Surf almanac with menu above. Click here to consult your free I Ching and Tarot while waiting (opens in a new window).
The Blogmanac: "On This Day" ... and much more
Think universally. Act terrestrially.
For in a hard-working society, it is rare and even subversive to celebrate too much, to revel and keep on reveling: to stop whatever you're doing and rave, pray, throw things, go into trances, jump over bonfires, drape yourself in flowers, stay up all night, and scoop the froth from the sea.
Anneli Rufus*
*Ø* Blogmanac August 2, 1939 | Albert tells FDR "we can do it!"
Albert Einstein suggested to President Roosevelt that atomic research should commence in the US. Roosevelt’s approval led to the construction of the first atomic bomb.
* Ø * Ø * Ø *
Albert Einstein arrives at a party and introduces himself to the first person he sees and asks, "What is your IQ?" to which the man answers "241." "That is wonderful!" says Albert. "We will talk about the Grand Unification Theory and the mysteries of the universe. We will have much to discuss!"
Next Albert introduces himself to a woman and asks, "What is your IQ?" to which the lady answers, "144." "That is great!" says Albert. "We can discuss politics and current affairs. We will have much to discuss!"
Albert then goes to another person and asks, "What is your IQ?" to which the man answers, "71." Albert ponders this for a moment, and then says, "How about them damn Muslims, huh?"
On August 2, 1876, while playing poker in a saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota, Wild Bill Hickok was shot and killed by Jack McCall who was later tried and hanged on March 1, 1877. The hand that Hickok held at the time he was shot was a pair of eights and a pair of aces. The hand later became known as the "dead man's hand."
Named for the god Lugh, who is associated with this season of Lammas, this is an old name for the Perseids, the most familiar of all meteor showers, that take place at around this time of year. Associated with the Swift-Tuttle Comet, the Perseids have been well documented since at least 830 CE and take their name from the constellation Perseus where shooting stars appear. We can well imagine ancient Celts looking upon these wonders and associating them with other phenomena of the season between the equinox and solstice, including the heat of the last of the Dog Days.
As is well known, most ancient cultures looked on meteor showers and other phenomena in the sky as having supernatural meaning. In pre-Zoroastrian Inida, the Perseids were the Pairikas, the prototypes of the Peris, the nymphs or female angels of later Persian tradition, and likewise the Parigs or Witches of Manichaeism. The Pairikas, in the form of worm-stars, are said to fly between the earth and the heavens at this time. These ‘shooting stars’ fall annually at about the time when Tistrya (Sirius) is supposed to be most active.
The remarkable annual appearance of the Perseids might explain why the ancient Egyptian Lychnapsia (‘Festival of Lights’, or ‘The Lights of Isis’) at this time of year was revered in the Osirian mysteries.
*Ø* Blogmanac | NY Times Links to Blogs, Scraps 'Public Editor' Idea
"(2003-07-31) -- New York Times executive editor Bill Keller said today he has scrapped plans to hire a public editor as a "reader representative," and instead will link the online newspaper to a network of so-called "blogs".
"Many bloggers post political and media commentary on personal web sites and often link to news stories in the Times and other news sources.
"'I figured we could save some money, and get better quality by linking to blogs,' said Mr. Keller, who recently took the reins of the so-called "gray lady" after a credibility scandal toppled the paper's former editor. 'If we hire a public editor, he'll quickly become an insider and people will think it's just an insincere, self-serving PR move. By linking to bloggers who critique us daily, we show that we respect the free marketplace of ideas, and aren't afraid of the heat.'
"A spokesman for the network of bloggers said, "We'll be glad to get the increased visitor traffic, and the Times readers will be glad to get the truth...for a change.'"
*Ø* Blogmanac | Legal warning to church on gay stance IRELAND, 2 August -- Clergy and bishops who distribute the Vatican's latest publication describing homosexual activity as "evil" could face prosecution under incitement to hatred legislation. The Irish Council for Civil Liberties (ICCL) has warned that the language in the 12-page booklet is so strong it could be interpreted as being in breach of the Act.
Published by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, it states that Catholics have a duty to oppose the introduction and operation of legislation recognising same-sex unions. It identifies politicians as having a duty to vote against any such moves. According to the document, Catholic teaching states that while homosexuals should be treated with "respect, compassion and sensitivity", homosexuality was "objectively disordered".
"Those who would move from tolerance to the legitimisation of specific rights for cohabiting homosexual persons need to be reminded that the approval or legalisation of evil is something far different from the toleration of evil," it states. It also claims that allowing children to be adopted into same-sex unions would mean "doing violence to these children". This would place them "in an environment that is not conducive to their full human development".
Ms Aisling Reidy, director of the ICCL, warned yesterday that the statement could be in violation of the 1989 Incitement to Hatred Act. Those convicted under the Act can face jail terms of up to six months.
"The document itself may not violate the Act, but if you were to use the document to say that gays are evil, it is likely to give rise to hatred, which is against the Act," according to Ms Reidy. "The wording is very strong and certainly goes against the spirit of the legislation."
Under the Act literature which is threatening, abusive or insulting, linked with the intent of stirring up hatred, is illegal.
In the Northern Hemisphere, halfway between the Summer Solstice and the Autumn equinox, comes the ancient Celtic pagan festival of Lughnasadh, also called Lughnasa (or the modern Irish spelling, Lúnasa) and Lammas, one of the eight Sabbats – one of the High Holidays, or four Greater Sabbats – of the Celtic Wheel of the Year. (This is the least known of the four seasonal cross-quarter days. Certainly, Samhain (Halloween) and Beltane (May Day) get more press in our age.) (In the Southern Hemisphere, some neo-pagans call this time Imbolc, after the station of the year directly opposite Lammas on the Wheel).
Lammas comes from Old English hlaf maesse, meaning ‘loaf mass’, the Christian holy repast at which bread baked from the first wheat of the season was blessed. Many cultures have the ceremony of the first of the harvest being sacrificially given to the gods, or god; the ancient Hebrews offered their ‘first fruits’ to Jehovah, just as the Bemanti clan of Swaziland offer theirs to their king during December’s full moon, in the Ncwala ceremony. When Christianity came to the Celtic lands, most ancient festivals such as Lughnasadh were imbued by the Church with Christian symbolism, so loaves of bread were baked from the first of the harvested grain and consecrated on the church altar on the first Sunday of August, a tradition still enacted in many churches.
Some have claimed that the word is from Lamb-Mass, “because on that day the tenants who held lands under the cathedral church in York, which is dedicated to St Peter ad Vincula, were bound by their tenure to bring a live lamb into the church at high mass; others derive it from a supposed offering or tything of lambs at this time” (Hone 1878).
The similarity of the pre-Christian name Lughnasadh to the Christian name Lammas might be more than coincidental, but it is a contended matter. The etymology might go something like this: the Celtic word nasadh meant ‘commemoration’, or ‘to give in marriage’; the Anglo-Saxons called this festival Lughmass; because it took place between the hay harvest and the corn harvest, the name was later confused with hlaf maesse; hence ‘Lammas’. We might, however, as easily assume that ‘Lughnasadh’ means the ‘Marriage of Lugh, as ‘Lugh's Mass’, a rather common interpretation.
Lugh, Celtic sun god
The god associated with the season is a Celtic sun god, Lugh, whose name is related to the Latin lux, or, ‘light’, and means ‘the shining one’. He was handsome, perpetually youthful, and full of vivacity and energy. Poet and author Robert Graves proposed that his name came from the Latin lucus (‘grove’), and even perhaps lu, Sumerian for son. Lugh was a deity cognate to Hercules or Dionysus, the Romans’ version of the Greek god Apollo. Another name for him was ‘Lugh the Long Handed’. In Wales, he was called Lleu, or Lleu Llaw Gyffes, meaning ‘Lion with the Steady Hand’. Lleu means lion, related to the Latin leo. (Note that the Zodiacal sign of Leo is now in the sun.)
