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By Steven McGinty
On 26 January, the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that they would be appointing the world's first 'digital ambassador' to act as the nation's representative to major technology companies, such as Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon.
At a conference on the future of the Foreign Service, the Foreign Minister, Anders Samuelsen, explained that:
"Denmark must be at the forefront of technological development. Technological advances are making such a great impact on our society that it has become a matter of foreign policy. I have therefore decided to announce the appointment of a digitisation ambassador."
In a follow up interview with Danish newspaper Politken, Mr Samuelsen expressed his belief that multinational technology giants "affect Denmark just as much as entire countries". He highlighted the examples of Apple and Google whose market values are so large that if they were countries they would only narrowly miss out from inclusion in the G20 – the global forum for cooperation between the world's 20 major economies.
As a result of this economic strength, together with tech firms' impact on the everyday lives of citizens, Mr Samuelsen argues that the technology sector should be treated as a form of 'new nation', which Denmark must develop closer relationships with.
Cooperation between nation states and the technology sector
Technology companies are becoming involved in activities that were once reserved for nation states. For example, Mr Samuelsen's Liberal party accepts donations in Bitcoin – an online currency which challenges the state's role as the only issuer of legal tender. And Microsoft have signed a partnership agreement with the French Ministry of Education to provide teacher training, in order to prepare teachers for running special coding classes.
The technology industry argues that it is better placed than national governments to provide effective digital services, at cheaper prices. In terms of national security, computer engineering expert and academic, Jean-Gabriel Ganascia, argues that this is probably the case. Mr Ganascia highlights that Google and Facebook have vast image databases that enable them to use facial recognition software far better than any national security service. Therefore, countries have started working with technology companies on a variety of crime and public safety issues.
Citizens are also spending greater amounts of time on social media platforms. In an interview with The Washington Post, Mr Samuelsen stated that more than half of the world's data has been created in the past two years (much of this from major platforms such as Facebook). This trend has implications for the privacy of citizens and the spreading of false information, a phenomena that has been labelled 'fake news'. These issues are fundamentally important for citizens and nation states, and are likely to increase cooperation between countries and the technology sector.
Australia's Ambassador for Cyber Affairs
Although Denmark will be the first country to introduce a digital ambassador, another government has made a similar appointment. In January, Dr Tobias Feakin was appointment as Australia's Ambassador for Cyber Affairs. His role focuses on cyber-security, but also includes issues such as censorship and promoting internet access. At this stage, it's unclear whether Dr Feakin will have direct contact with technology companies and whether this relationship will involve discussions over economic issues such as taxation.
Is a digital ambassador necessary?
Not everyone, however, is buying into the appointment of a government representative focused solely on digital issues. Technology journalist, Emma Woollacott, believes that it's a 'terrible idea'.
According to Ms Woollacott, Denmark already has a good relationship with technology companies, highlighting that Facebook has recently announced plans to build a new data centre in Odense, creating 150 new permanent jobs. These views may have some merit, as Mr Samuelsen has confirmed that the deal between the Foreign Ministry and Facebook was the result of three years of behind-the-scenes work.
Ms Woollacott also argues that Denmark is setting a worrying precedent by equating a private company to a nation state. In her view, the importance of the technology sector could have been acknowledged through hiring knowledge staff, rather than granting it a 'unique political status'.
However, Professor Jan Stentoft, who researches the insourcing of technological production to Denmark, believes creating the ambassadorial post is a good idea. He explains:
"We have much to offer these companies, but Denmark is a small country, and we obviously need to make ourselves noticed if we are to attract them to the country."
Marianne Dahl Steensen, CEO of Microsoft Denmark, also welcomed the creation of a digital ambassador position, but did acknowledge that the company 'can hardly be equated with a nation'.
Should the UK introduce a digital ambassador?
By introducing a digital ambassador, Mr Samuelsen is taking a pragmatic approach to ensure Denmark is a key player in the international digital economy, as well as attempting to manage the impacts of an increasingly digital society.
