Accompanied by brass bands and thundering preachers, several hundred people squeezed onto a narrow street in Washington, D.C. yesterday to be baptized in the drenching shower of a fire hose.
The tradition of the baptism by fire hose started in the late 1920s at the United House of Prayer for All People, which is headquartered in DC.
"We used to use the Potomac River," said pastor Apostle H. Whitner, but the church's founder, Charles "Sweet Daddy" Grace, decided to use a fire hose instead, "because a baptism involves sprinkling."
Although many Christian denominations view baptism as a one-time ritual for entry into the faith, the House of Prayer permits multiple baptisms as a way for members to periodically wash away their sins and heal physical ailments. For many in the church, yesterday's baptism is an annual practice.
The full story of drenching in water and emotion is at the Washington Post.
This is a transcript of a old C-SPAN video that's been watched a LOT in the last week.
"...if we'd gone to Baghdad we would have been all alone. There wouldn't have been anybody else with us. There would have been a U.S. occupation of Iraq. None of the Arab forces that were willing to fight with us in Kuwait were willing to invade Iraq.
"Once you got to Iraq and took it over, took down Saddam Hussein's government, then what are you going to put in its place?
"That's a very volatile part of the world, and if you take down the central government of Iraq, you could very easily end up seeing pieces of Iraq fly off: part of it, the Syrians would like to have to the west, part of it - eastern Iraq - the Iranians would like to claim, they fought over it for eight years.
"In the north you've got the Kurds, and if the Kurds spin loose and join with the Kurds in Turkey, then you threaten the territorial integrity of Turkey.
"It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq.
"The other thing was casualties. Everyone was impressed with the fact we were able to do our job with as few casualties as we had. But for the 146 Americans killed in action, and for their families - it wasn't a cheap war.
"And the question for the president, in terms of whether or not we went on to Baghdad, took additional casualties in an effort to get Saddam Hussein, was how many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth?
"Our judgment was, not very many, and I think we got it right.”
The speaker:
DICK CHENEY.
Find it hard to believe? Watch the C-SPAN interview, taped on April 15, 1994 with the American Enterprise Institute:
Washington Post blogger Mary Ann Akers gives the background:
The Untold Story of the Cheney 'Quagmire' Video
When the C-SPAN producer toiling in obscurity last month reached for the tape, he had no clue how juicy a nugget he had unearthed. The tape was labeled simply, "Life and Career of Dick Cheney"; dated April 15, 1994.
When he found it in the archives, the producer was just looking for something mildly interesting to help fill the 12-hour Cheney marathon planned by C-SPAN 3. The "Life and Career of Dick Cheney," produced for C-SPAN's "American Profile" series, seemed like a good bet for the marathon; after all, those interviews were personality-based and less wonky, letting viewers get a real feel for Dick and his wife/political partner, Lynne.
But instead of love and marriage, the "Life and Career" tape offered up a much younger looking Cheney saying that a U.S. invasion to capture Baghdad and topple Saddam Hussein would be, well, a quagmire.
At the time of the interview 13 years ago, Cheney was the ex-defense secretary, camped out at the American Enterprise Institute and contemplating a run for president. Asked why he didn't think U.S. forces should have gone on to Baghdad during the first Persian Gulf War, he asked rhetorically, "How many additional dead Americans is Saddam worth?" He added, "It's a quagmire if you go that far and try to take over Iraq."
The now famous "quagmire" tape, which has gotten over half a million views on YouTube, may well have remained buried in the archives for another decade (and doesn't Cheney wish it had!) if it hadn't been for that one C-SPAN producer, an affable young Irishman named Emmanuel Touhey.
Touhey didn't have time to review the entire hour-long tape before airing it, so he had no idea he was about to spark a firestorm on the Internet. And, at first, no one seemed to notice.
