My Sunday Feeling

I got the news early Thursday morning from Lafourche Parish that Chris had joined the Club.  His mother Jane McCulla Riviere had passed away.  He told me that her death was peaceful and that she was surrounded by her family.  She was 88 and her health had been declining.  

Comes to us all.  And we should all hope for a peaceful end.  

The Club of which I am referring to is the "Without Parents" club.  I officially joined in 2009 when my mother passed away during a 30 minute stretch when nobody was looking.  Nobody but the lady from Hospice, that is.  We were told that they will do that sometimes.  Bob, who was pulling the night shift, had just gone home.  I was crossing the Faulkner County line around 5:30 AM when I got the call.

They will do that sometimes. 

I may be wrong, but as far as I know, our friend Don is the only one of our group that still has both parents.  I saw them a couple of summers ago when I traveled to Birmingham to attend my first and, so far, only baby shower.  Big Don and Virginia are doing pretty good.  Still live in the home and are independent.  Big Don delighted in referring to me as "that old retiree."

It did seem sort of odd to both of us at that.

My own father, of course, passed away when I was a senior at Hendrix.  At this stage of the game it is almost as if he had never existed.  After all, he's been under a white stone at the Veteran's cemetery for 38 years now by my counting.  That's a long time to be away.  

I don't know if this has happened with Chris yet.  But I was asked by more than one person if i felt like an orphan when Mother passed.  That struck me as odd. If somebody asks him, I'm sure he will find it to be equally so.  After all, orphans are children, and typically are wards of either the state or a member of the extended family. I was in my fifties when Mother died.  I was a full-grown man (to use the country expression) practicing law, fending for myself in a house I own and otherwise getting on as best as I could.  Not much different than now.  

I didn't much even get the notion that I had been orphaned in the psychic sense but I kinda do.  There is this an awareness of the magnitude of the situation on a certain primal level.  It doesn't last for very long-at least it didn't with me.  But when your parents no long exist, it is a sign that time, like a rolling stream, bears all who breathe away. 

That's original with me by the way.

Perhaps I would have felt this more keenly if I hadn't been without one of my parents for such a long time.  My friend Becky's dad up and died two weeks after they buried her mom.  I see from her post on Facebook that their loss still resonates with her on occasion.  That has got to be hard to shake free from your mind.  Anyway, while I imagine, as I say, that Chris might find such a question to be odd, still, he is not made of wood.  And when your remaining parent passes, it is a marker.  And it is heavy.

When I sat up with Mother during her deathbed coma, Chris would call from time to time to check on me and keep me company. Mostly he would tell me jokes about the hapless Cajun known as Boudreaux and his wife, girlfriend, foil (whatever the story requires) Miss Marie.  Chris has been telling me these stupid Boudreaux jokes since our law school days.  He is a bottomless repository of these stories, few of which may be told in mixed company.  A couple of them he has told are unspeakable. 

But here is a clean Boudreaux joke.

Boudreaux, him, was crossing the state highway to get to the mailbox to see if the welfare check from the State of Louisiana had come when-summamabitch- he get hit by a truck driven by Miss Marie, non?  Miss Marie got on that cellphone and called "neuf un un." Then she grabbed a blanket out of the back of the truck and ran over to Boudreaux who was laying in the road.  She put the blanket under Boudreaux's head.

"Boudreaux," Miss Marie say as she knelt down beside that boy, "Are you comfortable?"

"I make a good living, mah Boo," Boudreaux say back to Miss Marie. 

Chris loves these jokes.  And he knew that he could make me laugh at him in spite of myself.  That's what friends do.

Death never comes at a convenient time.  I am usually pretty flexible.  But I just can't make it to Thibodaux for the funeral.  Melissa thought it would be nice if I sent flowers to the house and so I did.  Women are great at stuff like this. I made a memorial gift to a charity the family suggested.  And I said a prayer of thanksgiving both for Mrs. Riviere's life and for the repose of her soul.

Hopefully I can get down there in the next month after things have settled.  We will probably sit on his veranda with a couple of glasses of something amber. His sister lives next door.  If she comes out in the yard he will call out to her "Come see!  It's Paul!"

North of I-10 they say "come here." Cajuns say "come see." Which I catch myself saying occasionally. I can think of no more pleasant way to get someone's attention.  

And while out there we will raise a toast to Jane and Donice.  And I will ruefully welcome Chris to the Club.  

That's what friends do.

My Easter Feeling

They had need of me over to Conway this morning.  

15 year old J couldn't get his tie done right.  M asked me to fix it.

"I can't tie a tie," she said.  

He had done a pretty good job.  He just had it kinda twisted up.  I pulled off my jacket, took the tie from him, tied it around my neck, then helped him get it over his head and under the collar.

Cinching it up his neck, forehead to forehead, I noticed that J is slightly taller than me now.  He wasn't on Super Bowl Sunday when we put our backs to each other.  Now he is. No wonder that boy eats like he is on Death Row.  He's burning it up.  

"Check the back of the collar, please," M sing-songs from the kitchen.

I checked the back of the collar.  Pulled it down.  Good to go.

"That's a button down collar," I said. "That means...."

" Oh yeah," he said as he tried to find the buttons.  J has a lot of his Mom in him.  Her grey-blue eyes burned out of her son's head as he fumbled to button the goddamn buttons.  

I told him not to worry about it.  After all, Carrie back at the office used to fix my collar and straighten out my tie all the time before I would head out the door.  Sometimes you got to have somebody watching your back even with the nickel and dime stuff.  Sometimes it's all nickel and dime stuff.

I have written many times that I have no use for Christmas and that while I don't know what all I believe anymore I do believe in the concept of Easter.  I believe that victory remains in love.  I believe in second and third chances.

M prepared a wonderful lunch for after church.  After we had gathered around the table she asked if I wanted to bless the food. But I was afraid of a lightning strike.  Besides it's her house and she is armed with an M.Div. and I am not. So I demurred. 

She gave thanks for the food for the nourishment of our bodies.  She gave thanks for our health.  She thanked God for the gift of Easter and of His Son Jesus.  And she gave thanks for "friends, family, love and new beginnings."

I hope it is not hubris to think that I might be granted a small portion of the "love and new beginnings" part of the blessing.  

But all I believe in any more is Easter.  

