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Another Foggy Moment
These are the continuing adventures of a typical resident
of the self-proclaimed center of the Pugetopolis universe -
Seattle. Most are true stories but some are made of whole-
cloth. I ain't the Mayor, the Governor or a Big Shot. Just
another Working Stiff with a Bad Attitude.
THIS AIN'T NO STINK'N BLOG
------------------------------------------------
WARNING: This is not a Child-Proof Neighborhood.
If you're a kid - scram!, beat it! you little
punk before your Old Lady catches you and calls
the cops. They'll throw you in the Big House in
Walla Walla and won't let you out until you're
89 years old. There. Don't say I didn't warn you.
-------------------------------------------------
- 192 -
He's back. The ChickaChicka bird finally added is voice to the
growing Dawn Chorus. Oooo-eeee-Chicka-Chicka-ee. Spring has
truely arrived. Where yat bra!
U Dub's Quad has taken on the appearance of a Fantasyland with
the Yoshino cherry trees in full blossom. It's suddenly become
a favorite gathering place, especially for Asian students. Instead
of quickly shuffling through on the way to elsewhere, many are
lingering to groove on the Yoshinos organic vibes.
The UDub rowing shells are out at the crack of dawn practicing
for next month's regatta. They're way ahead of the usual pack
of grunting Yuppies and wheezing geezers from the Lake Union
rowing clubs. And none of that bullhorn chatter either. They
just quietly bend their backs to the task.
How strange it is. The Navy across the Sound is on war-alert,
the Coasties are on half-war-alert and the city is in peacetime.
We're all on different pages. United We Stand. Yeah sure,
whatever.
HOOTERVILLE HISTORY...
Happy Birthday to you. You live in a zoo. You look like a monkey
and smell like one too. Yes, Friday is the grand 50th Birthday
of the lovely Alaska Way Viaduct - Hooterville's answer to the
Berlin Wall. Wouldn't it be nice if they blew it up to celebrate
the event? Dream on. The world's ugliest and most dangerous
stretch of elevated roadway will live on another 50 years if its
up to the state of Washington to pay for a replacement. Olympia
keeps hoping an earthquake will trash the whole thing so they
can hit up Uncle Sammy for money to replace it. So far, no luck.
But anyone who's ever drove it has wondered if they will be one
of the lucky souls to get pancaked between levels in a sudden
rattler. One of these days...THUMP!...it's gonna happen to
somebody.
DOO DAH...
Emerald Downs' first Condition Book of the year arrived in the
mail last week. Racing Secretaries at horse-racing tracks all
over North America issue these periodic little pamphlets that
list their intended races for a month or so. There's nothing
hard and fast about them but they give a good picture of where
a trainer might be aiming their winning pony. Aside from that,
it means the barns out in Auburn are filling and the early
morning crowd is out there exercising their horses in preparation
for The Big Day. The summer card opens on Saturday April 19th.
Yee Haw!
Is "Gonzo" Gonsalves coming back for another summer of crazy
five-wide winning stretch runs? Which Baze kid will be wearing
the silks this year? Is Mike Pegram going to run any horses
out of Emerald? These and many other questions begin to invade
my thoughts.
B.C. FERRIES...
BC Ferries finally got rid of their four PacifiCat fast ferries.
Asking somewhere around $8 MegaBucks apiece, they ended up
getting more like $3 MegaBucks apiece. All four got scooped
up by one auction bidder for $13.5 Million U.S. (about $20
Million Canuk Loonies). They've been desperately flogging those
turkeys for the past few years. At one point they even turned
up on eBay but the winning bid didn't meet their reserve.
Basically a sound design by an award-winning local, they got
sadly redesigned by a politician who didn't know a thing in
the world about designing boats of any kind. Seriously. The
Premier of British Columbia at the time, a little twerp who
is presently flogging neon bar signs in Vancouver, literally
redid the winning design - by himself - to make them more
'user friendly'. He completely botched the job and totally
changed the vessels sailing characteristics. No longer capable
of handling the occasionally rough waters of Georgia Strait
where they were intended to run, restricted to running only
in calm waters, they still were forever breaking down. They
proved utterly useless. Two of them never even made it in the
water. They were shrink-wrapped and stuck in a warehouse,
untouched by human hands. The other two saw spot service
when BC Ferries was truely desperate for extra equipment.
They always broke down.
THE SEATTLE RED WINGS...
Further to Seattle being home to the first American team to win
the Stanley Cup...
