The Troglodyte

My Review of The Lion King

2012-01-27T11:33:00.000-06:00

A little over the top, but sums up the feeling... Link to video

If You Can't Beat Winter, Join It

2012-01-14T00:41:00.002-06:00

Debt Limit

2012-01-11T09:25:00.002-06:00

We are all Austrians now.

By the way, that annoying clacking you're hearing is all the Keynesians scrambling to object as to how naive this analogy is.

The 12 Days of Christmas

2011-12-27T00:21:00.001-06:00

Just a friendly reminder that it's only the third day. Merry Christmas! HHT: Man with Black Hat

Friday Video: Deck the Halls

2011-12-02T11:30:00.000-06:00

It's not Christmas yet, but I'm going to go with this being a preparation song from the U of M's School of Music, performed at the Carlson School of Management. Enjoy! HHT: Bring Me the News

Top 12, Heisman, and Paterno

2011-11-14T02:52:00.000-06:00

The Troglodyte Top 12

It seems odd that the inaugural ranking for the 2011 season is occurring in week 12, but that is a publishing problem, not a ranking problem. The ranking has been around since week 5 (Alabama, LSU, Oklahoma St., Stanford, Arkansas, Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Oregon, Clemson, South Carolina, Va. Tech, and South Florida), but I never got around to posting it (something that has plagued this site for months). One thing of note is the stability of those teams listed in the Top 12 since week 5 (only Wisconsin and South Florida out, with Kansas St. and Houston in). For reference, the Top 12's stick rate (10/12) is better than that of the AP and USA Today polls (both 8/12), which is likely a result of the bias created by early season rankings by the major polls, e.g., I never bought into Nebraska, or Florida, or Boise St, being that high. One more reason, I guess, to like the BCS, with its 8-week wait.

Heisman Watch

Andrew Luck should be the only player invited to New York. Period.

Paterno

I heard a guy on the radio Sunday morning saying that if he heard the phrase, "The healing has started at Penn State," or similar poppycock, he thought his head would explode. Quite right. If there is one thing that the priest sexual abuse crisis made clear 10 years ago, it was that for the victims, "healing" is still a struggle, even decades later, and certainly doesn't get rolling over a weekend.

Speaking of the crisis in the Church, there is an angle hear that applies to the question of whether Joe Paterno should have been fired. While there was no shortage of those piling on the Church during the crisis because it was all supposed to be a matter of chickens coming home to roost (yeah, right), there was a little different feeling among Catholics, practicing and non-practicing; a sick feeling of disgust rising in the pit of your stomach from what you were hearing and the slow burn from feeling betrayed as bishop after bishop was discovered to have enabled abusers by reassigning them to new posts and keeping it all quiet. Fr. Stephen Hamilton, then of Edmond, OK, provided much needed clarity to a laity longing to hear some during his Good Friday homily (read the whole thing):

This scandal involves bishops who, though themselves not guilty of abuse, covered up the truth and failed to protect others from abusers, theirs is a sin against the duty to govern the Church. This dereliction of duty in governing the Church does not touch upon Catholic doctrine (the teaching office), nor the validity of Sacraments (the sanctifying office)... It would be irrational to confuse a bishop’s failure to govern well with evidence that Catholic doctrine or the Sacraments are flawed.

... [S]exual abuse by clergy, though forgivable by God’s incomprehensible mercy, is absolutely inexcusable. Likewise, a bishop’s failure to remove such clerics from active ministry is a horrendous display of incompetence. In both cases, such offenders lose our trust and ought to be removed from office. Clerics who are guilty of such criminal acts have committed the spiritual equivalent of murder. The fallout from such abuse is often ruined lives and lost faith.

Joe Paterno is a Catholic. The very spring the priest sex abuse scandal was widely being made known, he learned about Jerry Sandusky and Victim 2.

*** Sidebar

Reason #572 why I could never be a so-called progressive: Creating common cause to aid and abet the spiritual equivalent of murder committed by members of NAMBLA.

*** End sidebar

While a bishop could make a lame argument that in the years previous he was just following the advice of secular experts that pedophilia and pederasty could be addressed by a change of scenery or, if that didn't work, the priest in question could be rehabilitated with therapy, Paterno couldn't use that excuse as it was clear in March and April of 2002 how wrongheaded that reasoning and line of action proved to be. What's worse, Paterno did even less than that.

Yeah, Joe, the all-time wins record is nice. So is that library. They don't really square things, however. Whether by willful ignorance, or gross negligence, you are an accomplice to the equivalent of at least one case of spiritual murder. Don't let the door hit you on the way out.