And I am so happy to share even a fleck of this "new beginning."

Amen.  

Happy Easter.  

My Sunday Feeling

"When he came down from the mountain, great crowds followed him;and behold, a leper came up to him and knelt before him saying, 'Lord if you will, you can make me clean.' And he stretched out his hand and touched him, saying, I will; be clean.' And immediately his leprosy was cleansed. And Jesus said to him, 'See that you say nothing to any one but go, show yourself to the priest, and offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a proof to the people.' "
                                                                    Matthew 8, verses 1-4 (RSV)

You can't make this stuff up.  Faith healer Benny Hinn was admitted to a hospital in California where he was treated for shortness of breath cause by atrial fibrillation.  According to the official statement issued by Benny Hinn Ministries, this is a condition from which he has "experienced intermittently for over 20 years."

It may be safely said that I have a deep and abiding skepticism when it comes to televangelists.  That skepticism goes into the red zone when it comes to faith healers such as Benny Hinn.  Especially when they resort to conventional medicine for their own care despite making an extravagant living allegedly casting out all manner of disease entities from the gullible and the desperate. 

When I was younger and had more time on my hands, I used to watch Hinn and Oral Roberts in action.  And once, stuck in a hotel room outside Tulsa while a torrential thunderstorm railed outside my window, I saw Oral's son Richard implore a caller to the show to touch his hand to the TV screen in order that afflicted victim might be delivered from his sinus infection.  

As far as I can tell, although this is not a scientific conclusion, if I may use such a phrase given the subject matter of today's post, faith healers tend to specialize in casting out discrete disease entities such as cancers, heart disease, paralysis and such. I don't think that dropping into a Benny Hinn healing service with a severed artery or a gunshot wound would be the smart play.

Which brings me back to Hinn condescending to earthly medical care for what appears to be a chronic medical condition.  What's Pastor Benny doing with a chronic medical problem?  Atrial fib is just the kinda invisible medical problem that is right in his wheelhouse.  You would think that he could just cure himself on the house.  Which leads me to another question?  Does Pastor Benny have medical insurance?  If so why?

OK.  Am I making too much of this?  Or at the very least having way too much fun?  Maybe so.  Maybe no.  But then again my rather paltry net worth is not dependent upon convincing the weak minded to part with their money.  And make no mistake about it.  Showbiz preaching and healing have been really good to Pastor Hinn whose net worth is said to be around 42 million bucks.

I'm no Biblical scholar but I know a thing or two.  The passage of Scripture cited above where Jesus heals the leper speaks to me in the context of fee-for-services faith healing charlatans like Benny Hinn for the following reason. According to the law of Moses, lepers were impure and could only be cleansed by the temple pursuant to an elaborate and costly ritual.

Here, Jesus not only heals the poor man, he also tells him to show himself to the Priest, to show the religious authorities that Jesus has bypassed the system and he did so for free.  A more blatant attack on the legitimacy of the Temple and the Priesthood cannot be imagined.  

Indeed, nowhere in the Bible is Jesus depicted as requiring payment or a "love offering" before he performed any of the miracles attributed to Him.

But that was then.  This is now.  Jesus's base of operations was largely confined to the sticks of Galilee.  Until he went to Jerusalem He was strictly local. He didn't have to fool with satellite, shortwave and cable outlets.  He didn't have to manage real estate.  Jesus may have been the Messiah but he wasn't a celebrity.  The latter can't really be done on the cheap. 

So get well soon Pastor Benny.  

Time is money.  Money is time.  

And be sure to take your beta-blockers. 

Sick Leave

I have been struck down by a sinus infection and pleurisy which is having an adverse impact on my otherwise sunny disposition and steel trap mental acuity.

I'm out.

AWOL

Busy weekend and the sun is shining.

I'm outta here.

Talk among yourselves.

My Sunday Feeling

For those of you outside the State of Arkansas, or without Internet access, this is State Representative Justin Harris of West Fork, Arkansas which is up in Northwest Arkansas.  He is a Tea Party Republican and he and his wife own a Christian day-care center up there that is heavily subsidized by Arkansas Department of Human Services to the tune of about 800 grand a year depending on what you read. He is also in the big middle of one the tragic stories I've ever heard.  Tragic in the sense that a small child was sexually assaulted while legally in the custody of he and his wife after they gave she and her sister to another family to care for.  

The practice is called "rehoming."  It is one that I had never heard of before the Arkansas Times broke this incredible story.  Basically, rehoming is when an adoptive or custodial parent gives a child or children to someone else to raise.  As you might imagine, not all adoptions work out.  Rather than trying to work through DHS at these times some folks just basically give the kid to someone else who wants him.  The new parents take the kid in without having to go through all the background checks and home visits that the law requires.   Indeed, there are websites where people can find kids that adoptive parents want to get rid of.  I have read that it is not unheard of for pedophiles to frequent these sites.

Obviously the practice of rehoming is a recipe for trouble of the worst sort.  And trouble of the worst sort, the most sickening and heartbreaking sort, is precisely what happened here.  

You can read the original Arkansas Times piece here: http://www.arktimes.com/arkansas/a-child-left-unprotected/Content?oid=3691164 . I will give Gentle Reader the Reader's Digest condensed version. 

Rep. Harris and his wife, who were already the parents of 3 boys adopted the two girls in question. (They had adopted another girl which they subsequently prevailed upon DHS to take back.) The girls came from a background of abuse which is sadly not unheard of in the juvenile court system.  It is common for parents who adopt difficult cases to receive a subsidy from the State as an incentive to adopt problem kids.  According to what I have read the subsidy is to help defray the additional costs engendered by these children.

The girls in question had been diagnosed with Reactive Attachment Disorder or RAD.  I have reasonably unfettered access to psychiatrists, which I concede I should probably take better advantage of, and they assure me that this is a real disorder.  It is characterized by a failure of the child to bond with the new parents and can manifest itself in acting out behavior and even violence. Representative Harris received a legal monthly subsidy for this reason.  

For whatever reason, things did not go well.  The long and the short of it is that Harris wanted DHS to take the kids back.  It is unclear as to what happened at that juncture.  Harris says they threatened him with a charge of abandonment. DHS will not confirm or deny this allegation because the adoption process throughout is veiled in secrecy.  And properly so.