The Cheney tape re-aired for the first time since 1994 on July 11, 2007. But it wasn't until C-SPAN aired the interview again on August 9 (on the same channel, at the same time) that the blogosphere noticed. As far as we know, the Cheney remarks on Iraq were first noticed by the site Grand Theft Country. When it quickly became an Internet phenomenon, Touhey was surprised. He said people have been calling C-SPAN over the past week asking when the network plans to air the Cheney segment again. (It doesn't, for the record.)
"I was quietly pleased with myself that I'd found a gem, however by accident," said Touhey, who, after nine years with C-SPAN is leaving next week to become a producer for The Diane Rehm Show. "I'm gleeful just from the perspective that it's getting a lot of attention. Any time C-SPAN 3 gets a lot of attention, I'm happy."
Asked what changed the vice president's mind about invading Iraq between 1994 and 2003, Cheney spokeswoman Lea Anne McBride said she was not authorized to comment.
She did, however, direct us to an interview that ABC News conducted with Cheney in February of this year in which Cheney was asked how his views had changed from 1991, when he also spoke of military action in Iraq as a "quagmire."
"Well, I stand by what I said in '91," Cheney told ABC. "But look what's happened since then -- we had 9/11." Now, about that faceless voice in the Cheney "quagmire" video -- it belongs to Bruce Collins, the corporate vice president and general counsel of C-SPAN who held the same title when he interviewed the former defense secretary and future vice president way back in 1994.
Collins shared with us a funny anecdote about that interview.
When he showed up at Cheney's office, he said the future Veep asked, "How much time do you need -- one, two minutes?" Collins explained it was an hour-long interview.
Cheney grumbled that he hadn't planned on that much time. Collins said the interview was for C-SPAN's "American Profile" series, which would give the audience a chance to learn more about Dick Cheney the man, where he comes from, how he thinks, how he lives.
"You mean, touchy feely?" Cheney replied, according to Collins.
"This is an opportunity to go beyond policy," Collins recalled saying.
To which Cheney growled, "Well, you know I'm a policy kinda guy."
And there you have it: Dick Cheney is not a touchy-feely kinda guy.
"Venice is a seductive city that has bewitched artists from all over the world. One writer who has settled in "the city on stilts" is the American author Donna Leon. The sinking Renaissance jewel is the backdrop of her "Commissario Brunetti" detective stories. Leon recently gave a visiting reporter a tour of her Venice. The story is part of a series, Crime in the City, about crime novelists and the places they and their characters inhabit."
"Leon stresses there are two separate Venices.
"One has quiet campielli (squares) and barges that deliver fruits and vegetables; that Venice belongs to Brunetti and its 60,000 other residents.
"The other Venice is filled with the booming voices of tour guides with microphones and attracts up to 20 million tourists a year."
"Leon describes a "Bermuda Triangle" of San Marco-Accademia-Rialto.
"'Most tourists spend the major part of their time in that triangle,' she says. 'That's where it's very, very unpleasant to be at almost any daylight hour, at almost any time of the year,' she says."
I agree whole-heartedly. During my visit last year, I found the most highly-anticipated part of the Venice itinerary, San Marco, deeply disappointing. Huge crowds, disrespectful behavior in the chapels, and merchants jaded from catering to daily throngs of tourists. I found the quiet side of Venice, far from the Bermuda Triangle Leon describes, walking around Cannaregio at dusk. [Read it here: Finding the REAL Venice. (You have to look for it!!)]
This was the real Venice I enjoyed, the place where real people hang their laundry out on a line over the canal.
Covering four acres near the Tidal Basin between the Jefferson and Lincoln memorials, visitors to the King memorial will first walk through a grove of spruce and magnolia trees by a waterfall and read a selection of the civil rights leader's famous words carved on walls. At the end of their walk, they will see King's likeness emerging from a chunk of granite, standing 28 feet tall - 9 feet taller than Jefferson's likeness nearby.
This statue will be sculpted by a Chinese artist.
And critics say that's outsourcing gone too far.
