Nathan's Notebook
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Nathan Bierma
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Monday, February 17, 2003
My latest B&C blog: Presidents' Day essays on the cultural impact of the presidency, plus my interview with Bonnie Hunt. http://www.christianitytoday.com/books/features/weblog/030217.html • My B&C blog archive My latest B&C article: This book review for Books&Culture has finally been posted. I've been wanting to post it for a while, because it captures one of the central tensions in my thinking and writing--and my conversion to a left-wing Christian--over the past two years: where is the line between "alternative consciousness" and dysfunctional cynicism? http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2003/001/18.39.html Also, I never posted my first article for B&C, on the Internet, morality, and community: http://www.christianitytoday.com/bc/2002/006/17.30.html The piece refers to my interview with Virginia Postrel, which I posted in full last week in my B&C blog: A letter writer to the Times defies the supposed conventional wisdom that Canada's health care system is too flawed to be instructive to the U.S. Re "Long Lines Mar Canada's Low-Cost Health Care" (news article, Feb. 13): Part of President Bush's sales pitch on war with Iraq is that America is a champion for good in the world. But to believe that you have to ignore our record on foreign aid, which is borderline immorally selfish. Bush's proposed budget only begins to correct this, says the NY Times. America ranks dead last among wealthy countries in foreign aid as a percentage of the economy. The new program helps, but the ranking remains unchanged. Foreign aid is less than 1 percent of the budget, and most of it goes to military or economic support for strategically important, but not particularly needy, friends — mainly Israel, Egypt, Colombia and Jordan. This furthers American interests but should not be confused with development aid. Sunday, February 16, 2003
• Randomly Interesting As I state at left, the media is at its best when it abandons its lazy news ruts and shows some random but useful curiosity about the world and its cultural patterns. I try to highlight this in my Places&Culture strand, but here are some curiosity-oriented articles I trimmed from my B&C blog. Satirical spammer sends out mass e-mail from President Bush. From the NY Times. Whatever happened to Anita Hill? The Boston Globe fills us in. The NY Times previews the Matisse Picasso exhibition. A war-prone president surrenders in the war on poverty: Bush budget dismantles the Great Society, says the Boston Globe. "Last year, 8.8 million lives were lost needlessly to preventable diseases, infections, and childbirth complications. ... None of them had to die." A series from the Boston Globe. The Great Lakes should freeze the most they have in six years, says the Chicago Sun-Times. I can see the ice forming on Lake Michigan from my Near North Side apartment's fire escape--a spectacular sight. • Architecture Watch When you take the Boston skyline as a whole, it's depressing. There was a whole generation of dumb boxes that look like the upended packing crates the real buildings were shipped in. After that came a generation of jokey so-called Post-Modernist buildings, such as International Place, by architect Philip Johnson, which is gift-wrapped in a skin of paste-on Palladian windows. Tired wit replaced genuine innovation. Johnson wasn't even trying. To be fair, it didn't happen only in Boston. Most American cities went through the same phases. But a place like Los Angeles spawned a lot more invention than Boston. Maybe that's because there's no context there. Designers feel more free from constraint. LA is the exception, though. Compared with places like Europe and Asia, we in the United States are a timid culture architecturally. • Previous A.W. Is Google News perfect? Machines will never best human brains in delivering the news, as the automatically generated portal's coverage of the Columbia disaster suggested. A couple hours after mission control lost contact with the shuttle and pieces of debris streaked like comets through the sky, this was the leading headline on Google News, with a link to a three-hour-old story from the Washington Post: "Columbia streaks toward landing" Also, note the spiritual tone of both the Reagan Challenger speech and Bush Columbia speech. • Urban Issues Watch from 
A CITY IS CONSIDERABLY more than the sum of its parts. This is especially so of Boston, a place largely defined by its abundance of history and lack of space. Yet make no mistake: The parts do matter. Perhaps the single most remarkable aspect of the Big Digeven more than the expense incurred, the upheaval caused, or the prodigies of engineering requiredis the spectacle of a city afforded the chance to reimagine a not-insignificant swathe of itself. A forest springing up on the edge of the Financial District? An enormous boardwalk hard by the Aquarium? Moving the Chinatown gate? When the Central Artery finally does go underground (now set for the end of 2004), these are some of the answers offered to the question of what we want the reclaimed land to look like. • Previous U.I.W. • Etymology Today from M-W: supercilious \soo-per-SIH-lee-uss\ : coolly and patronizingly haughty Arrogant and disdainful types tend to raise an eyebrow at anything they consider beneath them. The original supercilious crowd must have shown that raised-eyebrow look often, because the adjective "supercilious" derives from "supercilium," Latin for "eyebrow." (We plucked our adjective and its meaning from the Latin adjective "superciliosus.") The term has been used in English to describe the censoriously overbearing since the late 1500s, when playwright Ben Jonson used it thus: "There are, no doubt, a supercilious race in the world who will esteeme all office, done you in this kind, an injurie." More E.T.: Latin derivatives: demulcent : soothing "Demulcent" derives from the Latin verb "demulcere," meaning "to soothe," which comes from a combination of the prefix "de-" with "mulcere," an earlier verb that also meant "to soothe." As an adjective, "demulcent" often applies to the soothing nature of medicines, but you could also use it to describe such things as a soothing melody or a soothing demeanor. The noun "demulcent" is used for a gelatinous or oily substance that is capable of soothing inflamed or abraded mucous membranes and protecting them from further irritation. More E.T.: Indian derivatives: Golconda : a rich mine; broadly : a source of great wealth In the 16th century, Golconda was the capital of the Qutb Shahi kingdom in southern India. The city was home to one of the most powerful Muslim sultanates in the region and was the center of a flourishing diamond trade. Magnificent diamonds were taken from the mines in the hills surrounding Golconda, including Darya-e Nur (meaning "sea of light"), at 185 carats, the largest and finest diamond of the crown jewels of Iran. By the 1880s, "Golconda" was being used generically by English speakers to refer to any particularly rich mine, and later to any source of great wealth. • Previous E.T. Monday, February 10, 2003
My latest B&C blog: Valentine's Day vignettes: http://www.christianitytoday.com/books/features/weblog/030210.html • My B&C blog archive Thursday, February 06, 2003
My latest Tribune article: On elite use-of-force training sergeant Patrick Kreis: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/custom/Wilkenwin/... • My Tribune archive My latest B&C blog: The month in news links; Aniston goes "good": http://www.christianitytoday.com/books/features/weblog/030203.html • My B&C blog archive Saturday, February 01, 2003
My latest Tribune article: On the changing nature of the urban church, beginning with Chicago's oldest church building, Old St. Patrick's. http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/custom/... • My Tribune archive Monday, January 27, 2003
IMPORTANT NOTICE ABOUT THIS BLOG: I'm excited to report my weblog is being partially absorbed into BooksandCulture.com, as part of my new position as editorial assistant for Books&Culture magazine. That means a reduced output here, and a transfer of certain features like Places&Culture to the new digs. It will be up every Monday at B&C, and I'm eager to try out some new features, including a new twist on History&Today. I start this week with my Super Bowl diary, a sort of cultural critic's play-by-play: http://www.christianitytoday.com/books/features/weblog/030127.html Thursday, January 23, 2003
My latest Tribune article: Former winners from the original "Star Search": Where are they now? http://www.chicagotribune.com/features/lifestyle/chi-0301230006jan23,1,7083566.story • My Tribune archive Wednesday, January 22, 2003
Mayor Daley responds to a 3-part Tribune investigation to which I contributed, on the demolition of designated historical buildings. What specific measures will he take to address the problems the Tribune found? Said Daley: "Gee, I don't know." http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/mchenry/chi-0301170280jan17,1,9100.story Monday, January 20, 2003
• Quote of the Day "I've gone from being the stone thrower to the glass." Gilberto Gil, Brazil's counterculture pop star who has been appointed the country's minister of culture. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/31/arts/music/31GIL.html • Number of the Day: 11 Percentage of American girls who are Girl Scouts, for a total of 2.8 million girls, a 20-year high. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/25/nyregion/25SCOU.html • Previous Quote and Number • Places&Culture File from 
• Previous P&C The promise and perils of driving via Mapquest, from the NY Times: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/16/technology/circuits/16mapp.html Who knew? There's an organization called the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers with a website at AAML.org. It was cited in a Wall Street Journal article on the recent increase in divorce filings; although research on the divorce rate always lags a few years behind, 78 percent of AAML lawyers report an increase in case loads for last year, WSJ said. I came across these sites while looking for Christmas movie trivia for my Dec. 20 Tribune article on Christmas sites. ESLnotes.com uses It's a Wonderful Life and other movies to teach English idioms and expressions: http://www.eslnotes.com/movies/html/its-a-wonderful-life.html (I recently clipped an NYT article about Seneca Falls, presumably the real-life Bedford Falls: click here) This site culls enough stacks of TV and movie trivia from IMDB to kill four lunch breaks: http://www.faqs.org/faqs/movies/trivia-faq  Astronomers have discovered three new moons around Neptune, the BBC reported earlier this month.