politics

I am brushing off the dust of this blog to see if I will continue blogging...?!?

I find now that I teach I have a number of venues to throw out all sorts of my ideas and see if they actually work. I just got to love students :)

so what is it that makes me want to talk again. Politics.

I have been fascinated with this campaign...absolutely fascinated! I will disclose I am and have become a fan of Obama. His words are inspirational! He speaks of a future that I can believe in again.

What a waste of thumbs that are opposable
To make machines that are disposable
And sell them to seagulls flying in circles
Around one big right wing

Yes, the left wing was broken long ago
By the slingshot of cointelpro
And now it's so hard to have faith in anything

Especially your next bold move
Or the next thing you're gonna need to prove to yourself

Even the skeptic can think our country can be a leader ...one to help to see the world and believe it can be not on the road of the apocalypse, but peace. For the first time I don't believe Ani's words: and I wonder who's gonna be president, tweedle dum or tweedle dummer?

The issue.

Hillary. She has been the leading candidate...the perceived future of the Democratic Party. But here lies the problem. Why are we desperate to crown yet another member of the feuding ruling parties of the bushs and Clinton? I as a 34 year old man have lived merely 6 years without either family being in the white house?!?

Then there is the crying....she is single-handily taking the woman's movement back years. Whether it is the man keeping her down, or the breakdown of the stress, how are we supposed to believe she can operate beyond this pandering? Reagan revealed the presidency as acting, pulling off masterfully the beauty of the lines. She represents to me the loss of the substance of American politics. But hey...she has 50cent's endorsement.

Lastly, the article above lays out two very important points...she is running on the fact that she has the experience. But does she?

Questions about Hillary's role in the Clinton administration, and about Bill's business and philanthropic ventures since he left office, are not just fair but necessary.

Why won't the Clintons speed up the release of White House papers that would let us see what kind of
authority Hillary Clinton enjoyed? Who donated how much to the Clinton presidential library, and might those donors expect anything from a Hillary Clinton administration? What business tycoons have snuggled up to the former president, and what -- other than the chance to bask in the radiance of his wit-- did they hope to get out of the exercise?

So how should we use experience...when she only allows us to see certain parts of her history?

I am tired of all the reasons I am supposed to vote for this person or that person. abortion, gay rights, crime, war, torture, taxes, programs...etc. all of these single divisive issues...more about tearing the nation apart than uniting.

It is time for the UNITING issues to be heard.

proves nothing....except to incite Christians

It happens every year…around Christmas or Easter...someone finds a claim to prove or disprove Jesus.

This year it is this: jesus’ family tomb. For years we Christians are merely trying to hide the fact that heresies from the past are actually true. It is a good thing Christianity has never been challenged or experienced any questions, or otherwise the religion would quickly crumble and fall….uggghhh.

Ok I seems that is what people what to believe. Things like the Da Vinci Code and this new documentary are really just reposing the exact same question as in the Last Temptation of Christ…and consequently, what some of the Gnostics believed. They have been refuted for centuries…

What the real problem is that we are so quick to get sucked in to this. I know I am truly one of those. It is just so ridiculous that even as you read most of the articles advertising the documentary. They usually cite how most theists and non-theists are debunking the show. Really are we as a people so dumb that a documentary that no one believes can be put before us and I can guarantee you someone will question how I believe because of this new evidence. I guess it is similar to the Gospel of Judas issue just a number of months ago.

Here is a line from the previously referenced Newsday article:

Those facts are this: In 1980, a tomb was unearthed amid a construction frenzy in Jerusalem. Ten limestone bone boxes, called ossuaries, were discovered in the tomb, six bore inscriptions (markings used to prevent the inadvertent mixing of bones).

As the ossuaries were removed from the tomb and placed in storage by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), the Hebrew inscriptions were recorded. Three of the six were easily translated as Mary, Matthew and Joseph.

It was the last three names, however, that caught the attention of "Lost Tomb" filmmaker Simcha Jacobovici: A faint inscription which translated to "Jesus son of Joseph," a second inscription reading "Judah son of Jesus" and a third ossuary with the name "Mariamne," which in the "Acts of Phillip" -- a recently-discovered fourth-century work -- was revealed to be the real name of Mary Magdalene.

Given the statistical improbabilities of these names being buried together, the crew took the next step of extracting partial DNA samples from the Jesus and Mariamne ossuaries, which later proved they were not maternally related.

There is also a short news story on this, but note how really it just focuses on how wrought with errors it all is.

Oh well, I guess I will need to brush up on my apologetics on why Jesus is not married.

