Their own Bobby Kennedy

Confronted with a presidential candidate who challenges them to be more than the sum total of their desires, some young Americans have become unhinged, mistaking the messenger for the Messiah.

Or so says ABC's Jake Tapper:

Inspiration is nice. But some folks seem to be getting out of hand.

It's as if Tom Daschle descended from on high saying, "Be not afraid; for behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all the people: for there is born to you this day in the city of Chicago a Savior, who is Barack the Democrat."

Obama supporter Kathleen Geier writes that she's "getting increasingly weirded out by some of Obama's supporters. On listservs I'm on, some people who should know better – hard-bitten, not-so-young cynics, even – are gushing about Barack…

Describing various encounters with Obama supporters, she writes, "Excuse me, but this sounds more like a cult than a political campaign. The language used here is the language of evangelical Christianity – the Obama volunteers speak of 'coming to Obama' in the same way born-again Christians talk about 'coming to Jesus.'...So I say, we should all get a grip, stop all this unseemly mooning over Barack, see him and the political landscape he is a part of in a cooler, clearer, and more realistic light, and get to work."

Joe Klein, writing at Time, notes "something just a wee bit creepy about the mass messianism" he sees in Obama's Super Tuesday speech.

"We are the ones we've been waiting for," Obama said. "This time can be different because this campaign for the presidency of the United States of America is different. It's different not because of me. It's different because of you."

Says Klein: "That is not just maddeningly vague but also disingenuous: the campaign is entirely about Obama and his ability to inspire. Rather than focusing on any specific issue or cause — other than an amorphous desire for change — the message is becoming dangerously self-referential. The Obama campaign all too often is about how wonderful the Obama campaign is.“

IF I'M BARACK OBAMA, this kind of nonsense is messing with my mind. Then again, I think your mind already has to be pretty well messed with to go into politics.

Still . . . whose fault is it that some 21st century Americans are mistaking the first coming of Obama with the second one of Jesus Christ? I say it's our own damn fault, all of us.

We Baby Boomers, having thrown over God, family and tradition -- by and large -- seem to think we can raise up a new generation in a transcendental vacuum. God and family have been replaced with cynicism and stuff.

And the world we've created in our own image spiritlessly slinks off toward Sodom.

Until. . . .

The quadrennial silly season begins, and comes upon the political horizon a Democratic candidate who looks like America -- looks like America in all its messy, polyglot glory. And this candidate, Barack Obama, talks of creating a government that sticks up for the little people, while declaring to the world that our ends do not justify George Bush's torturing means.

WHEN MODERN AMERICANS once again hear rhetoric based upon enduring principles and not a laundry list of unpayable bribes . . . well, they can get discombobulated. Really, we haven't heard such unbridled apparent idealism since the spring of '68, when Bobby Kennedy appealed to the better angels of Americans' nature and got killed for his trouble.

In a nation unfamiliar with the audacity of Christian belief and praxis -- in a nation where many Christian churches are unfamiliar with the audacity of Christian doctrine and practice -- we do not know how to deal with the idealistic. When someone calls us to look beyond ourselves as the source and summit of whatever the hell it is we're looking for, why are we surprised when some who stumble in the darkness mistake the formerly normative for the supernatural?

We created Seinfeld Nation -- a country about nothing. So we have to deal with it when the ingenuous overreact to Something . . . especially when Something comes in the form of a presidential candidate.

So far, I don't think even "gimlet-eyed" journalists like Time's Joe Klein know how to deal with it and, in fact, are partially misreading it -- accustomed as journalists are to a different kind of political rhetoric. A recap from the Tapper excerpt above:

"We are the ones we've been waiting for," Obama said. "This time can be different because this campaign for the presidency of the United States of America is different. It's different not because of me. It's different because of you."

Says Klein: "That is not just maddeningly vague but also disingenuous: the campaign is entirely about Obama and his ability to inspire. Rather than focusing on any specific issue or cause — other than an amorphous desire for change — the message is becoming dangerously self-referential. The Obama campaign all too often is about how wonderful the Obama campaign is.“

WELL, that's one interpretation . . . the cynical one.

On the other hand, what Obama just might have been saying -- in a more upbeat manner -- is:

"The change agent you have been waiting for is you. You have the power, not me. So get off your asses and effect some change."

Of course, that messianic scenario has the power to throw several sectors of American society into their own conniption narrative.

He gets it

David Freedman of WWOZ -- New Orleans' jazz-and-heritage community FM station -- gets it. Commercial radio doesn't.

It's not about the transmitter, or about HD Radio. It's about the content, and how to best deliver lots of content in various forms to your audience.

Which is kind of what we're about at Revolution 21 -- just on a grass-roots scale.

Our capricious, sadistic deity?

Meteorological horrors happen, and one supernatural entity or another ends up getting the blame. But the weather never does.

The pattern holds with some poor, grieving Arkansans trying to make sense of what one can't make sense of, as reported by The Associated Press:

Tonya Selken's home sat in a dip along a ridge on Dog Mountain, where they had a sweeping view of rolling horse pasture and the misty Ozark foothills in the distance. But she didn't choose these two of her grandfather's 210 acres just for the scenery.

