Checking in

I haven't blogged in some time because I've been overwhelmed by the readings for my history class. Monday was brutal. I was blatantly honest when it was my turn to share - these readings didn't relate to anything I taught (and one of our presenters agreed - outside of "The Red Badge of Courage," what literature really came out of the Civil War?) and it was way too 'historical' for me. A few others chimed in and agreed. But since I was outnumbered 5 to 1 by history teachers, there wasn't much I could do. I just acknowledged that now I was in the place of many of my students - having to read something that I found completely boring and completely useless.

However, today we had our revenge. We spent much of the morning going over the poetry of Timrod - a southern poet who wrote at length about the glory of the southern cause. Loiell, one of our presenters, brought in some other literary elements, a song by Bob Dillon, and some poetry by Whitman, to help even things out for us English majors. So Tuesday was much better. Though I still have to admit, for Lincoln's speeches (which are incredibly long and horribly boring) I found myself underlining random things just to make it look like I actually read it.

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Tonight I received an email from a Republican friend (isn't that an oxymoron?). It concerned a little narrative about Oliver North telling senators that he spent $60,000 on his home security system. Of course, they thought he was nuts - especially Al Gore - however, North warned them about this one wachko - Ben Laden -who was a ticking bomb. So the senators asked North what they could do about Ben Laden. North - in typical conservative fashion - stated "Hire some guys to go out and kill him" (wonderful foreign policy, eh?).

Now this is about as credible as the National Enquirer. In fact, shortly after 911, I remember getting an email from a liberal friend (I was more conservative back then. It took Bush's last year in his first term to change that - likely forever). It commented on how no one in the senate listened years earlier when Gore - this time in the role of the good guy - warned them about a wacko named Bin Laden. But no one took him seriously.

That too was certainly just a load of rhetoric.

But what scares me is that some believe this crap!

What was it that a speaker once said, "The masses are asses"? I guess that holds up.