Natzweiler-Struthof 2

Implements of torture, before waterboarding was in vogue. They just strapped you to this and removed body parts.


Class A accommodations.


Gotta get rid of the bodies. They had a lot of urns for the purpose, before they stopped caring about even that.


A memorial to the French Resistance, who comprised most of those interned here.


Towards the end, they didn't even bother with urns, just dumping the ashes in this pit.

Click to embiggen.

Natzweiler-Struthof 1

Main Gate.


You couldn't run.


How they defiled the beautiful French countryside.


I tried out a cell in solitary for size. I'm 5'10".


The lab table, where humans were turned into lab rats.

Click to embiggen.

San Juan

Ft. Cristobal overlooking San Juan harbor.




Naturally we took the tour of the Bacardi Distillery. Heh ...




And of course, the beaches are extraordinary.

Click pics to embiggen.

Cavallaro v. Donohue

Full transcript.

[...]

COOPER: Well, I don't think it's our job here on 360 to tell you what to think about something. We just ask the questions and help you decide.

A few minutes ago, I talked to artist Cosimo Cavallaro and the man who worked to shut down his exhibit, Bill Donahue, president of the Catholic League.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: Cosimo, I want to start by asking you what your intention was with -- with this -- this piece of art.

C. CAVALLARO: My intention was to celebrate this body of Christ, and in a sweet, delicious, tasteful way.

COOPER: Why -- why use chocolate?

C. CAVALLARO: Because it's a substance that I like. And it's sweet. And I felt that the body of Christ, the -- the meaning of Christ, is about the sweetness.

COOPER: Were you trying to shock, I mean, to -- to cause attention?

Often -- usually, when Christ is shown, he's wearing some form of clothing. This is a naked Christ, which has also caused some concern.

C. CAVALLARO: No more than the religion, the way they use it. I was just using it as an iconic figure.

I mean, that my intentions was to shock people, no. I was -- my intention was to have them taste the -- and feel what they're looking at in their mouth.

COOPER: Bill, you call this exhibit hate speech. You said it's -- quote -- "one of the worst assaults on Christian sensibilities ever."

What specifically offends you about it?

WILLIAM DONAHUE, PRESIDENT, CATHOLIC LEAGUE: Well, of course, asking the public to come in and eat Jesus, with his genitals exposed, during Holy Week I think would be self-explanatory.

If we took an image of this artist's mother, and made her out in chocolate, with her genitals exposed, of course, to be equal, and then asked the public to eat her on Mother's Day, yes, he might have a problem. Maybe he wouldn't.

But you know what bothers me? It's not even the artist. I mean, we have a lot of these loser artists down in SoHo and around the country. What bothers me is that this guy Knowles, who is an artist in residence, the owner, the president and CEO of an establishmentarian site, the Roger Smith Hotel, 47th and Lexington, in the heart of Midtown Manhattan, that is what bothers me, because now we have the establishment kicking in.

And to put this out during Holy Week, on street level, when kids can walk in off the street, these people are morally bankrupt. And my goal is to make them financially bankrupt.

COOPER: Cosimo, do you understand the outrage this has caused? I mean, do you think it's overreaction? Do you get it?

C. CAVALLARO: Yes, I get it. I think it's an overreaction.

You just heard the gentleman calling artists losers, or me a loser. I think what he's -- his assault is on the public at large, artists, and freedom of speech, and every Catholic. I'm a Catholic, and I'm a Christian.

And I think this gentleman doesn't even represent the people that are in his faith.

DONAHUE: That's funny. You said I put out a fatwa, right? Or the -- or the -- that was the -- the guy who ran the lab, says I put out a fatwa. I put out a news release.

So, you're accusing me of being like the Taliban; is that right?

C. CAVALLARO: Who, me? You're not that intelligent.

(LAUGHTER)

DONAHUE: Oh, no, let me tell you something. You're -- you're lucky I'm not as mean, because you might lose more than your head.

COOPER: Cosimo, did you want people to eat this? Was that part of this?

C. CAVALLARO: No.

Did you hear what this gentleman is saying, that I would lose my head?

DONAHUE: No, I -- you heard what I said. I said you're -- you're lucky I'm not like the Taliban, because you would lose more than your head, which is why...

C. CAVALLARO: Right. So, therefore...

(CROSSTALK)

DONAHUE: ... guys like you wouldn't do this against Mohammed during Ramadan.