This was one of several places the family mapped out for their protection from tornadoes. In the nearly 60 years since the family bought the place on Shady Grove road, they had seen several twisters hop over this spot and touch down harmlessly on the ridge beyond.

"She was in the house once when one went right over the top of her," said her father, Jerry Simpkins.

But on Tuesday, the family's luck ran out.

The 36-year-old letter carrier and mother of four was one of three Van Buren County residents killed in a monster storm that ground a path across the Southeast, claiming more than 50 lives in several states. Her husband Raymond, 38, and their 14-year-old daughter, Ellise, were also seriously injured.

Standing Wednesday amid the debris field of twisted metal and pink insulation, Carmon Lagunes struggled to grasp why God would take her sister.

"That's his wrath," she said, looking toward the wreckage. "For some reason, he's not happy right now and this is. ... Nobody understands God's will. I sure as hell don't understand it.

Said Anita Goodnight, the sisters' aunt: "God didn't do it. Satan did."

Looking around the valley, where locals raise cattle and cultivate shiitake mushrooms, it is hard not to marvel at the capricious of nature. As workers cleared toppled trees and replaced snapped power poles, cows grazed lazily beside barns whose tin roofs proclaim "Jesus Saves."

THE QUESTION is not "Why did God kill somebody with this big ol' tornado?" And it's not a lock that the devil had anything to do with it, either.

S*** happens. And so do bad, bad tornadoes and other deadly meterological phenomena.

If you ask me -- and you didn't -- the proper question is "Why did God permit nature to take its course in such a cruel manner?"

"Why did God, who knows all, choose not to grant a saving miracle in this case, when He has in others?"

The answer goes something like . . . beats me. God's will is a mystery, and so is the interplay between the awesome power of nature and the randomness of dumb luck . . . or dumb misfortune.

We don't understand it, and we never will. At least, not this side of eternity.

Four Songs: Dust for Lent

Remember, man, that thou art dust, and to dust thou shalt return.

IT'S LENT, and that's one of two things the faithful might hear on Ash Wednesday as they receive ashes on their foreheads. The other would be "Repent, and believe in the Gospel!"

Dust. Ashes. Repentance. Mortality. Lent is not about warm fuzzies and attaboys. It confronts us with the reality of our fallen existence and ends by reminding us of The Way Out.

And the price Jesus paid to make it so.

So, this episode of Four Songs is about dust. And that's all I'm sayin'. It just seemed appropriate.

Download it now. You have to do something for Lent.

Louisiana's eternal hangover

If you reside in the Gret Stet, this depressing bit of reading should humble you mightily, thus rendering you capable of the kind of mortification required of this Lenten season.

IN OTHER WORDS . . . remember, Tee Fats, you are dust, and dust you never quite rise above.

Appropriately for its Ash Wednesday edition, The (Baton Rouge) Advocate went to some national industry-site consultants and asked the question, "No, really. How are we doing?"

On Sunday, lawmakers will gather for a special session on ethics that Gov. Bobby Jindal is billing as the linchpin to building a stronger economy.

However, half-a-dozen out-of-state industry site consultants contacted by The Advocate said the state has more pressing hurdles than political graft.

The biggest problems are that company executives consider Louisianans to be poorly educated, poorly trained and in poor health, the consultants said.

“If I have a client that says we need to set up an operation in the South somewhere, Louisiana’s not going to pop to the top of our chart,” said Ron Pollina, president and founder of Pollina Corporate Real Estate Inc. in Chicago.

Andrew Shapiro with Biggins Lacy Shapiro & Co. in Princeton, N.J., said he mostly represents white collar projects — financial services, headquarters, research and development and pharmaceutical companies — that would not think of looking at the state.

“I haven’t considered Louisiana in years because it’s redlined by clients,” he said, which means it is essentially kept off any list of potential sites.

(snip)

For 2007, the top 10 “pro-business” states were Virginia, South Carolina, Florida, North Carolina, Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Alabama, Georgia and Nebraska.

Where did Louisiana fall? The state was in the bottom 25, finishing better than lowest-ranked California but still keeping company with the states with sputtering economic engines.

Pollina began doing the study in 2004 — long before federal agents found U.S. Rep. William Jefferson’s bundle of money on ice. In four years, Louisiana has never crept into the top 25.

Shapiro said Louisiana’s education problems begin at the elementary level and build from there.

To have a skilled labor force, preparation must begin the moment future workers enter the school system, he said.

“(Louisiana) is not creating a capable work force that can compete,” Shapiro said.

WHILE THE NEWSPAPER reports a positive buzz out there about Louisiana's new governor, what Pollina says in conclusion ought to be enough -- especially with the last round of Mardi Gras hurricanes still clouding the brain -- to sober up even the most slap-happy "Bobby Jindal is the Messiah" die-hard.

I'll give you a minute to embrace the porcelain deity and prepare for your offering.

OK, here we go:

Pollina, whose father grew up on a Louisiana strawberry farm, points out that Jindal has a lot of obstacles to overcome, including a legacy of lackluster qualities associated with the state.

“Various governors come in. They go out. They do things to try to stimulate business in the state. We have not seen any consistency in their efforts,” he said.