From a brand-new article on Lammas just uploaded at the Scriptorium.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Cases of 'Living Dead' Growing in India
LUCKNOW, India (AP) - As far as the government is concerned, they're dead - and they're not at all happy about it.
Calling themselves "the Living Dead", two dozen people held a last rites Hindu ceremony outside the State Assembly to draw attention to their plight. All say unscrupulous relatives fraudulently had them declared dead in order to steal their property. They've been struggling for years to get the government to rectify their official standing.
"My son produced a fake death certificate to revenue officials and grabbed my 12 acres of property. The government still refuses to recognize me as alive,'' said Rashida Bibi, 62, who was declared dead in 1993. "I have been certified a living person by my village head but still the revenue officials refuse to recognize me as alive,'' she said.
India's bureaucrats are notorious for doing little work, and corruption is rampant. Many officials and clerks refuse to accept a claim or even talk to a petitioner without receiving a bribe. The "living dead", having been cheated out of their property, cannot afford to pay bribes or even legitimate fees to get their cases dealt with.
Lal Bihari, president of the Association of the Living Dead, estimated 35,000 people in Uttar Pradesh state have been wrongly certified as dead. "We have knocked on doors of government officials and police. No one is ready to recognize us as living persons because revenue records declare us dead,'' he said during the protest Wednesday.
Bihari was declared dead by an uncle 18 years ago, but despite numerous public protests has been unable to get the decision reversed.
31 July - An Austrian skydiver cut the journey time from Dover to Calais to under ten minutes, although it required jumping out of a plane in freezing conditions at a height that afforded little oxygen.
Extreme sports fan Felix Baumgartner became the first person to skydive across the English channel, knocking nearly 15 minutes off the standard Eurostar crossing just one day after the train broke the UK rail speed record in a 208mph test run.
He leapt from a plane flying 10,000m above Dover, and reached a speed of about 220mph before landing at Cap Blanc-Nez, near Calais, six minutes and 22 seconds later.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Pressure for inquiry into womb removals Ireland - The Minister for Health, Mr Martin, is under pressure to establish an independent judicial inquiry into the activities of Drogheda obstetrician, Dr Michael Neary, after the Medical Council decided that he should be struck off the medical register.
More than 100 women have alleged he performed unnecessary Caesarean hysterectomies on them during a 20-year-period up to 1998. Their wombs were removed following childbirth in a procedure usually used only in an emergency where the mother's life is at risk from haemorrhaging.
The council decision paves the way for at least 100 compensation claims, against the doctor and the State, with a potential cost, including legal fees, of more than €40 million.
A total of 60 compensation claims are already before the courts.
Home of the Almanac Your almanackist, snapped last month with his neighbours, grazing among the winter grass at Emerald Beach, New South Wales, Australia. The roos were grazing, not the almanackist. I am fortunate enough to live right on Sandy Beach, just behind the nearest headland on the left.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Grenade clears the aisles at Barnardo's
Business was very nearly booming when a live hand grenade was handed into a Barnardo's shop in Cornwall, UK. The shop was evacuated as a bomb disposal squad was called in to deal with the WWII weapon.
The grenade was handed in with a box of toys. "I don't think it was given with malicious intent," said a Barnardo's spokesperson.
Another charity shop had an altogether more pleasant surprise last week when it received an oil painting worth £25,000.
The painting, part of a collection donated to the shop by a mystery benefactor, was handed into a St Rocco's Hospice shop in Warrington, Cheshire. A volunteer at the shop noticed that it was by celebrated Scottish artist Francis Campbell Boileau Cadell and had it valued at a London gallery.
Q: Daddy, why did we have to attack Iraq? A: Because they had weapons of mass destruction honey.
Q: But the inspectors didn't find any weapons of mass destruction. A: That's because the Iraqis were hiding them.
Q: And that's why we invaded Iraq? A: Yep. Invasions always work better than inspections.
Q: But after we invaded them, we STILL didn't find any weapons of mass destruction, did we? A: That's because the weapons are so well hidden. Don't worry, we'll find something, probably right before the 2004 election.
Q: Why did Iraq want all those weapons of mass destruction? A: To use them in a war, silly.
Q: I'm confused. If they had all those weapons that they planned to use in a war, then why didn't they use any of those weapons when we went to war with them? A: Well, obviously they didn't want anyone to know they had those weapons, so they chose to die by the thousands rather than defend themselves.
Q: That doesn't make sense Daddy. Why would they choose to die if they had all those big weapons to fight us back with? A: It's a different culture. It's not supposed to make sense.
Q: I don't know about you, but I don't think they had any of those weapons our government said they did. A: Well, you know, it doesn't matter whether or not they had those weapons. We had another good reason to invade them anyway.
Q: And what was that? A: Even if Iraq didn't have weapons of mass destruction, Saddam Hussein was a cruel dictator, which is another good reason to invade another country.
Q: Why? What does a cruel dictator do that makes it OK to invade his country? A: Well, for one thing, he tortured his own people.
Q: Kind of like what they do in China? A: Don't go comparing China to Iraq. China is a good economic competitor, where millions of people work for slave wages in sweatshops to make U.S. corporations richer.
Q: So if a country lets its people be exploited for American corporate gain, it's a good country, even if that country tortures people? A: Right.
Q: Why were people in Iraq being tortured? A: For political crimes, mostly, like criticizing the government. People who criticized the government in Iraq were sent to prison and tortured.
Q: Isn't that exactly what happens in China? A: I told you, China is different.
Q: What's the difference between China and Iraq? A: Well, for one thing, Iraq was ruled by the Ba'ath party, while China is Communist.
Q: Didn't you once tell me Communists were bad? A: No, just Cuban Communists are bad.
Q: How are the Cuban Communists bad? A: Well, for one thing, people who criticize the government in Cuba are sent to prison and tortured.
Q: Like in Iraq? A: Exactly.
Q: And like in China, too? A: I told you, China's a good economic competitor. Cuba, on the other hand, is not.
Q: How come Cuba isn't a good economic competitor?
A: Well, you see, back in the early 1960s, our government passed some laws that made it illegal for Americans to trade or do any business with Cuba until they stopped being Communists and started being capitalists like us.
Q: But if we got rid of those laws, opened up trade with Cuba, and started doing business with them, wouldn't that help the Cubans become capitalists? A: Don't be a smart-ass.
Q: I didn't think I was being one. A: Well, anyway, they also don't have freedom of religion in Cuba.
Q: Kind of like China and the Falun Gong movement? A: I told you, stop saying bad things about China. Anyway, Saddam Hussein came to power through a military coup, so he's not really a legitimate leader anyway.
Q: What's a military coup? A: That's when a military general takes over the government of a country by force, instead of holding free elections like we do in the United States.
Q: Didn't the ruler of Pakistan come to power by a military coup? A: You mean General Pervez Musharraf? Uh, yeah, he did, but Pakistan is our friend.
Q: Why is Pakistan our friend if their leader is illegitimate? A: I never said Pervez Musharraf was illegitimate.
Q: Didn't you just say a military general who comes to power by forcibly overthrowing the legitimate government of a nation is an illegitimate leader? A: Only Saddam Hussein. Pervez Musharraf is our friend, because he helped us invade Afghanistan.
Q: Why did we invade Afghanistan? A: Because of what they did to us on September 11th.
Q: What did Afghanistan do to us on September 11th? A: Well, on September 11th, nineteen men, fifteen of them Saudi Arabians, hijacked four airplanes and flew three of them into buildings, killing over 3,000 Americans.