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: No, because I'm a Christian. And I'm not trying to...

DONAHUE: Oh, you're a Christian. Please. Don't lie about it, all right? Don't lie about it.

C. CAVALLARO: I'm not lying. No, I'm not lying about it.

DONAHUE: Yes, you are.

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: I want to ask you a question, Mr. Donahue.

DONAHUE: Yes.

C. CAVALLARO: Where do you think I should exhibit this? Because you -- you have bamboozled an art gallery.

DONAHUE: Right.

C. CAVALLARO: And you have bamboozled an establishment. You have put fear in people to listen to your rhetoric and to believe -- just because a man has got his arms extended and he's made in chocolate -- it's your Christ -- and it's offensive.

DONAHUE: That's right.

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: And, by the way -- excuse me. I'm going to talk to you for a minute. You keep quiet.

DONAHUE: And you want the public to eat him.

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: Now, you go to the Catholic Church...

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Let Cosimo finish his point.

C. CAVALLARO: You go to the Catholic Church, and you're going to see statues from Michelangelo that are nude. Are you going to clothe them for the Holy Week?

DONAHUE: OK.

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: And are you telling me that, apart from the Holy Week, we could do anything we want to do with the genitalia? What are you talking about?

DONAHUE: The...

COOPER: OK. Let Bill answer.

DONAHUE: All right. All right, first of all, Leonardo, you're not.

But, quite frankly, where should you have this displayed? In New Jersey is where New Yorkers put their garbage. There's a big sanitation dump. That's where you should put it.

COOPER: Bill, let me read you something that David Kuo, the former presidential assistant to President Bush, who worked in the Office of Faith-Based Community Initiatives, said in reference to your protest.

He said -- quote -- "Instead of getting all amped up over this art, Christians should be spending time facing the real and very challenging Jesus found in the Gospels, and encouraging others to do the same."

(CROSSTALK)

COOPER: Are you making a bigger deal out of this than it deserves?

DONAHUE: No, no, no, no.

COOPER: And doesn't this, in fact, give this more attention than it ever would have received otherwise?

DONAHUE: If, in fact, it was at some dump in SoHo, I probably wouldn't pay too much attention. But the fact that the Roger Smith Hotel...

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: ... dump in SoHo.

DONAHUE: ... right here in New York City is doing this thing, no. If I don't pay attention to it, then I -- my people should ask for me to be fired.

By the way, I am delighted with the response from Jews, Muslims, and others, not just Catholics and Protestants, with this. People are basically saying, enough is enough. This is absolutely revolting.

And what you're saying, sir, is totally disingenuous. No one believes it. I don't even think you believe it.

COOPER: But, Bill, doesn't -- doesn't -- I mean, don't people have a right to express themselves? And isn't that what art is about? Aren't artists supposed to provoke thought?

DONAHUE: That's right. And, if we -- and if we put a swastika out on a stamp in the United States, we could call that art. It was an art exhibition. I don't think Jews would go for that.

Just because art is art doesn't mean that it is a right that is absolute. Art can be insulting and it can be offensive. And when these people are whining, claiming victim status, as this guy is doing, because of my exercise of my First Amendment right of freedom of speech -- I didn't call the cops to come in and censor this.

I'm simply saying I called up about 500 of my friends and -- running different Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu and non- sectarian organizations to boycott the Roger Smith Hotel. They're morally bankrupt. I want to see them financially bankrupt.

COOPER: Cosimo, I want to give you the final thought. Do you plan to -- to display this elsewhere?

C. CAVALLARO: Yes, I do, hopefully.

And I would like to add to the gentleman who referred to the swastika, he's actually acting like a Nazi.

(LAUGHTER)

C. CAVALLARO: And I -- I would like to ask one question.

Where do you suggest that I exhibit this? Because you basically pulled it out of a gallery for me. So, where do you think...

DONAHUE: No. I -- I told you...

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: Where -- no, excuse me.

Where do you suggest that an artist should exhibit his work that you don't infringe on?

DONAHUE: Well, you know, go to some dump down in SoHo, where...

C. CAVALLARO: A dump?

DONAHUE: ... nobody will pay attention.

C. CAVALLARO: Is there a church in SoHo that's a dump, too, because...

DONAHUE: Oh, you would like to...

(CROSSTALK)

C. CAVALLARO: No, let me tell you something.

DONAHUE: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

C. CAVALLARO: There's two priests that have wanted to exhibit this in their church.

DONAHUE: Is that right?