YEP, that's about the historical shape of things. But did all y'all Louisianians really need a Yankee from Chicago to tell you that?

Mardi Gras . . . here and there

THIS IS MARDI GRAS in New Orleans, with the Golden Band from Tigerland (that's the LSU band for you infidels) marching in Rex, the grandest parade of Carnival.

THIS (left) is Mardi Gras in Omaha, where people call it Fat Tuesday, for they are infidels.

No one is parading in Omaha. That's because it's snowing, it's 21 degrees, the wind is blowing like a son of a gun, and the snow is drifting all over.

My big Carnival fun has been shoveling the walk and driveway. Maybe I'll try shoveling again while drinking beer.

THEN AGAIN, the @#$&*!$ bottle probably would freeze to my lips.

On days like today, this Louisiana boy soooooooo wants to go home.

Poopy drawers. Butt cheek. Piss. DAMNATION!

Bollocks.

Sh*t.

F***.

THERE, now I'll never have to bear the horrible burden of Dr. James Dobson ever endorsing me for anything, anytime:

"I'm deeply disappointed the Republican Party seems poised to select a nominee who did not support a Constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage, who voted for embryonic stem cell research to kill nascent human beings, who opposed tax cuts that ended the marriage penalty, and who has little regard for freedom of speech, who organized the Gang of 14 to preserve filibusters, and has a legendary temper and often uses foul and obscene language.

"I am convinced Sen. McCain is not a conservative, and in fact, has gone out of his way to stick his thumb in the eyes of those who are. He has at times sounded more like a member of the other party. McCain actually considered leaving the GOP in 2001, and approached John Kerry about being Kerry's running mate in 2004. McCain also said publicly that Hillary Clinton would make a good president. Given these and many other concerns, a spoonful of sugar does not make the medicine go down. I cannot, and I will not vote for Sen. John McCain, as a matter of conscience."

NOBODY deserves to have that done to them -- a Dobson endorsement, that is. You could be looked upon as a power-hungry, misguided prig purely by involuntary association.


HAT TIP: Crunchy Con.

Godwin's Law goes way of Geneva Conventions

You know, it's impossible to abide by Godwin's Law -- the unofficial law of argument that he who calls someone a Nazi automatically loses -- when so many people in this country are acting like Nazis.

First in the ranks of goosestepping disciples of evil would be the government of the United States of America. Specifically the Bush Administration and the Central Intelligence Agency.

Consider, for example, this testimony before Congress by CIA Director Michael Hayden, as reported by MSNBC:

Congress is considering a bill that would restrict the CIA to only those methods authorized by the Army's field manual for interrogation. Hayden said that would make no sense. The Army's interrogators are young people with limited training, while the CIA's interrogators are highly trained, he said.

The Army interrogates a broad range of people, while the CIA's program is tailored to a specific group of terrorists. It would make no more sense to apply the Army's interrogation manual to the CIA than it would to apply the Army's grooming standards or its rules on sexual orientation, Hayden said.

YES, THE CIA has goons quite skilled in the black art of torture. They can do this, because they are highly trained for it.

Just like the SS.

Isn't 'Boortz' Dutch for hemorrhoid?

I saw, in the New Orleans blogs, rumblings of a particularly odious diatribe against that "city of parasites" by libertarian radio ranter Neal Boortz.

Then I heard excerpts of it for myself over at Media Matters.

Obviously, "boortz" is Dutch for hemorrhoid.

LISTENING TO BOORTZ' ill-tempered broadside against poor, predominantly black New Orleanians who didn't get out of the way of Hurricane Katrina in August 2005, I began to hear things other than Boortz' dyspeptic rhetoric.

I began to hear echoes. Ugly echoes.

Here's Boortz, from his Jan. 30 program:

You have a hurricane descending on them and they sit on their fat asses and wait for somebody else to come rescue them. "It's somebody else's job to get me out of here. It's somebody else's job to save my life. Not mine. Send me a bus, send me a limo, send me a boat, send me a helicopter, send me a taxi, send me something. But you certainly don't expect me to actually work to get myself out of this situation, do you? Haven't you been watching me for generations? I've never done anything to improve my own lot in life. I've never done anything to rescue myself. Why do you expect me to do that now, just because a levee broke?"

That, however, wasn't the worst of it:

Listen, listen. When these Katrina so-called refugees were scattered about the country, it was just a glorified episode of putting out the garbage.

NOW, THOSE ECHOES I was talking about. Here is an excerpt from the official program accompanying "Der ewige Jude" ("The Eternal Jew"), a 1940 Nazi propaganda film directed by Fritz Hippler. The program came from Joseph Goebbels' Minsitry of Propaganda:

The film begins with an impressive expedition through the Jewish ghettoes in Poland. We are shown Jewish living quarters, which in our view cannot be called houses. In these dirty rooms lives and prays a race, which earns its living not by work but by haggling and swindling. From the little urchin to the old man, they stand in the streets, trading and bargaining. Using trick photography, we are shown how the Jewish racial mixture in Asia Minor developed and flooded the entire world. We see a parallel to this in the itinerant routes of rats, which are the parasites and bacillus-carriers among animals, just as the Jews occupy the same position among mankind. The Jew has always known how to assimilate his external appearance to that of his host. Contrasted are the same Jewish types, first the Eastern Jew with his kaftan, beard, and sideburns, and then the clean-shaven, Western European Jew. This strikingly demonstrates how he has deceived the Aryan people. Under this mask he increased his influence more and more in Aryan nations and climbed to higher-ranking positions. But he could not change his inner being.