Q: So how did Afghanistan figure into all that? A: Afghanistan was where those bad men trained, under the oppressive rule of the Taliban.
Q: Aren't the Taliban those bad radical Islamics who chopped off people's heads and hands? A: Yes, that's exactly who they were. Not only did they chop off people's heads and hands, but they oppressed women, too.
Q: Didn't the Bush administration give the Taliban 43 million dollars back in May of 2001? A: Yes, but that money was a reward because they did such a good job fighting drugs.
Q: Fighting drugs? A: Yes, the Taliban were very helpful in stopping people from growing opium poppies.
Q: How did they do such a good job? A: Simple. If people were caught growing opium poppies, the Taliban would have their hands and heads cut off.
Q: So, when the Taliban cut off people's heads and hands for growing flowers, that was OK, but not if they cut people's heads and hands off for other reasons? A: Yes. It's OK with us if radical Islamic fundamentalists cut off people's hands for growing flowers, but it's cruel if they cut off people's hands for stealing bread.
Q: Don't they also cut off people's hands and heads in Saudi Arabia? A: That's different. Afghanistan was ruled by a tyrannical patriarchy that oppressed women and forced them to wear burqas whenever they were in public, with death by stoning as the penalty for women who did not comply.
Q: Don't Saudi women have to wear burqas in public, too? A: No, Saudi women merely wear a traditional Islamic body covering.
Q: What's the difference? A: The traditional Islamic covering worn by Saudi women is a modest yet fashionable garment that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and fingers. The burqa, on the other hand, is an evil tool of patriarchal oppression that covers all of a woman's body except for her eyes and fingers.
Q: It sounds like the same thing with a different name. A: Now, don't go comparing Afghanistan and Saudi Arabia. The Saudis are our friends.
Q: But I thought you said 15 of the 19 hijackers on September 11th were from Saudi Arabia. A: Yes, but they trained in Afghanistan.
Q: Who trained them? A: A very bad man named Osama bin Laden.
Q: Was he from Afghanistan? A: Uh, no, he was from Saudi Arabia too. But he was a bad man, a very bad man.
Q: I seem to recall he was our friend once. A: Only when we helped him and the mujahadeen repel the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan back in the 1980s.
Q: Who are the Soviets? Was that the Evil Communist Empire Ronald Reagan talked about? A: There are no more Soviets. The Soviet Union broke up in 1990 or thereabouts, and now they have elections and capitalism like us. We call them Russians now.
Q: So the Soviets, I mean, the Russians, are now our friends? A: Well, not really. You see, they were our friends for many years after they stopped being Soviets, but then they decided not to support our invasion of Iraq, so we're mad at them now. We're also mad at the French and the Germans because they didn't help us invade Iraq either.
Q: So the French and Germans are evil, too? A: Not exactly evil, but just bad enough that we had to rename French fries and French toast to Freedom Fries and Freedom Toast.
Q: Do we always rename foods whenever another country doesn't do what we want them to do? A: No, we just do that to our friends. Our enemies, we invade.
Q: But wasn't Iraq one of our friends back in the 1980s? A: Well, yeah. For a while.
Q: Was Saddam Hussein ruler of Iraq back then? A: Yes, but at the time he was fighting against Iran, which made him our friend, temporarily.
Q: Why did that make him our friend? A: Because at that time, Iran was our enemy.
Q: Isn't that when he gassed the Kurds? A: Yeah, but since he was fighting against Iran at the time, we looked the other way, to show him we were his friend.
Q: So anyone who fights against one of our enemies automatically becomes our friend? A: Now you're getting the idea!
Q: And anyone who fights against one of our friends is automatically an enemy? A: Sometimes that's true, too. However, if American corporations can profit by selling weapons to both sides at the same time, all the better.
Q: Why? A: Because war is good for the economy, which means war is good for America. Also, since God is on America's side, anyone who opposes war is a godless, un-American Communist. Do you understand now why we attacked Iraq?
Q: I think so. We attacked them because God wanted us to, right? A: Yes.
Q: But how did we know God wanted us to attack Iraq? A: Well, you see, God personally speaks to George W. Bush and tells him what to do.
Q: So basically, what you're saying is that we attacked Iraq because George W. Bush hears voices in his head? A: Yes! Now stop thinking so hard, close your eyes, make yourself comfortable, and go to sleep. Good night.
Thank you, Al Qaeda, for taking note of our fears like that
Two days ago the US Department of Homeland Security released a warning that Australia is a target for Al Qaeda terrorism. The Australian government, receiving a kindly visit from Men in Black from the tourism and airline industries, did something completely out of character. With their biggest John Howard nervous grins, they mentioned politely to the USA that "The Australian People" were a tad dubious about that assessment.
At first, the big burly blokes in the American administration stood firm, and told the media they saw no reason to change their alert for Australia. Then, as if by some overnight miracle, or a phone call from some unknown benefactor, they rewrote the whole dossier for us. Big Aussie phew! Australia is no longer a target for Al Qaeda, which sure makes us feel safer. Me, I'm going to find me some big crowded airport right away!
What a great coincidence that the Al Qaeda leader changed his mind about attacking us on the very day that Australian industry delegations met government officials expressing their disquiet? And within hours of the Aussie delegation to Admiral poindexter.
We stopped being a target at precisely that time! Talk about synchronicity! I don't know who to thank more, Mr bin Forgotten, Prime Minister 'Honest' John Howard, President Bush or the nice Admiral, but whoever is responsible, a big God bless you from all us terrified but patriotic Aussies!! We salute you, gentlemen, and thank you for leading us because we know we can't lead ourselves. One day we might be just like you, but it hardly seems possible.
1578 Juliet Capulet, ill-fated lover of Romeo Montague in Shakespeare’s play, Romeo and Juliet, was born on this day
How do we know this was Juliet’s birthday? "Come Lammas eve at night shall she be fourteen. That shall she, marry; I remember it well. 'Tis since the earthquake now eleven years, an' she was weaned. " Source
Shakespeare's characters spoke as if they were English people living in his own times; London had an earthquake in 1580. She would have been two when weaned. Tomorrow, August 1, is the ancient Celtic pagan festival of Lammas, and today is Lammas Eve. These clues can make us confident that we may wish Juliet a happy birthday today.
"Americans can see their president on television almost every day. From policy speeches to White House meetings to photo opportunities on the road with selected groups, the sight of George W Bush is anything but a rarity. But opportunities for the nation's press to question the leader are far less common. Mr Bush holds far fewer briefings than his predecessors. "He will make comments before or after events - such as paying tribute to the late comedian Bob Hope - and he takes two questions after meeting visiting foreign leaders like Israel's Ariel Sharon.
"Yet the White House can let months go by without giving the press any extended opportunity to ask questions of the president."
This is a captivating blog by a guy in Iran, where bloggers are being shut down and persecuted. You will find a permalink to it from now on on the Blogmanac.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Refugees start hunger strike in Belgium
When asylum seekers in Australia's concentration camp-like 'detention centres' sewed their lips shut, some Aussie politicians and radio jocks affected to interpret this as the actions not of terrified, desperate people but as the manipulations of sophisticatedly cynical enemies of the state.
Now, news from Belgium of more cynical ne'er-do-wells trying to bend a nice white government to their wicked will:
"As the Australian Government continues to urge Afghan asylum seekers in Australia to return home, in Belgium a similar policy has prompted a desperate response from the Afghans.
"The Belgian Interior Ministry announced this week that more than 1,000 Afghan asylum seekers would be repatriated within three to nine months.
"Now around 300 of the asylum seekers have occupied a Brussels Church, and many of them have gone on a hunger strike to protest the decision to send them home ...
