THOUGH THIS BLOG MAY BE BARELY A MONTH OLD, READERS, Your Correspondent still finds it necessary from time to time to tweak things around for the sake of trying to attract notice.

Even if it means, for starters, using BlogMad as a way to get the blog noticed within the blogosphere through traffic swapping and banner exchanges.

Search Engine Optimisation, howbeit within the constraints of the limited resources @ my disposal, dictating the need for using free submission sites.

Even adding what could be called a decent logotype @ the top of the page, and a new motto of sorts--which, in case you're asking, is the Afrikaans for "...creating a healing time and space beyond reality for you...." (I admit to having this fondness for Afrikaans, a close relative of Dutch used widely in South Africa.)

Another promotional tool I use: None other than the good old letterposts; besides, "spam" (never mind attempts @ lily-gilding by using such pseudo-euphemistic terms as "bulk e-mail marketing") is not an effective online marketing tool, and what's more, the Terms of Service (ToS) prohibit its use. Besides, the Postal Service needs the work.

So, do excuse the virtual dust, readers, as things get tweaked around.

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MEMO TO WOULD-BE "FREEPER" TYPES: In case you have any designs on flooding the comments section of the current series of essays showing actual clauses of the several State Constitutions mandating systems of free public education and proscribing use of schools-fund monies for religiosectarian instruction with "swift-boating" attacks in the Freeper stylee: Don't think about it.

Especially considering where the comments section requires the entry of a "captcha" code prior to posting; the better to prevent "comment spam" and automated postings of identical-sounding messages in answer to "freeping" campaigns.

As well, I will not tolerate comment postings containing especially the Seven Dirty Words (you know what they are) and variants thereof, other tasteless language, appeals to racist or bigoted feelings generally, and comments sounding practically identical in tone and nuance. On the other hand, I would prefer a rational, sane sort of discussion on this or whatever other topics I have to discuss.

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THE NEXT CUBAN REVOLUTION WILL BE COMING within measurable distance.

And will be telecast exclusively by Fox News to distract the attention of Kankerdom from the "unhealthy attention" of Indecision 2008, the failings of the ur-RAHOWA Against International Terrorism, the near-collapse of the socioeconomic status quo and its potential exploitation by weird and unwholesome types and other so-called "junk food" news.

I say this in the wake of news that Cuba's longtime Communist leader, Fidel Castro, has acknowledged where he is now too frail and weak to even address the masses all the more ahead of the forthcoming Parliamentary elections--as if nearly two years in hospital recovering from abdominal surgery wasn't good enough for the Communist regime, Havana just had to use Fidel as a means to an end.

The end being National Unity and Cohesion against the likelihood of Fidel's decease, and such providing opportunity for "patriotic" paranoia about the United States exploiting the ensuing circumstances to launch "insurrection" and install what turns out being a corporatist regime under the guise of "restoring democracy" to the Cuban People and Nation.

Keith Rupert Murdoch just can't wait....

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WITH THE GOP PRESIDENTIAL PRIMARIES AND CAUCUSES TO DATE NOT PRODUCING a clear front-runner who can carry forward the GOP's agenda for Indecision 2008 ahead of the nominating convention in the Twin Cities later this summer (especially with Super Tuesday's primaries and caucuses not that far behind), it's enough for the Right-Thinking Americans to start reconsidering whether the GOP is still worthy of their vote come November.

As in the Iowa caucuses giving victory to an amen-snorter of dubious repute, especially as details of his part start becoming clearer all the more....

The New Hampshire primaries giving the victory to a senator with known connexions to a major figure in the savings-and-loan industry's meltdown in the late 1980's....

And the Michigan primaries giving the victory to a homestate boy chosen more out of homestate loyalties than anything else.

Too, you've also got a reconstructed(?) Libertarian using the GOP to make his message more mainstream, a whiz in the fundraising department but now facing charges that several newsletters published in his name and behalf contained racist, sexist, anti-Semitic, homophobic and neo-Confederacist content which he denies having written, let alone allowed to appear under his name and behalf.

In any case, whether the results out of Super Tuesday's caucuses and primaries make the picture more clear for the GOP's Presidential chances or no is best left to the Fates, methinks.