DO YOU HEAR them now? Do you hear the echoes of Goebbels coming from the mouth of a modern-day, right-wing American radio blatherer?

Here is a snippet of narration from "The Eternal Jew" itself:

Here at the Wailing Wall, Jews gather and mourn the fall of Jerusalem. But their homelessness is of their own choosing and in keeping with their entire history.

And now, Boortz:

But I am fed up with this conventional wisdom that Katrina and the disaster that followed was George Bush's fault. It was not. The primary blame goes on the worthless parasites who lived in New Orleans who you -- couldn't even wipe themselves, let alone get out of the way of the water when that levee broke.

Nazis:

Wherever rats appear they bring ruin, by destroying mankind's goods and foodstuffs. In this way, they (the rats) spread disease, plague, leprosy, typhoid fever, cholera, dysentery, and so on.

They are cunning, cowardly, and cruel, and are found mostly in large packs. Among the animals, they represent the rudiment of an insidious and underground destruction -- just like the Jews among human beings.

This parasitical Jewish race is responsible for most international crime. In 1932, Jews, only 1 percent of the world's population, accounted for . . . 47 percent of crooked games of chance, 82 percent of international crime organizations, 98 percent of prostitution.

Boortz (from June 6, 2006):

I love talking to you about these Katrina refugees. I mean, so many of them have turned out to be complete bums, just debris. Debris that Hurricane Katrina washed across the country.

TELL ME, NOW. Please. What's the difference between Neal Boortz' hateful demonization and stereotyping of every Katrina evacuee from New Orleans and the Nazi propagandists' hateful demonization and stereotyping of every Jew in the entire world?

Other, of course, than the more than six million Jews missing from that world by the time the Allies put an end to Goebbels' -- and his pal, Adolf's -- little global scheme.

The likes of Neal Boortz represent what we've come to in this country. What the media -- particularly radio -- have come to in this country.

The bloviating, racist pustule from Atlanta needs to be surgically removed from his microphone -- and his advertising-supported soapbox on the public's airwaves -- for good. And then we ought to hang our heads in shame that we handed him that bully pulpit . . . on radio spectrum that is part and parcel of the public trust.

In a country that fought a bloody world war to rid the world of people like Joseph Goebbels.

HAT TIP: Your Right Hand Thief.

Go to bat for Omaha

We're in the middle of an epic debate here in Omaha, the kind that only comes around every decade or three. We're trying to decide how to best keep the College World Series in town.

Do we build a new baseball stadium downtown? Or do we completely redo 60-year-old Rosenblatt Stadium . . . which lies Not Downtown.

HERE'S A FEW WORDS of wisdom to ponder before we proceed to disemboweling one another: You don't tug on Superman's cape; you don't spit into the wind.

You don't put lipstick on a pig, and you don't do yet another patchwork redesign of a stadium. Omaha has done that once -- remember the Civic Auditorium remodel? -- and we still ended up building the Qwest Center Omaha arena and convention center.

And a good thing we did.

Now, we're supposed to think fixing up old Rosenblatt Stadium is the way to go to keep the College World Series in Omaha forever and ever, amen. That probably would work OK if we didn't have to worry about a few things.

One, that the National Collegiate Athletic Association is a demanding mistress. A very, very demanding mistress. You give her a Buick, and she's gonna want a Mercedes as soon as she can get away with demanding another new car -- which, in the case of the NCAA, would be when the new "extended" contract is up for renewal in 15 years or so.

Just like when it's time to buy a new home computer, buying less than what you need never is a wise long-term decision. And for so many reasons, losing the CWS is not an option for the Big O.

Another consideration -- a big one -- is economic development. Where is the boost to the region's economic development in fixing up Rosenblatt Stadium?

Bueller . . . ? Bueller . . . ? Bueller . . . ? Bueller . . . ?

THE FACT IS, there is no boost. Renovating Rosenblatt and keeping the College World Series down on 13th Street -- assuming that fixing up the old stadium can keep the CWS down on 13th Street for the long term -- is, at best, a status quo proposition economically.

The prospects for economic development down on South 13th lie not in an old municipal baseball stadium, but instead in the nationally acclaimed Henry Doorly Zoo. There, we find the state's No. 1 paid attraction hemmed in by the old ball yard -- unable to expand and short of parking when the CWS is in town.

For the average fan seeking to kill time before, after or between CWS games, there is no shopping or sit-down dining within walking distance of the stadium. Hotel rooms are few near the venue.

You do have a couple of bars, a beer garden and some otherwise vacant old houses turned into whatever for two weeks out of the year. Parking, naturally, is a nightmare, and South 13th isn't exactly a mass-transit hub for the greater Omaha area.

Nor could it be made into a mass-transit hub, assuming anyone wanted to. And why? For two weeks a year?

Building downtown . . . even building downtown at twice the cost of renovation, you have the probability of collateral development and business growth far outpacing the extra money the city shells out. I think someone once dubbed that phenomemon "You gotta spend money to make money."

