan's Lab Gallery.
The Catholic League, which describes itself as the nation's largest Catholic civil rights organisation, also criticised the timing of the exhibition. "The fact that they chose Holy Week shows this is calculated, and the timing is deliberate," Mr Donohue said. He called for a boycott of the gallery and the hotel which houses it.

'Overwhelming response'

The gallery's creative director, Matt Semler, said the gallery was considering its options in the wake of angry e-mails and telephone calls. "We're obviously surprised by the overwhelming response and offence people have taken," he said. "We are certainly in the process of trying to figure out what we're going to do next." Mr Semler said the timing of the exhibition was coincidental.

Mr Cavallaro, the Canadian-born artist, is known for using food ingredients in his art, on one occasion painting a hotel room in mozzarella cheese. He used 200 pounds (90 kg) of chocolate to make the sculpture which, unusually, depicts Jesus without a loincloth.

(Thanks to Chris for pulling that from the BBC/Guardian)

Jumping the gun here, but Easter is my favorite holiday (the Pagan part).

UPDATE

Choc Christ exhibition scrapped over Catholic outrage
ABC Online - 14 hours ago
A Manhattan art gallery has cancelled its Easter-season exhibit of a life-size chocolate sculpture of a naked Jesus after an outcry by Catholics.
Gallery Director May Resign Over Chocolate Jesus Exhibition Playfuls.com
Chocolate Jesus exhibit cancelled BBC News
New York Daily News - Beliefnet.com - Pittsburgh Post Gazette - Guardian Unlimited
all 651 news articles »

This country is so lightweight..

The Zen of Kirsten-Daiensai

Richard Kirsten Daiensai: Seattle artist, painter, printmaker, sculptor, and Zen Buddhist priest. Daiensai has spent several months each year for the past 49 years wandering through Japan and Korea. All his paintings and prints are done in the quiet and solitude of these retreats, thus creating art that reflects the divine energy that exists in all things. Often, the spiritual quality of his work is tempered with a sense of cosmic joy and warm humor.

A flute, without a hole, makes no music

Be happy, while awaiting, happiness

The divine comedy of being

Let us merge, into the heartbeat, of all things

All paths, come, from the void, and, return to the void

"I was once asked why I don't participate in anti-war demonstrations. I said that I will never do that, but as soon as you have a pro-peace rally, I'll be there."

-- Mother Theresa
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Keeping with the mood, Lucca's Statuary molds everything - gnomes, Virgin Marys, fountains, urns, frogs, and everything else you might expect in a 20,000 square foot menagerie, but what I really liked was the Buddha factory.

Americone Dream

Seeing Things: Jim Woodring at Fantagraphics in Georgetown

Georgetown is on the outskirts of industrial Seattle, in the shadow of Boeing. Deco-era brick buildings are still within the grasp of artists and small businesses that have been pushed out of Pioneer Square and Belltown by gentrification and condos. Fantagraphics Comics has their stock adjacent to Georgetown Records' incredibly strange vinyl.

According to Wikipedia, "Georgetown has had a certain degree of a "scene" since the 1990s. It seemed to peak in the winter of 2001, when Industrial Coffee and Stella Pizza were both hosting a lot of live musical performances. The former folded, and the latter stopped hosting shows and changed its name to Stellar Pizza.

Since that time, however, quite a few new bars and coffeehouses have opened in the neighborhood, plus a record store, a barber shop, a bakery, a scooter shop, a "skin sanctuary" (which is to say, a waxing salon), and an art gallery/recording studio."

Laura Cassidy of the Seattle Weekly described the prevailing aesthetic: "Creatively employing the open, airy brick-walled spaces left behind by industry and manufacturing, and augmenting them with local art and 20th-century detritus, Georgetown's merchants consistently fashion warm, imaginative interiors: places you want to visit and never want to leave. Just walking through the streets you witness post-squat, industrial bohemian chic.