The team, was completely made up of Canuks of course. There were
no American players on the Seattle Metropolitans. Hooterville
hates a winner. If you want a guaranteed way to become highly
unpopular in Seattle, win something. It goes against the Natural
Order of things here. It seems somehow sinful. Naturally, the
Metropolitans became highly unpopular after winning the Stanley
Cup and were forced, by low attendance, to move to Victoria (BC)
where they became the Victoria Cougars.
Jack Norris was a notorious Chicago Robber-Baron whose grain
elevators dotted the American praries like Zits on a teenager's
face. A Canuk by birth, he had come south as a young man and
struck it rich in the grain biz. Loud, brash and bigger than
life, he wasn't shy about letting everyone know he was Stink'n
Loaded. He flaunted his wealth in everybody's face. He lived
BIG - bought politicians and judges, had big cars, big houses,
gambled High Stakes and had plenty of nurses to sooth his
jangled nerves. Which isn't to say he wasn't a good family man.
His everloving wife and children can attest to that.
He was also sports-oriented too if he smelled a buck in it.
The local Chi-Town boys had the baseball racket already covered,
football was still strictly for college kiddies, basketball wasn't
even on the map. But boxing was hot and crooked as a dog's hind
leg. It was full of people who appreciated the value of money.
Especially if it was slipped quietly to them in a paper-bag
under the table when nobody was looking. So Jack became a big
Push in boxing.
Somewhere along the way the NHL caught his eye. Here was a sport
that people could get excited about. It had speed, violence and
a certain elegance to it. Best of all, nobody else seemed to
have heard about it. But those Canuks in Montreal and Toronto
had it wrapped up tighter than Houdini on a bridge. Not being
the kind of guy to take 'no' for an answer, he whipped out his
wallet, greased the palms of a few of them Hosers and soon had
himself two new franchises in their NHL: Chicago and Detroit.
He was going to put hockey on the American sports map.
Now that he had a franchise, all he needed was a team. Where
could a Robber Baron find a hockey team? Canada, of course.
Jack looked around The Great White North a little and liked
what he saw in the Victoria (BC) "Cougars" (nee Seattle Metros).
They were struggling and came cheap. So he bought them - lock,
stock and barrel: players, coach, trainers, equipment - the
whole shebang. He then moved them to Detroit where he renamed
them the Winged Wheels. He came up with that distinctive team
emblem that they've had ever since. He even built them a fancy
new arena that nicely doubled for boxing matches: Olympia Stadium.
A short while later he came to his senses and renamed them the
Detroit Red Wings, giving them those cute Santa Claus uniforms
they've worn ever since. Bingo! He was in the hockey business.
As anyone who knows diddly about hockey can confirm, the Wings
have almost always been one of the classiest teams in the NHL
right from the old 6-team league days. In recent years, they
have invariably been The Team To Beat. Gordie Howe, Norm Ullman,
Terry Sawchuck, Ted Lindsay, Marcel Pronovost and many other
Hall of Famers have worn the Wings colors over the years.
We want 'em back. They're from Seattle. They belong here, not
in Detroit. Don't make us go to MoTown and kick butt to get
them back. We don't want to hurt anybody. We're peaceful people.
Just hand 'em over.
AN EERIE ENCOUNTER...
I finally ran into someone who supports President Yellowbelly's
Crusade Against the Mooslims. In all the time his stinky TWAT
has been rolling, it's been rare to encounter anyone who even
mentions TWAT. For the vast majority of Americans, it's a non-
issue at best. An unpleasant and controversial topic more likely
to lead to loud arguments than enlightenment. It's something
they'd prefer not to think about. This ambivalence is what our
News Nazis dishonestly sling as 'support'.
But that changed this week. It was a government office that I
periodically drop in on. And it is one of my favorite places
to visit - the most genteel and genuinely hospitable people
you'd ever want to meet. All were well-educated and of a mature
age. I only mention that it was a government office because it
seems to be what makes the difference though I'm not sure why.
There's no patriotic bunting up or effort to rally the troops.
I guess because those who aren't military vets are military
brats who grew up in vagabonding military families. An ordinary
citizen has a hard time getting hired for a government job. You
pretty near have to be a vet to crack Sammy's lineup.
They are very patriotic people. Not in the pushy, loud-mouthed
sense of the VFW Hall drunks, but in a far quieter way. Oddly,
they don't assume everyone possesses their 'faith'. They don't
foist it on others. Truely the nature of their patriotism is
closer to religious than secular: it lives in a profoundly deep
place in their heart. It's not up for debate and is utterly
impervious to rational/analytical discourse. It is not a matter
of the brain. You will not sway them with arguments. It would
be a waste of time to even try.