The impact on downtown Omaha would rival that of replacing a century-old lead smelter with a riverfront park and the Qwest Center Omaha. A new stadium would be a natural anchor for new retail and restaurant development, while serving as a boost to existing downtown businesses.

And a lot of visiting fans who formerly had to load up the car and drive to the Series would instead walk out of their hotel, saunter down the street a ways and walk in the stadium gate. As would a lot of people already downtown . . . because they work there.

SPEAKING OF DOWNTOWN, how'd you like Omaha's "King Corn" image from the recent American Idol episode taped here?

With the CWS at Rosenblatt, ESPN's exterior shots on game broadcasts can center on a congested 13th Street lined by repurposed, semi-dumpy old houses. Or you can get a shot or three of the zoo. Or fans grabbing some burgers and malts at Zesto's.

Perhaps a nice shot of fans milling around the parking lot.

Did I mention the zoo and Zesto's?

How, pray tell, does that advance Omaha's "branding," shifting it toward the cosmopolitan and away from cows and corn? Or corn and cows?

Short answer: It doesn't.

The easy, natural visuals from downtown would belie the stereotype, no matter how hard network crews might try to perpetuate it. Every wide shot would include Omaha's growing skyline.

And surrounding the new stadium, within range of roving camera crews, would lie the spruced-up Missouri River landing. The towering new pedestrian bridge across the Missouri. The charming Old Market. The emerging North Downtown (NoDo) entertainment district, including Saddle Creek Records' Slowdown club, with all its indie-rock cred.

What else could the TV cameras show the nation, without crews much breaking a sweat?

How about street musicians, pub crawlers and people solving the problems of the Free World at cafes and coffee shops?

The green space and lagoon of the Gene Leahy Mall. Horse-drawn carriages filled with young lovers and smiling tourists. Century-old Central High School.

The Joslyn Art Museum and the Durham Western Heritage Museum.

An emerging cosmopolitan city.

No cows. No corn.

Unless, of course, the Nebraska Cornhuskers made it to college baseball's big dance. Then you might see a few "cornheads."

I think most marketing types would call a downtown stadium's PR value to Omaha a "home run."

I CAN ENVISION a new stadium somewhere in NoDo giving the whole district a big dose of NoDoz. Imagine a stadium busy year round because it would have "storefront" eateries and retail incorporated into its design. A public plaza, too. And a Zesto's.

Picture Johnny Rosenblatt Field at . . . Cabela's Stadium. With a scaled-down Cabela's as the anchor storefront retail tenant, specializing in jerseys, fan apparel and basic sporting goods. Like balls, bats and gloves.

Imagine the marketing tie-in potential . . . and the growth potential for a Nebraska corporation. As in "Official Retailer of the NCAA's Men's College World Series."

Not too bad, eh? Or if Cabela's didn't want to go there, "there" being far afield from the "outdoorsman" thing, what about Dick's? Or whatever?

Being that Omaha now has a choice to make, it's useful -- necessary, actually -- to give the possibilities of What Might Be equal consideration to the nostalgia Rosenblatt backers Wish Still Was.

BUT HERE'S THE THING. The College World Series of Mom, apple pie, hot dogs, the "Twizzler Man" and a big small town has been all but killed dead by the Two Horsemen of the Apocalypse -- Progress and Money.

Yes, I know you THINK there's supposed to be a full Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. But when you have Progress and Money on the horizon, riding at you, any more would just be overkill.

So, trust me. The CWS my father-in-law helped bring to Omaha, the one he tirelessly promoted for more than three decades . . . that CWS is part of Omaha's history. Already, it's been written out of this city's future, Rosenblatt or no Rosenblatt.

Long gone are the days when my wife and her siblings helped her dad put up CWS posters in store windows and big promotional signs in hotel lobbies.

There is no more "Dingerville," the ad-hoc summertime small town of recreational vehicles, cold beer and good cheer. Its mayor, die-hard Louisiana State fan Glenarp Allmendinger died some years back, and what was left of his "municipality" got relocated and, finally, evicted for good.

Likewise, the Twizzler Man now roams the left-field bleachers only in our memories. Only in our sweet dreams of bright June afternoons do we still hear his credo, recited by all after another of his dozens of bags of red Twizzers had been passed among the sunburned baseball faithful:

"Share with your neighbor, and don't be stingy."

SEE, you can't bring food into the stadium anymore. Not even Twizzlers. Cops search your stuff to make sure. That, and to make sure you're not toting a "dirty bomb" in this post-9/11 world.

And bottled water is three bucks. That's enough to make a person stingy.

It's also enough to make clear that what we loved about the College World Series, and Rosenblatt Stadium, hasn't existed for some years now. At least not within the NCAA-governed confines of the old ballpark. What we have inside the concourses and below the grandstands has come to more closely resemble the big-time, big-money, Big Media worlds of college football's BCS Championship Game and college basketball's Final Four.

There, there's no room for the Twizzler Man. No accomodation for a Midwestern city's nostalgia for the more innocent days of a cherished local institution.