"Hakimi Manisha is heavily pregnant, but has refused to take food, and now even water. She says she will be killed if she is returned to Afghanistan, and draws no distinction between the Taliban or those who replaced them.
HAKIMI MANISHA: They come in the night, they take their valuable things from the house, and that's very dangerous situation for, particularly for the women, there is not available woman rights for the woman, for the girls, and also for the children.
When I go to Afghanistan, I know I can't put my baby in the school, because if she go at morning to school, til night when she come back I must be afraid that what's happened with my baby ...
"How long can you go on not taking water, not eating, how long will your hunger strike continue for?
ASYLUM SEEKER: I must continue till the Government from Belgium change their decision, when I dead, or my baby dead, or anybody dead, and these people – the Government from Belgium – must be responsible."
Do you like the Blogmanac? Do us a favorama please? Please click Blogarama. The click will raise our profile. Then click the Counter Culture category there and see the listing for Wilson's Blogmanac. Click where it says Site Reviews, enjoy the kind reviews people are writing about us, and scroll down to where it says Click here to add a site review. Then would you be kind enough to say a few words? It doesn't have to be much.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Plan for Terrorism Futures Market Dumped Only a day after it was disclosed, outraged senators of both parties called for the immediate end to the online trading bazaar that would have rewarded investors able to predict terror attacks and other global unrest. Pentagon officials raced to oblige, saying it would be shut down posthaste.
"It is a very significant mistake," said Senator John W. Warner, Republican of Virginia, the chairman of the Armed Services Committee.
Democrats quickly pointed the finger at John M. Poindexter, a retired rear admiral who was a key official involved in developing the plan.
"This Poindexter program is still a runaway horse that needs to be reined in," said Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, one of the two Democrats who brought the plan to light on Monday.
Admiral Poindexter first gained notoriety in the Iran-contra scandal during the Reagan administration and more recently he oversaw a Pentagon program for extensive electronic surveillance of computer records in the search for terrorists.
Mr. Wyden and Senator Byron L. Dorgan of North Dakota disclosed the existence of the futures program on Monday, calling it grotesque.
If you look in the right-hand column here, you'll see that you can subscribe to what's posted in the Blogmanac. it is not the same material as in Wilson's Almanac -- but you can subscribe to that too.
Our Blogmanac subs weren't working before, but they are now. It's really a cool free ezine, so take out a free sub and see for yourself. You get all the posts here, daily.
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29 | St Abdon; The MicMac festival Feast day of St Abdon St Abdon is the patron of hygiene. In the Vosges Mountains of Europe, the ashes of ferns cut and burned on this feast keep away insects and unwanted guests. Source
* Ø * Ø * Ø *
Feast day of St Julitta (White mullen, Verbuscum lychnitis, is today's plant, dedicated to this saint)
* Ø * Ø * Ø *
Micmac Tribe Festival of St Anne, Cape Benton, Canada Indian adoption of St Ann and the god Gloosca as Mother Goddess and Father God.
*Ø* Blogmanac July 30, 1967 | Arthur Stace passes into Eternity
The greatest graffitist
Every morning for 37 years, Sydneysiders, as those who live in Sydney are called, awoke to a word that helped in unknown ways to give a focus on the deep meanings of life, death, and meaning itself.
Arthur Stace died on July 30, 1967, aged 83. He had been ‘born again’ at St Barnabas's Church of England, Broadway, Sydney, in August 1930, and his friends described him as a very colourful character. He had been a methylated spirits-drinking, hopeless alcoholic and derelict in the streets of Sydney, when he was converted to Christianity at about 46 years of age. He had returned from World War One shell-shocked and soon became a scout for brothels, a petty criminal, and a ‘cockatoo’ (lookout) for two-up schools (illegal gambling rooms where the Australian game of two-up is played).
Just after his conversion to Christianity, Stace heard the evangelist John Ridley at the Burton Street Baptist Church preach about a man who was converted in Scotland through ‘Eternity’ being written on a footpath. Ridley cried out ‘Oh for someone to write Eternity on the footpaths of Sydney!’ Arthur Stace said to himself, ‘Here is something I can do for God.’ He did so, writing the word half a million times over nearly four decades.
The pedestrians of Sydney saw this one word sermon every morning for 37 years, its origin a mystery for most of that time. When the yellow Eternity vanished from our city streets, something vanished with it.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Grand Chief Woableza LaBatte badly injured
Thank you to my friend Tonya Maxwell for sending this:
Brothers & Sisters,
As most of you know by now, Sioux spiritual leader Grand Chief Woableza LaBatte of the World Council of Spiritual Elders and spiritual leader of the Manataka American Indian Council was severely beaten on the Choctaw Reservation early Monday morning, July 14.
His Injuries Head: Woableza head injuries are the most severe. During the assault, a piece his skull pierced the brain. A metal plate was sewn into place to stabilize the crack that is about seven inches long and shaped like a flat letter 'L' or 'N' . The wound itself is healing well and the swelling appears to be going down. Headaches are continual and medication is needed to alleviate pain ...
He is not on oxygen, however, an intravenous tube with a variety of anti-inflammatory and other medicines flow through a tube inserted by needle into the back of his left hand ...
His Spirit Chief Woableza is amazing. His countenance and spirit are strong. He smiles often and is continuing his prayers for others in need. We did detect some sadness and a small bit anger deep within, but he is working to resolve these issues with prayer and meditation.
Woableza does not complain - about anything. When the pain becomes unbearable, he does not complain or cry. He has not uttered a single negative word. He has not allowed any anger coming from friends and family to enter his consciousness. He remains humble to his purpose and rejoices at the many blessings he is given. Truly amazing ...
What Can You Do? 1. Pray for the continued healing of our most beloved and respected elder, Grand Chief Woableza.
2. Pray for his family that they may remain strong.
3. Pray for the perpetrators and their families that they may understand the gravity of this horrendous crime against a holy man and take responsibility for their actions ...
*Ø* Blogmanac July 27 - Sept 7 | India's great Kumbh Mela fest
"Since time immemorial, The Kumbh Mela, the greatest of the Indian fairs, has enamoured people from all walks of life. Irrespective of all worldly barriers of caste, creed, region, the Kumbh Mela has wielded a mesmeric influence over the mind and the imagination of the ordinary Indian. The mela brings alive the most spectacular India, now almost relegated to the pages of history"
*Ø* Blogmanac | Oil groups snub US on Iraq deals By Carola Hoyos in London
Some of the world's biggest oil companies have warned the US administration that they will not make large investments in Iraq while the security situation remains so dangerous.
The reluctance of the industry to invest long-term is a setback to US efforts to revive the oil industry and rebuild the economy. Industry experts estimate it would cost $30bn-$40bn to tap the full potential of Iraq's vast oil deposits.
It is understood high-ranking US officials recently met some heads of international oil companies to sound them out about when companies would be willing to start investing. Industry executives expressed concerns over the lack of security and political legitimacy. They say the US-backed authority, so far, had too little representation.
Such concerns were amplified last Thursday by Sir Philip Watts, chairman of Royal Dutch/Shell, who told his company's results meeting: "The safety our people is paramount. There has to be proper security, legitimate authority and a legitimate process . . . by which we will be able to negotiate agreements that would be longstanding for decades. We wouldn't go into that situation unless these conditions were satisfied because we are a long-term business doing long-term projects and we need the framework in which we can make this sort of investment decision."
US inability to bring security and a legitimate transitional authority to Iraq has forced oil companies to shy away from setting up all but a low-level presence. Even services companies such as ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco of the US and BP and Royal/Dutch Shell have been disappointed at the pace of progress.
