Lonesome Dove: The Series

I had been a fan, or at least deeply affected by, both the first season of Lonesome Dove: The Series, and especially the second season LD: The Outlaw Years. Not only did this series have real potential, it also had great depth in the story telling. There is a deep morality exhibited in the unfolding of the story without having to be lectured about it as it is done in The Rifleman. Not that there is anything wrong in the teaching of young minds about right and wrong and to help them understand and navigate it. 

What Lonesome Dove: The Series and The Outlaw Years accomplished was to show how those lessons had become internalized and exemplified in the life and character of Newt Call. 

I skirt the line

When Dan Quayle was running for vice president with Bush Sr, I remember something he said about missing the days of yore, namely the '60s, and I agreed with him. There have indeed been great changes for the worse in our country since then. 

But he became vilified for expressing such feelings. I'm not sure where the criticism came from although I got the feeling it was from "liberals" and other so-called lefties. I had already soured on partisan politics after Bill Clinton was elected in 1992 and the policies that came out of his administration only tightened the belts of the lower half of the socio-economic spectrum, and especially after Hillary's medical reform fiasco for which I would never forgive her.

So this line between left and right, liberal and conservative are all blurred except in terms of economic policy which is more about progressivism and economic equity and political equality. I don't care about identity politics only economics. As listed in FDR's Four Freedoms, freedom from want and freedom from fear is what matters most.

Big Bang disproved

When I learned in 6th grade in 1970 that there were/are two basic views about the universe: the Steady State universe and the Big Bang, I felt that that the Steady State universe was the correct view based on having grown up with Buddhism. I found it absurd to believe that the totality of the universe originated out of nothingness violates the laws of physics and stretches credulity beyond the breaking point, at least for me. And now the JWST is....ohh! Btw, the Doppler red shift is another hare-brained idea. The universe is not expanding but rather, the light has traveled so far in its journey here that it's slowing a fraction enough to produce a shift to a lower energy state. And now the JWST is showing pictures of mature galaxies just as anyone there looking at us would also see a mature galaxy, indicating a more uniform consistency of the universe which itself indicates the timelessness of it. And if anyone thinks 13 billion years is a long time doesn't understand the mindbogglingly huge numbers the Eastern Indians invented. Eternity is like that. At the same time it also means that that which is eternal is also ever-present. Hence Steady State. Do you see how the consistency works? There is no beginning or end to the universe. Only the arising and demising of the phenomena that occurs within it, from the formation of galaxies, stars, planets, and living beings to their eventual demise. Yin/yang.

The Real Johnny Depp

OMFG! I'm not even 10 mins into this audio recording and I hear the part where Johnny's been talking and I'm totally tracking what he's saying and he is exactly the kind of man I would want to be with, to just be with to talk and share this thing called life. Then at 9:25 I can hear it in his voice that exact moment when he knows there is zero connection with her when she corrected him about how he said he loves her by pointing out he had said "loved" when he was referring to why he proposed to her. I've been in arguments with people just like her. Or have listened to the likes of Newt Gingrich and been entirely gaslit about the condition of my impoverishment. It was systematic verbal abuse. As for Amber, there is zero connection with her on any level except a deep-seated desire to get away from her. I listen to Johnny and he feels like home. Someone to curl up with and meet each day as partners like Kurt and Goldie who have been together for 39 years and all the other fortunate people who have found good partners. The man is totally present. It's how he is. I could give him my heart, my soul, and it would be safe with him. I am so sorry he went through all that and I'm very glad he won his case and got his life back. I hope he finds someone who he would be safe with. He sure deserves it.

The Four Beginnings

2A:6 Mencius said: "All people have a heart which cannot stand to see the suffering of others. The ancient kings had this heart which could not stand to see the suffering of others, and, with this, operated a government which could not stand to see the suffering of the people. If, in this state of mind, you ran a government which could not endure people's suffering, you could govern the realm as if you were turning it in the palm of your hand."

"Why do I say all human beings have a heart which cannot stand to see the suffering of others? Even nowadays, if an infant were about to fall into a well, anyone would be upset and concerned. This concern would not be due to the fact that the person wanted to get in good with the baby's parents, or because s/he wanted to improve his/her reputation among the community or among his/her circle of friends. Nor would it be because he/she was afraid of the criticism that might result from a show of non-concern."

"From this point of view, we can say that if you did lack concern for the infant, you would not be human. Also, to lack a sense of shame and disgust would not be human; to lack a feeling of humility and deference is to be "in-human" and to lack a sense of right and wrong is to be inhuman."
"The feeling of commiseration is the beginning of humanity. The feeling of shame and disgust is the beginning of righteousness. The sense of deference and compliance is the beginning of courtesy, and the sense of right and wrong is the beginning of wisdom."

"People's having these four basic senses is like their having four limbs. Having these four basic senses and yet claiming inability to act on them is to cheat yourself. To say that the ruler doesn't have them is to cheat the ruler. Since all people have these four basic senses within themselves, they should all understand how to enhance and develop them. It is like when a fire just starts, or a spring first bubbles out of the ground. If you are able to develop these four basic senses, you will be able to take care of everybody within the four seas. If you do not develop them, you won't even be able to take care of your own parents."

~Wing-Tsit Chan, A Sourcebook in Chinese Philosophy, 1963.

Falling down rabbit holes - The Wizard of Ahs: Nick Beggs - part 1

Since no one reads here anyway, I'm just going to post this work in progress until I can get to it again. The top half is the good part. 

I posted this comment at a youtube video. 

