Posted 11:20 AM by Nathan
test post

Posted 12:45 PM by Nathan
E-mail from history professor on Robert Putnam, individualism, and post-Sept.11 altruism:

The Putnam reference is pretty interesting, and in fact this question came up
in one of my classes this week (I think I was the one who raised it though ...).
Are we really not as individualistic as he says we are? I think Putnam would
say that the compassionate response isn't necessarily evidence that things are
changing, or that he's been mistaken. In the book he focuses on the importance
of joining organizations, those social situations that require people to commit
longer term, to put up with irritating people, to go along with the consensus
when you don't entirely agree, to work for a greater good down the road--the
kinds of situations that make us into mature, civic-minded people. My guess is
that we're seeing at least in part an example of the "minute-man tradition" in
our culture--we have an amazing ability to rise up in response to crisis, but we
are not good at dealing with long-term, deeply rooted social problems (the
aborted War on Poverty being a case in point).

Plus, so much of this volunteerism seems to be couched in distressingly
one-dimensional patriotic language: we are good, and they must be evil. We're
really not interested in analyzing what went wrong in the larger world to cause
the evil, or dealing with messy political and social problems long-term. Sorry
if this sounds cynical, but there are an awful lot of flags on cars, houses, etc
around here, and a lot of God and country pieces in the Grand Rapids Press. It's
a little overwhelming.

Posted 12:44 PM by Nathan
E-mail from Will R in response to my thought of the day on religious freedom:

A free intellectual/moral marketplace -- a marketplace of ideas, if you
will -- and a free economic marketplace are not the same thing. The
former functions better with less government intrusion; the latter
needs repeatedly to be beaten with a stick to avoid devouring us.

Point well taken about the strip club thing, but -- and don't shoot me
for this one -- I do think they should be protected by the first
amendment. My reason is this: How can we say we are of strong moral
fiber if we come morally unglued as soon as the threat of temporal
punishment is lifted? My nausea over the tepid moral cesspool that is
America could not be greater, and I too agree with conservatives on
that, but the fact is we're no different than we were. The State
carries specific powers that I don't think should be used to enforce
morality, namely the power to revoke liberties and, whether through war
or capital punishment, to kill. If you hold someone at gunpoint and
tell him to do the right thing, that he does so is not a reflection of
his character, merely his desire to survive. The increase of civil
liberties affords the Church a unique opportunity to confront depravity
in ways that were impossible before, because the veil is lifted. People
will say what they really think, and we can answer them in ways we
could not. There should be laws, granted, so that the frontier between
my rights and yours is clearly defined and enforced, but only the
minimum that are necessary.

It is very tempting to apply these principle to capitalism, as our
President likes to do. (An funny side bar: Bush's name in Chinese, a
phonetic transliteration pronounced "boo sure", is a homonym
of "incorrect" or "it is not so".) To some extent they apply, but only
mutatis mutandis. Bush seems to think that it's a few bad apples that
are the problem -- it makes me wonder how many more companies have to
fold in scandal for him to see the need for systemic change. I happen
to think that in the case of corporate governance, the CEO dogs need
shorter leashes. I propose having a board of directors elected by the
shareholders -- the people who really got screwed when Enron, WorldCom,
et al., went under -- and having the authority to hold the CEO to
account, much as the President is accountable to Congress. It may be
that tighter regulation is necessary to effect this, in which case I'm
all for it. I'm not one of those let-the-market-sort-it-out, Wall-
Street-Journal-Editorial-page-is-my-Bible conservatives. The market is
a firehose that needs to be directed by human efforts in order to work
effectively and not put somebody's eye out.