Enter trouble of the worst sort.  Rebuffed, so he says, by DHS, Harris sought to rehome the girls with a man named Eric Francis and his wife, who had adopted children through a foreign agency.  Mr. Francis (who for God's sake should not be confused for 5 minutes with the local journalist of the same name) had worked briefly for Harris at the day care center owned by him until he was terminated for excessive absenteeism.  Mrs. Francis-or the former Mrs. Francis I should say for reasons that will become clear shortly-was said to be friends with Mrs. Harris.  

However we got to this juncture is murky.  But this much is agreed on.  DHS knew nothing about Harris rehoming the girls with the Francis family.  Harris kept receiving the subsidy checks despite no longer having the girls in his care.  

And Eric Francis raped one of the little girls for which he is now pulling 40 years.

In a news conference at the Capitol and in a subsequent interview with a local television station Harris blamed the alleged threats by DHS for his feeling as if he had no choice but to take the actions he did given the unruly behavior by the girls, behavior which he said escalated to threats of violence among other things.  This story, along with questions of whether Mr. and Mrs. Harris were suitable to adopt these girls in the first place, are raised in another story put out today by the Times.  You can read it here: http://www.arktimes.com/ArkansasBlog/archives/2015/03/07/foster-family-disputes-key-staments-from-justin-harris

I spent my career chasing down money and getting it back for the government. Government money comes with strings.  The recipient has to dot every i and cross every t. Or as the old SCOTUS case I always cited said "men must cut square corners" when they do business with the government.  And thus we come to the easy part of the case against Mr. Harris. 

In a subsequent news conference, Harris claimed that he can prove that he gave the subsidy checks to Mr. Francis.  Doesn't matter.  The subsidies in question were for the specific use of Mr. Harris for the care of the girls based on his having satisfied exceedingly stringent conditions precedent.  Mr. Francis was no more entitled to those checks than I was.  Harris had no authority to disburse that money in any fashion other than what the law allowed. Further, once he rehomed the girls how on Earth was he still an eligible payee?

In the interview he defended the decision to rehome the girls with Francis-a man that he had terminated from his day care center-because he had a "pristine" police record, one which we may candidly state is now decidedly less pristine.

Doesn't matter.  First of all, it was not Justin Harris's call to make.  That authority is vested in DHS.  Secondly, a clean police record is not the standard for adoption. 

In the past 18 months or so, I have passed 2 police background checks and hold a VIRTUS certification from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Little Rock.  My record with the cops is as pristine as Mr. Francis's was.  This just means that I am a fit candidate for taking pictures for Girls On The Run and for yelling at guys at Catholic High.  It does not mean that sending a kid to live with me is in the best interests of a particular kid.  No matter how great a guy I am or how much I love the kid.  The best interests of the kid is the standard.  Not lack of a criminal record or what is in the best interests of Justin Harris. 

So you may ask why wouldn't an elected official work within a system he took an oath to uphold?  Good question.  Harris is a powerful guy.  Why did he jump through all these hoops when he could just threaten to defund DHS and haul the Director in for a browbeating?  Why didn't he hire a lawyer to challenge the threat to charge him with child abandonment? If indeed one was made.  

There is the likely Tea Party reflexive response that he wasn't gonna let some pointy headed government bureaucrat dictate how he was going to run his family.  So he took matters into his hand as a sovereign citizen or the other foolishness I have seen in my day.  As for me, it has always been my practice to try to work with the folks that give me money.  But then again I don't have much of a sense of entitlement.  

But here's my theory, speaking of the money. It's all about the money. And not the subsidy checks. That's chump change.  I'm guessing that a DHS finding that Harris had abandoned the kids, if upheld, would adversely impact his license to-duh- run a daycare.  Which you and me are pretty much subsidizing. So for this reason he decided to game the system that was jamming him up. 

Which resulted in a child getting raped.  

Rehoming is not illegal in Arkansas.  But it may soon be.  A bill was introduced the other day that would make it so. Governor Hutchinson says he is concerned about this issue.  Former Governor Beebe says he never heard of rehoming until he was leaving office.  I fully believe both men.  I fully believe that what happened was a failure of a system that allowed Harris to adopt these kids in the first place.

I fully believe that Justin Harris is sick unto death about what happened to that girl.  I fully believe that he would have never knowingly placed that child in harm's way. That is the only undeniable truth he has uttered about this whole sordid transaction.  

I also fully believe that his response to this is firestorm reveals him to be a gold plated narcissist. He, and he alone, is completely responsible for what happened to that child. He neglected a child in his custody.  It resulted in her being violated at the tender age of 6.  She is the only victim here. 

Which leads me to the next question. 

What the hell does it take to get a day care license revoked in this state anyway? 

My Sunday Feeling

As statistics go it hasn't been a bad winter.  In fact, if one were to sit down and look at the data, one would probably find that the winter 2014-2015 was one of the milder on record.  And I know that I have played a good bit of golf in December and January.  

But to hell with data.  February has been brutal.  

As I type this my Weatherbug app informs me that it is 26 degrees on the other side of the wall.  I am beyond sick of this bitterly cold weather.  I made this observation at a luncheon following a Lenten service over to the neighborhood branch of the Baptists.  Father Erik, who had given the homily, reminded me of the fact that this Winter has been mild up until now.

I'm not one to rebuke the clergy but I have become even more cantankerous in my old age.  I wasn't going to take this layin' down just because this observation was coming from a guy wearing a collar.

"Oh yeah?," I said, trying to be helpful. "I wrecked my car on some black ice Tuesday night. I've had water running for 2 weeks.  I can't play golf and I'm tired of being housebound and eating my own cookin'.  Forgive me but I've just about had it."

Father's expression was quite tranquil seeing as how he was sitting next to a madman.  
"I'm sorry about your car," he said. "Spring will be here soon."

Spring will be here soon.  

I don't know if it is a function of my advancing age but I really long for Spring. I used to like Spring mainly because it heralded the beginning of baseball season. And there is still something reassuring that the Cubs will be yet again toiling away in the friendly confines of Wrigley in the service of utter futility.  

But I need to hear the birds, to see grass grow, feel the sun on my face.  I want to spend hours out on the deck.  I want to sit on the porch, play golf, and to take long walks.  This latter consideration is particularly acute seeing as how I now have a hiker in my life and I am not keen on being told by her to go take one by my lonesome.  

