Barbarians At The Gate

*



The Drunken Fisherman

Wallowing in this bloody sty,
I cast for fish that pleased my eye
(Truly Jehovah's bow suspends
No pots of gold to weight its ends);
Only the blood-mouthed rainbow trout
Rose to my bait. They flopped about
My canvas creel until the moth
Corrupted its unstable cloth.

A calendar to tell the day;
A handkerchief to wave away
The gnats; a couch unstuffed with storm
Pouching a bottle in one arm;
A whiskey bottle full of worms;
And bedroom slacks: are these fit terms
To mete the worm whose molten rage
Boils in the belly of old age?

Once fishing was a rabbit's foot--
O wind blow cold, O wind blow hot,
Let suns stay in or suns step out:
Life danced a jig on the sperm-whale's spout--
The fisher's fluent and obscene
Catches kept his conscience clean.
Children, the raging memory drools
Over the glory of past pools.

Now the hot river, ebbing, hauls
Its bloody waters into holes;
A grain of sand inside my shoe
Mimics the moon that might undo
Man and Creation too; remorse,
Stinking, has puddled up its source;
Here tantrums thrash to a whale's rage.
This is the pot-hole of old age.

Is there no way to cast my hook
Out of this dynamited brook?
The Fisher's sons must cast about
When shallow waters peter out.
I will catch Christ with a greased worm,
And when the Prince of Darkness stalks
My bloodstream to its Stygian term . . .
On water the Man-Fisher walks.

Robert Lowell



Oh if only we could find the answer, if only the sheets of light held solutions, but he was disturbed and there was no way out. I come slithering through the dark. I make enemies on the way. I dedicate life to the Word, and find no solution. These random, chaotic thoughts plagued him; but in the record of peak moments there was no backing out. We are destined. He rang Colin, his old friend from the 1970s, surprised once again to hear his chirpy voice. Hello love. I'm thinking of interviewing people your age; nobody knows what happened back then, the doctor said. He laughed. No they don't.

They most certainly don't. Our blizzard was too strong for the human frame. High above the clouds, he could see the crystals dancing. It would have been beautiful if it had not been so frightening. If you think you're life will make a story, it won't. If you're thinking of recording your adventures, don't. Everything must remain anonymous. Do not admit guilt. The forces of self righteousness have never been stronger. How we used to long for a left wing government. All would be well then, all the hypocrisy and brutality and unfashionable views would be gone.

But instead there is an even more brutal, more hypocritical world view. The left don't hesitate to manipulate public opinion to their own advantage, to what they see as the greater good. Truth is even more irrelevant to the left than it is to the right. Eight out of ten they've given Rudd for his first year as Prime Minister. I'm living in a parallel universe, my mate Steve at the cafe says, if that was eight out of ten. Steve's the token conservative in the country's most left wing precinct. We exchange rapid fire views at our own Table of Knowledge.

They're not intended to deceive, but only a few have the bigger picture. The hysterical dishonesty and man bashing of the domestic violence industry makes me sick to the soul. Why am I the only one that cares? Well one of only a few, as a blizzard of propaganda hits the airwaves, double page spreads in the Sydney Morning Herald of convenient victims. All men are brutes, violent patriarchs. You can see the answer to the inquiries already; more male bashing, more lambs to the slaughter, more vicious hypocrisy. That was it, the dark ages, he couldn't be more pissed.

What is this world, now, where group think is the only think? Where sceptics are derided, where independent thought is ridiculed? Why are they so ridiculously dishonest? Why can no one see through this wall of garbage? Impenetrable? I don't think so. Sheet after sheet of vacuous crap; if it's not happening to you don't care. Useful fools, ignorant fools, willing fools, they regurgitate the propaganda of the left as if it really was news; as if these fashionable shibboleths really did exist. And any one who didn't think so was very unfashionable indeed; barbarians at the gate.

Fools come marching, waving spears, shouts at the gate. The excited, colourful babble was confusing to the sight, he couldn't work out who was who; why they were waving their spears. He could smell the smell of the humans even far off. They shouldn't be here, he thought; they shouldn't be polluting this place. But the answers were contained in a different place. He wasn't going to be exhausted by these impracticalities. He smiled; and he heard the clashing of metal and the confused shouts; and remembered now where it all came from, the expression, barbarians at the gate. The trouble was, in all the modern twists and propaganda, it was the individual thinkers who had been portrayed as the barbarians; and there was no way back or out; to a decent, more honest place.



THE BIGGER STORY:

http://www.skynews.com.au/politics/article.aspx?id=281758

Oppn takes on Rudd government over budget
Updated: 05:28, Thursday November 27, 2008

The Coalition is battering the federal government over its admission that it may have to send the budget into deficit to deal with the economic crisis and its accelerating social costs.

Opposition finance spokesman Joe Hockey says he wants to know why the government is ready to to run a budget deficit when it's forecasting an additional two billion dollar in tax income.

And Opposition treasury spokeswoman Julie Bishop is questioning why the government can't keep the budget in surplus, given expected interest rate cuts and an estimated economic growth of two per cent.