My father-in-law -- Mr. CWS if ever there was a Mr. CWS -- died before my alma mater, LSU, won the second of its five national titles in 1993 . . . an eternity ago. There are no more signs in hotel lobbies, and my wife slapped her last CWS poster in her last storefront window more than three decades ago.

Money and Progress are telling us, in all likelihood, that we can hold on to the relic that is Rosenblatt or we can hold on to the College World Series. The NCAA can't take the memories we hold so close to our hearts as Omahans, but it can pack up the series and move it to Money's new favorite getaway.

It's time to do what we must. Let the College World Series become what it's bound to become, but let it do it at a shiny new home in cosmopolitan downtown Omaha. As opposed to cosmopolitan downtown Indianapolis . . . or wherever.

The venue may change, but that can't stop Omahans from still being who they are, or from making brand-new memories in a brand-new ballyard. Memories, one hopes, just as sweet as the ones we have from the old place, back in the day.

Just different.

The best little whorehouse in Hooterville?

If you tuned in to American Idol on Tuesday, and if you don't live here, you probably think Omaha is a big cornfield. You probably think we're all a bunch of rubes.

YOU PROBABLY think that to get to City Hall, you cross the Missouri River via pole boat, head east down dusty Farnam Trail and hang a right at the third silo.

Idiot.

That silo's been gone for years now. You turn right at the John Deere dealership to get to City Hall.

Likewise, if all you know about our fair cow town is what Ryan Seacrest showed you, I'll bet you think that, for a big time on a Saturday night, we're all about square dancing and Ultimate Cow Chip flingin'. That is, when the magic-lantern show's not in town.

Think again, bubbie.

The reality is, Omahans have discovered the modern way "to be stress free, relax and enjoy themselves without everyday life worries."

CALL IT the Best Little Whorehouse in Hooterville . . . uh, Omaha. Hey, they don't call us the "Big O" for nothing, as this story from the hardy frontier journalists of the Omaha World-Herald will prove to a woefully misinformed nation:

Makayla M. Peters, 26, who advertised her Web site on Craigslist.com as "a massage/masseuse therapy business," was booked Wednesday into the Omaha city jail on three prostitution-related misdemeanors. She was released after posting 10 percent of her $8,500 bail.

On Thursday, she posted something else: a lengthy defense on her sexually explicit Web site.

"Some of the men I have seen I've had sexual relations with, some merely dinner or a cocktail," she wrote. "Some of these men are even prominent people, some just an average guy, but all are middle to upper class middle aged men who are just looking for some time to be stress free, relax and enjoy themselves without everyday life worries."

In a phone interview early Friday, she called herself as a "call girl" who is paid by her customers for companionship and time.

Police, prosecutors and some of Peters' neighbors have a different take.

Officer Bill Dropinski, an Omaha police spokesman, said the Peters case marks the first time in several years that police have busted someone accused of running a prostitution service out of his or her home.

"This is the first kind of case that I can remember of this nature," Dropinski said. "This is definitely unusual to have a house of prostitution in this part of the city. It's something we don't see that often."

Peters was arrested on suspicion of committing three misdemeanor crimes within her home near 151st and Z Streets: prostitution, keeping a house of prostitution and operating a massage parlor without a license.

(snip)

Peters operated her business under the moniker "Valerie Omaha" and sought customers from a multistate region. Her Web site even boasted that she operated her business from the confines of a mostly secluded neighborhood outside of metro Omaha.

Her elaborate Web site included intimate details of various acts and sexual fantasies in which Peters was willing to participate with her customers, plus a breakdown of costs.

According to information Peters had on her Web site Thursday, some intimate overnight stays with Peters could cost several thousand dollars, depending on the rendezvous and type of fantasy. She also arranged transportation for her paying customers, if needed.

She included detailed information about her looks, plus home phone numbers and personal e-mail addresses for customers to contact. She also included lengthy answers to specific questions about various sex acts.

In recent weeks, the Omaha police vice squad conducted an undercover investigation into Peters' business. The investigation determined that Peters gave much more than massages or back rubs, Dropinski said.

"We believe she was offering more of a full-service-type activity, and the investigation led us to verify those complaints," Dropinski said. "Our officers acted fairly quickly. This kind of prostitution, in this part of the city, from someone's house, that's something we don't mess around with."

Some residents along Peters' street applauded Omaha police for taking action.

"I did not know her, and I did not have any idea of who she is," said Lee Epstein, who lives a block away from Peters' home. "I have lived here 20 years, and we have never had anything like this. Just get her out of here."

SIGH. There's always a moralist around. Even in hardy frontier towns in the middle of miles and miles of cornfields.

But don't let those snooty city slickers on the coasts tell you Omaha's all about corn. And don't let 'em make you think that we rubes in flyover country can't be as horny as Britney Spears at the Spanish Fly bottling plant.

Or that we can't make gratuitous Britney Spears jokes.

Just don't delay in gettin' one last "massage" before Marshal Dillon and the circuit-ridin' preacher come back around these parts.

3 Chords & the Truth: The right spot

You've got to know when to pick your spots.

Like knowing when to play a song that makes a hell of a point -- and strongly so -- but that also will give some listeners of a "faith-based" program a royal case of the reds. That's what we're doing on this edition of 3 Chords & the Truth, because there's a point to be made.