When You Come to the Fork in the Road, Take It, or Have Some Cake

2011-10-28T19:20:00.001-05:00

Today, just minutes before I'm about to give a presentation at work today, and one of our corporate vice presidents says, "Hey, Scott, you look like Mitt Romney." Now you can be the judge about any physical similarities, but I'm going to go with him saying that because I exude command and competence, or whatever it is that is supposed to be so appealing about the good governor.

Regardless, that got me to thinking. It is my birthday, after all, and one of those opportune times to cast a gaze across the landscape that is your life and ponder wondrous things. Here is what I noticed:

Tom Emmer is a.) Catholic, b.) father of 7, and c.) ran for Governor of Minnesota
Rick Santorum is a.) Catholic, b.) father of 7, and c.) is running for President of the United States
I am a.) Catholic and b.) father of 7

Therefore, I am feeling compelled to take one of two paths, although I'm not sure wife would hop aboard for either. Plan A seems obvious, particularly considering my apparently undeniable presidential bearing, but I am not feeling the proverbial "fire in the belly." So, I'm thinking give Plan B a shot. What do you think?

Oh, and Plan C is not an option... I won't leave the Church.

Addendum:

In the spirit of full disclosure, I'm not sure about the "presidential bearing" thing being behind the Mitt Romney comparison because his next comment was, "You know his nickname is Mittens. Maybe we should start calling you 'Mittens.'"

Friday Video - Led Zeppelin - Kashmir

2011-09-02T05:30:00.001-05:00

You knew Zeppelin had to show up sometime:

Friday Video - Deep Purple - Burn & Highway Star

2011-08-26T05:54:00.001-05:00

Sick double shot:

Friday Video - Bruce Springsteen - Born to Run

2011-08-19T05:45:00.002-05:00

A slight change of pace, but still fits:

Friday Video - Focus - Hocus Pocus

2011-08-12T05:41:00.001-05:00

Yodeling and whistling!

Friday Video - Kansas - Carry on my Wayward Son

2011-08-05T05:51:00.001-05:00

Rockin' and kickin':

The Man Who Saved the Debt Ceiling Deal

2011-08-02T08:58:00.000-05:00

There's a lot of buzz this morning about the vice president's role in the Congress and the White House reaching an agreement to raise the debt ceiling.

This should give us pause that the deal is little more than Washington business as usual, and is, perhaps, even a better indicator than both the Republicans claiming a victory for debt reduction through spending cuts for a plan that slows the rate of borrowing by only about 10% (if we're lucky) and the president insisting that "revenue increases" are still on the table, or the formation of another committee to make the choices the Congress won't make.

Lest we forget, this is what The Pivotal Man said about the budget and spending just two years ago:

People look at me and say, 'What are you talking about, Joe? You're telling me we've got to go spend money to keep from going bankrupt?' The answer is, 'Yes, I'm telling ya.'
- Vice President Biden, Arlington, VA, 7/16/2009

Friday Video - Edgar Winter Group - Frankenstein

2011-07-29T06:40:00.001-05:00

A/V out of sync, but still a great song:

Friday Video - Grand Funk Railroad - Footstompin' Music & We're an American Band

2011-07-22T06:26:00.004-05:00

This would have been too obvious to be the lead-off for the "Footstompin'" series,

so I'll throw it in as bonus lead-in for this:

Friday Video Summer 11 Series - Footstompin'

2011-07-22T01:17:00.000-05:00

The Friday Video series is coming back for the balance of the summer, through Labor Day weekend. To reflect the times and what's been going on in St. Paul and Washington, the primary theme is "Footstompin'," as in "Put your foot down, enough is enough." Therefore the focus is going to be on driving drums, which means songs from the '70's. The other theme is "Standing on principal," which in music means having musicianship... you gotta have the goods (and probably a keyboard). No cardboard cut-outs allowed. Enjoy!

This Day in History

2011-07-20T09:56:00.000-05:00

Image from Wikipedia

42 years ago today, the Apollo 11 astronauts discovered the Decepticon ship near the Sea of Tranquility.

Party Like It's 1999

2011-07-08T17:30:00.000-05:00

Scene: Minivan traveling I-35 northbound near Cameron, MO. 11 PM, 12 years ago today. Interior. William (age 5), and his parents are awake, his two siblings are asleep. Through the windshield, a very large thunderstorm is visible in the distance.

Will: There sure is a big party going on in heaven tonight.

Will's Dad (driving, distracted): What? ... What did you say?