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DECEPTION, THY NAME IS FUNDRAISING BASED ON FEAR AND LOATHING OF THE VULNERABLE: Item from People For the American Way's "Right Wing Watch" blog about fundraising appeals by the conservative fearmongering machine resorting to trick or deceit:

It looks like The Traditional Values Coalition's front-group, the Christian Seniors Association, is again mailing out its bogus "U.S. Taxpayer Census" forms in an attempt to extort donations from confused senior citizens:

Local seniors who contacted this newspaper said they found the letter they received from the Christian Seniors Association confusing, saying at first glance it appears to be a government mailing of some kind.

On the front of the document, in large block letters, are the words "U.S. Taxpayer Census" and a seal similar in design to the U.S. official seal. (The official seal of the United States, which features an eagle holding arrows in one claw and olive leaves in the other, differs in detail from the design on the letter).

Also printed on the front of each letter are the words, "Census Document #" (followed by a 11-digit number) and the words "assigned to:" (followed by the recipient's name).

Inside, the form further identifies itself as a "U.S. Taxpayer Census on the Social Security Preservation Act (HR 219).

In smaller print at the bottom of the first page of the document, the mailing is identified as "a special citizen action project of Christian Seniors Association, a division of Traditional Values Coalition."

[***]

The monetary appeal portion of the letter has check boxes next to suggested donation amounts of $15; $25; $50; $100; $250; $500 and "other."

Alternatively, seniors are invited to donate $8 to cover the "cost of tabulating my census and delivering results to Congress," if the recipient feels they are unable to make "a substantial contribution" in the amounts suggested above.

It is no surprise that TVC would stoop to this sort of fundraising tactic considering that, according to their most recent tax filing, their "total net assets" are -$4,288,151.

And Another Thing:

Postal Service regulations require that mailings sent out in simulation of United States Government-agency mailings (the latter usually sent out with "Official Mail--Penalty for Private Use $300" indica in lieu of regular postage such) must be prominently labelled on the front of the envelope THIS IS NOT A GOVERNMENT DOCUMENT and, in the covering letter, a disclaimer explaining that the mailers have no official connexion with the United States Government or any of its agencies.

Are the Postal Inspectors becoming asleep @ the switch, as it were, for ideological reasons vis-a-vis His Fraudulency's Great Within, never mind the Postal Reorganisation Act 1970 (which replaced the cabinet-level Post Office Department with the quasi-corporate United States Postal Service) removing politics from the mails in favour of a corporate, profit-based model?   

As a public service for such among you Zealots and True Believers (Good Christians All, besides) who want to pick a fight with the courts about the "legality" or "constitutionality" of free public education based on pseudoreligiopolitical arguments, The Exaggerator has decided to offer, as a public service, aide-memoire over the next four days of such clauses in the several State Constitutions as mandate a system of free public education in the several States, and proscribe use of public funds for religious or otherwise sectarian instruction.

(Clauses from the constitutions of Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa on these subjects were discussed previously in this space.)

For starters: As a reminder that educational policy is the sole domain of the several states, may I call your attention to the Tenth Amendment of the United States Constitution (a/k/a the "States' Rights Amendment"):

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

This time around, I will cover the constitutions of the several states Alabama to Colorado, inclusive.

FYI, all clauses referred to are from such sections of the respective websites of the several states given over to the State Constitution, and come from such Constitutions currently in force; so you can look it up for yourself, the specific section and clause are noted by reference.

Let's begin:

ALABAMA:

• The legislature shall establish, organize, and maintain a liberal system of public schools throughout the state for the benefit of the children thereof between the ages of seven and twenty-one years. The public school fund shall be apportioned to the several counties in proportion to the number of school children of school age therein, and shall be so apportioned to the schools in the districts or townships in the counties as to provide, as nearly as practicable, school terms of equal duration in such school districts or townships. Separate schools shall be provided for white and colored children, and no child of either race shall be permitted to attend a school of the other race. (Section 256, Alabama Constitution, 1901)

• No money raised for the support of the public schools shall be appropriated to or used for the support of any sectarian or denominational school. (Section 263, op. cit.)