C. CAVALLARO: Yes, absolutely.

DONAHUE: Give me their names.

C. CAVALLARO: I will not, because you're a bully.

(LAUGHTER)

C. CAVALLARO: And you know what? I believe that there's people in your organization that would like you to resign.

DONAHUE: Is that right?

C. CAVALLARO: Absolutely. And you're...

DONAHUE: Well, how come -- I haven't heard from them.

C. CAVALLARO: I got to tell you something, there's more filth that comes out of your mouth...

DONAHUE: Is that right?

C. CAVALLARO: Yes -- than I have seen...

(CROSSTALK)

DONAHUE: Look, you lost. You know what? You put your middle finger at the Catholic Church, and we just broke it, didn't we, pal?

C. CAVALLARO: No. You're wrong. You're wrong.

DONAHUE: Yes, we did. You lost.

C. CAVALLARO: I have a lot of believers.

DONAHUE: We -- we won. You're out of a job.

C. CAVALLARO: And I'm a Christian. And there's a lot of people like me, who are opposed to what you're doing, because you made a big...

DONAHUE: Yes? But I got a job, and you don't.

C. CAVALLARO: You made a -- "I got a job, and you don't"?

DONAHUE: Yes.

C. CAVALLARO: You're acting like a 5-year-old.

DONAHUE: I got a job, and you don't.

C. CAVALLARO: You're talking -- you're acting like a 5-year-old. And I feel sorry for you.

COOPER: All right. We're going to -- we're...

DONAHUE: Well, I won on this, and you lost, didn't you?

COOPER: Well, let's -- let's leave it there.

You both expressed your opinions.

Bill Donahue, appreciate you being with -- and, Cosimo Cavallaro, appreciate it as well. Thank you, sir.

C. CAVALLARO: Thank you, Anderson.

COOPER: Thank you.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

COOPER: Well, thankfully, there are other stories dealing with faith tonight that aren't causing quite so much of an uproar.

Just ahead: She was sick and now is cured. She won't call it a miracle, but the Catholic Church might. And a pope might achieve sainthood because of it, Pope John Paul II. That's coming up.

Also: selling religion with sex, why church leaders are taking a page from Madison Avenue -- next on 360.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

[...]

Britney's box

Remembering Molly Ivins

John Nichols at The Nation

Molly Ivins always said she wanted to write a book about the lonely experience of East Texas civil rights campaigners to be titled No One Famous Ever Came. While the television screens and newspapers told the stories of the marches, the legal battles and the victories of campaigns against segregation in Alabama and Mississippi, Ivins recalled, the foes of Jim Crow laws in the region where she came of age in the 1950s and '60s often labored in obscurity without any hope that they would be joined on the picket lines by Nobel Peace Prize winners, folk singers, Hollywood stars or senators.

And Ivins loved those righteous strugglers all the more for their willingness to carry on.

The warmest-hearted populist ever to pick up a pen with the purpose of calling the rabble to the battlements, Ivins understood that change came only when some citizen in some off-the-map town passed a petition, called a Congressman or cast an angry vote to throw the bums out. The nation's mostly widely syndicated progressive columnist, who died January 31 at age 62 after a long battle with what she referred to as a "scorching case of cancer," adored the activists she celebrated from the time in the late 1960s when she created her own "Movements for Social Change" beat at the old Minneapolis Tribune and started making heroes of "militant blacks, angry Indians, radical students, uppity women and a motley assortment of other misfits and troublemakers."

"Troublemaker" might be a term of derision in the lexicon of some journalists--particularly the on-bended-knee White House press pack that Ivins studiously refused to run with--but to Molly it was a term of endearment. If anyone anywhere was picking a fight with the powerful, she was writing them up with the same passionate language she employed when her friend the great Texas liberal Billie Carr passed on in 2002. Ivins recalled Carr "was there for the workers and the unions, she was there for the African-Americans, she was there for the Hispanics, she was there for the women, she was there for the gays. And this wasn't all high-minded, oh, we-should-all-be-kinder-to-one-another. This was tough, down, gritty, political trench warfare; money against people. She bullied her way to the table of power, and then she used that place to get everybody else there, too. If you ain't ready to sweat, and you ain't smart enough to deal, you can't play in her league."