They are needed immediately to repair oil infrastructure and boost exports, but fear tenders due to be awarded next month by the US Army will be considerably less than the maximum expected $1bn.
Walid Khadduri, editor of the influential Middle East Economic Survey, said: "The danger today is that, if the political situation deteriorates - and this is a real threat - the oil industry will not only be unable to expand but could also fail to return to its previous capacity."
Sir Philip said: "When the legitimate authority is there on behalf of the people of Iraq, we will know and recognise it."
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29 | Maîtresse Silvérine Maîtresse Silvérine, Voudon “Voudun: Festival honoring Maîtresse Silvérine, who only very slightly tastes of food offered to her; and Maîtresse Lorvana, who smells flowers for her nourishment.” Source: Earth, Moon and Sky
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29, 1578 | King Sebastian of Portugal went missing in battle
When will King Sebastian return? On this day in 1578, Portugal’s Don Sebastian, aged 22, was fighting (read invading) the Moors (African Muslims) in Morocco, at Ksar el Kebir. His army was so defeated that scarcely 50 of his men made it out alive. The Moors said that they had his body and buried it at Belem, but Sebastian's countrymen believed he had escaped and would return to lead them.
Despite the passage of many years, the conviction grew into a cult, passing on from one Portuguese generation to another, surviving into modern times.
The London Times of December 1825 reported that old Portuguese visionaries would go out on windy nights, wrapped in cloaks, watching the movements of the heavens. Sometimes they would see a shooting star and cry “Here he comes!” Sebastianism, a kind of messianic cult, persisted into the 19th century, with the belief that Brazil would become the chief nation of earth.
Sales of horses and some other things were sometimes made, payable at the coming of King Sebastian.
In Brazil, there is a legend that Don Sebastian appears in the form of a black bull on the beaches of mysterious Lencois Island, off the coast of Maranhao.
By the way, Don Sebastian is supposed to be a name of terror to Moorish children.
Nor shall Sebastian’s formidable name Be longer used to still the crying babe. Dryden, Don Sebastian (1690)
Pip Wilson's articles are available for your publication, on application. Further details Receive similar items free each day with a free subscription to Wilson's Almanac ezine. Send a blank email
* Ø * Ø * Ø *
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29 | Spain's Fiesta of the Near Death Experience
“Every year the small parish town of As Neves, lying south of the ferocious Río Miño (Minho) that marks the border between Portugal and Spain, sees thousands converge on the town's streets for the Fiesta de Santa Marta de Ribarteme, or the Fiesta of the Near-Death Experience. “The throngs of devotees of Santa Marta, the town's patron saint, known as the ‘saint of death’, besiege the church and surrounding area for a day to pay their respects. All these people hold one thing in common - they have all nearly died.
”One of the main festival highlights sees all manner of people being carried in their coffins by friends and relatives, in a procession that follows the effigy of Santa Marta around the church. It is not uncommon even to see the odd loner having to carry his own. Santa Marta carries a salver in her right hand which sees a constant flurry of donations. The proceeds go towards the maintenance of her shrine. The festival provides a great opportunity to have a good old natter about your near-death-experience, but do get there early. Many who don't (the majority) end up hearing the service on a tannoy from outside the church.” Source
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29 | Feast day of St Martha, dragon charmer Many cultures have dragonslaying heroes and heroines, and Martha is a European one with a good lineage, as she first appears in the Bible.
Martha was sister to St Lazarus and St Mary Magdalen and is matron saint of good housewives. According to one legend, she left Palestine after Jesus's death, around 48, and went to Provence with her sister Mary (possibly Mary Magdalene) and her brother Lazarus. Martha first settled in Avignon (now in France), then went to Tarascon, France. In art she is depicted in homely costume, often with a bunch of keys on a girdle, and holding a ladle of water. She is accompanied by a bound dragon, as she destroyed Tarasque, the dragon that ravaged the region around Marseilles, which she did by praising the monster for its goodness. She is Matron of Tarascon which was named after the dragon, as was the herb tarragon. After the townsfolk killed Tarasque, Martha wept for the dragon but forgave the people for they had suffered so long. Or, so it is said.
“In the thirteenth century, Friar Roger Bacon complained that ‘it is certain’ that Ethiopian sages were coming to Europe – to ‘those Christian lands where there are good flying dragons’ – luring dragons from their caves, saddling them, and then riding them back to Ethiopa where they would be butchered and eaten. A century later, European merchants, having belatedly grasped the commercial possibilities of the dragon trade, had established their own agents locally to acquire dragons for export to Ethiopia. It can be assumed that they advertised European dragons as a superior breed, and charged accordingly. And thus the systematic slaughter of dragons began, and decimated their numbers in both Europe and Africa.”
This quote comes from an essay at the boingdragon website which designed the free dragon hits counter, which I have added (with gratitude) to the right-hand column of this page because I think it's great.
*Ø* Blogmanac July 29 | Time of Thorn/Feast day of St Olaf, king of Norway Around this time, ancient Northern Tradition honours the god whom the Anglo-Saxons called Thunor and the Norse, Thor. The time of Thorn, as it is known, is a period of proper order and higher powers. This day also honours the sainted Norwegian king, Olaf, murdered around Lammas Day (an ancient festival on August 1, a time when other European kings of old were allegedly murdered, but in fact relates to harvest magic). Traditionally it was portrayed on calendars with the sign of the axe.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Pentagon's Futures Market Plan Condemned
"WASHINGTON (AP) - The Pentagon is setting up a stock-market style system in which investors would bet on terror attacks, assassinations and other events in the Middle East. Defense officials hope to gain intelligence and useful predictions while investors who guessed right would win profits ...
"The market would work this way. Investors would buy and sell futures contracts - essentially a series of predictions about what they believe might happen in the Mideast. Holders of a futures contract that came true would collect the proceeds of investors who put money into the market but predicted wrong."
*Ø* Blogmanac Hussein Captured, Asks What "All The Fuss is About"
"TIKRIT, IRAQ- After months of tireless searching, the number one past-due villain in America's war in Iraq emerged from a nondescript Tikriti home around dawn this morning and introduced himself to a group of surprised Coalition troops. 'Hey, fellas,' the fugitive dictator allegedly said, 'what's up?'
"Representatives from US Central Command happily announced Hussein's capture just an hour later, eager to announce to the world, as well as uneasy Iraqi citizens, that the brutal despot had finally been apprehended. Better yet, capturing Hussein alive means chances are good that a closure-generating war crimes trial might be in the offing. There is, it seems, one catch: Hussein himself. While the infamous Butcher of Baghdad has been alarmingly forthcoming and cooperative with investigators, the depth of what he does not appear to know has left them stymied.
"'Hey, from those American flag patches on your shoulders, I noticed that you're, um, not from around here," Hussein reportedly told his captors. "What's all the fuss about?'
"Hussein later admitted that he had been "hanging out" at a friends house since early March and had not been keeping up with current events. Hussein confessed to feeling a bit "out of sync" since his friend's satellite dish was on the fritz and he'd not seen a newspaper since late February."
If you see Glen, say gday he might be up in Sydney he left here last Halloween, infection in the kidney. Say for me that I’m all right though things get kinda stressed, he might think that I’ve forgotten him, don’t say I do my best.
If you get close to him don’t step upon his toes kiss him for me, but just a peck he might punch me in your nose. Whatever makes him lucid better let him have his way for the bitter taste still lingers on from the night I tried to make his day.
*Ø* Blogmanac | 'Roman Cosmetics' Found at London Temple Dig
LONDON (Reuters) - Archaeologists excavating the site of a major Roman temple in London have found a sealed box containing a white cream still bearing the fingermarks of the person who last used it, nearly 2,000 years ago.