"Atlanta resident Lea Winfrey Young says the "outsourcing" by U.S. companies and organizations to China has gone too far this time," writes Arianna Eunjung Cha in the Washington Post. "She and her husband, Gilbert Young, a painter, are leading a group of critics who argue that an African American -- or any American -- should have been picked for such an important project.
"'Dr. King's statue is to be shipped here in a crate that supposedly says 'Made in China.' That's just obscene," Winfrey Young says.
Why a Chinese artist? A former adviser for the memorial says the King Memorial Project Foundation did it "in the hopes of getting a $25 million donation from the Chinese government to make up for a shortfall in funding."
The foundation is rejecting the accusation. The president, Harry E. Johnson Sr., said yesterday that the foundation had raised $82 million of the $100 million needed to complete and maintain the project.
Another leading opponent of the Chinese project is painter Gilbert Young. He told Atlanta weekly Creative Loafing:
"The most grievous sin is these black men could have gotten together and said, ‘We could not find any blacks qualified to do the memorial.’ That’s insane.”
"Also insane, according to Young, is the foundation’s decision to use granite from China for the memorial. “We have beautiful stone right here in Georgia, and I know that some of the quarries offered granite at cost just so they could be involved,” he says.
“The worst thing as an artist and a black person is they took away my birthright to be first in line,” says Young. “Dr. King fought for the rights of black people in this country to have the fair opportunity to be equal. They selected an Asian from China, a country that has killed millions of their own people. They don’t believe in Christianity and they don’t believe in freedom. Giving my history away to someone from another country to interpret, I have a problem with that.”
This is sculptor Lei Yixin with his clay model of the statue in question. The citizens of his hometown, Changsha in Hunan, are "bewildered" by the controversy.
"Wasn't it King's dream to end all racism? Lei asked.
"He has always dreamed that people from all over the world will not be judged by the color of their skin -- that we would all be brothers and sisters and enjoy equal opportunity. Now I have the luck to get this opportunity," he said.
In that vein, King Memorial Foundation President Johnson says, "We don't want to take the stand to say African Americans can only work on this project. We appreciate the diversity we have. The sole criterion for choosing Lei Yixin was artistic ability, he says, citing Lei's skill at capturing personalities in sculptures, his expertise in hewing granite and his extensive experience with large public monuments.
NPR commentator and blogger John Ridley, who's African-American, sees both sides of the argument.
"When I heard it, my gut reaction was: no. No way should somebody who's not a black American do up the national memorial likeness of one of the most prominent of us.
"But you give it a second, you put your initial passions aside, and it is possible to see things in a different way.”No" softens into "why not?" Why not let Dr. King go global? Weren't he and his message phenomena beyond the Lower 48? What King borrowed from Ghandi, he lent to the likes of Ivan Cooper, the Northern Ireland civil rights activist. And perhaps a Chinese person getting the job is not outsourcing work, but exporting the ideals of freedom. We've seen how well that plays when distributed by the muzzle of an army gun. Better we should try to inspire. Better we should try by sharing "our" man of compassion with the world.
"Being able to see Lei Yixin not as "the Chinese guy," but as one of Dr. King's "children" is what Dr. King preached: judging people by their content, not their pigment. I think you can extend that to a person's place of origin. Certainly it can be extended to the political system under which they live. And how wonderful would it be for an oppressed people to be able to sculpt an image of the personification of freedom? Not to mention the high irony as J. Edgar Hoover, among King detractors, accused the doctor of being a commie or a commie tool."
"On your way out of the White House, don't let the screen door hit you where the dog should have bit you."
- Eugene Robinson, Washington Post Op-ed columnist (full article coming up in a moment.)
From the moment I woke up Monday morning through this morning, it's the most talked-about story - in Washington, around the country, and even around the world. People seem unable to be neutral about Rove. They either adore him or loathe him.
I can only recall one anecdote about Karl Rove that showed a softer side to the man - and even then, his motive could be questioned.