Your comments about de Toqueville's "tyranny of the majority" are good.
Once again, I have been helped in this department by Uncle C. S. He
says the majority of people -- including himself, but also the sort of
people who "think in catch phrases, believe advertisements, and spread
rumors" -- don't deserve a share in governing a hen roost, much less a
government. The Founding Fathers had no intention of letting them
govern; hence the electoral college. Also, the Senate was not designed
to be directly elected, but to be elected by state legislatures. Their
dilemma is spreading power thinly enough to prevent tyranny without
letting the great unwashed influence policy too much. I agree with
Lewis that equality is a necessary legal fiction for avoiding tyranny,
but it is just that -- a fiction. Nature knows no equality. We are
God's equals. I am not Melville's literary equal. Americans seem to
have forgotten that this is a fiction and want to apply it to their
everyday lives, and Christians seem especially susceptible to it. It
seems like everyone and their dog writes a Christian self-help book
these days. Many of these people comment on things they have absolutely
no business commenting on. That there are many cultural voices, and
that they are all equally valid does not mean that everyone who can
read and write has a cultural voice. Many people can neither understand
nor articulate the nuances of cultural debate. They should accept with
gracious humility that God made them for something else and should give
a certain authority to the people God has designed for this sort of
thing, just as I defer to my doctor's judgement about what's wrong with
me. He knows better than me, simple as that. One relatively recent
example comes to mind that illustrates this. There was a golfer a few
years back, Casey something, I can't remember his name, whose swing,
they say, was in the same league as Tiger Woods, but who was excluded
from the PGA tour because of a medical condition that prevented him
from walking the course -- he had to use a cart, which is prohibited by
PGA rules. He could walk fine, but didn't have the endurance for 18
holes. The Supreme Court absurdly ruled that the PGA tour let him use a
cart -- let him cheat, in other words. Having the endurance to walk is
part of the game, but he felt he should be exempt from that because he
couldn't help his medical condition. I can't help that I suck at golf,
but does that mean I have the right to an exemption from the rules? No.
I am not equal to the champions of golf; neither was this guy. Tragic?
Yes. It is a shame that someone who can hit the ball so well should
have such a handicap. Unfair? Not in the least. He simply was not good
enough. The irony is that when everyone plays under the same rules, or,
to put it in legal terms, when all are equal under law, our true
inequalities and differences come out. God made us this way and we
shouldn't try to change it. Each of us is a bundle of unique strengths
and limitations. The limitations are the result of sin, or flaws in
God's creation; he put them in us to keep us humble, to remind us that
there is One who can do all. No one is God but God. We forget that
sometimes.

Posted 12:41 PM by Nathan
By Nathan VanderKlippe, February 2003

It’s not every day you get paid to be a human penny, rolling down a
super-sized version of one of those mall charity funnels.

But the West Edmonton Mall was opening a new slide called the Tropical
Typhoon, and duty called: I came to work armed with my swimming shorts.

Best to arrive informed, I thought, and called Kevin Hanson, the mall’s
operations manager. He says the big funnel cost $300,000 and is the
only one in Western Canada.

"We like to bring stuff in that’s going to dazzle you a little bit or
amaze you," he explained. Over the past few years, waterpark usage has
stagnated at around 500,000 people annually and the park is trying to
freshen up. It’s investing $1.2 million in renovations and new slides
this year alone.

I had to know what to expect on my first ride, so I asked Hanson.
Little did I know he would throw down the gauntlet.

"We’ve had guys that have made up to four spirals on it before they
drop out the middle," he said. "I would suspect if you’ve never ridden
it, you’ll do one turn before you go out the middle."

Just one measly turn? This man didn’t have much faith in me. I mean,
you get at least six or seven satisfying spirals when you chuck a coin
into one of those charity funnels.

What I needed was professional help. If anyone could help me beat the
laws of nature it had to be someone who knows them inside out so I got
Doug Schmitt, a University of Alberta physics prof, on the line.

"It would depend on basically how fast you were going," he opined. "So
the faster you’re going, the higher your kinetic energy. Basically that
would dictate what level you’d spin around on the funnel."

OK, got it. Minimize the friction, keep up the kinetic energy and see
if this unsculpted body can beat gravity. I have visions of my torso as
a human version of one of those Olympic skeleton sleds, lithely snaking
my way around the funnel’s bowl.

But, I figure, I’ll likely end up looking more like a soggy sack of
flour.

These thoughts in mind, I spend 35 minutes in line waiting to mount the
shiny new ride which looks a bit like a UFO being watered by a big blue
straw. I’m surrounded by students from Cardinal Leger Catholic Junior
High who are slip-sliding their way through Valentine’s Day.

Fourteen-year-old Nicholas Rocchio is one of them, and among the very
first to test the new slide when it opened at noon.

His verdict: "it’s the best slide I’ve ever been on!"

Now it’s my turn. I swing my way into the blue tunnel and start
plummeting toward the watery bowl. I close my eyes when I hit and feel
centrifugal force press my back into the plastic. I whip around, then
lose speed and tumble out of the bowl with all the elegance of an
elephant doing his business.

