Author: Tom Fitzpatrick

Life

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Members of a Catholic church in England reported their priest gave a sermon suggesting that, given the way Jesus died, he probably died with an erection. So now it has become big news and a lot of people are talking about it. Which is irritating for the following reasons:

  1. What Jesus’ erection has to do with the crucification is beyond me. It sounds like the priest was giving graphic details of how a man dying on the cross would suffer. The priest was giving way to much data here. Yes, it is important to know Jesus suffered, but I think even a child can figure out that being nailed to a cross is no picnic. Why the priest had to throw in all the gory details which included that in Jesus dying minutes the blood rushed to his penis and caused him to pop a boner seems beyond the pale. It’s irrelevant to the Easter Story.
  2. Since there is no earthly reason for the priest to discuss Jesus’ erection, why did he drop this little bomb into his Easter sermon? He had to know that mentioning the word erection during a church service was going to cause a commotion. The mere mention of anything sexual perks up the ears of the more Puritanical members of any congregation. They heard erection and their knives were drawn and ready. This was professional suicide on a grand level. It says a lot that he decided to kick the chair out from under him during one of the most well attended church days of the year. I can only think that he was sick of his job and decided to go out in a blaze of glory. He succeeded.
  3. It doesn’t really matter because popping a boner while dying is not a sin. Even though the priest has been removed from his position and it looks like he did something wrong, there is absolutely no theological debate regarding men who have erections while dying. Men in their prime often find themselves erect for no apparent reason whatsoever. It just happens. I realize that Jesus’ erection is unimportant and the Pope has way more important things to deal with but he might mention this in a future speech or sermon sometime if he is running short of material — erections are not sinful.
  4. Jesus, up until his death, was a human being subject to the same human temptations as any other human being. Isn’t that an important part of the Jesus story? He struggled with his humanity like any other human while he was here. An erection just humanizes the man. Although, I think, in keeping with the Easter story, that Jesus’s death is a better illustration of his humanity and is very much in keeping with the Easter Story.
  5. Some of the church scolds were worried that children might have heard this story. Let me assure everyone, as a young person who once spent every Sunday in Mass, the children missed it entirely. All I recall about Mass was my eyes would glaze over upon entering church and for the next hour I daydreamed or looked at people or tried to talk to one of my siblings in the pew with me but I rarely, if ever, paid attention to the priest. The only thing I can remember is my parents rousting me out of my slumber in order to get to communion. Mass, as every kid forced to go knows, is a snoozefest.
  6. This is not a free speech issue. The Catholic Church is not a public entity and should be free to police their employees as they wish. They did.
  7. Why is this getting so much press? I can see that it may be an issue for the members of the church, but for the larger world it is nothing but the press stirring a pot to see what kind of controversy they can create with a nothing event. I don’t know why they wasted precious headline space on this when they could be talking about something really important like the Met Gala or Taylor Swift. It’s like the press has lost all sense of what is important.

Finally, on a brighter note, I would recommend the name Jesus’ Erection as a great name for any new band who are looking for a catchy name. It is sure to get noticed, all you have to be is good and the world is your oyster.

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There are times when there are only bad options on the table. That doesn’t mean you can opt out of the choice. Bad options still require a decision.

I this is where we are with Israel and Gaza. What exactly will a ceasefire do? There was a ceasefire in place before Hamas attacked on October 7. Hamas eventually broke that ceasefire. So, 2 weeks, months, years, decades from now the ceasefire will be broken. In the interim, is there any possible peace plan that both sides will accept? I am not hearing any.

Everything I hear is more war without anyone actually saying the word war. Palestinians want the river to the sea or all of Israel. How is that going to happen peacefully? There are 9 million Israelis. They are just going to pack up their things and move. Is that the idea? Where? The West, particularly North America and Europe, is already antagonistic towards immigration. It isn’t likely that pushing even more migrants onto the Western World is going to make them more receptive to mass immigration on this large a scale. With no place to go, and everything they have in Israel, it is a pretty safe bet the Israelis will fight.

Some say a truce would allow for the evacuation of women and children in Gaza. This would be good if somebody would take them but nobody wants them. What country has said that they would take Palestinian refugees? Particularly when many of these refugees are committed to waging war with Israel. What country wants to become a target for Israel’s revenge against the Palestinians?Let’s face it, the Palestinians aren’t going anywhere. So, then, there is no place to evacuate them to. A ceasefire is only delaying the next war not stopping it.