But today it is 26.  The clouds are positively leaden.  

Tomorrow the Little Rock Marathon will take place.  They are predicting a high in the forties with a 60% chance of rain.  

Ugh.  I'm sorry.  But that just doesn't sound like fun.  

But there is no chance of snow.  The temps will get above freezing.  

Father Erik is right.  Spring will be here soon.

Go Cubs!

Duty Calls

I will be busy most of the weekend listening to high school age tenors and sopranos audition over the Internets for the vocal music program at the Arkansas Governor's School.  So no blogging this weekend.  If history is any guide my hands will be shaking too badly to type anyway.

Talk amongst yourselves.  

My Sunday Feeling

I got a letter the other day from an unexpected source.  The return address indicated that it was from a gentleman that I know from church.  K is a retired real estate man as I recall.  In my experience, unsolicited correspondence of this sort tends to generally be limited to fundraising.  So imagine my surprise when I read the first paragraph.

"For the past several years, rather than giving up something for Lent, I have instead given special time to thoughts and prayers for special people."

My day is Friday the 20th.

"[I] will pause to thank God for you.  I will ask that he make his presence known to you in all you do and to bless your life and, through you, the lives of others. I'll be praying about your family and all those you love, about all the things that keep you busy, and about your health.  I'll be expressing particular thanks for your talent as a writer and the education you received at Hendrix and for your long membership in the church I love.  Finally, I'll thank him for you friendship and the privilege I have to know you."

To say that I was stunned is to to understate the case considerably.  In the first place, I don't think that I've had a conversation of any substance with this gentleman in 2-3 years.  Secondly, while God knows I could use it, I don't exactly consider myself a fit subject for such intervention.

My initial thought is that K had obviously reached the bottom of the barrel of available candidates for intercessory prayer after all of these years.  After all, as I said, I haven't had many dealings with K in some time.  

But I was mainly struck by what a profound kindness out of the blue the letter represented.  To know that someone thought about me and was thankful of it is profoundly humbling.  And while I am not superstitious in the slightest I confess that it is comforting to know that someone will be praying on my behalf next Friday.  

We live in a brutal world filled seemingly to the brim with fear and hatred.  And that's just the Arkansas legislature.  It is all to easy to forget that people are capable of "random acts of kindness" as the saying goes.  

Ash Wednesday is at hand.  It is the first day of the penitential season of Lent. It is the day that we remember that we were formed from dust. And that unto dust we will return. 

I will also remember that people can be capable of indescribable grace and kindness even to those that are completely undeserving of same.  Such as myself. 

And I will try to pay it forward if I can.  

My Sunday Feeling

I never cease to be amazed by the persecution complex present among certain majorities.  Some straights claim to be persecuted by gays.  Rich folks by lazy welfare cheats. Whites by African-Americans.  And some Christians by everything.  Scientists, historians, "secularists" and people that say "Happy Holidays" during the Winter Solstice.  

A recent example of this paranoia may be seen in its full flower over to the Commonwealth of Kentucky where a ministry called "Answers in Genesis" has sued over Kentucky tourism officials denying AiG (not to be confused with the financial and insurance conglomerate that damn near took down the world's economy when it defaulted on all the credit-swaps it "insured" during the real estate bust in 2008) 18 million bucks in tax incentives to build a theme park called the Ark Encounter which would feature a 500 foot long replica of the vessel used by Noah to save all of the animal kingdom (except the dinosaurs) during either one or both of the Great Floods as recounted in the Book of Genesis.   AiG is no stranger to this type of real estate development.  The ministry opened the Creation Museum in northern Kentucky which promotes a strict interpretation of the Genesis account of creation.  

According to an AP story in the Lexington Herald Leader, AiG is suing because Kentucky's actions allegedly violate the organization's right to free expression of religion which is guaranteed by the 1st Amendment.  

Which, of course, is complete hooey.  Here's what happened.  

Kentucky was on board with this project until it found out that AiG would require applicants for jobs at the park to sign a statement that they believed in the Genesis account of Creation including the belief-considered non-sensical even by many fundamentalists(even that known rationalist Pat Robertson)-that the Earth is a relatively juvenile 6000 years old. The tourism board considered this to be discrimination based on religion which the state could not support through taxpayer financed tax incentives.  

As I say at times like these, this is an opportunity to teach.  

Religious institutions, to a certain extent. are free to discriminate in their hiring practices.  A Catholic school may limit the pool of applicants considered for a position teaching theology to Catholics.  A Jewish school may likewise hire only Jews to teach Torah.  A Baptist church in the Southern Baptist communion may hire only graduates from a Southern Baptist seminary for its clergy.  And so on.

Where it gets less clear is if a Catholic school would only consider Catholics for positions to discharge strictly non-ministerial duties such as teaching math or coaching football.  Or being a janitor or food services worker. The case law, as I remember it, is that our hypothetical Catholic school could not discriminate in this fashion for every position that it offered to the public.

But we don't need to go there.

What is clear in the present case(at least to the Kentucky tourism folks) is that if the park is primarily an extension of AiG's ministry, it is not eligible for state tax incentives.  Further, if the purpose is primarily a business, such as a football stadium or water park, it is not eligible for assistance from the state if it discriminates in its hiring practices.  AiG cannot have it both ways.

This is not discrimination against religion by Kentucky.  This is not suppression of free expression of religion.  If AiG can gin up the money for this silly park through private donations as it did for the equally silly Creation Museum ( where I read that there are exhibits depicting humans cavorting Flintstone-like with dinosaurs), then God bless. But every application for state funding for private business ( loans and loan guarantees, bids on building projects, government contracts, you name it) I have ever seen in my illustrious career requires the applicant to sign a statement that it will not discriminate in its hiring practices. Which is where I am guessing the trouble started here.

Answers in Genesis, as a ministry, may limit its pool of job applicants to "young Earth" types if it so desires.  It just can't ask the government to help finance such an endeavor.

It can't have it both ways.  And I like the Commonwealth's chances in Federal Court. 

My Super Bowl Feeling

It is somehow fitting, at least to the sort of person that thinks along these lines, that the NFL's liturgical year should end with today's Super Bowl being played at something called the University of Phoenix Stadium.  