ALASKA:

• The legislature shall by general law establish and maintain a system of public schools open to all children of the State, and may provide for other public educational institutions. Schools and institutions so established shall be free from sectarian control. No money shall be paid from public funds for the direct benefit of any religious or other private educational institution. (Article VII, clause 1, Alaska Constitution, 1959)

ARIZONA:

• A. The legislature shall enact such laws as shall provide for the establishment and maintenance of a general and uniform public school system, which system shall include:

  1. Kindergarten schools.

  2. Common schools.

  3. High schools.

  4. Normal schools.

  5. Industrial schools.

  6. Universities, which shall include an agricultural college, a school of mines, and such other technical schools as may be essential, until such time as it may be deemed advisable to establish separate state institutions of such character.

  B. The legislature shall also enact such laws as shall provide for the education and care of pupils who are hearing and vision impaired. (Article 11, section 1, Arizona State Constitution, 1912)

• No sectarian instruction shall be imparted in any school or state educational institution that may be established under this Constitution, and no religious or political test or qualification shall ever be required as a condition of admission into any public educational institution of the state, as teacher, student, or pupil; but the liberty of conscience hereby secured shall not be so construed as to justify practices or conduct inconsistent with the good order, peace, morality, or safety of the state, or with the rights of others. (Article 11, section 7, op. cit.)

ARKANSAS:

• Intelligence and virtue being the safeguards of liberty and the bulwark of a free and good government, the State shall ever maintain a general, suitable and efficient system of free public schools and shall adopt all suitable means to secure to the people the advantages and opportunities of education. The specific intention of this amendment is to authorize that in addition to existing constitutional or statutory provisions the General Assembly and/or public school districts may spend public funds for the education of persons over twenty-one (21) years of age and under six (6) years of age, as may be provided by law, and no other interpretation shall be given to it. (Article 14, clause 1, Arkansas Constitution, 1874)

• No money or property belonging to the public school fund, or to this State, for the benefit of schools or universities, shall ever be used for any other than for the respective purposes to which it belongs.  (Article 14, clause 2, op. cit.)

***TO BE CONTINUED*** 

TODAY, GRETNA GREEN--TOMORROW, THE REBORN CONFEDERACY? Yesterday, Your Correspondent took note of some of the key points of the Scots body of law, what with the Neo-Confederacist community's designs on seeking to reestablish the soverign status of the Confederate States of America using Scots models of law and "heritage" as their (presumed) foundation.

WELL--!!!

Space precluded me from pointing out another (un)likely angle of Scots law and "cultural heritage" they would like to see "preserved" as part of their warped design:

Marriage by Declaration, as made infamous by the "anvil weddings" performed in the Scots village of Gretna Green (specifically, those performed by the legendary "anvil priests" over the Auld Blacksmith Shop's anvil), allowing those who were @ least 16 years of age to be married by any competent person in the presence of @ least two witnesses.

Which became rather legendary thanks to the 1754 Marriage Act of Lord Hardwicke, requiring couples as were under 21 years of age to obtain parental consent prior to marriage--only if they were in England or Wales, to which the Act in question applied. In Scotland, however, the same Act didn't apply, giving the village of Gretna Green a unique place in history.

Especially when you consider where Gretna Green was the first village of consequence coming into Scotland on the main coach road between London and Glasgow, as well as the junction of five such nicknamed "the Headless Cross" by locals.

So, for 186 years (until the Marriage Act 1940 brought an end to "anvil weddings" and the "anvil priests" solemnising them by requiring that all such be solemnised either in the confines of a church or in a Registry Office), Gretna Green became Wedding Central among such young couples wanting to get it over and done with without attracting the attention of the angry or otherwise ballisto parental units likely to catch wind of what was going on. Performed by all manner of shady and (in the minds of critics) dangerous characters having no other formal qualifications to solemnise marriages, not even a degree in theology, and in practically any conceivable venue so long as two witnesses could be procured as a mere formality of witness.

But none more legendary than over the anvil of the Auld Blacksmith's Shop, where the bang of the blacksmith's hammer on the anvil made the couple man and wife.

No reading of Banns for three weeks beforehand.

No parental consent.

No Wasserman tests, even.

(Even with a slight hiccup in the form of the Marriage Act 1856, which required @ least one of the partners to an intending Scots marriage to reside there for 21 days prior to the ceremony.)

Which must seem rather ironic for the same sort of crowd who frowns on homosexual unions as being "incompatible with defending the sanctity of Traditional Home and Family Life," yet seeking to embrace Scots law as the foundation of a Confederacy reborn.

(Then again, of all the "irregular marriages," to use the legal term for such performed under Marriage by Declaration, performed over the Auld Blacksmith's Shop's anvil, Your Correspondent wonders how many such managed to endure well into old age.)