What Hamas gained from their attack on Israel is a mystery. Surely an aggressive military response from Israel must have occurred to them. Yet, they still went ahead with an attack of a superior military force with no plan to protect the civilian population of Gaza. Indeed, it looks very much like they wanted an Israeli counter attack of Hamas which, of course, would include civilians. Well, Hamas got what they wanted. For their efforts, Hamas got one day of unseemly celebrations for killing Israelis and then the relentless hammer of the Israeli military. This hardly seems worth the beating that the people of Gaza are experiencing presently.

The Israelis are getting bad publicity but then this doesn’t seem to bother the Israelis. They expect it. The Israelis, however, are united in their commitment for the survival of Israel. If this calls for bombing Gaza into submission, so be it. It is a horrible thing to happen, but then we used similar tactics during World War II. German and Japanese civilians suffered terribly during the Allied bombing of their cities. But then war is terrible.

So who gets the nod.

Hamas is antagonistic towards women’s rights and gay rights. They also stopped having elections in Gaza once they took control, so not particularly committed to democratic institutions. The atrocities that Hamas committed on October 7 further undermined their reputation as a civilized fighting force. The leaders of Hamas either don’t want to control their fighters or can’t control them. None of this speaks well of their ability to govern reasonably.

Netanyahu, on the other hand, is corrupt and dangerously self-serving. He wants to bend Israeli law in such a way that he can retain power. He also leads a government that is hostile to any Palestinian grievances. He opposes the two state solution which is the only peaceful solution even remotely considered as possible by both sides. Not much hope for peace while Netanyahu is in power. The Israelis do continue to have elections so there is some possibility that Netanyahu will be dismissed at some future date.

So two really bad options. But, it doesn’t take much thinking on my part, I would much rather take my chances with a government led by Netanyahu than one led by Hamas.

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There are many good reasons I won’t be voting for Donald Trump this November, but the one that stands out is that he is mean-spirited. Trump recently pointed out Senator Jon Tester’s weight. It takes a lot of moxie for an overweight man to pick on another man’s weight. Let he who is without extra weight cast the first stone, I say. But much more importantly, what adult publicly points out a person’s weight? It is widely understood social faux pas. He isn’t making a catty comment about someone among a few friends which is wrong but also completely understandable. Almost everyone makes catty comments from time to time. And, if some friend reported that Trump said something like this in a private setting, I would think the reporting friend was an asshole. Trump, though, is speaking in front of an audience at a fundraising dinner. He thinks being mean-spirited is amusing and, worse still, isn’t the least bit embarrassed about it.

Since he finds it so amusing, I couldn’t help myself with my title. It is all in good fun after all. Ha Ha Ha Ha.

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Mr Bates vs the Post Office documents the ongoing scandal between the British Post Office and their subpostmasters. First the title is far from sexy. I am not sure how the makers of this television series could have spiced up the title because this part 4 part series is far more absorbing than the title suggest. Perhaps this is deliberate given that this is about real people involved in real work using the tools common to the modern business workplace. The horror is real because the problem is so familiar — who hasn’t become frustrated with malfunctioning computer software and helplines that give no help.

Bates (Toby Jones) is a subpostmaster in Wales who runs into trouble when he is unable to balance his books with the Post Office’s computer’s software. Instead of signing off on the incorrect data, Bates refuses to sign off and refuses to make up the difference as his Post Office contract requires. The Post Office ends his contract letting him think that the is the only one to be having this trouble. It is only later that he finds out that he is one of many subpostmaster’s having a similar problem.

Once he learns that other subpostmasters are having the same problem, he tries to right this wrong. Initially believing that all the Post Office needed was data to prove his case but after hearing numerous stories of the Post Office management bringing to trial his fellow subpostmasters does he realized that something more nefarious is going on — the deliberate destruction of Post Office workers in order to protect the reputation and the profits of the Post office. Thus begins his twenty year (and it is still ongoing) struggle for justice.

It is hard to believe that a story about malfunctioning software, indifferent and arrogant business managers could be so engrossing but it is. I binged watched 3 of 4 episodes in one night and I would have watched the 4th on that same night if it had been possible instead I had to wait a week for the last episode. It is a highly relatable series. The horrors are horrors of the every day man and woman. Loosing everything to fight a huge corporation who have the resources to grind a person down until they will admit to anything to make the whole thing go away.

The Post Office management are the perfect bureaucratic villains. Sighting rules and contracts as reasons for their ruthless handling of the subpostmasters and spouting technobabble when people question their computer systems. Whenever any one of them says “our system is robust,” you know that they haven’t a clue about the problems with their system. They are reading from a script from their legal department. They surrendered their humanity for bonuses and prestige and cling mechanically to a confidence in Fujitsu’s Horizon software long after the problems with the system are evident. It would be almost tragic if they had not been so arrogant.