I CALL IT "The Truth" half of 3 Chords & the Truth.

What is it? Not gonna tell you that, because that would just be a great big "spoiler," now, wouldn't it.

So what you're going to have to do is go here -- or just use the pod-O-matic player on this page -- and listen to the Big Show for yourself. I guarantee, it's worth your time.

And while you're at it, download 3C&T's bite-sized companion program, Four Songs. Both, especially this week, exemplify "music with a message."

Be there. Aloha.

Omaha Goddam

Alabama's gotten me so upset
Tennessee made me lose my rest
And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam

This is a show tune
But the show hasn't been written for it, yet

Hound dogs on my trail
School children sitting in jail
Black cat cross my path
I think every day's gonna be my last

Lord have mercy on this land of mine
We all gonna get it in due time
I don't belong here
I don't belong there
I've even stopped believing in prayer

BACK IN 1964, jazz great Nina Simone recorded a scathing indictment of the state of "all men were created equal" in these United States, premised on the reality then that things were bad lots of places, worse yet in Alabama, and in Mississippi . . . goddam!

WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT -- for all my city's present-day, all-American problems involving issues of race and class -- that some 19-year-old, liquored-up punk, new to the big city from the hinterlands of South Dakota, would cause people to think "Omaha . . . goddam!" But that's the tragic tale in today's Omaha World-Herald, with the county attorney saying the drunk punk had something terrible in common with the worst Kluxer monsters from Mississippi, 1964:

Kyle Bormann dressed in camouflage, hoisted his hunting rifle and homed in on Brittany Williams for one reason, Douglas County Attorney Don Kleine said today.

The color of her skin.

Kleine said today that Bormann's own words — and the circumstances of the shooting — point to the Jan. 20 slaying of Williams, a 21-year-old black woman and pre-nursing student, as being race-based.

In formally charging Bormann this morning with first-degree murder and weapon use, Kleine filed notice of his intent to offer an aggravating circumstance that could lead to the death penalty.

The alleged aggravator: that Bormann's choosing of Williams "manifested exceptional depravity by ordinary standards of morality and intelligence."

"This was no accident," Kleine said. "When something senseless like this happens, you have to ask yourself, 'What is it that made this person do this?' That (explanation) comes right out of his mouth."

Bormann's attorney, John J. Kohl, has said he isn't aware of any evidence that suggests his client was racist or racially motivated.

Prosecutors say Bormann, 19, admitted to parking his car about 100 yards away and shooting Williams as she waited in the drive-through lane of the Kentucky Fried Chicken/Long John Silver's restaurant, 7601 N. 30th St. The restaurant is two miles down 30th Street from Bormann's father's Ponca Hills house.

When Bormann was arrested shortly after the shooting, Kleine said, the first words that came out of Bormann's mouth referred to black people.

Bormann, who had been drinking, mentioned being upset with the officiating in the New York Giants-Green Bay Packers NFC Championship game, Kleine said.

Bormann said something about the officiating favoring the black players, Kleine said.

In a later interview at Central Police Headquarters, Bormann also described being "pissed" at black people but gave no specifics, Kleine said.

Kleine acknowledged that some of Bormann's comments in the interview were contradictory.

At times, Kleine said, Bormann denied being racist or shooting Williams based on her race.

And several minutes after admitting to the shooting, he denied having shot her at all, Kleine said.

He said the avid hunter also described himself as a good shot.

(snip)

"We cannot and will not tolerate or ignore the evil of racial prejudice," Kleine said in prepared remarks. "We will honor Brittany Williams' life and the lives of all victims of violent crime by seeking justice and doing everything within our power to prevent these acts of violence borne of these disturbing and unimaginable thoughts."

Morris, Williams' friend, noted that Williams was killed on the night before Martin Luther King Day. Morris, Williams and other members of Alpha Kappa Alpha, a mostly African-American sorority, had planned to observe the holiday by volunteering to paint at a local nonprofit organization.

"All I can say is Brittany's family is grieving," Morris said. "This is going to make it more painful again, to think that their baby was killed because she was black."

HOW MANY have marched, have sat in, have been set upon by police dogs and fire hoses? How many have been jailed and beaten?

In the decades-long fight against hatred, segregation and racism in America, how many have been martyred in the hope that what happened to Brittany Williams in Omaha last week would be banished from our national makeup forever? But, according to the local prosecutor, it hasn't.

Not here, at least. And probably not anywhere else, either.

Now, a 21-year-old woman -- one with her whole bright future ahead of her -- has been added to the hallowed roster of America's civil-rights martyrs. And all she wanted was some KFC.

The struggle continues. May God's mercy be upon us all.

The brownshirt strikes back

Over at Louisiana Conservative.com, "Avman" just doesn't get it:

I’ve had it with some people’s stupidity. Where’s common sense at? I laid out the reasons why I will not support John McCain, and instead of trying to give me a reason to support him, I get called a Brown shirt, and exactly who is trying to intimidate who again? When I say I don’t support John McCain’s 100 year war in Iraq, I mean that I don’t support wars that last so long that eventually everybody forgets why we are fighting. I mean that I don’t want to commit children who haven’t even been born yet to an endless war. When I say I want to do what is necessary to win a war, that means I want to keep war to a minimum instead of supporting decades of mothers and fathers crying because their child died in a war that nobody even knows why they are fighting. What’s so ridiculous about wanting wars to be short lived? Would anybody actually argue that 20 year wars are better than a five year war? How stupid is that? When wars are fought, do what it takes to win it, and win it quickly. Cripes, where’s General Patton when you need him?