Georgetown is bounded on the north by the mainlines of the BNSF Railway and Union Pacific Railroad, beyond which is the Industrial District; on the west by the Duwamish River, across which is South Park; on the east by Interstate 5, beyond which is Beacon Hill; and on the south by Boeing Field. Despite being surrounded on all sides by industry and major transportation corridors, Georgetown retains a good number of residences and businesses.

White settlement began on September 16, 1851, when Luther Collins staked his claim. It was named by Julius Horton after his son in 1890. Rainier Brewing Company's original Rainier Brewery, once reportedly the sixth-largest brewery in the world, began operations in 1882. On the National Register of Historic Places and now called the Georgetown Brewhouse, the red brick brewery, home to artists and small businesses, dominates the commercial district along Airport Way S.

Georgetown existed as an independent city from 1904 to 1910, when it was annexed by Seattle. The movement for annexation began in 1906 but did not gain significant support until 1909. Following presentation of a petition for an annexation vote, a special election was held on March 29, 1910. The annexation proposition passed with 389 votes in favor and 238 opposed. The City of Georgetown was officially consolidated with Seattle on April 4, 1910.

Fantagraphics is dedicated to promoting comics as an art form and has published critically acclaimed and award-winning series and graphic novels such as Ghost World, Hate and Love and Rockets, for many years it was financially dependent on its pornographic Eros imprint.

In 2003 Fantagraphics almost went out of business due to the failure of its then-distributor to the book trade. Fantagraphics was saved by a restructuring and a successful appeal to comic book fandom that resulted in a huge number of orders.

My favorite is "Bitchy Bitch," by Roberta Gregory. Fantagraphics hosts gallery openings and has a couple of active half-price rooms, one for regular underground comics, one for erotic ones.

Suppose you loved underground comics like Robert Crumb and the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers (if you are a baby boomer) or you are into anime (your parent is a baby boomer), they will have it.

Jim Woodring was featured, in a show called "Seeing Things." Miller Draft and water were served and the bar next door had free peanuts. Jim Woodring (born October 11, 1952) is a comic book author and artist. Jim suffered from hallucinations of floating, gibbering faces over his bed as a child. He told The Comics Journal that under the right circumstances he is still capable of "hallucinating like mad." Woodring dropped out of college when he hallucinated a cartoon-like frog in the middle of an art history course. He spent a few years working as a garbageman, developed a serious drinking problem, eventually quit drinking, then worked in animation studios, then turned to comics. He gets serious points (from me) for being self-taught.

Georgetown Records sells the best and cheapest vinyl party records in all genres, strong especially in exotica, western and foreign rarities. The prices are unbelievably good and the wares hard to resist.
You think you have alot of these in your garage or basement ..

Note the expert Photoshopping of the Lee Harvey Oswald assassination by Jack Ruby to create a rockabilly Band on the door of The Shitter.

Time for a new Protest Sign

(submitted by Alan Castle)

Leonid

I thought at first that he was speaking Russian.  I could not understand a word.  I searched his face.  I finally ran his accent through my auditory processing filter and then I understood every word without a problem.  "My name is Leonid, like Brezhnev.  Are you born here or another country?  What is your background, your grandparents?    English ..  good background.  You are  curious person, looking at walls where people were writing.  Have you been in Russia?  It was cheap fifteen years ago. Now you must be millionaire.  Do you have a house?  Do you have room to rent to me?"

"It's the Muslims. We will be at war forever, I am afraid."

For several days I have been in shock over a comment by an intelligent, kind and caring Christian woman who announced to me as if it were fact that we would be at war in the middle east "until those muslims stop attacking us." She added that she didn't see any hope for an end it.

I am dumbfunded. I am also amazed that I didn't just deck her for her willful ignorance. I was actually really nice to her. I forcefully changed the subject. She was so nice, I just didn't want to come down on her the way I normally do when people exhibit their ignorance, when such ignorance causes death.

I was at the local Bi-Mart to get some seedling soil for the garden that I hope will offer me a few moments of peace this coming summer. I saw this older woman with about 20 gallons of bottled water and I stopped to chat to let her know that with containers she could get filtered water from a machine for .35 cents per gallon and save $1000's per year!