It was eerie listening to these gentle, decent people talk about
the war. It was like a game for them: we unquestionably are the
Good Guys and the rest of the entire world was the Bad Guys. Yes,
they see the ENTIRE WORLD as their enemy, not just Saddam or the
Muslims. Advances by American troops were cause for celebration;
bad news was simply ignored and got no further mention. They are
the pentultimate American Optomists - this is the way they also
treat bad stock-market or baseball news. It is quickly shunted
out of sight and out of mind.
Only once did they mention foreign criticism and those against
the war. The depth of their distaste for such people was in sharp
contrast to their normal gentility. The pain and sense of betrayal
they felt from such dissent was actually personal. It was as if
it were directed at them. I got the feeling that they wouldn't
be at all upset if all Peaceniks were taken out and shot. And if
one of those B-52 strayed over to Europe and blew the hell out
of Paris, they would merely find it amusing. Many of them have
been to Paris. They would miss it, but not a great deal.
None of them have been to Baghdad. They never once even mentioned
the Iraqis. It was always "Saddam this...", "Saddam...that". It
was like there were no people in Iraq. Just Saddam and his army.
Strangest of all was their attitude towards President Yellowbelly.
A year or so ago they were laughing at him. It was fair game to
openly mock and ridicule him. Not any more. He is close to being
venerated. Something happened in the interim and they have now
accepted him as their leader. They've given him their hearts. I
suspect this is strictly a war-time thing but I'm not sure.
I, of course, didn't say I was against the war. They didn't ask
and, being a guest, I'm old-fashioned enough to behave myself.
I think that because I didn't voluntarily say something supportive
that they suspected I had my doubts so they didn't push it. They
are very careful to avoid confrontation of any sort. So they
weren't even vaguely curious as to what my doubts might be. Not
at all. I'm more of an observer than a preacher by nature anyways.
I was glad they didn't ask. It would have made things awkward.
These people are a minority. An opinion I think they would likely
take no small pride in. They seem to see themselves as a patriotic
'elite' of sorts. Just a little more American than everybody else.
A common attitude amongst ex-military types. Our military institutions
nuture it. Few people I run into have their xenophobic paranoia
about auslanders. Fewer yet have their unquestioned loyalty. In
fact both characteristics seem almost radically un-American. We
are pissers and moaners by nature, not passive Zombies. And most
of us are convinced the grass is always greener on the other side
of the fence. It's reassuring to think that these nice people are
freaks. I sure hope that's true.
BOYCOTT AMERICA...
As quickly as it formed and impressive as its numbers have been,
the anti-war movement has been highly ignorable to date. President
Yellowbelly ignores them, our Congressional Whores ignore them,
politicians around the world ignore them as do the world's News
Nazis. The Official Apparatus mocks, belittles and spits on them.
They failed to stop Yeller stinky TWAT in Iraq and have been
flopping around aimlessly since it started. All this despite
the fact that international polls universally indicate that 80-90%
of humanity is against this war. Peaceniks are truely an oppressed
massive majority.
When you talk to a thug, you need a Big Stick. They don't listen
to anybody who isn't capable of at least seriously implying that
they have the means to inflict major physical pain. Far as Mr.
Thug is concerned, if you got no stick to threaten him with, he
can safely ignore your existence and continue his thuggery. You're
nothing to worry about. You can't hurt him.
Now it looks like the Euro and Canuk Moo-Moos may have found their
Big Stick. In the past week or so a number of boycott campaigns
have rapidly formed that are targetting American companies and
products - Starbucks, Microsoft, McDonalds, Boeing, Coca-Cola,
as well as many lesser fish. Ask for a Coke in a Munich/Bonn/Koehn
bar and they'll tell you it's no longer available due the the
political situation. While it's still Early Times, the public
response has been highly enthusiastic. People really seem to like
the idea. It gives that 80-90% majority an effective, non-violent,
largely anonymous way to tell Uncle Sammy to shove his war up his
ass sideways. It lets him know that if he wants to ignore world
opinion,it's going to cost him. The concept is catching on like
wildfire.
www.consumers-against-war.de
www.adbusters.org
Needless to say, it's far easier for the world to target the
U.S.A. than it is for America to target the world. Given our
international dependancy and the sorry state of our economy,
we are especially vulnerable right now. Wouldn't take much to
inflict considerable pain if not damage.