Unlike, neighboring schools like, for instance, the University of Arizona or Arizona State, the University of Phoenix does not participate in intercollegiate athletics.  Indeed, some might say that it doesn't participate in academics.  

It primarily exists as an online alternative to traditional colleges and caters what the education industry refers to as "non-traditional" students.  The cynics among us might also refer to UP as a mercenary diploma mill which, along with its other equally aggressively marketed "for profit" competitors, issues phony credentials to those few students that actually finish a prescribed course of study in whatever "degree" path they elect to follow.  

Go ahead.  Google "University of Phoenix." You will read tales of woe on various consumer sites from former students.  No respect for a diploma earned there. Credits earned there that are not transferable to the average community college.  Accumulation of student loan debt that would choke a mule enforced by predatory collection practices.  

But what do they expect?  Everybody is accepted.  Student loans are pretty much the way that every student's tuition is paid.  

Now are some of these posters merely disgruntled hacks?  Sure.  Are some of these stories anecdotal?  No doubt.  Are some of them planted by competitors? Wouldn't surprise me in the slightest.  

By the same token you are unlikely to find someone complain about their experience at Columbia University in "The Ripoff Report."

But today's post is ostensibly about the Super Bowl which will bring down the curtain on Roger Goodell and the NFL's annus horribilis in which you had a player cold-cock his wife, a botched and insensitive investigation of same, and a star running back spank his 4 year old with a tree limb along with the usual garden variety failed drugs tests and car wrecks.  

There has been some speculation as to whether this clown car of unusual travesty will cost Goodell his job.  Nah.  Not likely.  The Commissioner's job is to make the owners money and to bust the NFL Players Association.  On the former he is succeeding wildly.  On the latter, well, he is not doing them any favors.  

The NFL is all about product.  The game is almost irrelevant, dwarfed as it is by the endless commercials and a halftime show that Baz Luhrmann would find lurid. 

But of course I am going to watch.  Not that I particularly care about the outcome.  Actually, I don't care at all.  The Super Bowl provides me with an excuse to eat chili and to spend the day with somebody I like. Overly high-minded about these things I am not.  I walk as closely with hypocrisy as the next man. 

And so I find that it is right and proper that a phony baloney academic institution like the University of Phoenix should play a prominent role in today's extravaganza. It's all about money, honey.

Speaking of which, the line in this morning's paper calls the game even.  From what I can tell, most of the sports books in Vegas have the Patriots by one or two over the Seahawks.  

This means that the pros in the sports investment industry are predicting a close game.  Which also means that the first half might be a great warm up act for Katy Perry and Lenny Kravitz. 

Enjoy.  

My Sunday Feeling

I was still pretty young when Ernie Banks was at the height of his powers. But I have a vivid recollection of watching baseball with my grandfather over in Quitman one day.  The Cubs were on the Game of the Week that particular Saturday for some reason as they were their typically lousy selves.  

Anyway, I remember the broadcast starting with a smiling Ernie Banks facing the camera and saying, "It's a beautiful day for baseball.  Let's play two." I was probably all of 10 at the time.  I loved baseball.  I thought Ernie Banks was pretty cool. 

My father grew up in what is now called "Chicagoland."  Back then they were content to refer to it as Valporaiso, Indiana which is right across Lake Michigan.  When he was a kid he and a buddy used to hop the train when it would stop in Valpo and ride into Chicago to watch the Cubs and the Blackhawks.  Even then you couldn't get a ticket to see the Bears.  

And so my father was a Cub fan.  And like most Cub fans, and other veterans of combat, he had a sort of PTSD that prevented him from talking about it very much.  Being a Cub fan will do that to you.  Unlike my youngest brother, who named his son after the intersection upon which Wrigley Field sits, I have remained mostly agnostic about the Cubbies.  I refuse to permit hope to dwell in my heart given their record, writ large as it is upon history's immortal scroll and available for examination by the public.

Because the Cubs-and let's not put too fine a point on it- have stunk on ice for most of their existence.  They somehow even stunk with a lineup in those days that, off and on, featured Ron Santo, Don Kessinger, Ferguson Jenkins, Billy Williams and, yes, Ernie Banks, the universally beloved "Mr. Cub,"who died yesterday at 83.  

Yes child, Mr. Banks could certainly play.  He batted .274, had 2,583 hits and 512 home runs.  He twice led the league in homers.  He is rightfully in the Baseball Hall of Fame.  His number 14 is retired.  

But those are just numbers.  To me, and to legions of Cubs fans, he was the embodiment of "Cubdom"or, "Cubismo" if you will, in that he always projected an aura of sunny optimism in the face of almost certain merciless clockwork doom.  He was ready to "play two" while other Cub teammates were looking for ways to get traded if not outright looking for small handguns with which to end their misery. The true Cub fan understands this.  After all, the Cubs play in a Catholic town.  The true Cub fan is not one of the arriviste types that bought up the brownstones in the neighborhood so they could watch the games from the roof.  The true Cub fan is not a narcissist unlike these insufferable types.  He is also unlike Red Sox and Giants fans in this regard as I ponder this further.  

No. The true Cub fan is a guy who took the "El" in to Wrigley from some place. A guy who sits by his lonesome in the bleachers on a September day nursing an Old Style("Authentically Kraeusened")as the first hint of autumn wind rolls in from the lake, foreshadowing as it always does misery and futility. The Cubbies are apt to be comfortably 15 games out of contention in the effing division at this point in time. The true Cub fan, who prosecutes a close walk with grief, guilt and shame, is there.   And yet, and also in order to push the Catholic metaphor to the vanishing point, what passes for faith, a faith so far yet cruelly unrequited, compels him to yet believe in those things visible and invisible.   Well, mostly invisible. These are the Cubs after all. 

What passes for faith sustains him even when he witnesses legendary ineptitude -and I'm just picking one out of the air here-such as the night portly right hander Rick Reuschel injured himself FALLING OFF THE MOUND DURING WARMUPS. Which I actually saw on TV.  And Reuschel was pretty good.  

The true Cub fan believed in Ernie Banks and Mr. Banks understood him.  

Ernie Banks never had a bad day.  And you would think somebody who carried the grim mantle of "Mr. Cub" would have had plenty.  