Al Gore's campaign manager Donna Brazile was on an NPR program (Fresh Air, I think) some time after the 2000 election, and talked about how hard it was after the Supreme Court handed down the decision giving the presidency to Bush. But she got a call from Karl Rove - and he asked, "how are you doing?" I can't remember her exact words, but Brazile said something to the effect that she was touched by that personal tone....it sounded as if almost nobody else had thought to ask her that.
If you have no love for Karl Rove, you can easily question whether that call came with sincerity, or with gloating....or maybe with an eye on the future? Thomas Edsall and Dana Milbank write in the Washington Post:
"Few would suspect that Rove regularly trades tips with Donna Brazile, Al Gore's 2000 campaign manager; she tells Rove how Bush's proposals are faring among Democrats, while Rove makes sure her clients are included in White House events."
The article examines Rove's wide web of connections; you can read it here.
The Washington Times reports that Rove called Brazile Monday afternoon, the day his resignation was announced.
"Democratic strategist Donna Brazile wanted it to be known that presidential adviser Karl Rove called her from Air Force One this afternoon.
"He said he was looking forward to hunting and fishing," she said.
It was important for people to know she and Mr. Rove talked, Ms. Brazile said, because "you can disagree with people, but you have to respect them."
Ah, Donna. You still show "grudging respect" for Karl, and that galls some in your own party - they want you to have nothing to do with him at all. As I said, it's hard to be neutral about him.
Brazile think Rove haters should not rejoice at his departure. "Karl outside the White House is more dangerous to Democrats than Karl inside the White House," said Democratic strategist Donna Brazile, who was Al Gore's campaign manager. Her view: He'll have lots more free time now to dream up ways to boost President Bush's standing, "rebrand" the GOP and conquer the 2008 electoral map. (USA Today)
Eugene Robinson certainly isn't holding back. He lets loose in today's Washington Post op-ed, Good Bye, Boy Genius:
"Buh-bye, Karl Rove. On your way out of the White House, don't let the screen door hit you where the dog should have bit you. "I can't say that I'll miss George W. Bush's longtime political strategist -- the man Bush used to call "Boy Genius" -- because, well, that would be such a lie. And anyway, to quote one of the great country song titles -- "How Can I Miss You When You Won't Go Away?" -- I don't believe for a minute that Rove really intends to withdraw from public life. I predict he'll be writing op-eds, giving interviews to friendly news outlets and calling Republican presidential candidates to warn them not to abandon Bush, no matter how low his approval ratings slide. Rove's new job will be to put lipstick on Bush's hideous legacy -- and, in the process, freshen up his own.
"Rove's reputation as the great political thinker of his era took a severe beating in November, when, despite his confident predictions of a Republican victory, Democrats took control of both the House of Representatives and the Senate.
"But let's give the man his due. Karl Rove managed to get George Walker Bush elected president of the United States, not once but twice. Okay, you're right, the first time he needed big assists from Katherine Harris (speaking of lipstick) and the U.S. Supreme Court, but still. Honesty requires the acknowledgment that Rove was very good at what he did.
"The problem, of course, is that what Rove did and how he did it were awful for the nation.
"Rove announced he was quitting as White House deputy chief of staff in an interview with the Wall Street Journal, saying that while he knew some people would claim he was just trying to elude congressional investigators, "I'm not going to stay or leave based on whether it pleases the mob." That's the man, right there in that quote: Benighted fools who don't blindly trust his honesty or fully appreciate his genius are nothing more than "the mob."
"Rove didn't invent "wedge" politics, but he was an adept practitioner of that sordid art. When Bush was campaigning in 2000, he proclaimed himself "a uniter, not a divider." But the Bush-Rove theory of politics and governance has been divide, divide, divide -- either you're "with us" or "against us," either you're right or you're wrong, either you should be embraced or attacked without quarter.
"Yes, politics is about winning -- they don't give style points for graceful failure. But the us-or-them brand of politics that Rove mastered and that Bush practiced has been a disaster for the nation and its standing in the world.