She laughed, as she was buying distilled water for a good friend who had kidney stones. "Ohhhhhh," I said, "never mind!" And we chatted about her friend who had this sudden downturn in her health (probably requiring surgery if she can't dissolve the Stones). Her friend's husband just deployed to Iraq a few weeks ago as part of a medical team. And they have several elementary school aged children, one of whom had a fall that required a trip to the ER for stiches.

I expressed how I thought that the health issues in the family are probably the natural result of, essentially, losing the patriarch.

I also expressed regret that the husband had to go to Iraq.

My new stranger-friend agreed, but assured me that the husband absolutely wanted to go to serve his country. (I can't imagine any thinking person believing that deploying to Iraq 4 years into it was 'serving their country'. Did they not get my Feb blog post on what will happen to them if this man is seriously injured?)

Sensing that I was probably talking to a bush/war supporter though, I stated that I was sorry it was even necessary for ANYONE to fight ANY war. And that's when my new stranger-friend hit me in the gut.

Oh, well, until the Muslims over there stop attacking us, we are going to have to continue to fight them there.

She expressed that as if it made sense and as if I would say, "Oh yeah... well, of course, that's exactly right. Those evil Muslims, dammit!"

Okay, earlier I said I was reallly, really nice. I lied. I had to say something. I knew immediately that going into the truth talking points (no WMDs... they didn't have anything to do with 9/11.....it's a civil war) was not going to go over well. And since she reduced it down to a RELIGIOUS issue... I figured fair was fair, and I said, with much animation:

Oh, I don't think it's a "Muslim Problem." I mean, I am not a Christian, and people right here in this town treat me like I am some Satan Worshipper or something! I have a problem with that! [I got scared cause I just know to my bone that she probably thought.. egad, it's a damn lesbian! Lesbians and Satan are one and the same!]

[I continued....] I mean, I am a really nice and decent person. Ask my dog! [who was thankfully sitting in the car next to me looking happy and healthy] So maybe we should deal with religious extremism here before we attack it over there. And I might add that if the western world had not caused complete havoc in the middle east for the past 90 years, things would be a lot different [knowing full well that this woman would have no clue that the chopping up of the Ottoman Empire is at the root of this mess....]

To my surprise, my new stranger-friend didn't even start edging away from me. I give her credit. She didn't respond in any noticeable way. Not even a facial expression. Maybe it was the strangest response she had ever heard and maybe she will think there might be more to the story?

I then just changed the subject back to her sick friend and gave her the very best advice ever for dealing with Kidney Stones. I sure hope she tells her friend try castor oil packs. She sounded like she would.

I wonder if she is as dumbstruck with what I expressed as I am with what she said?

I know one thing, there's a soul sickness in this nation. No amount of reason, truth or fact about our illegal invastion and ultimate occupation in the middle of a bloody civil war that we started is going to get through to a subtantial number of our citizens. These people seriously believe the WHOLE ISSUE comes down to "fighting them there, so we don't have to fight them here."

"So we don't have to fight them here.... " Where do you go with that nutwing talking point?

I am sorry some bad guys did something really evil in 2001. That was a bad day. I remember an interview by Bill Clinton from wayyy back. He was talking about how you handle foreign policy with different cultures and how you really need to take their history in account to understand what formed their belief system or national character. One example he gave was China. China has a loooonnnnngggg arse history of being invaded. As a result, they are a bit paranoid and making agreements with them takes some TLC to gain their trust. They require big safeguards and boundaries (like a Great Wall as an example. Hey, aren't we building a Great Wall too?).

The USA? What is our history? It's been a pretty fine ride these past 250 years! We have had TWO attacks in the past 200 years. One by a country (Japan in 1941) and one by a motley crew of 200 extremist haters (Bin Laden in 2001). TWO. We have never had an invasion where a bunch of foreigners dropped in and took over our whole lives. Why are we so paranoid as a result of 9/11? Is it because we believed we were untouchable and we are reacting with total indignancy at the gall that someone would blow something up on our soil? We didn't call out the cavalry when other nations had stuff blown up on their soils.