Rest In Peace, Sir.  Boy, have you earned it.  

My Sunday Feeling

It is a remarkable thing that Alex Malarkey survived the car crash that occurred when he was 6 years old.  Indeed, the crash was so horrific that the responders called for the coroner to come to the scene. You note that I didn't use the word "lucky" to describe young Alex as the accident rendered him a quadriplegic.  I know other kids left in a similar state after accidents.  I wouldn't describe them as "lucky" either. Beloved, brave and inspirational maybe.  But "lucky" never.

As you might think, boy's condition was grave after extraction from the vehicle.  Indeed, he lapsed into a coma that lasted two months.  And when he woke up, he allegedly claimed that he had gone to Heaven and that he had communed with angels and met Jesus.  He and his father Kevin, who holds himself out as a "christian therapist," wrote a book about Alex's claimed experiences called "The boy who came back from heaven" which was touted by Tyndale Publishing company as "a true story." It became a #1 best seller in the category of inspirational books.  It got a 4.2 rating on Amazon.

Except it wasn't true.

Earlier last week Alex-now 16 or 17 by my math-recanted the testimony about his cameo appearance in the Hereafter.  In a letter to Christian bookstores posted to the "Pulpit and Pen" website, he plainly stated "I did not die.  I did not go to Heaven." Tyndale issued a statement in which it said it was "saddened" by this turn of events (I'll just bet) and that they were taking the book out of print.

Alex's parents are divorced.  Last April Gwen Malarkey posted on her blog that Alex's objections to the continued sale of the book had been "ignored and repressed." She also stated that Alex had not received any money from and that his medical needs-which must be staggering- had not been funded by it.

According to the Huffington Post, Kevin Malarkey, with whom Tyndal contracted to reduce Alex's story, or at least Kevin's version of it, to writing,  has not commented on his son's recantation and neither his blog nor his Facebook page have recent posts.

I am painfully aware that my profession is widely reviled in polite society.  But we are useful at times.  And Tyndale would have been well-served if it had run the manuscript past a lawyer before publishing it.

If Tyndale had brought it to me my first red flag would have been their idea to pedal Alex's testimony as a "true story."  Because, not to put too fine a point on it, in the first place,Alex didn't die. He may have been near death while in a coma.  But he didn't die.  Indeed, Alex has recently made the self-evident, if lugubrious claim, that he neither checked out nor visited the Far Shore after doing so.

"I did not die," he stated.  Of course he didn't.  And this would be, and I can't believe my sudden compulsion to type these words-the generally accepted condition precedent to joining the Choir Invisible.

Look, I'm not busting the kid out.  He was 6 at the time he was in the coma.  Who knows what a child under such dreadful circumstances and full of all kinds of medication is going to believe he thought he saw in such a state? I used to see ghosts when I was that age.  My claims of contact with the restless departed were met with skepticism and outright occasional annoyance by my father who usually would patiently explain that "there are no such things as ghosts."  Other times the explanation consisted of "Get back in bed."

But the literature of "near death experiences" or "NDEs" is a popular genre with all kinds of otherwise unreliable informants leaving us here on this vale of tears only to return to relate their unprovable tales in exchange for a fat paycheck..  Even Mitch Albom, who occasionally writes about sports when he is not cranking out "inspirational" and exceedingly lucrative potboilers, has written a recent book about "phone calls from Heaven" or some such foolishness.  Nobody is going to tell the paying customers to get back in bed.

I wonder how a phone call from Heaven would show up on Caller ID?  "Burning Bush?" "Fear Not?" But I ramble.

It sounds like to me-cynic that I may be- that fantasies related by a badly injured little boy-if they were related at all-got turned into a cash cow by somebody betting on the sustained gullibility of an reliable audience for this kind of hooey . I bet Tyndal Publishing gets lawyered up for real now in an attempt to get back the money they paid the Dad.  After all, it is only here in the temporal world that people part with hard earned money for-pardon me-complete and utter malarkey.  It is here that Tyndal will have to regain what passes for credibility in a genre that relies on that which is completely unverifiable.  And the I also bet the next time poor Alex tells this story it will be under oath.

I don't much know what I believe anymore.  But I don't believe in ghosts.  I don't believe that you go to Heaven while still a life-in-being as they say in probate law.  And I while I don't know for sure what happened here, I do believe that it is all going to come out in the wash both in the fullness of time and before the statute of limitations runs in any event.

And I also believe that there is a special place in Hell for somebody that tries to mine the commercial potential of a disabled child.

Just sayin'.

AWOL

No Sunday blog today.  Too much stuff going on.

Talk amongst yourselves.

My Sunday Feeling

A friend invited me to go with her to a folk music concert put on by the local folk club last night.  I confess that I was lukewarm about this as I am not much of a folkie.  But I like her and I had watched about all of the football that I could stand for one week.  So off we went.

My father was a big folk music person.  I remember listening to the Weavers-Buck owned the album inserted above-a lot when I was a kid.  I remember thinking at the time that Pete Seeger was funny and that he could really sing.  I was also fascinated by the fact that bass Lee Hayes (the big guy wearing glasses)was from Arkansas. After all, nobody was from Arkansas.  We also watched Hootenanny and some other folkie show that was on TV in those days.  And he was into early Simon and Garfunkel which was pretty much a folk act in their early incarnation.

As I have written before, my father was no leftist.  But folk music, with its themes of brotherhood and justice, obviously spoke to him on some level.  I wonder if his experiences in World War II, experiences that he rarely if ever talked about, lit this spark in him.

I don't know.  He died long before I had sufficient gumption to try to mine these thoughts.  After all, the Weavers were damn near Communists and my father tended to vote for Republicans.  At least Republicans as existed back in those days.  Way back before the GOP was taken over in these latter days by snake-handlers. 

But I ramble.

I forget the name of the act that performed last night.  Some husband and wife duo from Northwest Arkansas.  They were fine musicians.  But the performance, at least during the first set, was interspersed with highly tendentious and occasionally tedious disquisitions about Ozark culture and the environment and the imperative to preserve same.

At least it was tedious to me.  I was there to listen to music.  Not to attend a lecture.  