Molly Ivins could have played in the league of the big boys. They invited her in, giving her a bureau chief job with the New York Times--which she wrote her way out of when she referred to a "community chicken-killing festival" in a small town as a "gang-pluck." Leaving the Times in 1982 was the best thing that ever happened to Molly. She settled back in her home state of Texas, where her friend Jim Hightower was about to get elected as agricultural commissioner and another friend named Ann Richards was striding toward the governorship. As a newspaper columnist for the old Dallas Times Herald--and, after that paper's demise, for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram--Molly began writing a political column drenched in the good humor and fighting spirit of that populist moment. It appealed beyond Texas, and within a decade she was writing for 400 papers nationwide.

As it happened, the populist fires faded in Texas, and the state started spewing out the byproducts of an uglier political tradition--the oil-money plutocracy--in the form of George Bush and Dick Cheney.

It mattered, a lot, that Molly was writing for papers around the country during the Bush interregnum. She explained to disbelieving Minnesotans and Mainers that, yes, these men really were as mean, as self-serving and as delusional as they seemed. The book that Molly and her pal Lou Dubose wrote about their homeboy-in-chief, Shrub: The Short But Happy Political Life of George W. Bush (Random House, 2000), was the essential exposé of the man the Supreme Court elected President. And Ivins's columns tore away any pretense of civility or citizenship erected by the likes of Karl Rove.

When Washington pundits started counseling bipartisanship after voters routed the Republicans in the 2006 elections, Molly wrote, "The sheer pleasure of getting lessons in etiquette from Karl Rove and the right-wing media passeth all understanding. Ever since 1994, the Republican Party has gone after Democrats with the frenzy of a foaming mad dog. There was the impeachment of Bill Clinton, not to mention the trashing of both Clinton and his wife--accused of everything from selling drugs to murder--all orchestrated by that paragon of manners, Tom DeLay.... So after 12 years of tolerating lying, cheating and corruption, the press is prepared to lecture Democrats on how to behave with bipartisan manners.

"Given Bush's record with the truth, this bipartisanship sounds like a bad idea on its face," Ivins continued, in a column that warned any Democrat who might think to make nice with President and his team that "These people are not only dishonest--they're not even smart."

Her readers cheered that November 9, 2006, column, as they did everything Molly wrote. And the cheers came loudest from those distant corners of Kansas and Mississippi where, often, her words were the only dissents that appeared in the local papers during the long period of diminished discourse following 9/11. For the liberal faithful in Boise and Biloxi and Beaumont, she was a lifeline--telling them that, yes, Henry Kissinger was "an old war criminal," that Bush had created a "an honest to goodness constitutional crisis" when it embarked on a program of warrantless wiretapping and that Bill Moyers should seek the presidency because "I want to vote for somebody who's good and brave and who should win." (The Moyers boomlet was our last co-conspiracy, and in Molly's honor, I'm thinking of writing in his name on my Democratic primary ballot next year.)

For the people in the places where no one famous ever came, Molly Ivins arrived a couple of times a week in the form of columns that told the local rabble-rousers that they were the true patriots, that they damn well better keep pitching fits about the war and the Patriot Act and economic inequality, and that they should never apologize for defending "those highest and best American ideas" contained in the Bill of Rights.

Often, Molly actually did come--in all of her wisecracking, pot-stirring populist glory.

Keeping a promise she'd made when her old friend and fellow Texan John Henry Faulk was on his deathbed, Molly accepted a steady schedule of invites to speak for local chapters of the American Civil Liberties Union in dozens of communities, from Toledo to Sarasota to Medford, Oregon. Though she could have commanded five figures, she took no speaker's fee. She just came and told the crowds to carry on for the Constitution. "I know that sludge-for-brains like Bill O'Reilly attack the ACLU for being 'un-American,' but when Bill O'Reilly's constitutional rights are violated, the ACLU will stand up for him just like they did for Oliver North, Communists, the KKK, atheists, movement conservatives and everyone else they've defended over the years," she told them. "The premise is easily understood: If the government can take away one person's rights, it can take away everyone's."

She also told them, even when she was battling cancer and Karl Rove, that they should relish the lucky break of their consciences and their conflicts. Speaking truth to power is the best job in any democracy, she explained. It took her to towns across this great yet battered land to say: "So keep fightin' for freedom and justice, beloveds, but don't you forget to have fun doin' it. Lord, let your laughter ring forth. Be outrageous, ridicule the fraidy-cats, rejoice in all the oddities that freedom can produce. And when you get through kickin' ass and celebratin' the sheer joy of a good fight, be sure to tell those who come after how much fun it was."