The war propagandists have a good portion of our population believing that that last attack was an absolute attack 'on our way of life." A building came down. 3000+ people died. Let's not exaggerate here, folks! That day I went to my job and knew I was safe traveling about the city. I had sex with my main man that night (well, I am lying.... but we coulda if we wanted to and there wouldn't have been any bombs going off in the neighborhood). I even went to the grocery store that evening to pick up some things for supper - with no fear. I prayed (without persecution) many times that day. Heck, my boss worked my arse off that day. It was imperative that we get that trademark application filed, dammit! Business as usual.

The only change in my life was that I was sad and upset about what had happened.  But my 'way of life' didn't change. That didn't happen until a few weeks later when those I elected to represent me in Congress passed the US Patriot Act. That's the day my life changed.

• Today I know that everything I write on this blog is being censored.
• Every e-mail I send should be considered 'read and filed by the government.'
• I consider every phone call I make as being listened to and 'evaluated.'
• The news stories I read this week about Khalid confessing to everything except the assassination of JFK are really about my government performing torture as a routine tool for fighting this 'war on terror.' (We used to set the standards for civilized behavior!)
• I know that when I voted in 2002 and 2004 that it is very possible that my ballot was thrown out on grounds that I am ineligible to vote for some erroneous reason -- and I will never be told about it OR that the tabulating machines didn't count my vote.
• I know that if I write a letter to George W. Bush, Jr telling him what I really think about him that I might come home and find that someone has been in my house going through my personal effects.
• I know that all the letters I have written to congress people expressing my anger and dissent has definitely put me on a list somewheres in the federal government.
• I know that marching against the then-potential invasion of Iraq in Jan and Feb 2003 put me on the same list.
• And the worst change in my life?  Knowing that my country has killed over 600,000 people. Boy, that should make bad guys re-evaluate future actions against the US of A, eh? 

Oh yeah, I am afraid. But it isn't a fear of Muslims. Lord, where IS a mosque when a fearful, doubtful gal needs one? I am in need of spiritual solace in a big way. On the contrary, I am afraid of the evil-doers that have been propped up by arrogantly self-defined Christians who have propped up some scary traitors to the US Constitution who have, indeed, attacked my 'way of life.'

A Sad Anniversary

**It was impossible and probably pointless to do crowd estimates in Seattle this three-day weekend. There were protest rallies yesterday and today, peace vigils in a number of neighborhoods tonight, and an event with a popular Congressman last night.

What I did today was try to make the rounds of feeder rallies that would eventually feed into a master rally at the Federal Building. I saw a mix of church, political and neighborhood organizations as well as those devoted to issues such as the environment, human rights and labor. There was noticeable inclusion of those all along the age spectrum, range of incomes, race and ethnicity and both civilian and military (past and present). I also overheard police and bus drivers talking about chances for overtime, news reports about traffic congestion related to protests and I saw some local media and a couple of helicopters overhead. So I guess for a work day, it was a good representation.

All the same, it's a damn shame to commemorate going into our 5th year of a needless war. I read earlier today in our local newspaper that "containing" Saddam with flyovers and weapons inspections would have cost 1/10th as much as this war. The financial cost is almost unfathomable, but the human cost is even more so.

Excerpted from Rep. John Murtha's Blog:

...During this year, the Bush Administration has requested $1 trillion for the Department of Defense. $9 billion a month is being expended for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, including a $2 billion a month logistic trail for transporting equipment and personnel into Iraq.

Over 3,200 of our sons and daughters have lost their lives in Iraq and close to 25,000 have been wounded, to include thousands of traumatic brain injuries and hundreds of limb amputations. The cost of disability benefits as a result of this protracted and intense war will be staggering. A recent report by the Harvard University School of Government put the total cost of providing medical care and disability benefits to veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan at $350 to $700 billion...