Look. My sister-in-law Judy does folk music for a living too.  She dresses up in period attire and plays at various county fairs and the like.  Judy gets on with it and spares her audience her insights into current events.  She preserves the culture by doing the culture and she pretty much lets it go at that from what I can tell.  It's not my cup of tea, and she knows that, but I have deep respect for her as an artist.  And I hope she knows that.

But you know what?  I'm not the target audience for these acts.  The crowd there last night-mostly older, older than me even-loved it.  They had a blast. They bought all the CDs the performers brought with them to sell at intermission.  I was in the distinct minority.  

And even though I thought the performers last night veered perilously near self-parody at times-one of their songs was actually entitled "Too Much Information" which almost put my friend and I on the floor given all the sermonizing-there was no denying the earnestness and sweetness-for lack of a better word- of the evening.  These qualities of the genre are perfectly captured by comedians Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer and Micheal McKean as "The Folksmen" which is a parody.  

But folk music is as American as American gets.  A lot of is meant to be political.  A lot of it is about preservation of culture.  And it continues to inform us today even if some of us aren't particularly aware of it.  I was fooling around on the guitar with Wilco's "California Stars" the other night.  At least I thought it was Wilco's. Turns out that it was written by Woody Guthrie.  I had no idea. Shows you what I know.

The local folk club puts on a show every month.  Maybe I will go back sometime. Maybe I won't.  I'm glad I went.  It was something different to do and I enjoyed being in the company of people-many of which were probably recovering hippies- that were having such a good time.  Like I said, it's not my cup of tea.  

But something about folk music obviously spoke to my father who voted for both Nixon and Ford.  I wish we had talked about it.  Maybe I would have learned more about both folk music and my dad.  

My New Year's Day Feeling

I don't know how your New Year's Day started.  Mine started at 8 AM on the dot with a call from a voice translator calling for a deaf lady in Maryland about a Legal Services case I'm doing.  The translator asked me to call the lady tomorrow.  

This couldn't have waited?  Happy New Year!

I write these words as I contemplate the smoking rubble that is college football in Mississippi  Both Ole Miss and Mississippi State were in the top 10 at one time this season, which some convincingly claimed was a sign of the End Times as prophesied by John the Revelator.  And both got their doors completely blown off yesterday in their respective bowl games.  The Mississippi State game at least looked competitive on paper if you didn't actually see those boys from Georgia Tech getting their cardio in against the Bulldog defense.  However, the Rebels got thoroughly whacked by a riled up bunch of TCU Horned Frogs who were high pissed at a) not getting put in the Final Four by the College Football Selection Committee and b) having to put up with the likes of Ole Miss. 

By the way, a TCU alumna to whom I am related by marriage posted TCU's cheer on Facebook during the "game."  Here it is: " Riff,Ram,Bah, Zoo, Lickety, Lickety, Zoo, Zoo, Who, Wah,Wah, Who, Give 'em Hell, TCU!" 

My research (watch it) reveals that this cheer originated in the twenties which would have put Bard of Fort Worth Dan Jenkins at about 40 years of age at the time. Anyway, this was back when collegiate athletics in the old Southwest Conference was the exclusive province of white folks.  Black folks wouldn't have come up with something this stupid.

Anyway, Carolyn is not only a nice person but she is a minister of the Gospel over in Indiana last I heard.  It made her happy to share this foolishness and it is certainly harmless.  Besides reading her post was more interesting than watching the actual sportscast.  

But back to the new year. As many of you know, I don't actually make resolutions.  But there are some things that I would like to accomplish in the coming year.  I'm going to write more.  I'm going to play and sing more.  I'm going to play more golf and I am going to blow town with more frequency in order to do so. I have some projects around this damned old house that I would like to get done.  

And I'm going to do a better job of counting my blessings.  My boon companion Kerri and I were texting about just this subject last night before she and the Colonel ventured out into the Hell that is New Year's Eve.  We take so much for granted in this life.  We should all do a better job of not doing this.  Maybe that should be my resolution.  I could make worse ones. 

All in all 2014 was not so bad.  I made new friends.  I still cling tightly to my old.  I actually regressed as a golfer if that's possible.  But I don't much care anymore.  I got out and played and sang in front of a live audience and it didn't completely suck.  And believe me, not completely sucking was about all we were shooting for.  Unlike my golf game, this project has potential.  Then again I am under strict supervision. 

After all a man has to know his limitations.  And I am fully conversant with all of mine.  

As for today, I'm certain it will be spent watching football and receiving the usual erudite running commentary from fans both near and far.  My buddy Allen down the street is a Florida State alum.  It is my New Year's wish for him that Jameis Winston makes bail in time to suit up for the Seminoles today.

Happy 2015 to one and all.  I wish you all health, happiness and prosperity.

And to all the Mississippi State and Ole Miss fans in my life (and they seem to be Legion), who were unusually chirpy even for them in 2014, I have only this to say:

Riff, Ram, Bah, Zoo. 

Early Holiday Trauma

I'm going to take a little break from this space.  I got way too much to do. Which seems odd since, suffice it to say, its not like I am overly burden by work-related cares.  In fact, I was way better at multi-tasking back then.  Now I'm not real good at "two-tasking."  

A friend of mine who is a retired law professor warned me about this.  He said I would arrive at this place.  

Boy he wasn't kidding.  

Then again, a lady told me the other day that I was awfully busy for somebody that has nothing to do.  There is that too.  Before I left the house last night I was emailing back and forth with a lawyer in Louisiana about the Declaratory Judgments Act along with other fascinating matters.  

As they say, once a Baptist always a Baptist.  Once a lawyer always a lawyer. Now, don't get me wrong.  I could not be trusted with a simple divorce without supervision. But I guess as long as my mind remains polluted with experiences involving the United States Code, federally insured loans and other arcane matters, the phone will ring from time-to-time.  

But that was yesterday.  Today, I have a book review to concoct before the Saints come on.  And I need to practice my guitar.  

What stress.

Talk among yourselves until I get back.  I'm going to lie down now.

Post Football Lethargy

No MSF today.  Too busy with friends, fambly and college football.  Will return soon.

Talk among yourselves in the meantime.

My Sunday Feeling

         I first came into the orbit of William H. Bowen, who died a week or so ago,  when I was in my early thirties.  I had written something for the old Arkansas Gazette that had caught his eye.  Actually, my last name caught his eye.  Turns out he had a lifelong habit of trying to get to know anybody named Bowen that he ran across to see if there was some sort of relation. 