Which brings us to the Fujitsu’s Horizon computer system. Like HAL in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001, every time the camera hones in on the Horizon hardware I got a sense of doom. It seems innocent enough but the blinking lights, the menacing cold machine is trouble but I can’t quite explain why. But it can’t be wrong, right? It is a machine. A machine that mindlessly pours out incorrect data that makes no sense to the human beings looking at it and offering no explanation on how it got it but requiring that the users have complete obedience to the information it created. Because Horizon is a robust system. How can anyone argue with that?

This is an odd television story where the story trumps everything else. Everything is done well (Acting, Production) but if there was an actor reading the script in front of an empty canvass, I would have found the story compelling because it is highlighting a problem we see on a much smaller scale in our own lives. How human beings get caught in a tangle of false confidence in infallible technology and unthinking bureaucracy. The show is horrible because you can imagine yourself getting caught up in such a tangle and believable because we see these problems every day. This is must see television.

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Katherine Maher, the new CEO of National Public Radio, tries to defend herself against accusations of her First Amendment ambivalence. She awkwardly replies to her critics in the Wall Street Journal with the following, ““It is by no means a personal perspective; it’s a very bad faith distortion of a nuanced perspective on a policy landscape issue.”  WTF? I have absolutely no idea what she means here. To be fair, I am not sure how Christopher Rufo, one of her critics, determined her position on the First Amendment from this video link.

She speaks in an academic jargon that is meaningless to the vast majority of Americans. This is fine if she is sitting down to lunch in a university cafeteria with a bunch of Social Science professors. On the other hand, if she is trying to defend herself against the idea that she is an Ivory Tower Academic Elitist, she might try using plainer language because, unfortunately for her, every time she speaks she sounds like an Ivory Tower Academic Elitist.

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The Daily Beast published a story about a gentleman who calls himself the Girth Master. His name should give you a big hint on what he does for a living and it is quite a living. He makes between $40,000 and $80,000 a month. That’s right a month. He makes in one month what most people make in a year.

Admittedly, he is self reporting his income so, in the interest of accurate reporting, I investigated him further at his Instagram site. I, unfortunately, wasn’t able to learn more about his income but he wasn’t lying about being a Girth Master (Let this also serve as a warning. You will definitely learn more about his girth so please no feedback about how you were struck blind by the girth of the Girth Master). What I am saying is if he didn’t lie about his dick size, I am going to give him the benefit of the doubt about the less important matter of income.

Any way, yes, $80,000 in a good month. Listen I don’t blame the man. He seems a bit of a charmer and even sounds a little embarrassed about his success. If people are buying sex and he is able to sell it, more power to him.

The problem, for me at least, is the $80,000 a month. This is close to a million a year. For something he would do for free but because he has a big dick, people are willing to pay him. Talk about loving your work. It also calls into question the morality of the Free Market. What we care about is where we put our money, right? Well, then, as far as I can see, we care about porn sites and billionaire Taylor Swift.

It also means that we don’t care particularly much about public education or single mothers or homelessness or drug addiction clinics. We know this to be true because well the Girth Master makes $80,000 in a month showing dic pics. Notice the word we. I can’t tell you the amount of money I have spent on dining out, alcohol, lottery tickets, casino gambling and vacations.

Yes those are fun activities and everyone deserves fun in their life. I also know that if I were to spend less on these activities my life would have pretty close to the same amount of fun. But, if I am given the choice to spend my money on another drink at the bar or the homeless man on the street outside, well, I can tell you the extra drink for me is going to win every time.

In the meantime, we will shower the Girth Master and Taylor Swift with more money than they know what to do with. We also will continue to complain about homelessness, mentally ill people roaming the streets, derelict buildings falling into the streets, and pot holes that swallow whole cars. Somebody should do something about that. Not me. But somebody. Really. Because it is a real problem.

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Some wise guy tricked George Santos into congratulating NAMBLA on their anniversary. NAMBLA is an acronym for North American Man/Boy Love Association which promulgates pederasty. Santos, like billions of other people, didn’t know that. Instead of checking on what it meant, he carelessly and stupidly went through with the congratulatory video. What an idiot. Let’s point our fingers at him and laugh. Let’s put it on line and tell everyone about it. Bumbling George did it again.

Sorry, but I am missing the humor of this prank. First, Santos is a lying narcissist who seems willing to do anything to get attention and pretty dim about how to act appropriately. He disgraced himself and the Congress. For this he deserves all the mud slung in his direction. On the other hand, he has fallen and I don’t believe there is anyone left willing to help him up. He is down on the ground and likely to stay there. If the video does anything, it proves that Santos has learned nothing during the past year to help him make better decisions.