"This is of major significance," said Museum of London curator Francis Grew Monday. The substance, which will now be chemically analyzed, could be face cream or even face paint, he told reporters. "We are in completely uncharted territory here. Not only is the quality of workmanship of the box exceptional, but to find one in such good condition still sealed and with its original contents will raise huge interest around the world," he added.
Museum conservator Liz Barham who opened the fist-sized cylindrical tin box for the first time Monday, in front of the world's media, described the smell from the half-full container as "sulphurous" and "cheesy."
The box was found at the bottom of a ditch on the edge of the site of the temple next to the merging of two major roads into Roman London -- Watling Street from the port of Dover and Stane Street from the garrison town of Chichester. The site -- which last year revealed a stone tablet with the earliest known inscription bearing the Roman name of London -- dates from 50 AD and contained two small temples, a guest house for travelers, plinths for statues and a stone pillar.
"The site has been remarkable. It has revealed far more than we could possibly have expected," said Gary Brown, managing director of Pre-Construct Archaeology, which has been digging the soccer pitch-sized area for the past year. Apart from the tin box and stone tablet, the site in modern day Southwark, about two miles south of central London, has also revealed pieces of statues, leather shoes and a wooden writing tablet among many other artifacts.
It will disappear under concrete this Summer when construction of a shopping and housing complex starts.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Afghanistan: Warlords Implicated in New Abuses Report Details Threats to Women's Rights, Freedom of Expression
New York, July 29 - Afghan warlords and political strongmen supported by the United States and other nations are engendering a climate of fear in Afghanistan that is threatening efforts to adopt a new constitution and could derail national elections scheduled for mid-2004, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today.
The report warns that violence, political intimidation, and attacks on women and girls are discouraging political participation and endangering gains made on women's rights in Afghanistan over the last year.
"Human rights abuses in Afghanistan are being committed by gunmen and warlords who were propelled into power by the United States and its coalition partners after the Taliban fell in 2001," said Brad Adams, executive director of the Asia Division of Human Rights Watch. "These men and others have essentially hijacked the country outside of Kabul. With less than a year to go before national elections, Afghanistan's human rights situation appears to be worsening."
The 101-page report, "Killing You Is a Very Easy Thing for Us": Human Rights Abuses in Southeast Afghanistan, documents army and police troops kidnapping Afghans and holding them for ransom in unofficial prisons; breaking into households and robbing families; raping women, girls and boys; and extorting shopkeepers and bus, truck and taxi drivers. The report also describes political organizers, journalists and media editors being threatened with death, arrested and harassed by army, police and intelligence agents. The subject area of the report, the southeast of Afghanistan and Kabul city, is one of the most densely populated areas of Afghanistan.
Because soldiers are targeting women and girls, many are staying indoors, especially in rural areas, making it impossible for them to attend school, go to work, or actively participate in the country's reconstruction. In many places, human rights abuses are driving many Afghan families to keep their girls out of school. The atmosphere of violence, along with resurgent religious fundamentalism in parts of the country, is endangering the most important human rights improvement since the end of the Taliban--the ability of girls to go back to school.
"The fact is that most girls in Afghanistan are still not in school," said Adams. "In many cases, returning refugee families who sent their girls to school in Pakistan or Iran are afraid to do the same in Afghanistan."
The testimony of victims and witnesses implicates soldiers and police under the command of many high-level military and political officials in Afghanistan. These include Mohammad Qasim Fahim, the Minister of Defense; Hazrat Ali, the military leader of the Eastern Region; Younis Qanooni, the Minister of Education; Burhanuddin Rabbani, the former president of Afghanistan; and Abdul Rabb al-Rasul Sayyaf, a powerful former mujahidin leader to whom many of the officials involved in the documented abuses in Kabul city and province remain loyal.
The report urges the Afghan government to sideline and pressure abusive leaders and to seek more international assistance in its efforts.
Human Rights Watch called on the United States, the United Kingdom, Iran, Russia and other external powers to end their support for local strongmen and commanders involved in human rights abuses.
"Australia: A FORMER Burmese political prisoner shuffled through Brisbane's CBD in leg irons today at the start of a campaign to raise awareness of the recent bloody crackdown in his home country.
"Htoo Htoo Han, 33, winced in pain as he slowly made his way through the city centre at the start of a three-week tour which will take in Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra.
"The shackles, which will rub his ankles until they are raw, reminded Mr Han of the three years he spent in prison in Burma from 1989 after a pro-democracy student uprising.
"In prison, the then 19-year-old Mr Han was subjected to daily beatings and torture, and was chained for almost a year in a cell so squalid his body swelled because of the unsanitary conditions."
"Blair is facing a storm of accusations that he beat up the threat of weapons of mass destruction to sway a sceptical public. But could the same charge be made against the media? Were intelligence agencies planting faulty intelligence through journalists to pave the path to war? And, more disturbingly, were some of those journalists willing participants in the stage managing of that information?" Read on about an Oz controversy
*Ø* Blogmanac | A potpourri of important actions to take and background information from Voice4Change.org
Terror To Empire By Stewart Nusbaumer
With Democrats fearful and media silent, the Bush Administration has transformed the war against terror into a war for empire. Can Americans stop this madness?
The Bush Administration hawks are lumping together all kinds of reasons and excuses under the rubric of terrorism and exploiting the horror of 9/11 for political and corporate gain -- the war against terrorism has become, in fact, a war for empire. Instead of enhancing our national security, the Administration is making America more vulnerable, more susceptible to even more deadly attacks.
The Democrats, however, refuse to oppose this hemorrhaging of the war on terrorism, a war spreading to the four corners of the world. Democrats seem paralyzed, petrified of being labeled unpatriotic and soft on terrorism, excluding a few honorable mentions. Let’s face it, what disturbs Democrats the most is not the death of young Americans, but losing the next election.
Though The Heavens Fall By William Rivers Pitt t r u t h o u t | Perspective
Friday 25 July 2003
The political fortunes of the Bush administration are never so strong as when people are dying. A review of newspaper headlines from September 10, 2001 clearly shows an administration under serious attack from all quadrants. That changed after some 3,000 people were killed the next day, and George has never looked back. The attack of September 11 was the best thing to ever happen to George W. Bush. He knows this, and uses those attacks to great effect in promoting everything from aggressive wars to tax policy.
Recall that it was Bush who said, on October 4, 2001, “We need to counter the shock wave of the evildoer by having individual rate cuts accelerated and by thinking about tax rebates.”
Recall that it was Bush, one year and four days later, who said, “We have experienced the horror of September 11…Facing clear evidence of peril, we cannot wait for the final proof -- the smoking gun -- that could come in the form of a mushroom cloud.”
S.14, "The Energy Policy Act of 2003," sponsored by Republican Sen. Pete Domenici of New Mexico, points in the wrong direction. At a time when America needs safe, clean, affordable energy, this bill is harmful to consumers and the environment.
This regressive bill (along with its accompanying energy tax finance package, S.1149) includes provisions that:
-- Repeal the Public Utility Holding Company Act (PUHCA), a vital electricity consumer protection, which would allow for the expansion of deregulation and more Enron style schemes
-- Offer public financing of up to half the costs of constructing new nuclear reactors, leaving taxpayers liable for an estimated $14-16 billion
-- Encourage nuclear irresponsibility by promoting nuclear waste reprocessing and extending liability protections for nuclear plant operators through the permanent reauthorization of the Price-Anderson Act
Join Jobs with Justice this fall as we fight for the rights of workers in the United States and throughout the hemisphere.
This fall, three major mobilizations give us the opportunity to link the issues of Immigrant Rights, Global Justice and the Fight for Organizing and Collective Bargaining Rights. Clearly these are not separate fights, but part of the same struggle to win justice for all. Join us as we enter this Season of Struggle!