Airpower in NYC

(top and middle)

USAAF P-51 Mustang, USAF F-16 Falcon, F-15 Eagle, A-10 Thunderbolt II (Warthog). You know the lady. The middle photo shows the flight over the 59th Street Bridge, Roosevelt Island is in the middle, Manhattan on the right, and Queens on the left. The wet stuff is the East River.

(bottom)

USN Blue Angels F/A-18 Hornets.

Click to embiggen

No more Bush

On Dave ...

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Rich Wood and I run the Alternate Brain, a blog concerned mainly with veterans' affairs. I am honored to stand before you today with two of my heroes, men of honor. Let me throw out some numbers:

Close to 3,000 American service people dead

Over 20,000 wounded, many with serious brain injury, many missing limbs.

No WMDs

Civil War in Iraq

Osama bin Forgotten

And the Taliban are resurgent in Afghanistan because troops needed there have been sent to Iraq instead.

President Bush and his henchmen lied to us at every turn to provide a justification for the war in Iraq. They fabricated evidence of WMDs, as Ambassador Wilson proved beyond a shadow of a doubt. They've cashiered flag officers, like General Shinseki, who before the war even began, made clear the war plan was insufficient and inept. People who knew failure was a foregone conclusion before the first American boots touched the Iraqi sand.

They've used the war in Iraq, our soldiers' lives, for political purposes. They've gone so far as to destroy the career of an American intelligence officer in a petty attempt at revenge. Ambassador Wilson's lovely wife, performing the critical mission of chasing down WMDs and the people who would supply them to terrorists, was put in mortal danger by her exposure, as were her contacts and assets working in the region, because Mr. Wilson dared to speak the truth. Remember, she was looking for the WMDs the President said he so desperately wanted to find.

President Bush does not want to win the War on Terror; he wants it to go on forever, for that is the basis of his power. Were it not for a Congress of sheep, or lemmings as it were because they're following him off a cliff, he would have never been able to get away with it. The Human Rubber Stamps, like Peter King, have enabled him, smiling and nodding their heads, giving him everything he asks for without oversight.

Good men like Dave Mejias are needed to put a stop to this mess.

Dave will ask the tough questions, unlike Peter King who'll do and say whatever the Republican Spin Machine tells him to.

Dave Mejias knows American troops are not just props for photo ops, not just cannon fodder and deck apes in the imperialistic conquest and illegal occupation of Iraq. Not just a comma in a footnote of history.

Dave knows that America's obligation to our fighting men and women does not stop when they can no longer carry a rifle in combat.

Dave Mejias knows that the Armed Forces of the United States are not political tools to be used by a spineless bunch who've never looked into the business end of an enemy rifle. Dishonorable men who went to the greatest lengths to avoid service in their generation's war, yet squander the lives of this generation's soldiers so cavalierly.

I have, and it is the reason I stand with him. It is the reason every veteran in New York's Third District should as well. Dave Mejias knows the true meaning of 'supporting the troops' and that's why he has my endorsement, my respect, and my unqualified support.

Mejias Press Conference

Yours truly, Capt. Cleere, Dave Mejias, and the local VFW Commander.

King-sized scandal

Reprint of an email from the Mejias campaign, 27 October 2006:

FARMINGDALE - On the heels of the recent news that the home of Congressman Curt Weldon's lobbyist daughter was raided by the F.B.I., Dave Mejias, Nassau County Legislator and candidate for Congress in New York's 3^rd Congressional District, called on Congressman Peter King to tell the truth about his dealings with Park Strategies, a lobbying firm that employs King's son, Sean King.

An article in yesterday's Newsday ("King's son works for defense lobbying firm"), details that Sean King is a Vice President at Park Strategies, and that "Park Strategies has lucrative contracts with many big businesses to lobby on defense and homeland security spending." The article quotes Peter King as saying "[Sean King] has no clients that deal with my office." NOT TRUE. This video shows Sean King in Taiwan touting his clients, Lockheed Martin and L-3 Communications, both firms that receive Homeland Security contracts.

A posting on the New York Observer's Politicker Blog quoted King as saying "[Sean King] is not a lobbyist, does no lobbying, and has no dealings with my office whatsoever." NOT TRUE. According to the State of New York, Sean King IS a registered lobbyist.