"Yesterday, in remarks on the White House lawn, Rove praised Bush for putting the nation "on a war footing" after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. But that's precisely what Bush failed to do. Rather than try to foster a spirit of national solidarity and shared sacrifice, he persisted with tax cuts designed to please his wealthiest supporters. Rather than engage critics of the war in any meaningful dialogue, Bush accused them of wanting to "cut and run." Rather than actually practicing the bipartisanship he disingenuously preached, Bush governed with a hyperpartisan political agenda.
"It's no wonder that Democrats on Capitol Hill, after six years of essentially being told to stuff it, are issuing subpoenas left and right -- and also no wonder that the White House is so strenuously resisting them.
"One of the things Congress would like to ask Rove is whether the administration's extreme partisanship extended even to the Justice Department -- whether U.S. attorneys were fired for political reasons and whether Rove was involved in those decisions. Congress would also like to know why Rove and others in the White House political office conducted their business not through the White House e-mail system -- which would have opened their communications to scrutiny -- but through e-mail accounts at the Republican National Committee, which seems to have misplaced the messages in question.
"Rove said he was leaving so he could spend more time with his family -- the standard reason in Washington for leaving any job. Bush said Rove will continue to be "a dear friend," and I don't doubt for a minute that Rove will continue to be one of the president's closest and most trusted advisers. I don't think the Bush administration is going to change course at this late date.
"I'll be on the road behind you here in a little bit," Bush said to Rove as the two men faced reporters yesterday.
"Not soon enough."
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More Rove-ing opinions appeared in the Washington Post today; here are links:
Harry Potter and the Chinese Overseas Students at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry
The plots are hilarious. This is the gist of Harry Potter and the Chinese Porcelain Doll:
Harry Potter learns that Mysterious Man (Voldemort) is going to China to persuade his rival Yandomort to attack Harry as well as the Western magic world. Harry decides to find Chinese Porcelain Doll, who could beat Yandomort in China. On a passenger steamer, Harry makes friends with Long Long and Xing Xing, who are part of a Chinese circus. It turns out that Naughty Bubble, the boy who usually bullied Xing Xing at the circus, was Yandomort. After Voldemort killed Naughty Bubble’s mother, Big Spinach, he took Naughty Bubble as his disciple, and taught him black magic to make him become Yandomort.
in Harry Potter and the Leopard-Walk- Up-to-Dragon, Harry becomes a fat, hairy dwarf after being caught in a “sour and sweet rain”; he loses all his magic and can get it back only by obtaining the magic ring. After he does, Harry becomes a dragon that fights evil. Voldemort has an even more powerful brother who makes trouble for Harry.
Excerpt:
"Harry doesn’t know how long it will take to wash the sticky cake off his face. For a civilized young man, it is disgusting to have dirt on any part of his body. He lies in the elegant bathtub, keeps wiping his face, and thinks about Dudley’s face, which is as fat as Aunt Petunia’s bottom."
Any ideas for more Harry Potter stories? Submit a title and synopsis in the comments!
[Disclosure: I'm not a HP fan, not in the least. Tried my best to read the books but failed, and slept through the movies (had to take the kids!). Many have told me I'm missing out on a great story. For now, I'll just have to suffer this terrible, self-inflicted deprivation.]
I spent the better part of my two-week vacation resting and reading.
And reading.
And reading.
What a luxury! To sit in the shade of the big rowan tree and read half a book, take a break for lunch or tea or dinner, then read for a few more hours, only to move indoors and continue reading in bed until my lids were too heavy.
No wonder my blood pressure is looking so much better!
I caught up with Precious Ramotswe's latest adventures in the last two books in the No.1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith, thrilled to the Life of Pi, and laughed out loud at David Sedaris' essays in Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim. (Full reading list is in the sidebar.)
Then I picked up my tattered old copy of Wuthering Heights, which I have not read in 25 years.