Although appointing an ambassador for the technology sector poses philosophical and ethical questions, the UK should closely monitor how this new role develops and the potential benefits (and challenges) it brings for Denmark. In particular, if the new role is able to improve dialogue between technology companies and the security services on matters such as privacy, or help address the sector's need for digitally skilled workers, then maybe introducing a digital ambassador is something worth exploring.
Follow us on Twitter to see what developments in public and social policy are interesting our research team. If you found this article interesting, you may also like to read our other digital articles.


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The Story of Ray Markman – Part 9
by John Jonelis
I'm still alone in my office picking through my box of documents on Ray Markman when I come across this:
Ray's in Acapulco on vacation after he pulls off a tremendous success with his all-woman ad agency. He gets a call: 'You gotta come down here. Big meeting with Britannica.' He says he's not interested and hangs up. Britannica isn't his account.
Next day he gets another call. Different tone. 'You better get your ass back here.'
He says to his wife, 'Honey, I gotta go.' And it changes his life.
The Big Meeting
This Encyclopædia Britannica meeting drags on for a day and a half. The agency is showing 100 ads—big fat plan books. It's one of those all-out presentations his boss is fond of doing. He's already created the layouts practically ready to shoot. Lots of money tied up in it and any return is at the whim of the client. This is "bet the farm" for the agency. Remember, he owns stock in it.
Listening to the presentations and seeing the response, Ray knows something's wrong here. So he takes the clients to lunch—alone—separate from the agency people. Here's what they tell him: 'Your people missed it, Ray. We didn't need new creative, new marketing. Our top account guy left and they didn't even replace him.' So it was simple as that.
Ray says, 'I don't know your business but I know how to build a team and I plan on sticking around.'
They say, 'It's too late. Our president already told everybody your agency is fired. And your people are still making presentations.'
Ray figures Britannica must have 25 agencies pitching the business. He says, 'Stall as long as you can and you won't be sorry.'
And they do. And Ray saves the Britannica account for his agency.
Then he goes on to increase their business, just the way he did with the previous campaign.
But that doesn't mean Britannica is out of trouble.
The Big Shift
Ray leaves the agency to become VP of marketing at Encyclopædia Britannica. I don't find the reasons that drive him to make such a big move in my cardboard box of records. Maybe he just wants the chance to shake up a sleepy company. Maybe he's addicted to turnarounds.
Britannica's market share is slipping. World Book and others are eating into their sales. The Encyclopædia Britannica is the gold standard. It's huge, prestigious, and takes up a whole bookshelf. So what's the problem?
Ray does a lot of research and discovers that it isn't the best choice for a family because it's too hard for kids to understand. People buy it as furniture to show that they have it.
Turns out Britannica has a secret product called "Plan B" that's been cooking for years. Five thousand scholars from around the world create it. It costs 36 million dollars and they don't know how to market it.
So Ray grabs onto that and launches Brittanica III. It's divided into three parts.
- The Propaedia—The summation of all knowledge in the world in one volume.
- The Micropaedia—10 volumes, similar to the "World Book." Short, easy-to-read articles on every subject in the world.
- The Macropaedia—17 volumes of long scholarly articles—like the original Britannica.
Ray recognizes he needs three separate ad agencies to market it: A general agency to describe Britannica like you'd describe Tide. 'Tide's in, dirt's out.' Then two direct marketing agencies.
Finance says they can't afford that. But Ray says, 'Of course you can because I'm gonna buy these agencies in a way they've never been bought before— à la carte.' And he goes on to do something unique—he buys only the functions he wants and mixes them into a stew.
At one agency, he buys the creative department, not the media, research, or the rest. He works out a specialized fee schedule for all three agencies. This is outside the way advertising traditionally works, but they're okay with it because the money's still good.
Then he does something never done before. He gets the three agencies together and says, 'You guys are my team—we're all in business together. When you come to my conference room, you leave your egos outside the door because you're gonna work together. You're gonna make each other better and we all sink or swim together.'
With that, Ray re-writes advertising history.
And he creates a machine. Normally, if an agency beats its control ad by 10%, it's good. Ray's team runs 26 test ads against the control. They wind up with huge numbers—sometimes 100% better than the control. If an ad falls below 25% they ditch it. That's unheard of.