Today, in a separate Newsday article, Peter King continued to deny any wrong doing despite mounting evidence that he is engaged in a clear conflict of interest - homeland security contracts being awarded to companies that employ his son's lobbying firm.

"This is a perfect example of the culture of corruption in Washington - relatives of members of Congress lobbying for homeland security contracts," said Mejias. "Peter King is lying about his son's employment as a lobbyist, and Sean King's clients receiving government contracts. This is a major conflict of interest, and the people of Long Island deserve to know the truth."

Mejias called on Peter King to answer several critical questions:

What calls or meetings has Peter King had with Sean King and clients of Sean King?

What requests has Peter King made on behalf of Sean King and clients of Sean King to government agencies and congressional committees?

What Homeland Security contracts have Peter King steered in the direction of Sean King's clients?

Has Peter King ever encouraged companies lobbying for Homeland Security contracts to hire Sean King's firm?

Will Peter King release all correspondence with his Congressional office about lobbying for Homeland Security contract?

Will Peter King release his Congressional calendar to show who he met with, and when?

"It"s bad enough that Peter King has been a rubber stamp for the failed policies of the Bush administration," said Mejias. "Now we learn that Peter King's relatives are cashing in on his position, and he's lying to cover it up. It's time to put an end to the culture of corruption in Washington. We need leaders in Congress who will fight for us, not pad their family's pockets and roll over for the special interests."

Bombing the Google

Just helping Darryl, blogging at the General's place:

...

Share these links with your friends and family, and plaster the links all over your blogs and web pages!

Senate races:

WA-Sen: Mike McGavick

VA-Sen: George Allen

TN-Sen: Bob Corker

RI-Sen: Lincoln Chafee

MT-Sen: Conrad Burns

MO-Sen: Jim Talent

MD-Sen: Michael Steele

AZ-Sen: Jon Kyl

House races:

WA-08: Dave Reichert

VA-10: Frank Wolf

PA-10: Don Sherwood

PA-08: Mike Fitzpatrick

PA-07: Curt Weldon

PA-04: Melissa Hart

OH-18: Joy Padgett

OH-15: Deborah Pryce

OH-02: Jean Schmidt

OH-01: Steve Chabot

NY-29: Randy Kuhl

NY-26: Tom Reynolds

NY-20: John Sweeney

NY-03: Peter King

NV-03: Jon Porter

NM-01: Heather Wilson

NJ-07: Mike Ferguson

NH-02: Charlie Bass

NC-11: Charles Taylor

NC-08: Robin Hayes

MN-06: Michele Bachmann

MN-01: Gil Gutknecht

KY-04: Geoff Davis

KY-03: Anne Northup

KS-02: Jim Ryun

IN-08: John Hostettler

IN-02: Chris Chocola

IL-14: Dennis Hastert

IL-10: Mark Kirk

IL-06: Peter Roskam

ID-01: Bill Sali

IA-01: Mike Whalen

FL-22: Clay Shaw

FL-16: Joe Negron

FL-13: Vernon Buchanan

CT-04: Christopher Shays

CO-07: Rick O'Donnell

CO-05: Doug Lamborn

CO-04: Marilyn Musgrave

CA-50: Brian Bilbray

CA-11: Richard Pombo

CA-04: John Doolittle

AZ-05: J.D. Hayworth

AZ-01: Rick Renzi

Click here for more information about this post, and see this if you want to do something similar on your blog or web page.

...

Cross-posted at the Brain.

Horta

Ponta Delgado

Cruise ships vs. Ocean liners

Since I'm sharing my vacation with you, I figured I'd explain a little about the differences in cruising between cruise ships and ocean liners, just in case you were seeing how much fun we're having and would like to book a cruise of your own.

There are more than two types of passenger ships but for cruising purposes you need only concern yourself with two of them. There are cruise ships and there are ocean liners and they are very different vessels. The first rule of thumb in differentiating is that cruise ships are a hull that's built around a hotel. Basically taking a land-based hotel and making it seaworthy. An ocean liner is a hull into which a hotel is fitted.

While both are basically floating hotels, ships like the Noordam and her sisters, Oosterdam, Westerdam, and Zuiderdam (Vista - class ships), Queen Mary 2, and Queen Elizabeth 2 are ocean liners. Most ships now plying the tourist trade routes however, are cruise ships. Big, boxy things that the esteemed writer and lecturer Bill Miller (who is also passenger aboard Noordam for this crossing and I had the delightful opportunity to meet the other day) calls "forgettable".