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MEANWHILE, BACK IN WINONA: Your Correspondent can't quite help but notice how the marquee @ the Culver's restaurant comes out in explaining the Flavour of the Day for frozen custard (Culver's house speciality; Vanilla and Chocolate such are always available, with a different flavour available every day), with the daily menu special immediately thereafter.

Sometime in future, I may want to make note of these marquees and post them in this weblog, the better so you can see how whimsically silly the arrangement can get.

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THOSE OF YOU WHO STILL THINK THE SO-CALLED "NORTH AMERICAN UNION" IS A CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER to the "antient and pecuilar" soverignty and soverign identity of the United States (as if such mattered above all else) will want to read this interesting item from Snopes.com as debunks the argument.

But don't come crying to me if you get any ideas of my having "no regard for the facts" which you lack.

HIS FRAUDULENCY (OTHERWISE KNOWN AS PRESIDENT BUSH) must have this belief that his Presidential duties and powers, the Constitution notwithstanding, extend to resorting to a "schoolyard bully" role, if and when necessary, for the sake of defending American soverignty and soverign identity.

Case in point: His Fraudulency asking OPEC, under pain of "extreme measures," to increase oil-production output within measurable distance "for economic reasons," as if suggesting that cheaper oil is one with National Economic Stability, in turn to be seen as one with National Cohesion and Identity. Not to mention "dropping hints" for the GOP's Presidential campaign handlers on "talking points" their eventual Presidential candidate should expect to parrot out to the voters.

Which seems rather ironic in the wake of a study just coming out as suggests that a gasoline-ersatz made from switchgrass could actually be more environmentally-friendly than such made from cereal grains, in particular when it comes to carbon-dioxide emission rates (88% less than conventional gasoline); further, the study suggested that 320 US gallons of biofuel could be produced from just one acre of switchgrass.

But then again, is it feasable for facilities producing ethanol from cereals to be converted to producing switchgrass-based fuels in a cost-efficent manner?

For now, though, farmers, don't bet the farm on switchgrass as a viable answer to energy self-sufficency.

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TELL ME THIS IS A RATHER SICK WAY to get off welfare, especially when you're in an area where jobs are few and hard to come by and the prevailing mood is to leave for elsewhere:

Anti-Cosa Nostra officers in Italy have arrested 51 Nigerian nationals as were caught up in a Nigerian-based human-trafficking ring which tricked Nigerian women into "employment" as prostitutes and drug couriers across Europe; another 15 were arrested in Operation Viola, mostly in The Netherlands.

It's not just 419 scams any more coming out of Nigeria....

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TO HEAR NORTH DAKOTANS PUT IT, SOMETHING IS ROTTEN in its depiction by National Geographic in its January number under title of "The Emptied Prairie."

The vast majority of the complaints so directed, involving not only high-level North Dakota government officials but also proud North Dakotans themselves, take issue with an overzealous emphasis on rural North Dakota's decline.

As in abandoned farms, houses and grain elevators.

Derelict rural churches.

Even rural communities in severe population decline, with mostly elderly residents left to carry on.

Which, to the Peace Garden State's epistles of Babbittry, is not a very positive image indeed, especially considering where North Dakota's agricultural exports are on the rise, they've become the North American continent's #3 producer of durum pasta wheat, and the Bakken oil and natural gas field in the northwest shows signs of becoming a major production area for the 21st century.

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MEANWHILE, BACK IN MINNESOTA, Governor Pawlenty's new budget just out seems to have a fetish for road and bridge projects thanks to the I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis last summer, the which has now been attributed to design faults per a preliminary enquiry by the National Transportation Safety Board.

Yet, Pawlenty still thinks it's feasable to finance such construction by keeping gas taxes @ unrealistically low levels, and justifying such laughable rates as being necessary to maintain socioeconomic stability--especially so among the Lower Classes otherwise "helplessly enslaved" to State welfare and in "clear and compelling need" of "the healthy and beneficial effects" of free-market capitalism.

And things could be even worse: The Star Tribune is reporting where MnDOT kept an embarrassing inspection report on the Hastings bridge over the Mississippi River out of the loop since its most recent inspection last summer. I say "embarrassing" because the Hastings bridge, which replaced the legendary Spiral Bridge in that same city in 1951, is the single busiest two-lane span in the The Gopher State in terms of traffic volume and is showing it with rusted and corroded deck plates throughout.