That he is still making mistakes shouldn’t be a surprise and to trick him into saying something stupid doesn’t seem like a particularly difficult task to accomplish. He seems mentally ill to me so his continued pursuit of attention, even when it makes him look like an idiot, is pathetic and sad. Goading a mentally unstable person into continuing his self-destructive behavior is mean spirited and unnecessary.

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Anti-Israel Protesters blocked the Golden Gate Bridge causing a traffic snarl in the Bay area. Google employees who disagreed with their company’s contracts with Israel stormed and occupied the suites of top executives. Other than bringing publicity to their cause, these demonstrations seem largely ineffective at changing minds. The major sentiment for people on the other side of the protest is irritation. Why are these people fucking with my day?

There is this notion, particularly on the left, that these brave souls are sacrificing themselves for the greater good. Take it to the streets and when the people see this massive show of popular sentiment, they will join the fight. That this rarely happens is beside the point. There is always the dream that this time it will work.

Demonstrations, contrary to popular thinking, are anti-democratic. Just because I can get 100,000 people marching for my cause, everyone else who isn’t marching must agree and you must do whatever I ask. The problem is that there was million or more people who failed to show up. What exactly is their position? At best, they might agree but don’t think it is important enough to take it to the streets or, at worst, they disagree and find you an irritation. Their opinion is unknown. The only way, at least in a country with democratic processes, is an election. Until then,why should any government change their position based on a couple thousand people stopping traffic.

The underlying fear in large demonstrations is the threat of violence. There are many people in the streets, some of them might be willing to resort to violence, governments might then decide to pacify the crowd by changing their position. This is an incredibly dangerous precedent for any government, left or right, to take.

For example, January 6. A small number of angry demonstrators occupied the congress because they were disappointed in how the democratic processes turned out. They too felt that their numbers had to be acknowledged, that by showing their numbers to legislators that the government will change its position and give the protesters what they want because if you don’t, there are millions of other Americans just waiting for the word from these patriots and this could mean violence all over the country. Indeed, I think the January 6 rioters actually thought they were going to ignite a revolution and were genuinely surprised when nothing happened. Instead, the vast majority of Americans decided to stay home.

Demonstrations are also exercises in moral superiority. You bastards aren’t listening to me so I am going to annoy you until you change your mind. Yelling at people, I have found, rarely gets people to change their minds. In fact, I would bet, it makes a lot of people stand firm on whatever position they have, particularly if that opinion differs from the demonstrators.

Take to the streets if you like. It is your right but I think a better way to spend your time, energy and money is peacefully changing people’s minds and winning elections. I know it isn’t as satisfying as storming the barricades and being joined by the masses you have inspired but, let’s face it, is much more likely to happen through elections than demonstrations.

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Donald Trump is somebody I enjoy making fun of. He is a pompous buffoon. He says whatever comes to his mind and it is invariably nasty mean-spirited drivel. He deserves every insult that comes his way for those things. But falling asleep during court isn’t one of them. Anyone who has ever been to court knows that the most difficult thing about the whole process is staying awake. It is boring — filled with a lot of instructions, explanations, points of law and other things that are mostly obtuse and uninteresting. Staying awake is a real challenge for any non-legal person.

It is petty to point it out and certainly doesn’t do him any damage with his supporters. In fact, it humanizes a person whose large personality makes him difficult to humanize. The gleeful reception that his opponents greeted his dozing with is out of proportion to the crime committed. Let’s not get sidetracked by minutiae because if you wait long enough, Trump will provide plenty of real fodder for his critics to chew on.

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Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles Dodgers batting star, was hoodwinked out of about 16 million dollars by his Japanese interpreter. I don’t blame him for being in this mess. His interpreter is a thief and should be punished accordingly.

What also is clear is that until someone brought this to Ohtani’s attention, he was unaware that the 16 million dollars had gone missing.

The whole proposition of this type of capitalism is that the individual is a better steward of the money than the government. But time and again, we see rich people getting ripped off by scoundrels, covering up their crimes, using it on profligate expenditures that help no one including the indulgent individual or, in the best case scenario, putting it away in the bank and collecting interest. We are told that the best way to enrich everyone else is to let the rich spend their money as they wish and a rising tide will lift all boats.

The problem here is that the rich too often are spending money on things that benefit no one other than themselves. Personally, I don’t mind giving a tax break to businesses that reinvest their profits back into the business. There is some hope that this reinvested money will get into the hands of the employees of the company. But, seriously, 16 million gone without noticing it means that the Feds could have taken it in taxation and Ohtani wouldn’t have missed it either. His rich happy life would have continued to be quite happy and still rich.