Ocean liners have a long, storied history, making their debut upon the high seas around the turn of the last century. They are, as I quote Mr. Miller once again, "the largest piece of moving machinery made by man." Noordam and her sisters are just the latest in a long line of ships who were built to make the North Atlantic crossing from Europe to the Americas. And that is the key fact about ocean liners, they are built to take the pounding of the North Atlantic through four seasons.

There is also a different culture aboard liners as opposed to cruise ships. Liners are still considered transportation, just as they were before the advent of passenger aircraft and the jet engine. Many people aboard Noordam, over a hundred by the way, are either staying aboard after we dock in NYC to move on to other destinations or were aboard when we embarked at Civitaveccia in Italy, leaving us in Spain or at Bermuda when we arrive. Mrs. F and I have come to believe that liners are the only way to return from a European vacation, which we did for the first time coming home from London aboard QM2 two years ago.

I won't get into the wonderful history of ocean liners, Mr. Miller does that far better than I in his 60 books on the subject, but I will make it easy for you. Ocean liners are a culture of sophisticated elegance. Cruise ships are party boats. Each has its place. The Mrs. and I have had a great time on the fourteen holidays we've taken on cruise ships since we were married. At this point in our lives though, you probably won't see us on another one. As I said, there is a different culture aboard liners.

Where a cruise ship has Caribbean bands and the canned background music is reggae, hip hop, and rock & roll, aboard a liner you're far more likely to see a string quartet or a big band, and the background is more Mozart than Bob Marley. A liner is more sedate, the crowd a bit older, and drinking and raucous partying is not the priority. Lord knows, the alcohol does flow, but you won't see people falling-down drunk. You won't see jeans and t-shirts at dinner, and it's the odd man who doesn't wear a jacket and tie to the dining room. Many people's downtime is rather spent in the library, attending lectures, or classes on one subject or another. I signed up for several master class lectures by Mr. Miller and the Mrs. is taking a series of cooking classes from some world-renkowned chef, broadening her already gourmet-caliber talents.

Refined elegance and liner culture is truly an amazing thing and the ghosts of the old liners now departed, the German Emperador, the Italian Rex, the French Normandie, the American United States, Lusitania and Mauritania the ships of the legendary British White Star Line (yes, even Titanic), and the original Queens, Mary and Elizabeth from Cunard stand guard over us as we make the crossing that was once the only way to get from Old World to New. Liners embrace the romance of the high seas and while to many, a ship is a ship, reading one of Mr. Miller's books will give you a new understanding of these leviathans of the world's oceans.

Liner vs. Cruise ship? Put me on an ocean liner any day. Once you're bitten by the bug, you'll see what I mean.

Gonzalez-Bayass Winery

Cadiz/Jerez de la Frontinera 2

Seems that St. Michael (San Miguel) is a big macher in Spain. I think more churches are named after him here than any other. He's the patron saint of Jerez de la Frontinera.


This is the oldest doorway in the city of Jerez. Still in use in the town hall since just after the Romans got tossed.


The Plaza de la Asuncion in Jerez, also dating back to Roman times, Julius Caesar living here for a time.


The Gothic Cathedral de la Salvador. Notice the flying buttress architecture. To architecture nuts like the Mrs and me, this was heaven.


A statue of Dope Pope John Paul II who blessed the cathedral on a visit to Jerez in 1984.

Cadiz/Jerez de la Frontinera

Entering Cadiz through the old city walls.


A beautiful square in the center of the Old City. They have so many of these that I forget the name of this one, but way cool regardless. Art Deco abounds here.


Cadiz is a city of beaches as it sits on the Atlantic, just outside the Straits of Gibraltar. The sand is yellow, the color reflected in a lot of the old construction. The boats belong to the mackerel and anchovy fisherman who head out to sea in those little fucking things as the sun goes down.


The Al-Kazar. The Moorish/Muslim influence is great here, owing to the proximiy to Africa.


The ancient mosaics also decorate every street corner, a hint at the Catholic background of 90% of the people here.

Misc.

In Florence.


This bust of Dutch King William is at the end of our corridor on the ship. I rub his head for luck every time I go past.


Kids build the same crappy cars all over the world - Valencia.


The Fixers on the bus - Valencia.


Mother Superior jumped the gun. Boy was she pissed at me for taking her pic. Heh ... - Florence.