Thousands rally in Minneapolis: Familes, students, dogs and -- penguins (photo journal)

Five thousand rallied and marched earlier today in Minneapolis. These photos were all taken today at that rally.

What were they doing?  Five thousand were agitating for peace.

I counted five pro-war/Bush supporters.

By now, nearly everyone realizes the president’s pants are on fire.

And those lies have led to many deaths.

The number of US dead is rising everyday.

And when the number of injured is included, it’s much higher.

As the NY Times reported today, families of the soldiers are suffering

and by some reports, as many as 400,000 Iraqis have died.

Money spent on the war cannot be used for healthcare.

And imagine how much college tuition that money would support.

We are saying no to US terrorism

The conflict in Iraq is not a war, but a result of an occupation.

US legislators should listen. Americans overwhelmingly want peace

Bring the troops home

How many ways do we have to say it

We have taken to the streets. We have voted.

No more shock and awe diplomacy

It’s time to think. End this mistake now.

McDermott's Potato Feed

This is a post that I just put at Democracy Cell Project, which I didn't do as an article - because Jim McDermott is the Congressman from my district. I'm not plugging him in a political sense when I write about him. I'm writing about him in the sense I would write about Martin Luther King or some other hero who represents the common good. It is beyond partisan, but I'm not sure how to make that clear.

...

I just went to Congressman Jim McDermott's Potato Feed which he has every year around St. Patrick's Day. Jim's wife is in South Africa with a Professional Development Foundation, working with AIDS patients and helping determine which agencies are beinf the most effective.

He went into politics after working with Vietnam Vets during the Vietnam War (mostly head-injured and he is a psychiatrist). He has visited over 200 countries and done alot fo psychiatric patients, AIDS patients especially in Africa, and for vets as regards depleted uranium and post-traumatic stress, dating from the 1991 Gulf War.

He was one of the few in Congress who voted against the Iraq War, realizing from day one that we would have a flood of head injuries coming back and we are. We have only seen the tip of the iceberg. Compared with Vietnam, we are saving more soldiers who aren't killed and we know how to fix arms and legs but not brains. The brain can only take so much jostling around (and I've worked as a speech pathologist with head-injured).

Jim has been to a retreat with Pelosi and believes there will be a vote about Iran, and limiting Congressional authorization, because if you give Bush an inch, he takes a mile. They know that now. He told me personally tonight that if we go into Iran, it will be 30 years before we ever get out. I have seen him most every time he is in town and he has really been focussed on stopping them before it is too late.

The audience asked him hard questions, and people in his/my district are devoted, informed and supportive. They do ask about impeachment and he says Bush is impeachable but it would tie up the rest of the time in his lame duck term and the investigations have to happen. Congress has to undue alot of the damage that has been done under the Republicans. & we'd be stuck with Cheney. Now he did say that virtually every committee has investigations to run because this administration has done whatever they wanted for six years. & that if we don't get back our system of checks and balances the way the Constitution intended, then we would be living with an Emperor; that the President didn't need more power.

He said he would be surprised if Gonzales isn't gone by Friday and that Republicans in the Congressional gym consider him a rock around their neck and are admitting it. When he went to the White House to talk about health care, Rove even came back to schmooz with him.

I did also meet a lobbyist for Care International and she was trying to help get Joe Biden enough money to stay in the race. Both of us favored the same people - Biden, Richardson, maybe Obama. Both of us were pissed that the media has determined the top tier before the race should have even begun and that experience doesn't seem to be valued enough. She also was touting the slogan PELOSI in 2007, which I thought was a good idea.

Now to go to this I had to donate (which I never mind) and I missed the protest sponsored by ANSWER but it was mostly the "usual suspects" and I'm going tomorrow to the one by SNOW because it will have all the neighborhood groups and people from all walks of life.

It was really fun tonight with all the food and balloons and beer and to be surrounded with people who care deeply, but also very sobering because Jim is a very hard and relentless worker and always lets us know how high the stakes. It is really a situation in my district where he works for us and we work for him and that's the way it should be.

Slugbug

Saw this bumper sticker as I headed to my car.