They produce 2 million leads a year.
Then they put out a "Book of the Year". It covers all the changes that happen that year. They make a science yearbook, a medical yearbook, and on and on.
Britannica goes from losing money to a billion dollar company.
It's clear to me that Ray is at his best starting something new or saving a faltering company. And if it means re-writing history, that's what he does.
Comment on this article — Name and email optional
Find Chicago Venture Magazine at www.ChicagoVentureMagazine.com Comments and re-posts are welcomed and encouraged. This is not investment advice – do your own due diligence. I cannot guarantee accuracy but I give you my best.
Copyright © 2012 John Jonelis – All Rights Reserved


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Historic Week for Company With Jet's Last Print Edition
The end of the print edition of Jet magazine this week is only one piece of history taking place at the parent Johnson Publishing Co. In assembling a new team for Ebony magazine, of which she is now editor, former Jet editor Mitzi Miller is proceeding without the last remaining editor to have worked with the company's late namesake, John H. Johnson.
Desirée Rogers, Johnson Publishing Co. CEO, confirmed that Margena A. Christian, Ebony senior editor, and Shirley Henderson, Ebony copy editor, are leaving the company. Others are reported to be departing as well. As all new editors do, "She's building the team," Rogers said of Miller.
Miller is bringing from Jet Wendy Wilson as managing editor, Deanna Martin-Osuagwu as copy chief and S. Tia Brown as entertainment editor.
Christian told Journal-isms by email, "During JPC's major reorganization in 2009, I was transitioned from Jet as a Features Editor to EBONY as a Senior Writer. . . . Prior to that time, I was an Assistant Editor and Associate Editor at Jet where I worked under the guidance of its pioneering publisher, John H. Johnson.
"I was the only editor still standing who worked with John H. Johnson. I was also the only editor in the company's history to have worked with EBONY, Jet, EBONY Man, EBONY South Africa, Ebony.com and Ebony Fashion Fair, where I wrote the history about the show. I was also the only person in the company's history to have earned a doctorate, completing a dissertation about John H. Johnson. I am proud of my accomplishments because I worked full time, worked two part-time adjunct English positions but still earned my doctorate in three years!!! I've been an adjunct English professor with the City Colleges of Chicago since 1997.
"So, what's next for me? After having my position eliminated due to budget cuts on May 30, I hit the ground running the following week. I delivered two presentations at Penn State during the Adult Education Research Conference and its African Diaspora Pre-Conference. I look forward to sharing my research with the world in a book.
"The world must never forget that a man named John H. Johnson walked this earth and believed in his people enough to tell all of our stories. He loved being Black and didn't mind saying it loud and being proud! Black is beautiful and John H. Johnson reminded us of this weekly and monthly. I am blessed to have known and worked with such a giant. I will continue teaching at the collegiate level, which is why I felt compelled to earn my doctorate. With my DocM.A.C.write Consulting, I've started editing work on dissertations and plan to do some freelance writing."
Johnson Publishing Co. announced last month that Jet, a staple in black homes, beauty parlors and barber shops since 1951, would end print publication at the end of June and become a digital magazine app. The final print edition went on sale on Monday.
Rogers said Jet sells about 85,000 or 90,000 copies on newsstands, about 20 or 30 percent of its circulation. The company did not print additional souvenir copies or have time to promote the final issue to gain additional advertisers. "We hope to have [fewer] of them returned," Rogers said by telephone.
In April, the company announced that Miller would move from the editor-in-chief's position at Jet to the same position at Ebony, meaning that Amy DuBois Barnett would be stepping down.
Rogers, who spoke by telephone, said that Miller's first Ebony issue, with Earvin "Magic" Johnson on the cover, was about to be released and that its look is different. She said there was more male-female "balance in the stories" and that different staff people were involved in its design. Some had begun to call Ebony a woman's magazine, but Rogers noted that 40 percent of its audience is male.