Here’s what happened: Anti-choice Congressman Darryl Issa has spent more than a million dollars generating petition signatures that are now forcing a vote to recall the pro-choice Governor. The candidate behind it is Republican Congressman Darryl Issa.
Make no mistake about: Issa is a real threat. He’s supported a Constitutional amendment to criminalize abortion. He voted for a bill that would establish a back door gag rule – allowing health care companies and HMOs to tell their doctors what services and information they can and can’t provide to their women patients. He voted twice to deny women in the military the right to use their own money for abortion services. He’s earned a 0% rating from our organization every single year he’s been in office.
Around the country, anti-choice governors are approving restrictions on women’s rights that put the government in the middle of our personal decisions. They’re working to outlaw safe abortion procedures, and trying to undermine Roe v. Wade.
The first Cromwell to lead an English revolution, Thomas was born the son of a blacksmith at Putney, London, in 1485, who had saved money and become a brewer, or else a fuller.
Thomas got a fair education, went to Europe, mastering several languages. He became a merchant then a soldier, and served in Italy. In England he became a lawyer and soon attracted the attention of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, who made him his solicitor. In 1523 he was elected to the House of Commons and in two years Wolsey employed him as his chief agent in the period of violence and repression of Roman Catholics, the dissolution of the monasteries. In this period, monastery land was seized and sold off cheaply to nobles and the newly emerging merchant class. On Wolsey's fall he accompanied him in his retirement to Esher, but soon returned to court. Cromwell made his way into royal favour, by being advocate for the king in the break with Rome. Soon he became the main adviser to the crown, but the Catholic party hated him. He raised rapidly to wealth and honours – and the estates of dissolved monasteries contributed to his wealth. He was actively involved in Henry's marriage to Anne of Cleves; when the king was disappointed in her he took his anger out on Cromwell. Archbishop Cranmer pleaded for him in vain, but Cromwell was executed in the Tower of London for high treason. A nephew of Thomas Cromwell inherited the estates, and was the great-grandfather of Oliver Cromwell, the famous ‘Protector’.
Pip Wilson's articles are available for your publication, on application. Further details Receive similar items free each day with a free subscription to Wilson's Almanac ezine. Send a blank email
Monday and Tuesday seven weeks after Pentecost: Vardavar – Rose Day, Armenia The Transfiguration of Jesus Christ – known as Vardavar in Armenian – is one of the Armenian Orthodox Church’s most important feasts. Celebrated on the Monday and Tuesday seven weeks after Pentecost, the feast is marked by a popular custom: On that day people pour cold water on each other. Indeed, throwing water at people – or throwing people into rivers and streams – is quite an integral part of the holiday. Throwing water on complete strangers is just as likely as on relatives and friends. Some families offer the traditional matagh (sacrifice) of lamb, feasting beside or near water.
The Oxford Companion to the Year (Blackburn, Bonnie & Leofranc Holford-Strevens, Oxford University Press 1999) says that this was once an Armenian pagan midsummer festival of Anahid, the most prominent goddess in the pre-Christian pantheon of ancient Armenia, who was offered roses and doves. Anahid's feast days occurred in spring and autumn, the most important ceremony dedicated to her being held on the fifteenth day of Navasard, the first month of the ancient Armenian calendar.
Vardavar coincides with the time of harvest, and there was formerly a tradition that the first apples of the year were eaten on the day of Vardavar. In Shatakh, Armenia, on the evening prior to Vardavar, young men would stack piles of hay before setting fire to them to usher in the sunrise. Apples were baked within these haystacks, while young girls danced around the pyres. In mountainous regions of Armenia, tightrope walkers performed at fairs and feasts where horse riding and water games were common.
Born on this day in 1902 at the Ntaria (Hermannsburg) mission in Australia’s Northern Territory, Elea (baptised Albert in 1905) Namatjira became the first Australian Aboriginal artist to gain national and international fame. His life, however, was marred by racism, misfortune and depression.
Albert Namatjira was born to Christian parents whose background had been as tribal people in the northern deserts. He attended the school at Hermannsburg, a mission about 225 km (140 miles) from the remote outback town of Alice Springs, and at 13 was taken into the bush for manhood initiation ceremonies in his Aranta tribe. Work as a camel driver took him to parts of Australia’s red centre that he might not otherwise have visited, places that appeared in his work. He had learned to draw in school, and from the late 1920s Namatjira had contact with white Australian artists, who came to ‘the Centre’ in search of magnificent scenery afforded by that part of the world. In 1936, one visiting artist, Rex Batterbee, taught the keen student how to paint in the European style.
Namatjira’s first public showing was two years later, in Melbourne, and proved to be a great success as his superb watercolours drew the attention of art lovers. Over succeeding years his fame grew for his haunting landscapes of land and gumtrees, and with it came financial rewards. In 1954, he met Britain’s Queen Elizabeth on her Australian tour. The Queen purchased several of his paintings, including Ghost Gums in the Macdonnell Ranges. Married (to a woman of another tribe, which attracted great displeasure amongst his people) and with seven children, Namatjira tried to lease a cattle station (ranch), but paternalistic laws in the Northern Territory at the time disallowed this. Though his name was known in virtually every home in his ancestral land, the Aboriginal celebrity’s attempts to gain permission to build a house in Alice Springs also met with a firm wall of forbidding racism.
Albert Namatjira descended into depression and alcoholism, eventually finding himself jailed for two months for providing alcohol to family members. Despite his fame and success, his life had become a litany of injury, hospitalisation, imprisonment and despair, and he died in 1959, aged just 57, a broken man.
The person who had first shown all Australians, indigenous and non-indigenous, the heart of their own continent, was a man of two cultures as widely different as it is possible to imagine, and never fully accepted by either.
Pip Wilson's articles are available for your publication, on application. Further details Receive similar items free each day with a free subscription to Wilson's Almanac ezine. Send a blank email
*Ø* Blogmanac Add to your Favorites! | Our Free Radio-TV portal
Tune in to a huge small planet
Do you want to be able to access electronic broadcast media from your computer, without having to pay, search or use those corporate players with all the ads and sneaky ways of putting adware on your machine?
I really believe our own portal is the best-kept secret at Wilson's Almanac. It's got a great interface without loads of ads, and the number of stations you can tune into is fantastic. I use it nearly every day myself, when the programming in my local area is no good. Tune into literally hundreds of stations from so many countries I doubt we've even heard of some of them. When not thinking universally, think globally.
Tonight I'm finding out about the military disturbances in the Philippines, and also listening to radio live from the Isle of Man, a small island in the Irish Sea. (I should have tuned in on their national day, as I wrote an article on their ancient customs on that day.) One great feature of our portal is that you can click Random and take a world tour at your own desk. Get out of the local rut -- it's a huge small planet!
Music of all varieties, and fast-breaking news from your choice of stations -- it's a bargain, and free. Just click this globe and check it out. Add it to your faves and never have a quiet evening at your computer again.
PS It's perma-linked in the left-hand column of the Blogmanac, near the top.
"Hi, folks, my name is still Thompson, and I still drink gin with ER Nurses at night -- but in one particular way, I am a New Man, a different man, a more dangerous man than I was the last time we talked. And that was a few weeks ago, eh?
"Indeed, I can walk again, and I like it, because last month I felt an acute spasmodic pain in my spine when I walked. There was nothing cute about it, no socially redeeming factor. It just plain sucked.
"But I have just returned from an extremely intense few weeks at the world-renowned Steadman Hawkins Clinic in Vail, Colo. (yes, the same city where Kobe Bryant ...), where I had radical surgery to repair what was beginning to give me some pain. Great pain on some days, and I finally decided to get rid of it."