 @ricoF  I agree about Nick's basslines having that special something. It goes way beyond words to describe, but it feels like making love through sound. True love, the kind that holds your soul in their own. And is deeply sensual as well. 

It is deeply sensual in the way it touches the inside of you in an emotional way carried by the way the sound touches your ears and body. There is a fundamental difference in the way the lower frequencies affect the way we hear and feel that is more visceral and less mental. Not that I don't love good guitar especially in the way David Gilmour could make his "sing" giving the soul wings to fly into the ether. But the bass is more primal and operates on a more instinctive level. Nick would call it guttural. Which is what makes Nick's bass so phenomenal. 

He, like others I admire or respect like Bobby Kennedy, are often touched by tragedy and must deal with the suffering in such a way as to turn it from a poison to a medicine, or as the Japanese do with broken bowls or cups by using gold to repair them thus ennobling the scar of their ordeal. 

Hm, what's my point? Just that Nick Beggs is a really decent person, plays a mean bass, and is a prime example of being a good human being. 

This can be seen in what became Kajagoogoo both with Limahl in 1983 and the White Feathers album and in the following year without Limahl on the Islands album. Given the zeitgeist of the '80s New Wave British pop bands of that time Nick's energy is unmistakeable. 

I'm not sure how it happened but sometime during the week of Thanksgiving 2021 I found myself watching a YouTube video of clips of '80s music hits. How I came to watch it I have no clue. But as a result I watched a video of Too Shy. It was the only American hit they had and I had no idea what their name even was. Had I known it was Kajagoogoo I'm pretty sure I would have remembered that. Nevertheless, the moment I heard that baseline I was back in the '80s when I was instantly hooked. Not to the point of becoming a fan of the band and getting their albums, but enough to sear it memory for all time. I also learned that it's "too shy shy" and not "too zsa zsa". While I didn't think much of the song itself, that bass was an instant attraction. 

So now in the age of YouTube I promptly fell into the rabbit hole of Kajagoogoo and into the world of Nick Beggs. It's been quite a wild ride. It is the third one of these I've been on. The other two were with Pink Floyd in 2008 and Prince in 2018. But there is something very different this time, something far more significant in how it speaks to me and the impact it is having on my own life. 

Interestingly, not too long after this journey began around Thanksgiving I serendipitously came across an over-the-air broadcast of a PBS documentary about Pink Floyd that circled around again to Roger Waters talking about how his mom was an educator who's orientation was to prepare students for a life that starts in the future. But his experiences with Floyd led him to the realization that life starts at "dot" and your in it and that at any time you could take up the reins and drive it yourself. That's actually a lot easier said than done and harder still for women in a patriarchal society, not to mention the kind of ambition one needs to have to even think that way. Still, he is absolutely right. 

The issue for me is figuring out how to do that given the circumstances and experiences of my own life. Then comes along Nick Beggs and Kajagoogoo dropping into my world from straight out of the blue as if to show me how through their experiences. And in the process get to know them, mostly Nick because he's the most public figure having a musical career with his bass and Chapman stick. 

Anyway, I'll have to get back to this later so I can link it back up with the title of the post which started out as:

"The Way does not enlarge the man; the man enlarges the Way. Nick Beggs: An exemplary human"

What's a Leftist?

By Peter Daou:

What's a Leftist? (https://www.directleft.com/p/whats-a-leftist)

I really like his description. It also fits for what is a progressive. I also call it sane and humane. It encompasses the principles Confucians call humane government. Something devoutly to be wished.

https://www.facebook.com/nicholas.billing/posts/10159108964527929

TERF Wars

I'm posting these here to find later.

"All I’m asking – all I want – is for similar empathy, similar understanding, to be extended to the many millions of women whose sole crime is wanting their concerns to be heard without receiving threats and abuse." ~J.K. Rowling (https://www.jkrowling.com/opinions/j-k-rowling-writes-about-her-reasons-for-speaking-out-on-sex-and-gender-issues/)

TERF wars: An introduction:

"our aim is to advance understanding of the TERF wars, their place in the feminist past and present, and their relationship to ‘science’. While we do not claim to address every topic of debate in this multifaceted field, we aim to contribute to an unravelling of exclusionary discourses within both feminist and trans communities. Our hope is that one day these entrenched debates over ‘trans-exclusionary’ and ‘gender critical’ politics will become entirely irrelevant, so that we might instead unite around a shared interest in sex liberation and feminist freedom for all."

More than nostalgia for the 1960s.

I don't really know how it happened. How what was once wholesome and where right and wrong were clearly known and shown in our culture and in the media. But then something put in motion an unwhoiesome way of thinking about things and how to see them. This is been pushing things a particular way that has landed where we are today. The shows and programs in my childhood in the 1960s and very early '70s. A lot of criticism was heaped on those shows, but they were all like the Harry Potter books and the original Star Wars trilogy. Shows like Here Come the Brides and Star Trek and Kung Fu and Bonanza. Good and wholesome, but also brave in its honesty, sincerity, vlunerability, but also capable of meeting the challenges, the bullies, and the unethical. The world, at least my world, did have what was presented in popular television programs. But then things got edgier and weirder and creepier and sleazier as if all of life is that way when it is not. I'm very glad to be watching the weekend marathon showing of Here Come the Brides this weekend. It's unfortunate that the second season got just a tad edgier from the first season even if it was able to maintain decent writing. It was the 70s. Things drastically changed in that decade and we have yet to recover. I am also surprised to see so many people who had been on Star Trek doing work on Brides. In our time, it is The Mandalorian and baby Grogu that are harkening back to the wholesome. Wholesome is the way.