Will: Heaven's having a party. You know, Grandpa Gary said that when there's a thunderstorm, it means the angels are having a party.

Will's Mom (begins to sob)

Will's Dad (tears welling, tries to keep van on the road): Yep. Your're right. A big party.

We waited until the next morning to tell him that his Grandpa Gary, my father, had passed away that night (a couple hours before the "party").

My father dancing with my sister at her wedding in 1996.

I don't claim to know the details as to how the whole purgatory/get-in-to-heaven thing works, so I don't know whether the party would have been in heaven proper, or in paradise. But I'm going to choose to believe there was a party.

Today it is very common to hear people talk about how some dear one has "gone to heaven," or "gone to meet Jesus." Like a child told a story about a thunderstorm, we want to believe there is a happy occasion beyond the unsettling reality we face. The idea that everyone gets to heaven is a childish one. But, after all, we are encouraged to have the faith of child, as well.

In that unsettling moment, through Love, we are open to Faith with Hope for heaven. Yes, it's childish. Yes, at its base, it's probably a response out of fear. But I'm willing to let it slide. The trick, of course, is to not confuse a child-like faith with child-like reason. The gospel points out, repeatedly, that not everyone gets into heaven. And in case we missed it there, Our Lady, has reminded us of it many times through the ages since Jesus Christ told us so. Yes, there is still a time to put away childish things.

So we celebrate his life and have a party. And think of him as the guest of honor at a bigger party. And then we also pray for the dead. And, ourselves, prepare the way of the Lord, and make straight His paths.

May you have eternal rest, Dad. May the Perpetual Light shine upon you. May you reside in the New Jerusalem. All through the Grace of God's mercy. Requiescat in pace. Amen.

Killing the Economy One Person at a Time

2011-06-21T02:17:00.000-05:00

While it is arguable, even if your sympathetic with Freakonomics-type heuristic reasoning, whether falling crime rates have been caused by abortion. It is much more clear that the retarded population growth, all other things being reasonably equal, since the judicial innovation of Roe has depressed the American economy correspondingly. Feel free to file that under the temporal effects of grave sin, better known as "the chickens coming home to roost."

Fr. Corapi Acts Unfatherly This Fathers' Day Weekend

2011-06-19T21:45:00.001-05:00

At first I wasn't sure what to make of this announcement. That lasted about five seconds. Since the news of the accusations against Fr. Corapi surfaced and his ensuing suspension, like some others, I adopted a wait and see attitude, not wanting to root for the accuser, or the accused, to be guilty of grave sin, or in need of significant psychological help.

Now we have the news that Fr. Corapi is leaving the priesthood. While I can accept easily that in the wake of the priest sex abuse scandal, the field may have tilted too far against the accused, as he suggests. But I fail to see how this action is the proper response for anyone, much less a priest, who loves the Church. I am not alone. He created a false dichotomy and made a choice. I would have preferred he had taken a different course.

That within only three months he is abandoning the priesthood, has an autobiography ready to be published, and is launching a global new media presence, is most curious, to put it kindly. It almost seems orchestrated. But that would uncharitable. I will just wait and see on this one, too.

Nevertheless, today is Trinity Sunday and Fathers' Day. All across the land there were homilies describing how the Holy Trinity is a fancy description of how God is Love (thank you, Mr. Chesterton) and in that, we, particularly fathers, can find an example for how to live. Today's Gospel reminds us that God so loved the world he gave his only Son. Likewise, we fathers, need to be prepared to give of ourselves. To be for our wives; to be for our children.

And if we find that difficult to picture, we can always turn to the saints for an example. One such example, of course is Padre St. Pio. But instead today we have an example for how fathers ought not to act in the public persona of Fr. Corapi (I'm adopting the "once a priest, always a priest" stance). Perhaps this is a case of the Lord moving in mysterious ways.

Friday Video - Auld Lang Syne

2010-12-31T06:30:00.002-06:00

Link to video

Friday Video - Silent Night

2010-12-24T06:55:00.002-06:00

Link to Video

Friday Video - Carl Perkins - Blue Suede Shoes

2010-12-17T06:45:00.001-06:00

55 years ago today, Carl Perkins recorded "Blue Suede Shoes."

Link to video

Friday Video - Fats Domino - The Fat Man

2010-12-10T06:55:00.001-06:00

Today in 1949, Fats Domino had his first recording session.

Link to video

Friday Video - Julie Andrews - Camelot

2010-12-03T06:05:00.001-06:00

50 years ago today, "Camelot" opened on Broadway.

Link to video

Not to be confused with Spamalot