As I clamber up the ladder, I ask the slide attendant how many times I
made it around.

"Four," he tells me.

Nicholas, for all his youthful agility, only made it around twice.
Victory is mine.

Posted 12:04 PM by Nathan
>e-mail fwd:
Why did the chicken cross the road?

GEORGE W. BUSH
We don't really care why the chicken crossed the road. We just
want to
know if the chicken is on our side of the road or not. The
chicken is
either with us or it is against us. There is no middle ground
here.

AL GORE
I invented the chicken. I invented the road. Therefore, the
chicken
crossing the road represented the application of these two
different
functions of government in a new, reinvented way designed to
bring
greater services to the American people.

COLIN POWELL
Now at the left of the screen, you clearly see the satellite image
of
the chicken crossing the road.

HANZ BLIX
We have reason to believe there is a chicken, but we have not
yet been
allowed access to the other side of the road.

MOHAMMED ALDOURI (Iraq ambassador)
The chicken did not cross the road. This is a complete
fabrication. We
don't even have a chicken.

SADDAM HUSSEIN
This was an unprovoked act of rebellion and we were quite
justified in
dropping 50 tons of nerve gas on it

RALPH NADER
The chicken's habitat on the original side of the road had been
polluted by unchecked industrialist greed. The chicken did not
reach
the
unspoiled habitat on the other side of the road because it was
crushed
by the wheels of a gas-guzzling SUV.

PAT BUCHANAN
To steal a job from a decent, hard-working American.

RUSH LIMBAUGH
I don't know why the chicken crossed the road, but I'll bet it was
getting a government grant to cross the road, and I'll bet
someone out
there is already forming a support group to help chickens with
crossing-the-road syndrome. Can you believe this? How much
more of
this
can real Americans take? Chickens crossing the road paid for
by their
tax dollars, and when I say tax dollars, I'm talking about your
money,
money the government took from you to build roads for
chickens to
cross.

MARTHA STEWART
No-one called to warn me which way that chicken was going. I
had a
standing order at the farmer's market to sell my eggs when the
price
dropped to a certain level. No little bird gave me any insider
information.

JERRY FALWELL
Because the chicken was gay! Isn't it obvious? Can't you
people see
the
plain truth in front of your face? The chicken was going to the
"other
side. That's what they call it-the other side. Yes, my friends, that
chicken is gay. And, if you eat that chicken, you will become gay
too. I
say we boycott all chickens until we sort out this abomination
that
the
liberal media whitewashes with seemingly harmless phrases
like
"the
other side."

DR SEUSS

Did the chicken cross the road? Did he cross it with a toad?
Yes, The
chicken crossed the road, But why it crossed, I've not been told!

ERNEST HEMINGWAY
To die. In the rain. Alone.

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.
I envision a world where all chickens will be free to cross roads
without having their motives called into question.

GRANDPA
In my day, we didn't ask why the chicken crossed the road.
Someone
told
us that the chicken crossed the road, and that was good
enough for us,
and that's the way it was and we liked it!

BARBARA WALTERS
Isn't that interesting? In a few moments we will be listening to
the
chicken tell, for the first time, the heart-warming story of how it
experienced a serious case of moulting and went on to
accomplish its
life-long dream of crossing the road.

JOHN LENNON
Imagine all the chickens crossing roads in peace.

ARISTOTLE
It is the nature of chickens to cross the road.

KARL MARX
It was an historical inevitability. I would cross and the chicken
and
I are cousins.

VOLTAIRE
I may not agree with what the chicken did, but I will defend to
the
death its right to do it.

RONALD REAGAN
What chicken?

CAPTAIN KIRK
To boldly go where no chicken has gone before.

FOX MULDER
You saw it cross the road with your own eyes! How many more
chickens
have to cross before you believe it?

BILL GATES
I have just released eChicken 2003, which will not only cross
roads,
but will lay eggs, file your important documents, and balance
your
checkbook - and Internet Explorer is an inextricable part of
eChicken.

ALBERT EINSTEIN
Did the chicken really cross the road or did the road move
beneath the
chicken?

BILL CLINTON
I did not cross the road with THAT chicken. What do you mean
by
chicken? Could you define chicken, please?