Of all the anti-war strategies that have emerged, I like the
potential this one has. It looks like a winner. Peaceniks may
not have any mainstream political clout but they do have money.
Some of them have a LOT of money. Boycotts are as old as the
hills. Conducted by a central body, they are vulnerable to our
corrupt judicial system. But conducted via an informational
webpage with people being encouraged to give free reign to
their creativity, well...the sky's the limit. Finding suitable
victims would be easy: just watch TV, listen to the radio, read
the paper and note who sponsors our News Nazis spew. Pick one
out and nail the bastard. Be sure to tell them KING/KIRO/KISS/
Seattle-Times sent you. Grab them by the financial short-hairs
and their corporate hearts/minds/wallets will follow.
TRICKY RICKY PEARLE...
We found out this week that Richard Pearle, now former Chairman
of the Defense Planning Board, ain't one of the Big Ass White
Boys. He's just a Little Ass White Boy. He is a Jew, afterall.
Rummy, Ashcroft, Dickhead Cheney and Yeller ain't gonna let no
pushy Heebs horn in on their comfy little Aryan Christian Prayer
Klub. Despite what Pat Buchanan says, the Israel-First Gestapo
aren't calling the shots. Just the reverse. The Big Ass White
Boys are playing them for suckers too, just like all the rest.
As long as they keep killing little brown Mooslems, select
individuals can have a small piece of the action.
As with his previous appearances in High Office, Tricky Ricky
got caught do'n what an honest person would never dream of doing.
First time he unexpectedly popped-up on an FBI wiretap passing
Top Secret info to the Israeli embassy. Pretty much the same
thing Jonathon Pollard got life in prison for. The FBI was given
a stern warning and told never to tape Tricky's conversations again.
This time he got caught shaking-down foreigners for non-terrorist
status if they threw his company some business. But don't imagine
he's gone and forgotten. He's still there and still on the payroll.
.........................................................................
"The enemy we're fighting is different from the one we war-gamed
against."
- General William Wallace -
Senior Ground Commander in Iraq
DOH!
.........................................................................
'OL YELLER'S TWAT
(aka The War Against Terrorism)
Geez! This was supposed to be the easy part. The World's Biggest
Asshole was supposed to be sitting pretty in the bombed-out wreck
of Baghdad by now, passing out Hershey bars to adoring Iraqis
grateful for their liberation while the boys sniffed around for
some of that exotic Mooslem Poontang. Instead, Uncle Sammy's
thugs are getting a sharp stick shoved increasingly further up
their asses as the Iraqis refuse to roll-over and have instead
hunkered down for a long, drawn-out, bloody fight.
America is not invincible. Just ask the Vietnamese. They didn't
have a single aircraft or tank when we first kicked in their
door. They were far poorer and less militarily endowed than
the Iraqis, yet they pulled off the military upset victory
of the century when they sent Uncle Sammy packing. They won
simply because they're better people than we are. All we had
was our greed and our military gizmos while they had heart,
soul and a suicidal desire to be independant. That's why we're
going to lose in Iraq. It's deja-vu all over again.
Not only is Yeller's stinky TWAT illegal and immoral, it's run
by imbeciles who apparently have little idea what they're doing.
Going into this thing without even a recent asessment of Iraq's
military by our DoD and no CIA analysis was a stupid move more
worthy of General Homer Simpson than General Franks. The lack
of planning and preparation are obvious, as is the constant
political interference and showboat posturing for the Media. All
the patriotic whinners who are so in love with Our Troops don't
seem to mind the simple fact that the Pentagoon and White House
cynically sent them into Iraq under-staffed, under-equipped and
under-budgeted. Duh! Some patriots eh.
Phony advances, phony new fronts, magically disappearing POWs and
fantasy BBC victories may impress the True Believers amongst our
Rubes and Jaspers, but it ain't impressing the Iraqis. We've
failed to take a single city, we're stalled out in the middle of
the desert, our Luftwaffe's Blitzkrieg (aka Shock & Awe) was
a total failure and Saddam is not only still running the show,
every day that passes he gets stronger.
Adding to his strength is our assinine strategy of bombing the
civilians of Iraq. Apparently many Iraqis, while unwilling
to aid our fight, were prepared to quietly sit at home and
await the dethroning of Saddam to see if we could come up
with something better. They were willing to believe our fight
was with their leadership, not them. And they did believe it
right up until the moment the bombs and bullets got aimed at
them. They've responded accordingly. They now realize that
they are indeed the target and that this is indeed an invasion
not a liberation. Rationally enough, they are now increasingly
turning to Saddam to save their bacon. We've turned their
ambivalence towards Saddam into an open embrace of him. Doh!
