"Barbara O’Brien’s wide-ranging account of Zen history is conveyed with a master storyteller’s ability to keep the forest from getting lost in a myriad of trees. Wearing her scholarship lightly, she blends just the right amount of skepticism about her hagiographic sources with a deep appreciation for the Dharma." — Barry Magid, author of
Nothing Is Hidden and
Ending the Pursuit of Happiness Order here!
And back then the catch phrase du jour was “better dead than red.”
Now we get “the Constitution is not a suicide pact.”
Yep, pretty much.
Bed-Wetter Nation
“What is conservative rule doing to our nation?†And can we ever recover?
“What is conservative rule doing to our nation?” What kind of question is that? And what kind of person thinks they are under “conservative rule”. I don’t think that I am under any sort of rule. I see that corporate trends lean a certain way, but to go chin up and belly full and admit that you are under conservative rule? If a person thinks in this country that they are under some sort of rule “conservative or otherwise” than they have not lived the same life as I have. I see the attempted takeover, but I don’t see the rulers. This country is free and will remain so as long as we folks keep it that way. If you feel oppressed you better do something about it!
Yeah, but they still didn’t let him into Disneyland.
American “character” in 1959 was only recently over the hysterics of McCarthyism and still deeply hysterical about school integration… if we have even less character now than we did then, that’s pretty sobering.
I think the problem we have with Ahmadinejad is that he’s a slimy lying pissant douchebag figurehead. And therefore has slightly greater moral stature than our head of state, so naturally we’re cowed by him.
Who? Disneyland?
uncledad– The idea is to click on the link and read the article.
Sorry, uncledad; some context: although we extended Khrushchev nearly every courtesy, when he visited S California (back when it was the industrial heart of U.S. military aviation, BTW) he was prohibited from visiting Disneyland. I believe the claim at the time was that there simply was no way to provide sufficient security (in Orange County, the home of the John Birch society? hmmm… perhaps so.)
Another tidbit: When Khrushchev died, the L.A. Times’ inestimable political cartoonist Paul Conrad drew him arriving excitedly at Heaven’s gates, crying “Disneyland!”
The Times, of course, was buried in letters complaining that Khrushchev would never be allowed into Heaven.