It wasn't a completely random choice. My current favorite CD is "Betcha Bottom Dollar" by the Puppini Sisters (read my previous blog entry about them) and enjoyed the track "Wuthering Heights." The Sisters put a lot of energy and spirit into the song – it's really a lot of fun to sway along with it.
So it wasn't until several listens that a faint memory suddenly asserted itself: this was the same haunting song I listened to as a teenager, strangely drawn to the voice of British pop diva Kate Bush. I'd never heard the likes of that voice: a highly unconventional style, worked over four octaves.
So I paid more attention to the lyrics. (Let me just say now, if you know nothing about Wuthering Heights and plan to read it some day, or watch one of the many versions on film, consider the rest of this blog entry a spoiler. STOP RIGHT HERE!)
"WUTHERING HEIGHTS"
Out on the wiley, windy moors
We'd roll and fall in green.
You had a temper like my jealousy:
Too hot, too greedy.
How could you leave me,
When I needed to possess you?
I hated you. I loved you, too.
Bad dreams in the night
You told me I was going to lose the fight,
Leave behind my wuthering, wuthering
Wuthering Heights.
Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy, I've come home. I´m so cold,
let me in-a-your window
Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy, I've come home. I´m so cold,
let me in-a-your window.
Ooh, it gets dark! It gets lonely,
On the other side from you.
I pine a lot. I find the lot
Falls through without you.
I'm coming back, love,
Cruel Heathcliff, my one dream,
My only master.
Too long I roamed in the night.
I'm coming back to his side, to put it right.
I'm coming home to wuthering, wuthering,
Wuthering Heights,
Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy, I've come home. I'm so cold,
let me in-a-your window.
Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy, I've come home. I'm so cold,
let me in-a-your window.
Ooh! Let me have it.
Let me grab your soul away.
Ooh! Let me have it.
Let me grab your soul away.
You know it's me--Cathy!
Heathcliff, it's me, your Cathy, I've come home. I´m so cold,
And just to let you know why I found this song creepy and haunting and so Yorkshire Moors, watch Kate Bush singing it:
I could just see Catherine Earnshaw wheedling at her demonic and cruel lover from beyond the grave. Kate Bush certainly caught the spirit - so to speak - of that dreadful, painful story!
As I said earlier, it's been a quarter century since I last read Emily Bronte's one and only novel. Even though it's impossible to forget the story, the details had become fuzzy and I decided grab my cloak and wander across the moors, as it were, with Lockwood's curiosity.
My reaction was considerably different on this reading! How on earth did I not remember Heathcliff as one of the vilest domestic abusers ever! How did I not see that he and Catherine were completely sick! How did I not find young Linton Heathcliff one of the most annoying figures in literature? And on and on and on....
Over the weekend I bumped into several people and mentioned that I'd just re-read WH, and almost all who told me they had re-visited the novel as mature adults were less enthralled on second read.
Evil and awful as these chracters may be, dark and chilling as the tale may be, Wuthering Heights is still riveting. Thus I ran out to the video shop and rented the 1992 movie, starring Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche. (The clerk told me there was also an MTV version of WH that came out a few years ago, but I decided to pass up. Maybe if I'm completley bored some day...)
And I watched it. Unfortunately, on a sunny summer afternoon. Given some similarities between the Yorkshire Moor and the Palouse, it might have been a thrill to watch it late at night, in a winter windstorm! Mybe I'll rent it again in December.
THIS was the role Fiennes played the year before portraying Amon Goeth in Schindler's List! Heathcliff was good prep for the Nazi SS butcher.
So - what are your thoughts on Wuthering Heights - novel, movie versions, songs, ripoffs? Please share!
Let's now have a palate cleanser to close this post, shall we? Here are the Puppini Sisters with their much sunnier version of Kate Bush's song.
I began writing this blog as host of Morning Edition on Northwest Public Radio. In September 2008, I was promoted to a programming and operations position and thus this blog will now only carry the occasional, and personal, entry.