          In our case there was not, but that didn’t keep him from graciously inviting me to join him nonetheless for my first lunch at the Little Rock Club.  I don’t remember much about the lunch except that I enjoyed the view from atop what was then the Commercial National Bank building (as I recall) while wondering why on Earth Bill Bowen was wasting his time with the likes of a nobody such as me.

          We kept in touch over the years mostly through mutual friends and acquaintances.  We would see each other when out to dinner and the like.  And he called me out of the blue shortly after Uncle Sam and I split the sheets to make sure I “didn’t do something stupid” as he put it before he could get to me. 

          But my favorite memory of Mr. Bowen was back when he was running Bill Clinton’s office while the latter was flitting around all over the country running for President.  Our family has held our reunions at Eden Isle for as long as I can remember.  It was during one of those occasions that I ran into him in the club house at Red Apple Golf Course.  After we had made small talk and caught up with each other he asked me what I was doing in Heber.  I told him that I was up there for the family reunion.

          “Now, you lost your daddy when you were young,” he said.  “Did I remember that right?”

          He did.  The fact that he remembered it at all was amazing to me.

“Is your mother still living?”

          “Yes sir,” I said. “She’s in one of those condos over there.”

          “Take me to her.  I want to meet her.”

          “Really?”

          “Of course I want to meet your mother.  Lead the way.”

          At that point in time he was merely the 3^rd most important guy in the damn State behind Frank Broyles and Bill Clinton.  What was I going to say?  I had a tee time?

          He put his arm around my shoulder as we walked to the condo where Mother and the rest of the family was staying.  Mother was sitting in a rocking chair when we entered. 

          “Mother, I want you to meet Mr. William Bowen,” I said. 

          “Don’t get up ma’am,” he said as he extended his hand to her.

          “He’s the Chief of Staff for the Governor of Arkansas,” I said by way of introduction for the first and last time in my life.

          By this time, Mother had just begun her cruel descent into dementia.  Mr. Bowen must have sensed that as he took her hand in both of his. 

          “My name is Bill,” he said gently.” What’s your name?”

          “My name is Donice,” she said. 

          “I’m glad to meet you Donice, he said as he patted her hand.” I’m glad Paul told me you were here. I want you to know that your son is a very fine man. I’m honored to meet his mother. And that’s all I want to say other than I hope you are enjoying the family reunion.”  

     

          “Thank you Sir,” my poor confused mother said.

          As he left he said,” You take care of your mom, Paul.  Call me if you need me.”    

          They say that you can tell if a man is a gentleman by the way that he treats the waiter.  And I agree with that.  But a gentleman is also a man who takes the time to impart a kindness for no other reason than he has the opportunity to do so.  After all, is there a mother that breathes who doesn't like to hear a compliment about her kid? Even if in the case of Donice's oldest boy, Bill Bowen had to apply considerable gild on an exceedingly dubious lily in the process.

          Like I said, I’m nobody.  But on that day years ago a truly great man like William H. Bowen offered to meet Nobody’s mother just because he had the opportunity to impart a kindness.  

          Thank you Mr. Bowen.  You were a gentleman.

          Rest in Peace. 

         

         

          

My Sunday Feeling

I really am agnostic when it comes to most things Razorback.  One of my best friends doesn't believe this.  But it's true.  

But if you are going to be a fan of Division I sports in these here latitudes you have to be at least cognizant of what is going on up in the Ozarks when it comes to the kingdom Frank built.  Because with all due respect to Arkansas State fans the Arkansas Razorbacks may not be the only game in town but they are the biggest.

Ok.  So they're not really "in town" anymore.  They have forever abandoned Little Rock and it's crummy football facility.  But they still have a hold on the collective mindset of our fair city.  That much is fair to say.  

And last night they beat LSU up in Fayetteville to end a 17 game losing streak in the SEC and to even their record to 5-5 over all.  

Really, their record should be better.  The only team that beat the daylights out of them was Georgia here in Little Rock.  They should have beaten A & M.  They should have beaten Mississippi State and Alabama.  They had a chance against Auburn.  

And they blew all of those games high, wide and handsome.

Unlike some of my friends and acquaintances that have expressed an opinion on the matter, I am no expert on college football.  But you have to wonder how much psychic residue Houston Nutt-Bobby Petrino-John L. Smith left on this program.  But, as second year coach Bret Bielema-who a couple of my friends believe should be fired already-said, of last year's squad, that it was the first bad team he had ever seen that was completely blameless for how it got there.  

But last night may go a long way towards cleaning up the residue.  Not only did they thoroughly dominate a quality opponent, that quality opponent was LSU.  

Suffice it to say, the LSU fan base is borderline psychotic.  Worse than Alabama and Auburn even who can at least back it up.  Ole Miss's fans are merely delusional while Mississippi State's are just kinda cute given the latter's newly found-and so far not unprovable legal-major prowess.  And A & M and Missouri have even less business in the SEC than Arkansas.  

But LSU is the worst.  Not a game goes by-not even the ones the Tigers win-that commenters on blogs run by the New Orleans and Baton Rouge papers call for the scalp of Les Miles.  Charles McClendon-"Cholly Mac"-coached there for 18 years.  This sort of tenure is unthinkable down there given the advent of talk shows and internet bulletin boards.  Indeed, who could blame Miles if he said    " to hell with this" or the Cajun-French equivalent and took the soon-to-be-open job at Michigan from whence he graduated?  At least the Wolverines are just obsessed with Ohio State.  

So despite my agnosticism concerning all things WPS, it was indeed highly amusing to see the downtrodden Razorbacks lay it on the Bayou Bengals.  And I shall enjoy collecting on an improvident bet made by a friend in Baton Rouge, although I know at least one lawyer here in town that took LSU with the oddsmakers favoring the Razorbacks by two.

I do not begrudge him this.  Because I do not care and because I know that bidness is bidness.  

So next week the best 5-5 team in the country gets the Ole Miss Brown Bears at home.  I will root for the Razorbacks for no other reason than they are playing Ole Miss which is all sufficient to my mind.

To think that this bunch could get bowl-eligible next week is practically mind-boggling.  

Thanks LSU.  They couldn't have done it without you.