At least one Marine has had a bellyfull and went AWOL. The
Marines mine-sweeping Atlantic bottlenose dolphin "Takoma"
split first time they put him in the water. He was supposed
to clear the way for HMS Galahad. That was 48-hours ago
and nobody's heard anything from him since. Which puts him
about 100 IQ points above his Jarhead handlers. So long and
thanks for the fish...suckers.
BTW - where in the hell are the Pollocks, Wops, Czechs and
Spaniards? Are the Aussies still back at the bar in Kuwait?
Yeller's phony/baloney coalition is so useless he's forced
to dip further into his own reserves for relief. Dang! We
ain't even to Baghdad yet and already he's running out of
bodies. Those reserves aren't battle-ready. Most of them
aren't even trained for a conflict like this. They'll get
their asses kicked. More ominously yet, he's clearly going
to have to go to a military draft before this thing is
over. Oh boy. That's going to be one helluva can of worms.
What's gonna happen when we get to Baghdad? We will, if we
have to bomb our way in. If we can't even handle the simple,
straight-forward stuff, it's a cinch we won't be able to
handle the far more complex task of trying to occupy a city
full of hostile locals. We failed in Somalia. And those were
irregulars - little more than local gangs. Saddam's boys are
not only better trained and equipped than the Somali warlords
were, they'll also have an enormous local-knowledge advantage
as well as a population that we've now turned to their favor.
I want to see us lose Bigtime. Saddam is nothing. Guys like
him and President Yellowbelly are a dime a dozen. The world
is full of them. Always has been, always will be. I want to
see us lose simply because unless we do, we won't learn to
mind our own goddam business. We seem to be incapable of
common-sense and reason. Unless we get our butts kicked we'll
continue to have our insane delusions about Empire. We're too
stupid to understand anything less than thousands of body-bags
filled with young American kids. Well...what the hell. If
that's your price then I say fill 'em up. Whatever it takes.
One thing's for sure - the Terrorist Threat, like Yeller's TWAT,
is pure bullshit. That's as plain as the nose on your face.
..........................................................................
- MONDO VATICANO -
The fascinating machination of Mondo Vaticano ground on this week.
Cardinal Dulles, Cardinal "Ratso" Ratzinger and the rest of the
Curia fascisti have slipped quietly back into the shadows. The
'liberals' have obviously been given a rare green-light to do
their Peace Thang. And as long as you don't look further back
than the past couple weeks, you won't realze the Vatican had
its lips firmly suctioned to Uncle Sammy butt during the entire
year-long run up to the Iraq War.
Bishops don't get arrested without authorization, like Bishop Tom
Gumbleton of Detroit did this week, unless the Curia has personally
promised to go his bail. It is an extremely rare event and a pretty
clear indication that the Curia Queens feel that President Yellowbelly
schnookered them bad on Iraq. Bishop Tom got collared, along with
two Nobel lauriates and a Methodist bishop out front of the White
House while protesting Yeller's stinky TWAT operation in Iraq.
But just so you don't get the idea that the Vatican's left hand
knows what the right hand is doing...
Fr. Gary Mercure at Sacred Heart got into hot water with his parish's
Nazis when he told them in his homily that the War against Iraq
was wrong. The usual crew of right-wing wackos got up and goose-
stepped out the door whinning about Fr. Gary being 'outta line'.
Apparently there is some part of "Do Not Kill" that they don't
understand. So far no condemnation and threat of excommunication
from Pope Bill at the Catholic Fascist League. He's get'n slow
in his old age eh.
Then there was Gary Tankard, a teacher at Bergen Catholic High
School in New Jersey. Like a number of other teachers, he wore
a red/white/blue button that said "War Is Not The Answer". Unlike
the others, he refused to take his off when ordered to by the
principal of the school. He quit instead. The principle, a fat
Wop who apparently hasn't heard that the Vatican opposes the
war, said this anti-war stuff is all well and good but wearing
buttons is taking it too far. Somebody want to tell this jerk
he's full of crap?
Finally there's that Austrian who flew into St. Peter's Square
this week in a motorized hang-glider trailing an anti-war banner.
Rather than embrace him as a Fellow Traveller, the "anti-war"
Vatican has him locked up and is pondering whether or not to
hand him over to the Goombahs on the Italian side of the Vatican
border for violating Italian airspace. He's lucky Cardinal "Ratso"
Ratzinger didn't nail him with that anti-aircraft battery he's
got on his roof. Ratso ain't anti-war. He LOVES wars.
