Happy Earth Day!
Wisconsin Senator Gaylord (uproarious laughter) Nelson first proposed a national day to celebrate the earth in September of 1969. The Vietnam War was wrecking Southeast Asia’s jungles, the Cuyahoga river caught fire in Cleveland, and South Carolina’s Savannah River nuclear power plant was melting down. The negative aftereffects of mass consumerism and industrialization that emerged during the end of World War II were spreading across North America like a terrible monstrous weed.
All of those events–and the other events that contributed to America’s first environmental movement–were important factors in increasing American’s awareness of the fragility of our natural environment and the long term consequences of its neglect. All of that stuff is incredibly important, but to me there is one event that stands out beyond all the rest.
The picture above was taken on the 7th of December, 1972. Colloquially called the “blue marble” picture, it is the first picture ever taken of our planet. Although this occurred after the first ”official” Earth Day, I think it was the single most important promoter of environmentalism we saw in the twentieth century.
It has since become the most widely distributed picture in human history. It reminds us that what we have is incredibly special and vibrant, but also susceptible to our carelessness. It’s difficult to frame our perspective in the universe when we have our feet firmly planted on the earth’s soil, but we exist in an incredibly precarious state. If we imperil the planet’s habitability, we have nowhere to turn. We are surrounded by a bleak inhospitable vaccum that would freeze our lungs and immediately suck the life out of us if we stepped into it for only a moment. Thinking of conservation and sustainability with that perspective tends to reorganize one’s priorities.
Imagine what it must have been like to look upon this picture for the first time back in 1972. Take some time today to view the high-res version here.
There’s only one of these. Take care of it, and have a great day.
Nixon W. Bush
Who is the worst President in the history of the United States?
OK, obviously. Let me revise the question: Who is the worst President in the history of the United States (active Presidents excluded)?
There are a few names you might be tossing around in your head. Hoover. Buchanan. Harding. But, chances are that there is one especially demonic, psychotic, megalomaniacal gargoyle that immediately leaped forward and started doing somersaults as soon as you finished reading the question.
NIXON
For years, I feel like our generation has lived in Nixon’s shadow. He was always the nadir of American politics. No one ever had anything nice to say about the former President, and he was the constant subject of ridicule for comedians and cartoonists. His physical appearance was ghastly-the demented eyes, the sagging jowls, the profuse sweating, the constant fidgeting, as if he were trying to slip out of his suit without unbuttoning anything. He spoke in a horrible guttural growl that made him sound like a gorgon with laryngitis.
NES RBI Baseball reenactment…
Perhaps the most infamous moment in all of baseball… This is the entire bottom of the 10th inning from game 6 of the Red Sox/Mets 1986 World series… I can’t even begin to guess how long this took the person who did it…
What’s so Civil about War Anyway?
I’ve recently been watching Ken Burn’s epic documentary on the Civil War. As I’m nearing the end, I consider the following two impressions to be the biggest lessons that I have learned so far:
1. The Union’s leaders were not the visionary geniuses we sometimes consider them to have been. Lincoln was a great president, but at the time he was mired in a constant state of doubt and insecurity. The public received his Gettysburg Address with confusion and disinterest, and he was convinced that it had been a failed speech. The Emancipation Proclamation nearly backfired on him as well, when thousands of northern civilians rioted in response. He was unpopular towards the end of his first term, and he did not expect to return for a second. Union generals such as Ambrose Burnside and George McClellan made innumerable tactical blunders and provided despairingly poor leadership. Their cowardice and inept battle plans often resulted in thousands of deaths with no gain and no explanation save misjudgment. The Union’s eventual victory is quite astounding, and in some ways seems almost accidental. The people who lived through the conflict certainly did not anticipate or even expect the eventual outcome.
2. Aside from the whole “we-believe-black-people-are-property” component of their ethos, it’s pretty difficult not to fall in love with the Confederate cause. There is something incredibly romantic and compelling about the way in which secessionists spoke about their culture and their land. In a way, they sound almost like a band of Robin Hoods defending their Sherwood Forest against President Nottingham Lincoln. Colorful characters like Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Nathan Bedford Forrest seem almost as if they had sprung from the pages of an ancient Homeric epic poem. The common rebel soldier possessed a roguish wisecracking demeanor that made him considerably more likeable than his stoic but bland Union counterpart. Confederates also had an extensive spy network, which included Southern Belles who would ferry arms under their hoop skirts. There was even one woman, a debutante living in D.C., who regularly extracted secrets from the Union’s secretary of war via seductive methods!
Sweet Home Alabama, the way it should be performed…
…with the entire Red Army Choir backing things up… (This is the Leningrad Cowboys, btw… This goes out to you BigJar (and any Lynyrd Skynyrd fans)…
Nice 9/11 reference there “Skip”…
Happy Opening Day Everybody!!
‘Ol Busheroo throwing out the first pitch (and getting heckled…) at the Nationals’ season opener…
Bible + Natural History Museum = Awesome
Now, I know there are plenty of religious people who would never allow their children to be put through shit like this… but this is what you get when dogma and superstition overtake reason and evidence… Oh, and evolution is definitely a religion; I pray to Darwin and PZ Myers nightly…
In honor of the day…
A little something I think we can all agree with: from Monty Python’s Life of Brian…
Obama talks to us like adults, has a serious conversation about race
If you have 35 minutes, do yourself a favor and watch/listen to the speech Obama gave yesterday about race in America. The desire to broach the topic has been building for a while, and he finally said, you wanna talk about race? I can talk about race biatch! (not referring to hill here). Not only does Obama have the personal experience to speak with authority on the topic, but he’s clearly an informed academic on the topic as well. It is very rare that a politician will talk about a topic like this without dumbing down the issue.
after the fold, Tracy Morgan hilarity… Read more
Fecking brilliant…
This is a video in which god is seen offering the position of jesus to a guy in what is conceivably Heaven. It is a funny discussion and it made me laugh. Perhaps it will make you laugh. Let me know if it did! Thanks for being you!