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/2656959.stm Speaking of space, the Chinese government reported it retrieved its robot space capsule from a space trek, and hopes to become the third country to send an astronaut into space later this year, the AP reported earlier this month. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/06/international/asia/06CHIN.html Unique New York (say that five times fast...): NY Magazine sums up the city's character in a list of phrases, along with its year-end NY awards. What kind of lower life form do you need to be to loot a national park? Understaffing and sticky fingers spell doom for the purity of the National Park System, reported USA Today last month: http://www.usatoday.com/usatonline/20021212/4694601s.htm • Money&Culture File from
In the basement of his Standard Oil Building, just steps from Wall Street, where the Museum of American Financial History celebrates the wonders of capitalism, an exhibit wall is papered with gaily colored stock certificates carrying names like Enron, WorldCom and ImClone Systems. It's the dark side of the American dream. But the dot-com debacles and infamous bankruptcies of the infant millennium are as much part of the nation's financial heritage as scandals of the past and the stock market crash of 1929, says the museum, an affiliate of the Smithsonian Institution.Exhibits about that Black October Friday that ushered in the Great Depression, and accouterments like the plunging ticker tape record, have long been the biggest draw of this low-profile and literally underground museum, in its 15th year at 28 Broadway, where Rockefeller first moved into a smaller building in 1883, on same the site where Alexander Hamilton's law office once stood. • Previous M&C Alberta is becoming a porn haven--not so much for its weather as its libertinism, according to the Calgary Herald: Often considered to be a bastion of social conservatism, Alberta's lack of regulation has proven to be fertile ground for retailers selling explicit pornography that would be illegal in other provinces, according to industry officials. http://www.canada.com/calgary/story.asp... • Urban Issues Watch
• Previous U.I.W. What could make an already overpriced, undersized Manhattan apartment even more of a rip-off? When the stars move in next door, says the NY Times. • Technology&Culture File from
• Previous Technology&Culture Revisiting Lewis&Clark: It's the 200th anniversary of their trek. Earlier, I linked to a couple features celebrating their exploration, and another questioning their importance (here). • Latest History&Today • Etymology Today from M-W: lethargic \luh-THAHR-jik or leh-THAHR-jik\ *1 : of, relating to, or characterized by drowsiness or sluggishness 2 : indifferent, apathetic In Greek mythology, Lethe was the name of a river in the underworld that was also called "the River of Unmindfulness" or "the River of Forgetfulness." Legend held that when someone died, he or she was given a drink of water from the river Lethe to forget all about his or her past life. The name of the river and the word "lethargic" both derive from "lethe," Greek for "forgetfulness." similarly sluggish: stoic \STOH-ik\ 1 capitalized : a member of a school of philosophy founded by Zeno of Citium about 300 B.C. 2 : one apparently or professedly indifferent to pleasure or pain Zeno of Citium was a Syrian merchant who lost his fortune at sea. In Athens he was consoled by the Cynic philosopher Crates, who assured him that money didn't bring happiness, and he was so impressed that he founded his own school of philosophy and began teaching at a public hall called the Stoa Poikile. Zeno's philosophy, Stoicism, took its name from the hall where he taught, and it preached self-control, fortitude, and justice; passion was seen as the cause of all evil. By the 14th century, English speakers had adopted the word "stoic" as a general term for anyone who could face adversity calmly and without excess emotion. • Previous E.T. |
PARIS, Jan. 5 — These are dark days in the City of Light. It is a cruel trick played on those who are not forewarned. Paris is a northern city, on about the same latitude as Seattle and Vancouver. New York, by contrast, sits on a level with Madrid and Naples. So when winter comes, Paris's northern position combines with humidity, above-freezing temperatures, the absence of fierce winds and a location at the bottom of a basin to rob the city of sun and light. ... Daylight arrives well after 8 a.m. and leaves only eight hours later. Even as the days begin to grow longer now that the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, has passed, the demons of darkness linger. ... The darkness has such an effect that the French government's generous medical insurance program covers medical consultations for those who grow depressed because of the waning light of winter. The syndrome — clinically known as seasonal affective disorder, more commonly as the winter blues — affects as much as 20 percent of the population, according to studies.