+
The ArchBishop of Hamburg, Germany, got his shorts in a knot
this week. No, he isn't pissed off about the war. He probably
doesn't even know there's one going on. He's pissed off about
ice-cream. Now there's a man with perspective eh.
The Anglo-Dutch company Unilever's "Magnum" ice-cream subsidiary
came out with a new line of ice-creams for the Euro market,
named after the Seven Deadly Sins. "Lust" was first out the
gate. It's got a strawberry coating on the outside. I'm sure
there's a connection between strawberries and lust but I'm
too old to remember what it is. Anyways, the Hamburg ArchBishop
dashed off a press-release condemning the new line as just a
cheap attempt by Unilever to cash in on German's sinfulness.
It was like a marking-department's dream come true: a product
so sinful a bishop condemned it. No word if the bishop is
getting a cut under-the-table for all the free advertising
he's giving the ice-cream people.
They've been test-marketing the Seven Deadly Sins ice-creams
in Australia and South Africa. Reportedly "Vanity" is the hot
seller. "Gluttony" is next up for the Euros. It's got a
chocolate-nut covering. Hmmmm. Sounds sinfully interesting.
+
Every year about this time I get out my copy of Sholem Asch's
"The Nazarene". While Lent culminates in the Passion, most of
it is taken up with a rememberance of Christ's mission amongst
the Jews. This book tells the story of that mission in a unique
and fascinating way. It not only nicely fills out the Jewish
environment Christ lived and worked in, it also relates much
of the history of that time. And it is full of an intelligent
Jew's fascination with the mysterious figure of Christ. It is,
in fact, his attempt to make sense of it all.
He organized it into three 'books' each of which was narrated
by a different individual. Book One is related to a young
Jewish scholar by the the Roman centurion Cornelius, who has
reincarnated as a nasty, deeply anti-semitic old vendor of
stolen archeological artifacts. Book Two is supposed to be the
translation of a fragment of a long-lost Gospel - the Gospel of
Judas of Iscariot! Book Three is the voice of Joseph, a young
Jerusalem Temple student of Rabbe Nicodemus in Christ's time.
Asch was a Jew. Not a Jew For Jesus - but a practicing, faithful
Jew. In fact he wrote strictly in Yiddish. Because of this book
and his many others on Christian themes, he was and largely
remains anethma to many Jews. The screaming virulence of his
Hebrew critics is really quite remakable. It drips with deep
hatred. Not to be outdone, many Christians consider Sholom's
writings to be also anethma. They consider him a Jew who is
trying to 'kidnap' Jesus and turn him into a Jew. He was, as
a matter of Gospel fact, a Jew, but they let that one slide.
In short, Sholem got it from both ends. Reportedly he couldn't
have cared less. His books sold well. They deserved to.
There are many reasons why I like this book. Because he was
so knowlegable about Jewish traditions and the history of that
time, his Christ has an extraordinary integrity to Him. He
feels Real and rings true both historically and spirtually.
Rather than try to indulge in arcane theories about the nature
of Christ, Sholem instead tries to recreate how such a Jew would
likely have been received by His own people. How he would have
been understood. Who would likely have been friendly towards
Him, who would have felt most threatened by Him but mostly,
how His peculiar and strange message would have been received.
I don't think he actually came out and said it, but I suspect
Sholem felt that Christ was indeed a Messiah. But not the
promised Messiah the Jews have been waiting for. Rather, He
was a Messiah to the Gentiles. One who deeply valued both the
people and Law of the Old Covenant but wasn't for them. Just
a hint: I think Rebbe Nicodemus in the book was the voice of
Sholem's own thoughts, doubts and speculations on the matter.
I've seen it in Barnes & Nobel as well Border's so it must
still be in-print. There are always plenty of used copies
around. It's an old book. A lovely, poetic old book.
"The Nazarene - A Novel Based On the Life of Christ"
Sholem Asch
Translated by Maurice Samuel
G.P. Putnam & Sons, New York, 1939
abebooks.com
-----------------------------------------------------
The above is copyright material. You want to use it,
ask. You want to make money off it, gimme some first.
I'll let you know if it's enough. You want to steal it,
I'll sic my lawyer Yoshi 'The Proctologist' Rasmussen
on you baby. He'll teriyaki your sorry butt and turn
it into Lutefisk.
~----------------------------------------------------
MAIL: tofoggymoment@yahoo.com
ARCHIVE: https://www.angelfire.com/nb/afm
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