COLONEL SANDERS
I missed one?

Posted 12:42 PM by Nathan
Ventura County Star
February 1, 2003

Freedom to search
Unitarian Universalists find liberation in individual interpretations of God

Tom Kisken; kisken@insidevc.com

Who or what is God? In a Unitarian Universalist religion that prides itself
on challenging questions, this one is a doozy. It's sparked by a national
controversy spiced by allegations of faulty journalism, the temptation to
pin labels on the infinite and the role of divinity in a faith community
where belief in God is optional.

Howard Bierma, of Thousand Oaks, says he uses the word sometimes, maybe
after someone sneezes or when he has banged a finger, but not to express his
spirituality. He is an atheist and humanist who has been a member of the
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Conejo Valley for about five years
and defines religion as interaction among people aimed at improving
humanity.

He answers the question of the day this way: "Creation is all random, so I
wouldn't define God."

Bierma's take is a reflection of the spiritual breadth of the 200 or so
members of the Thousand Oaks church and certainly not a cloak identifying
the community. Those attending the weekly services include people who
identify with Christianity, Judaism, pagan religions, Buddhism, humanism,
Taoism and varied combinations. Some prefer phrases like the holy, ultimate
importance or reverence to God.

Their Sunday service is so eclectic that members sing "Amazing Grace,"
with
the line "that saved a wretch like me," and later discuss the concept
that
people are born saved. The minister's caveat -- "whatever that means to
you" -- fits virtually every word spoken.

Lee Anne Christensen, of Thousand Oaks, joined because of the church's
openness, because the other members don't tell her how to think. As a child,
she was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. She
believes in God as someone or something that provides solace.

Dennis Weiher isn't sure about God but knows he doesn't think of the concept
as a tangible entity. "God is something that is within us all. It's that
part of us that makes us human and connects us to each other," said Weiher,
who is board president for the Conejo Valley church and has been a Unitarian
Universalist for about 40 years.

He sees his religion's diversity as freeing. "It allows people to search
for
their own spirituality and be supported by others in the community," he
said. "It absolutely gives you the freedom to search without fear of being
castigated or being looked down upon."

The UUs, as they call themselves, came to be 42 years ago when two separate
churches -- the Unitarians and the Universalists -- merged. While
Christianity asks its members to believe in the trinity and Muslims base
their beliefs on the teachings of the Quran, the UUs have no single,
unifying creed.

They do ask their members be sympathetic with stated Purposes and Principles
that include an affirmation of the dignity of every person and also a call
of respect for the interdependent web of all existence.

That signature statement was wrapped into controversy when the national
president of the Unitarian Universalist Association, the Rev. William
Sinkford, noted in a January sermon that the Principles lack religious,
reverential language. He called for people to identify the aspect of faith
that some label as God.

"Put a name to what calls you," he said.

The Forth Worth Star-Telegram newspaper covered the sermon and published a
story that was picked up by papers across the nation, including the Ventura
County Star. It said Sinkford was pushing to include the word, God, in a new
UUstatement of principles.

Kaboom.

The Rev. Betty Stapleford, minister of the Thousand Oaks church, received 45
e-mails about the story, ranging from people who liked the God proposal to
those who said if it was true they would have to leave the religion.

Sinkford sent out his own e-mail saying he was misquoted. The paper printed
a clarification acknowledging the association president did not call for a
God amendment to the faith's statement of principles.

It was a big deal because pinning one name on what people believe is holy
constitutes a limit in a community that doesn't believe in limits and
reaches unanimity with the frequency of a solar eclipse.

"If you get together two UUs, you have at least three opinions,"
Stapleford
said. "It would have said, 'This is what you have to believe.' "

Stapleford is walking, talking advertisement of the diversity that
symbolizes her faith family. The doctoral student at Claremont School of
Theology was a Methodist who became a humanist and is now a panentheist,
meaning she sees God as a force that is within every living thing and
connects all life. She's influenced by Taoism and, at her home, has a large
stone Buddha and the kind of gong used in Bali to call Hindus to faith.

She defines being a Unitarian Universalist as not just accepting diversity
but supporting differences in people and together tackling life's biggest
questions whether or not finite answers are possible.

Stapleford doesn't want to limit conversations within her church to one
perception of what is holy or divine. But like Sinkford, she doesn't want to
exclude God either.