But federal treasurer Wayne Swan says it would be irresponsible not to go into deficit if the economy and jobs are at risk.

His stance followed Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's statement to parliament yesterday that the budget may have to go into a temporary deficit to counter the effects of the global financial crisis.

To make things worse, a seniors' group is warning falling company dividends will force thousands of self-funded retirees onto the government pension and it says Canberra must stick to its promise to reform the aged pension, even it it means sending the budget into deficit.

http://www.news.com.au/entertainment/story/0,26278,24713525-10229,00.html

GORDON Ramsay has apologised to his wife Tana after admitting he met his alleged mistress at least four times.

The couple have now made a pact to keep their marriage together as they brace for more accusations in the coming days.

"I'm so sorry I've put Tana through this," Ramsay told a friend who was quoted in Britain's Mirror newspaper last night.

"I've apologised to her and feel absolutely dreadful. I feel I've been a fool. She really doesn't deserve all this grief."

The F Word and Hell's Kitchen star, 42, has been accused of having a seven-year affair with Sarah Symonds, the author of a book for mistresses.

Ms Symonds, 38, has declined to comment but there were claims yesterday that Britain's News of the World paid her as much as $238,000 for the sting on Ramsay in which he was caught leaving a hotel with her last week.

She was believed to be holed up in a hotel with the paper's representatives and further claims were expected this weekend.

The scandal is showing no signs of disappearing. One report called Ms Symonds a "sex crazed tiger" after a former lover came forward and detailed his bedroom experiences.

Former bouncer Mark Mendelssohn said he had once had sex with her nine times in seven hours.

"I was scared. I could barely walk out of the place," he said.

Ramsay and wife Tana, 33, who have four children, were said to have had a "heart-to-heart" over the crisis at their $9 million south London home yesterday.

"Gordon was honest with Tana," the friend told The Mirror.

http://www.paradisepost.com/opinion/ci_11065860

The number of global warming skeptics is expanding, largely because new data shows temperatures are not going up, but rather, " they're coming down!"

For instance, on Sept. 5 scientists in Southern Brazil reported, " their heaviest snowfalls ever! They are entering what has turned out to be their coldest September
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in a century." It seems something called the, "Pacific Decadal Oscillation" has a lot to do with these phenomena.

This information comes from Brazilian Climatologist, Eugene Hackbart. He says, "El Niño's produce warmer climates, while El Nina's produce cooler climates."

Hackbart further points out periods of solar inactivity known as "solar minimums" magnify cold spells on the South American continent. According to Gunter, American scientist, Dr. Craig Locehle, who conducts modeling on global climate change, confirmed the findings, " the so-called Medieval Warm Period of about 1,000 years ago did in fact exist and was even warmer than 20th century temperatures."

New research confirms the warm period of 1,000 years ago produced temperatures higher than today's temperatures. The conclusion, confirmed by tree rings, lake and ocean floor sediment, ice cores, and early records written on climate, particularly in Northern Europe. Remember, there were no vehicles to create tons of hydrocarbons at that time.

This was the period when Leif Erickson and other Danish seafaring adventurers, discovered Greenland, Iceland, and Vineland, which is now part of Canada and the north eastern tip of the United States.

Gunter claims supporters of the Kyoto conference, which forecast global warming as a "threat" to our existence, had to bury information on the Medieval Warm Period in order to obtain credibility. That's a serious accusation.

Western Washington University geologist, Don Easterbrook says today's warm temperatures will drop, and we will enter a period of "global cooling," as the Sun enters a particularly inactive phase."

In addition, Easterbrook says he's studied temperatures and climate back 400 years and has found, "an almost exact correlation between climate fluctuations and solar energy received on Earth."

He believes there is virtually no correlation with increased hydrocarbons in the atmosphere and global warming (sometimes referred to as "climate change," a term now used by the press).

Also involved in this research are scientists, Dr. David Douglass of the University of Rochester and Dr. John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville. Last month they dealt global warming enthusiasts a stunning blow when they produced data that shows hydrocarbons produced by humans are not behind any warming of the Earth's atmosphere.

In a joint statement the two scientists concluded, " variations in global temperatures since 1978 cannot be attributed to carbon dioxide." These two scientists have been working together to produce a paper using data from weather satellites. They reportedly measured 300,000 temperature readings around the globe, and conceded our hydrocarbons may have a "slight impact, (but) variations in global temperatures since 1978 cannot be attributed to carbon dioxide."

In addition, their chart shows rising temperatures beginning in 1979 - have all but disappeared, largely due to reduced solar activity. Now, you would think the press would report on these investigations to balance what appears to be propaganda from the pro-global warming crowd including Gore, but it's not happening.

Gore has been silent about, climate change lately and the press certainly is not picking up on it either. Their silence is deafening! A growing database is showing exaggerated global warming fears in an effort to scare the public.

The press is not printing stories on accusations that Gore, along with social engineers on college campuses, may have reacted too quickly to early reports of climate change.