WELL, THEN. If "do what is necessary" is the be-all, end-all "gold standard" of human conduct, let's just blow the whole Middle East to hell with our nuclear arsenal -- and China, too! -- and we can win the War on Terror and solve global warming via nuclear winter in one swell foop!

Then, back at home, we can attack the nation's crime problem by overturning the Supreme Court's Miranda decision and then move on to waterboarding suspected gang bangers until they rat out every Crip, Blood and MS-13 hoodlum from sea to shining sea.

And, you know, the poor are a pretty bad drag on the rest of us, even when they're not committing crimes. Maybe . . . I mean, if we're truly committed to "do what is necessary" to build a more literate, prosperous and orderly country . . . maybe we just ought to "eliminate" the problem.

Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge. Say no more! Say no more!

Cripes, where's Adolf Hitler when you need him?

THEN AGAIN, maybe we could just try another tack. Maybe we could start by adhering to the Geneva Conventions.

And maybe we could try not attacking countries on the flimsiest of suspicions that they might try something funny.

After we've mastered those things, maybe we could crack open some compendium of the moral law -- I like the Catechism of the Catholic Church, myself -- and take it to heart. Like this part, for example:

Respect for bodily integrity

2297 Kidnapping and hostage taking bring on a reign of terror; by means of threats they subject their victims to intolerable pressures. They are morally wrong. Terrorism threatens, wounds, and kills indiscriminately; it is gravely against justice and charity. Torture which uses physical or moral violence to extract confessions, punish the guilty, frighten opponents, or satisfy hatred is contrary to respect for the person and for human dignity. Except when performed for strictly therapeutic medical reasons, directly intended amputations, mutilations, and sterilizations performed on innocent persons are against the moral law.⁹¹

2298 In times past, cruel practices were commonly used by legitimate governments to maintain law and order, often without protest from the Pastors of the Church, who themselves adopted in their own tribunals the prescriptions of Roman law concerning torture. Regrettable as these facts are, the Church always taught the duty of clemency and mercy. She forbade clerics to shed blood. In recent times it has become evident that these cruel practices were neither necessary for public order, nor in conformity with the legitimate rights of the human person. On the contrary, these practices led to ones even more degrading. It is necessary to work for their abolition. We must pray for the victims and their tormentors.

Respect for the dead

2299 The dying should be given attention and care to help them live their last moments in dignity and peace. They will be helped by the prayer of their relatives, who must see to it that the sick receive at the proper time the sacraments that prepare them to meet the living God.

2300 The bodies of the dead must be treated with respect and charity, in faith and hope of the Resurrection. The burial of the dead is a corporal work of mercy;⁹² it honors the children of God, who are temples of the Holy Spirit.

(snip)

III. SAFEGUARDING PEACE

Peace

2302 By recalling the commandment, "You shall not kill,"⁹⁴ our Lord asked for peace of heart and denounced murderous anger and hatred as immoral.

Anger is a desire for revenge. "To desire vengeance in order to do evil to someone who should be punished is illicit," but it is praiseworthy to impose restitution "to correct vices and maintain justice."⁹⁵ If anger reaches the point of a deliberate desire to kill or seriously wound a neighbor, it is gravely against charity; it is a mortal sin. The Lord says, "Everyone who is angry with his brother shall be liable to judgment."⁹⁶

2303 Deliberate hatred is contrary to charity. Hatred of the neighbor is a sin when one deliberately wishes him evil. Hatred of the neighbor is a grave sin when one deliberately desires him grave harm. "But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven."⁹⁷

2304 Respect for and development of human life require peace. Peace is not merely the absence of war, and it is not limited to maintaining a balance of powers between adversaries. Peace cannot be attained on earth without safeguarding the goods of persons, free communication among men, respect for the dignity of persons and peoples, and the assiduous practice of fraternity. Peace is "the tranquillity of order."⁹⁸ Peace is the work of justice and the effect of charity.⁹⁹

2305 Earthly peace is the image and fruit of the peace of Christ, the messianic "Prince of Peace."¹⁰⁰ By the blood of his Cross, "in his own person he killed the hostility,"¹⁰¹ he reconciled men with God and made his Church the sacrament of the unity of the human race and of its union with God. "He is our peace."¹⁰² He has declared: "Blessed are the peacemakers."¹⁰³

2306 Those who renounce violence and bloodshed and, in order to safeguard human rights, make use of those means of defense available to the weakest, bear witness to evangelical charity, provided they do so without harming the rights and obligations of other men and societies. They bear legitimate witness to the gravity of the physical and moral risks of recourse to violence, with all its destruction and death.¹⁰⁴

SO, I MAY BE STUPID, but I do understand one important thing that American brownshirts don't. Many things are possible. Not all are permitted, lest we ourselves become that which we find repellent.