Feast day of Saints Malchus, Martinian, Dionysius, John, Serapion and Constantine, the Seven Sleepers These Christian saints were Ephesians (ie, from Ephesus in Turkey), walled up by Emperor Decius (249 - 251) in a cave for their faith, in 250 CE. They were found by masons in 479, and were only asleep, and thought that they had been asleep only one night, instead of 229 years.
Rubbing from his eyes the sleep of more than two centuries, Malchus made his way into town to buy bread for the others, and was amazed to see crosses on buildings, for when he fell asleep Decius’s Roman gods were all that could be worshipped. The bakers were amazed at the coins he offered, and thought that the young man had found treasure.
When Malchus saw them talking together, he was afraid that they might take him before the emperor, and asked to be let go, saying they could keep the strange money – and the bread. The bakers said if he would share the treasure they wouldn't tell anyone, but Malchus was so afraid he couldn't speak. The bakers tied a cord around his neck and dragged him through the city, where all the citizens abused him, saying that he had found a treasure and was keeping it secret.
The outraged townsfolk (no doubt brandishing torches) brought him before St Martin and Antipater. Malchus reaffirmed that it was his money and he’d got it from members of his family, but, of course, his interrogators had not heard of these relatives, and asked how he could have money hundreds of years old ...
Last Sunday in July Festival of Domhnach Chrom (or Crom) Dubh, Ireland Originally to the god Lugh; connected with festival of Lammas. Also connected is John Barleycorn, personification of grain, who is killed by being cut at this time.
NEW DELHI — India's working elephants are to be fitted with reflective patches on their rears to prevent fender-bending road accidents that sometimes result in more than a damaged trunk. The Wildlife Trust of India introduced the reflectors last week to help drivers spot the working pachyderms at night in the Indian capital.
"The butt reflector, roped to the [seat], costs just [$2] and is the simplest way to protect them," trust Program Director Aniruddha Mookerjee told Reuters news agency.
Working elephants are often used at weddings, festivals and by the tourist industry and often have to walk long distances along the city's chaotic, congested roads.
The trust took the safety initiative after an elephant was severely hurt by a speeding truck last December. The elephant was put to sleep after veterinarians said it could not recover. "You could see tears streaming from its eyes as it lay in pain. You can't have elephants being hit by cars and trucks," Mr. Mookerjee said, adding the trust planned to introduce the reflectors for elephants in other cities as well.
An estimated 33,000 elephants are left in India — a quarter of their 19th-century population — and many are put to work in construction, logging, security patrols and other businesses.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) has accused Indian state governments of routinely exploiting elephants. "Elephants live for more than 70 years if left unmolested in the forest, yet their average life span in captivity is reduced to 14 miserable years," said Anuradha Sawhney, the head of PETA India.
*Ø* Blogmanac | Classified Section of 9/11 Report Faults Saudi Rulers NYTimes, Washington — Senior officials of Saudi Arabia have funneled hundreds of millions of dollars to charitable groups and other organizations that may have helped finance the September 2001 attacks, a still-classified section of a Congressional report on the hijackings says, according to people who have read it.
The 28-page section of the report was deleted from the nearly 900-page declassified version released on Thursday by a joint committee of the House and Senate intelligence committees. The chapter focuses on the role foreign governments played in the hijackings, but centers almost entirely on Saudi Arabia, the people who saw the section said.
The Bush administration's refusal to allow the committee to disclose the contents of the chapter has stirred resentment in Congress, where some lawmakers have said the administration's desire to protect the ruling Saudi family had prevented the American public from learning crucial facts about the attacks. The report has been denounced by the Saudi ambassador to the United States, and some American officials questioned whether the committee had made a conclusive case linking Saudi funding to the hijackings.
The declassified section of the report discloses the testimony of several unidentified officials who criticized the Saudi government for being uncooperative in terrorism investigations, but makes no reference to Riyadh's financing of groups that supported terror.
Some people who have read the classified chapter said it represented a searing indictment of how Saudi Arabia's ruling elite have, under the guise of support for Islamic charities, distributed millions of dollars to terrorists through an informal network of Saudi nationals, including some in the United States.
The Saudi ambassador to the United States has angrily denied that his country had failed to cooperate with the F.B.I. and C.I.A. in fighting terrorism and dismissed accusations that it helped finance two of the hijackers as "outrageous."
Behind the immediate issue of whether Saudi Arabia played any role in terrorism are a complex web of political, military and economic connections between the two countries. Successive Republican and Democratic administrations have aggressively sought to maintain the relationship with a huge producer of oil and an ally in the Arab world.
What Congress Does Not Know about Enron and 9/11 By Atty. John J. Loftus In order to give Enron one last desperate chance to complete the Taliban pipeline and save itself from bankruptcy, senior levels of US intelligence were ordered to keep their eyes shut and their subordinates ignorant.
"A captured Al Qaida document reveals that US energy companies were secretly negotiating with the Taliban to build a pipeline. The document was obtained by the FBI but was not allowed to be shared with other agencies in order to protect Enron. Multiple sources confirm that American law enforcement agencies were deliberately kept in the dark and systematically prevented from connecting the dots before 9/11 in order to aid Enron’s secret and immoral Taliban negotiations."
5-Minute Video of George W Bush on the Morning of 9/11
At 9:03 AM on 11 September 2001, the second airplane hit the South Tower of the World Trade Center. President Bush was in Florida, at the Emma T. Booker Elementary School, listening to children read. Chief of Staff Andrew Card came over and whispered in Bush's ear, "A second plane hit the second tower. America is under attack."
What did the Commander in Chief do? Nothing. He sat there. He sat for well over 5 minutes, doing nothing while 3,000 people were dying and the attacks were still in progress.
Not only did the leader of the free world sit as his country was attacked, the Secret Service also did nothing. Bush was appearing in public at a previously announced photo-op. He was a sitting duck. The attacks were ongoing at that point (planes had yet to hit the Pentagon or the field in Pennsylvania), and nobody knew how much more destruction was going to happen. Were there two, three, four, eight more planes hijacked and on their way to crash into prominent buildings? Was one headed for the school, where anyone who checked the President's public itinerary would know he was located?
Remember, Bush said he saw the first plane hit, on TV. There was no film of that at the time!
US Code, Title 4, Chapter 1, Sec. 8 (g): "The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature."
Pages
of Days
Almanac
President
Albert Einstein suggested to President Roosevelt that atomic research should commence in the US. Roosevelt’s approval led to the construction of the first atomic bomb.
On August 2, 1876, while playing poker in a saloon in Deadwood, South Dakota, Wild Bill Hickok was shot and killed by Jack McCall who was later tried and hanged on March 1, 1877. The hand that Hickok held at the time he was shot was a pair of eights and a pair of aces. The hand later became known as the "dead man's hand."
Named for the god Lugh, who is associated with this season of Lammas, this is an old name for the Perseids, the most familiar of all meteor showers, that take place at around this time of year. Associated with the Swift-Tuttle Comet, the Perseids have been well documented since at least 830 CE and take their name from the constellation Perseus where shooting stars appear. We can well imagine ancient Celts looking upon these wonders and associating them with other phenomena of the season between the equinox and solstice, including the heat of the last of the Dog Days. 
"(2003-07-31) -- New York Times executive editor Bill Keller said today he has scrapped plans to hire a public editor as a "reader representative," and instead will link the online newspaper to a network of so-called "blogs".
Two days ago the US Department of Homeland Security released a warning that Australia is a target for Al Qaeda terrorism. The Australian government, receiving a kindly visit from Men in Black from the tourism and airline industries, did something completely out of character. With their biggest John Howard nervous grins, they mentioned politely to the USA that "The Australian People" were a tad dubious about that assessment.