“They are an eyesore”

Article in Houston Chronicle

I just love when ranchers are now making comments on aesthetics. They have a way to supplement their incomes, they can use the wind that comes ripping through the plains in Texas and possibly use the farms to help prevent some of the soil erosion through their crops. But alas, they have an argument against it…they’re an eyesore.

Uggh. I was all proud of my home state. Hopefully, it is just like most things in papers these days. They present a “fair and balanced point of view.” The problem with this is that the opposing view could be an extreme minority…one or two people, but they feel to fully represent the story they present their opinion as equal. A quote in the article reinforces this: “Jack County Judge Mitchell Davenport characterized opposition to the wind project as "small but vocal" and said he expects most landowners will lease their land for the project if they have not already.”

Who's clapping now?

So I watched part of the state of the union the other day...mainly because there was nothing on! I started to wonder why would I not be interested in the most important scheduled address the president does?
as I watched it, I started to realize not only had I heard all of the information either leaked or issued in a previous speech (just a couple days ago about the escalation ) or I was really interested in how people stood up and others didn’t…constantly just being silly. It just seems like our politicians are just so juvenile with all of this applause and posing for the camera. I think we should remove applause from the speech so we don’t get these asinine statistics like “how many standing ovations” or “total applause time.”

It all takes us back to the solver of all problems…yes, the “Brady Bunch”. Who could forget the infamous episode “Vote for Brady” where in the end Mike and Carol in all of there wisdom state that we are a family and we should not split even over the party of Boy or Girl. Sadly, there is no political Mike or Carol. We are stuck with “pundits” who shout from the top of their lungs party lines!

What ever happened to dialogue in our society? Our country would never have been founded if this was the age in which the constitution had been written. They managed to come to such great compromises spanning such divisive issues from the role of the federal government to (sadly) slavery. But the purpose far outweighed the politics.

Some blame the parties; some blame the system, while still others blame the likes of Rush Limbaugh or Fox News. In an excellent semi-prophetic book, Amusing Ourselves to Death, Neil Postman suggests it is the role TV plays in our government. I think he has a great point. While he was really seeing the beginning (the book was published in 1986), it amazing what transformed our society from debates prior to the radio to what we have today.

that's professor archi-raj

well it is official, as of 1pm monday i am officially a professor at Catholic University's architecture program!

i will be teaching 2 classes: a 9 hour studioand one class on construction documents (a 3 hour lecture class).

one of the students politly asked me, "so what qualifies you to teach this class?" if only she knew. i tried to answer, but told her she was just going to see and maybe she will better be able to tell me next semester!!

well, off to contaminating the ivory tower...

in DC

So I guess I should add an update. I know I have not spent much time on this blog really discussing me…perhaps that could be the reason for the title of this blog, “My own quest for insignificance.” HOWEVER, I can for the 2 or so people who actually read this ridiculous thread of meaningless words give a little update.

So we have been in DC for a month. After finding out Kie passed the State of Texas Bar ,we arrived in DC having towing our meager possessions that survived our own Craigslist purgings. I loved the comment that we were a turtle with our house on our backs. With only one little hiccup, the camry’s key did not work and needed to rekey the ignition, we made it here in the morning on Sunday.

Since we had signed our contract on the apartment sight-unseen, we were quite nervous when we got here to see what we had committed to for a year. We have named our little basement apartment “the bunker” (possibly reminiscent of dick cheney’s time in the “undisclosed bunker” during 9/11) because of the lack of windows. However, our place is very nice. A quite large apartment, a number of spaces that were with some help, worked out well to fit our needs. I absolutely love the neighborhood. The scale of the tree-lined streets with a great density that is very human. Coming from Houston, where nothing is scaled for pedestrians, I am excited to experience this very different way of living.

As for work we ran into a little snag with Kie’s job, but with some patience getting through the red tape, she was able to start 2 weeks later than we thought. On my side, I have had nothing but positive things happen! While I was nervous about trying to change professions I am amazed at the providence as I was able to secure a job with an even better university than I was expecting. I will be teaching at The Catholic University of America school of Architecture (which will henceforth be known as CUArch). I will be teaching possibly 2 classes, both upper-level. It might work out that I am able to actually earn a living doing this teaching thing!

We have started to go to a church in the neighborhood (just a three block walk!!) Capitol Hill Baptist Church . we are enjoying it so far. How is it that people who don’t go to church even meet people?

We still feel completely alien in this city…but it is slowly but surely getting more comfortable. It is amazing that such a world renown city is SO small. With a population of just 570,000 ( versus houston’s 2,000,000 ) and more experientially we roamed on a Saturday night at about 9pm for a coffee shop to just sit for a little bit, but all were closed but starbucks opened to a late 10.00pm!

day at the national zoo.

me and an alligator turtle face off. he did end up snapping at me. who doesn't love the zoo!




of course we saw the pandas