History's million dollar question

Howler, Whoops, and Miracles: Which Party is More Strange?

Great line.

"Democrats, who consider equality the value before which the virtuous genuflect, worry that their nomination might be settled by "superdelegates," who are more equal than others. These are august people (officeholders, party officials, former luminaries) who, although no one voted to give them the job, get to vote at the nominating convention because liberals believe that if they fine-tune the world's rules with this or that wrinkle, everything will come out just right."

So true, so true.

"Many Republicans," he continues, "think that, come what may, things will come out the way Providence intends. Daniel Webster said 'miracles do not cluster,' but Webster did not anticipate Mike Huckabee, whose campaign manager is, evidently, God. Two months ago, Huckabee said he rose in Iowa because of divine intervention (the power that propelled him there was not 'human' but the one that fed the multitudes with two fish and five loaves). On Saturday, as he was winning the caucuses in Kansas, where many Republicans think Darwin should go back to Missouri where he came from, Huckabee said that the arithmetic is daunting (he must win almost all the remaining delegates to stop McCain) but he shall persevere:

'I know people say that the math doesn't work out. Folks, I didn't major in math. I majored in miracles, and I still believe in those, too.'

Although some of his supporters defend him against the accusation of sincerity, it is not unfair to assume that Huckabee, who has made his piety integral to his politics, means what he says. There is appealing clarity, but also a whiff of lunacy or charlatanry, in the theory that the Author of the Universe is writing his campaign story. 'The world,' wrote the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins, 'is charged with the grandeur of God." The world, perhaps, but the Republican delegate scramble?'"

It's an equal-opportunity mocking. And well deserved.

At some point, people acting this dumb have to ask themselves why they take themselves so seriously.

Then, again, that's history's million dollar question, now isn't it?

Love and liberty (and their alternatives)

Gaza notes forbidden Valentine's Day

I love this passage:

"Al-Wakid, a policeman who's stayed off the job since the Hamas takeover, said he began buying flowers for Valentine's Day four years ago, when he was engaged. Since then, his wife has come to expect the gesture, he said.

Across the street at the Rose Flower Shop, two young women, one dressed in a black Islamic robe and head scarf, bought a bouquet of roses, a rare sight in Gaza. The shop had managed to bring in 500 roses from Israel, using Gaza medical patients treated in the Jewish state as "mules," and had about 50 roses left.

Salesman Mohammed Sussi, 30, said he hadn't received any complaints about his business. "They didn't tell us anything, whether from the government or anyone else, that it is 'haram'," he said.

But at a third flower shop, a TV crew earned angry glares from salespeople, and shoppers adamantly refused to be interviewed on camera. Asked why the reluctance, one salesman said his customers didn't want to be filmed doing something "haram."

Even in the most repressive regimes, people break the law for a good cause. Always have. Always will.

"Hamas police spokesman Islam Shahwan said Valentine's Day might go against Gaza's traditions, but Hamas is not trying to replace civil with Islamic law. 'We are by nature a religious people and hate and reject all strange things," he said. "(But) we don't kill adulterers or gays or cut off the hands of thieves.'"

What a relief. I guess everyone congratulates themselves for why someone else is a bigger dick than they are.

But it's nice to know that some celebrations still bring out the best in us.

Love and liberty. We perpetually take them both for granted. And, yet, it is within both of them that we learn the lessons we need to learn to live better lives together.

Doubt that? Consider moving somewhere like Gaza where neither of them are taken as seriously as their alternatives.

Love

And we wonder why so many people have marriages and relationships they are unhappy with.

In Romance, Looks Matter Most to the Beautiful

Because we are so goddamn foolish.

If you marry someone for any other reason than because you're in love with them and they seem like a really stellar person, expect to be disappointed. Looks fade, money comes and goes, and none of it is real love.

And when it doesn't work out, you can come whine to me, but I'll tell you the same goddamn thing. Especially if you whine to me on Valentines.

Find someone you love. And love them.

The single biggest reason that people are unhappy in relationships, I think, is because so many people look for someone to love them rather than someone they can love and give more of themselves than they expect in return.

Love is not that complicated. Like everything else, we just expect too little of ourselves and expect of our partners things they can't give us. Love yourself and find a partner who loves themself and then share everything you have to give.

And ignore bullshit research like this.

Happy Valentine's Day.