xenophobic jerk

I think people who want to be a citizen of this country ought to learn English and they ought to learn to sing the national anthem in English.

might as well say "English -- the language the Bible was written in". Because Francis Scott Key has the direct line on the Original Intent, dontcha know.

I wonder if he's upset about the modifications to the melody too?

ETA: Erik Bakovic has more on Language Log.

a fable from beckyb

beckyb told me a story the other day from her cousin. I'm adapting it here because I wrote it down for an IM chat with firinel and I thought it might be interesting to others as well:

a bodhisattva was walking along and came upon a chalk mudra mantra.
the bodhi had nothing with him. it started to rain.
Rather than let the rain destroy the mantra, the bodhi put an old shoe over the mantra to protect it from the rain -- top-down, to avoid defiling the mantra more than necessary
this is a good thing, he thought.
he went on his way.
a second bodhisattva came down the same road, not two hours later. The rain had passed.
"Why is there a shoe on the mantra?!" she exclaimed.
"surely this is the work of some thoughtless, evil person!"
Here endeth the lesson.

It occurred to me that this story is a lot like recovering from the traumas of your past. You install all sorts of nasty countermeasures under those problems -- because you need them, to survive.

But when it is no longer raining, the shoe remains.