a lefty’s log

so, as promised in my previous post, here is part one of the conversation. i almost didn’t post; my sister needed some ‘girl talk’ yesterday, and i didn’t get to it on the day i should have. then i figured, “how hard is it to paste an email conversation that happened already?” how hard indeed? it follows after a few more words. . . .

i sound a little bitter in my comment about my sister above, but i’m not. it was a wonderful conversation that we probably needed to have for a long time: she, to vent about her current married/not-married situation and life in general; me, to explain why i haven’t moved there yet as i’ve promised. we both shared our worldviews about politics and religion, which i will get to over the next few weeks. we both shared some of our favorite books. well, i think i did more sharing there.

it was a good 4-to-5-hour conversation that was honest and revealing and probably only the kind that siblings or married people can have anymore. i wonder why that is?

attribution: from the wiki on gray wolf, under the heading “hierarchy.”

the pasted message that started things.

AC, name initialized per website style, recently left the place i work to seek greener pastures. he left for a number of reasons, not the least of which is a bulletheaded ogre of a supervisor who seems to need an omega-worker(s) (as do the wolves of a pack) to harass in order to feel worthwhile. for whatever reason, AC became his whipping boy du jour, and he folded from the pressure. it is said that “people don’t quit their jobs, they quit their bosses,” and in the case of AC, this couldn’t be further from the truth. i mentioned this to him before he left, and he agreed. he knew he was under the gun, for no real reason at all, though i asked him to explore that. we concluded that BH (bullethead) is a bully, who required something to control, for whatever reason, and needs to surround himself with employees who are docile. there was also a fundamental difference in worldview, with BH being staunchly conservative, and has espoused such claims inappropriately at times, and AC being, as far as i can tell, progressive. i think his wearing of an ACT t-shirt really got under BH’s skin. . . .

we had also concluded that there was something larger going on, that in the society-at-large, something is contributing to this attitude in certain people of intolerance of differing opinions. we mentioned the usual suspects, then i had to get back to work.

so AC went west in search of greener pastures. i passed him my email addy and promised to keep in touch. this is the first message i sent him:

On 27/9/06, lefty [lefty @ tbgq.net] wrote:
AC:

this is a test message to add you to my address book and to pass along a
link.

apropos to our conversation today, i heard a portion of this chat with npr
talk show host diane rehm:

(you’ll have to pardon the lack of html interactivity; i eschewed that
fanciness for webmail-ability) (not necessary, since this is fully marked up in wordpress, but retained for purists.)

realplayer stream link

windows media stream link

this following content from the diane rehm page for 27 sept 2006:

(wordpress, or my current style sheet, won’t let me block quote inside a block quote, so this sentence is here to break the blocks.)

10:00 Christian Voters

A recent poll suggests a growing number of conservative Christians have
become disillusioned with the Republican party. We’ll hear what’s
mobilizing Christian voters on the right and left of the political
spectrum.

Guests

Peter Sprigg, vice president for policy at the Family Research Council

Bob Edgar, general secretary, National Council of Churches, author of
“Middle Church: Reclaiming The Moral Values Of The Faithful Majority From
The Religious Right” (Simon and Schuster)

John Green, senior fellow in religion and American politics, Pew Forum on
Religions and Public Life and director of the Bliss Institute of Applied
Politics at the University of Akron.

it was an interesting conversation, both mine with AC and this timely one with Diane Rehm.

there isn’t much substance here, but that will be more than taken care of in the next exchange. i hope to have it up before the end of next week.

happy halloween, kids. (don’t forget to “fall back” tonight.)