. . . With Both Hands: Tales of the South Side: Breakfast at Tiffany’s Reviewed by Kondike ” Moose” Cholak

Man, I took a beating in April of 1965. That was not my best year by far. The Nun I had for the tail-end of Sixth Grade at Little Flower told my folks that I was ‘retarded, obstinate, disorganized and destined for bad end.’ To say that I was a miscreant little jerk is not a stretch and I remain less than anal retentive in my assault upon tasks. However, bad end? I think not. I have been saved by great folks.

Etc.

Hickey is Second City‘s answer to Dublin’s Flann O’Brien, especially O’B as columnist.

. . . which would be no problem if a debate format were employed.

A Catholic school could entertain the worst of the worst in its lecture halls, but with equal time for Catholic-friendly. It’s the least the Catholic parent or non-Catholic parent could expect.

Let them go at each other hammer, tong, and precision in distinctions honed from long hours in at least Catholic-respectful and -tolerant philosophical discussion.

Otherwise, what is this? Suicide missions one after the other by schedulers, deans, presidents, holy priests and sisters and brothers? Some times it looks that way, as in this event at Lemoyne College.

This man is giving them a boost to the roost.

Go Barnes & Noble too, with its wise placement, also on Drudge, of this book-buyers’ in formation.

Look what popped up on my screen while reading Drudge.

Yes, I had to click the link, but it looks like Drudge has readers (how many, I wonder) who care about COMPANY MAN: MY JESUIT LIFE, 1950-1968.

Needless to say, I applaud the placement. Go Amazon!

Oh my. Our friends at NY Times do have their way with news, do they not?

The counter?

New for 2013: The hypnotic effect of YouTube, Facebook, MySpace, Podcasts, and any other similar site where you upload your presentation, is one thing: The Counter. Without the counter, these sites would have no more use to you than your phone number listing in the phone book. Why does the counter matter so much?

Read this to find out. But I am taken by that “hypnotic effect” part, as also I am by this reference to the man who gave us the “hot” and “cold” media and “The medium is the message”:

Psychologically, it has to do with the “media effect”, which is explained in mass media studies (especially Marshall McLuhan’s book called “Understanding Media”). But you don’t have to understand psychology to understand how the “counter” is misleading you and other authors. Imagine for a second, that all counters were removed forever. No more counters, ever again. Never again will you be able to tell how many people “heard” your presentation. Wow.

This fellow writes for writers and filmmakers, I gather.

It allows former Anglicans to keep “aspects of their spiritual and liturgical traditions.”

History will be made in the Catholic Church on Thursday 10 October when a new text for the Mass which includes traditional Anglican words is officially introduced in London.

Me, I welcome this. The Book of Common Prayer, for instance, is English up with which I gladly put. As opposed to some of (all of?) the group-written U.S. text for us pew-sitters. If we are to go vernacular, which we are, why not in English that rings?

Stanley Kurtz discussing Islam’s presumed long slog to embracing a democratic society:

Catholicism’s centuries-long war against kin-based social structures helped create the conditions for Luther’s individualist Protestantism.

What’s that?

From the 4th century through the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church fought to protect personal choice in marriage, while prohibiting marriage between cousins and other relatives. This policy undercut social forms based on kinship and collective identity, laying the basis of democratic individualism in the West. [italics added]

How often have we heard of the church’s cutting through customs that undercut individualism, that is, human dignity, during the Middle Ages, for God’s sake?!

Point is, we see nothing like this concern for the individual in fundamentalist Islam, which rules the Middle Eastern weltanschauung.

Hence, the long-slog, not-in-our-lifetime-realized democratization of Muslim Brotherhood, Kurtz argues, vs. Reuel Marc Gerecht, whose books he discusses — The Islamic Paradox: Shiite Clerics, Sunni Fundamentalists, and the Coming of Arab Democracyand The Wave: Man, God, and the Ballot Box in the Middle East — in Claremont Review of Books for summer, 2013.

Sun-Times’ David Roeder about capping the Kennedy:

City planners have for years seen as sensible the idea of building a landscaped cap over the Kennedy, shielding the cars from neighbors and creating a park. [italics added]

Whoa. As if the neighbors were lobbing grenades at rush hour. He wants shielding the neighbors, I’d say.

Incidentally, he says it’s his last column before joining state gummint’s (“Gov. Pat Quinn’s administration in his”) Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity.

What’s that? He’s leaving a business with so much growth possibility? He must be very patriotic fellow.