"If we give up the right to talk about God, we've let someone else define
what it means for us," she said.

That it means many things to different people is evidenced by one in a
rotation of sayings that accompany the opening page of the Unitarian
Universalist Association Web site.

"You don't have to see God as straight, white and a man," offers the
slogan.

At least a few UUs would define God as omniscient, said the Rev. Jan
Christian, minister of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Ventura. Others
would say the traditional concept isn't relevant to their lives.

And some use the word as a verb.

"God is how we are to each other," said Christian. "God is
love."

Some UUs talk of holiness as they talk of everything else, with varying
shades of ambiguity. Everything is a question.

Christian acknowledges a few in the faith family know more about what they
don't believe than what they do. But she doesn't buy the notion that
Unitarian Universalists can believe anything. Their beliefs have to be
pointed toward goals that are pursued not only as individuals but as a
community.

"Religion is something that binds people together in community in a search
for ultimate meaning, truth and an ethical way of life," Christian said.

So back to the question. Who or what is God?

Before Christine Blasman of Newbury Park answers, she offers a
clarification. It's not God in her mind; it's Goddess -- a multifaceted
energy that surrounds and encompasses people. She believes in an Earth-based
faith and calls herself a pagan. She was raised a Christian. Her husband was
Jewish. They joined the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Conejo
Valley about seven years ago. They wanted their then-13-year-old daughter to
go a church that taught youth to understand not just one religion but many.

Some at the Thousand Oaks church say they experience the holy as a feeling,
not an intellectual concept. Three members try words to pinpoint their
definition of reverence or of God. Then they try sign language.

Finally, a visiting UU from Manhasset, N.Y., offers an observation that
brings a chorus of agreement.

"We pray," said Sydelle Lopez, "to whom it may concern."

Ventura County's UU churches

There are three Unitarian Universalist churches in Ventura County. Each has
a unique personality. They are:

Universalist Unitarian Church of Santa Paula; services at 10:30 a.m. Sundays
at 740 E. Main St., Santa Paula, 525-4647.

Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of the Conejo Valley; services at 10 a.m.
Sundays at Goebel Senior Adult Center, 1385 E. Janss Road, Thousand Oaks,
492-8751.

Unitarian Universalist Church of Ventura; services at 9:15 and 11 a.m.
Sundays at 4949 Foothill Road, Ventura, 644-3898.

UU Principles

Here are the seven core principles of the Unitarian Universalist
Association:

n The inherent worth and dignity of every person;

n Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;

n Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our
congregations;

n A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;

n The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our
congregations and in society at large;

n The goal of world community with peace, liberty and justice for all;

n Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a
part.

On the Net: For more information, try www.uua.org.

GRAPHIC: The Rev. Betty Stapleford of the Unitarian Universalist
Fellowshipof the Conejo Valley welcomes Rhami Christian Ryon Alsadek, 2,
into thecongregation as proud daddy Abdallah Alsadek looks on. Stapleford
wantscongregants to feel free to discuss views of God or what some call
ultimateimportance but not to be forced to accept someone else's
interpretation.

Dana R. Bowler / Star staff

Posted 6:09 PM by Nathan

60 above zero:
Floridians turn on the heat.
People in Michigan plant gardens.

50 above zero:
Californians shiver uncontrollably.
People in Saginaw, Michigan sunbathe.

40 above zero:
Italian &English cars won't start.
People in Michigan drive with the windows down.

32 above zero:
Distilled water freezes.
The water in the Detroit River gets thicker.

20 above zero:
Floridians put on coats, thermal underwear, gloves, wool hats.
People in Michigan throw on a flannel shirt.

15 above zero:
New York landlords finally turn up the heat.
People in Michigan have the last cookout before it gets cold.

Zero:
People in Miami all die.
Michiganders close the windows.

10 below zero:
Californians fly away to Mexico.
People in Michigan get out their winter coats.

25 below zero:
Hollywood disintegrates.
The Girl Scouts in Michigan are selling cookies door to door.

40 below zero:
Washington, DC runs out of hot air.
People in Michigan let the dogs sleep indoors.

100 below zero:
Santa Claus abandons the North Pole.
Michiganders get frustrated because they can't start the Mini-Van.

460 below zero:
ALL atomic motion stops (absolute zero on the Kelvin scale.)
Michiganders start saying..."Cold 'nuff fer ya?"