"Earth to Pawlenty! Earth to Pawlenty!"

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AND ONE THING MORE: Horror-movie actress Vampira (t/n Maila Nurmi), perhaps best remembered for her role in what many call the single worst movie ever out of Hollywood, 1958's Plan 9 From Outer Space, has died @ 85 years of age. 

BLAME IT, BY AND LARGE, ON THE WARPED AND MISGUIDED ZEALOTRY AND TRUE BELIEF in certain scions of His Fraudulency's Great Within, but their belief in a Classless Ownership Society especially targeting the Lower Classes may be backfiring thanks to the meltdown in the "sub-prime" and "Alt-A" mortgage-lending crises aimed @ steering the Lower Classes into a healthy embrace of the Classless Ownership Society through owner-occupancy housing, for starters.

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FOR STARTERS, you've got what could best be called pure, unadulterated carpetbaggery by way of what could best be called Emotional Mortgage Rescue, which targets such with "sub-prime" mortgages in clear and present risk of foreclosure and ensuing eviction.

In such a scheme, the perpetrators claim to be either affiliated with some class of a "foundation" or have found "angels" among the wealthy who would be more than willing to take over the mortgage on the house of such targeted, allowing the same to remain and not face eviction.

But that's in theory.

In Reality, however, there are no "foundations" or wealthy "angels" extant; instead, those involved push documents on such in danger as actually sign over title to the "foundation" and advise the dupes to make all future mortgage payments to the "foundation" rather than the original lenders.

It's enough to wonder if Emotional Mortgage Rescue could be a cheap and cheerful fundraising front for the Extreme Right of the highest order, taking advantage as they enjoy doing of the vulnerable and easily-led.

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MOVING FROM THE RIDICULOUS TO THE DOWNRIGHT STUPID, you could just imagine where so-called "Christian" mortgage lenders, in their Zealotry and True Belief of homophobia being one with Christian Love, might try exploiting the "sub-prime" crisis by way of:

• Buying up whole neighbourhoods of foreclosed properties for what may turn out being their true value (IMHO, about 10% of the value of the last mortgage taken out on same) from real-estate auctions;
• Offering (you guessed it) "Christian" home mortgages through so-called "Christian" marketing channels as are financed through "convertible securities" (debt-backed such easily convertible into receivables under the right circumstances) sold to churches, mission societies and "Christian" investors (all the while claiming exemption under securities-registration laws); and
• Doing the "Minneapolis Flip" (as in inflating real-estate pricing based on arbitrarily-inflated appraisals having nothing to do with the real property value of the affected) before suckering in "Christian" homebuyers with claims that the neighbourhood is "emerging" as a major "Christian" socioeconomic centre.

And the obvious rationale they have is to prevent "further serious dilution of property values" by way of "morally deviant elements" (read: gays and lesbians) seeking to "exploit" such solely for profit above Healthy Regard for Family and its Values.

I admit this may be a stretch; however, you never can tell about just such a possibility.

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AND IT'S NOT JUST HOME BUYERS AND MORTGAGE LENDERS WHO WERE "taken to the cleaners," so to speak, in the whole "sub-prime" lending imbroglio:

New York and Connecticut securities regulators are reportedly looking into claims that "sub-prime" mortgage lenders managed to have debt securities backed by "sub-prime" mortgages bundled into debt securities offered en tranche to especially institutional investors and bond funds not expected to be consciously aware of the "sub-prime" mortgages being serious investment risks in their own right.

Next thing you know, expect these same lenders as are In Liquidation to resell such "sub-prime"-backed mortgages as "fully-secured, bank-guaranteed Accounts Receivable Acquisitions" paying (or so claimed) up to 40% p.a.--and sold all along as "low-risk" investments, even to the extent of resorting to patsies and bromides to explain why the marketers could not issue an Offering Circular as required by the securities laws.

Let alone fail to explain that any such securities advertised as "bank-guaranteed" all the while:

• are not considered bank accounts or products;
• are not FDIC insured; and
• carry risk for loss of value, including loss of all or significant part of the original investment.

And more than likely through "spam" e-mail, "cutting out the middleman" and "avoiding unnecessary regulatory burden"--or so the promoters think all the while.