500 below zero:
Hell freezes over.
Michigan public schools are closed.

Posted 3:26 PM by Nathan
"Wrigley Rapture"
By Steve Rushin
Sports Illustrated, May 28, 2001

The elevated train clatters toward Wrigley Field and a female conductor drones "Addison is next" and "Stand clear of the opening doors" and "Parents, hold the hands of your children as you leave the train." Then--from her sealed box, through crackling speakers--she sighs, "It's a beautiful day for a ball game."

Exit the station, blinking against the sunlight. A panhandler says, "Help the beerless?" Chicago cops in checkerboard hatbands tell him to beat it. The sign outside Hi-Tops bar says WELCOME BACK CUB FANS.

An old man in a John Deere feed cap poses, at Sheffield and Addison, before a statue of Harry Caray. His wife tries to take his picture, but she can't find the shutter button. So the old man stands there, stiller than the statue, while his petrified grin becomes a grimace.

It's the last thing you see before you're swept through a turnstile on a tide of humanity and into the Friendly Confines. The stadium smells like concrete and Lysol. An eight-year-old boy in the concourse beneath the grandstand has the blue lips of a choking victim. Then you see, in his right hand, a bale of Smurf-blue cotton candy. He smiles, and his teeth are the color of babershop-comb disinfectant. And you think, Where on earth would I rather be?

Follow a shaft of sunlight up a tunnel to your seat. The thwock-thwock-thwock of batting practice echoes off the bricks. The field is awesome, a brushed baize poker table. Atop the scoreboard a riot of flags flutters in the breeze, like the handlebar tassels on a girl's bike. The beer man arrives unbidden and says, "What'll it be, guys?"

For a couple of brews our change from a 10-dollar bill is one single, soaked in Bud Light. A tractor drags the infield in circles, which looks right because the ballpark organ sounds like the calliope on a merry-go-round. We are drinking beer at noon on Thursday and feeling fully alive, like fugitives from justice, while the rest of the world is at work in a cubicle.

The Cubs were co-owners of baseball's worst record last year and have lost six straight games. Still, 36,014 fans are inside the stadium, and there are filled rooftops beyond the bleachers and, on Waveland Avenue, invisible figures with baseball gloves and radios. So when Houston Astros outfielder Richard Hidalgo hits a home run over the bleachers, the ball is regurgitated onto the leftfield lawn before he can cross home plate, and a cheer goes up for the Unknown Fan responsible.

A cell phone bleats behind first base, and the shirtless man who answers it says, "What? I can't hear you. No, I'm at Wrigley, watching these &@#%! losers lose." But the complaint sounds insincere, halfhearted. So, too, do those in the men's room: Strangers stand at stainless-steel, trough-style urinals, each man staring a hole in the wall in front of him, while voicing his shock and disappointment in this year's lineup--even though the Cubs, as every one of them knows, haven't won a pennant since 1945.

Shadows travel east across the diamond, from the third base line toward the pitcher's mound, but here, along the rightfield line, the seats are forever in sunshine. Four hours into the afternoon, every hatless head in our section is turning red and painful-looking, like a thousand thumbs struck with hammers. Nobody cares.

Because Sammy Sosa is rabbit-eared and responds in rightfield--with a head nod or a flick of the glove--to each lone voice that hollers his name. "Sammy!" (Nod.) "Sam-may!" (Flick.) This happens every time without fail, regardless of what's going on in the game, and children sneak down to the front-row railing to yell "Sam-may!" and have a superstar athlete acknowledge their existence.

At the seventh-inning stretch, Chip Caray leans out of the broadcast booth and sings, like his grandfather before him, Take Me Out to the Ball Game. We sing along: "Well, we'll root root root for the Cuhhh-bees, if they don't win it's a shame " They don't win. It's a shame. A glum face stares from a square in the out-of-town scoreboard, on which appear eight letters, stair-stepped down from left to right, across four empty line scores: They spell NITE GAME. (Nite is misspelled, like Sox or sno-cone, in the venerable baseball tradition.)

Just before we exit the ballpark and repair to Murphy's Bleachers bar for "one more," we cast an eye at all those poor be-nited cities on the scoreboard: at New York and Los Angeles, Atlanta and Oakland. And we wonder why, in a free society, everyone doesn't live here.