In 2010, the NBA Hall of Famer was reported to be in talks to buy Johnson Publishing, but Brett Pulley of Bloomberg News quoted Johnson then as saying an affiliate of his company couldn't come to an agreement, despite advanced talks.
Linda Johnson Rice, chairman and CEO, later declared that she had no plans to sell the company and hired her friend Rogers as CEO.
Tom Foremski, ZDNet: The media industry's 2nd Apocalypse: The rapid rise of mobile
Phil Yu wrote this Friday on Angry Asian Man, the blog of which he is founder, editor and primary blogger:"If Asians Said the Stuff White People Say"
"BOOM. Check out this short but sweet BuzzFeed video by my good friend Abe Forman-Greenwald: If Asians Said The Stuff White People Say, in which our pal Jenny Yang and Eugene Yang turn the tables and drop a volley of ignorant comments… about white people. My people, you've heard it all before: [video]
"Oh no they didn't! When you put it that way, hypothetically, those comments sound pretty ridiculous Well, guess what? The actual Asian version of those comments always sound ridiculous. To us. All the time."
Ezra Klein's Vox Hires Black Journalist as "Lead Editor"
Vox Media, one of the new journalism startups that has been criticized for lack of diversity, hired Lauren Williams, a black journalist who has worked at The Root and Mother Jones, as "lead editor," the publication tweeted on Monday.
Williams told Journal-isms that Ezra Klein, the former stalwart of the Washington Post's Wonkblog who founded Vox Media as a forum for explanatory journalism, "reached out to me about the position."
Williams said by email, "I'm really excited.
"As lead editor, my job will be to edit stories across subject platforms, establish and implement an efficient editorial process, facilitate daily copy flow, and work with senior editors on daily editorial planning.
"Ezra Klein reached out to me about the position. Mother Jones is a great place, but working at Vox was an opportunity I couldn't pass up! "
Williams has been story editor at Mother Jones since July. Before that, she was associate editor and deputy editor of The Root and lifestyle editor at AOL Black Voices.
The Racism Beat Can Wear a Writer Out
"For several years, I made my unofficial beat the stories, struggles, and politics of blacks in America," Cord Jefferson wrote Monday for medium.com. "I wrote about other things, also, but never with the same frequency or interest. I was pretty good at it, and, more than that, I enjoyed it. Eventually, people began to assume that I'd comment when a particular kind of news story bubbled up — generally one about something bad happening to a black person — and I often times would.
"I wasn't surprised when a website I liked asked me to write about the case of a white man of little note in New Hampshire calling a hugely powerful black man a 'nigger.' But then I realized I didn't have anything to say.
"Or maybe it wasn't that I didn't have anything to say. Maybe it was the realization that writing anything would be to listlessly participate in the carousel ride: an inciting incident, 1,000 angry thinkpieces, 1,000 tweeted links, and back to where we started, until next time. Perhaps it was a feeling that writing anything would finally be too redundant to bear, a pursuit of too many sad and obvious words to heap onto so many other nearly identical words written down before, by me, by thousands of others.
Jefferson also wrote, "I think about race and racism every day of my life. How can any American not? (James Baldwin once proffered the idea that 'the Negro-in-America is increasingly the central problem in American life.') I anticipate that I'll always write about race and racism in some professional capacity. Still, wouldn't it be wonderful if writers and creatives on the periphery were welcomed in from anonymity, not thanks to their accounts of woe, but simply because they have things to share — tales of love, joy, happiness, and basic humanity — that have nothing to do with their race and also everything to do with their race.
"I'm ready for people in positions of power at magazines and newspapers and movie studios to recalibrate their understanding of what it means to talk about race in the first place. If America would like to express that it truly values and appreciates the voices of its minorities, it will listen to all their stories, not just the ones reacting to its shortcomings and brutality.
"If this doesn't eventually happen, I wonder how many more writers of color will come to the conclusion, as my colleague did, that this life we've made for ourselves is unsustainable. How many essays can go up before fatigue becomes anger becomes insanity? How many op-ed columns before you can feel the gruesomeness of trying to defend another dead black kid slowly hollowing you out? How many different ways can you find to say that you're a human being? . . ." . . ."
Jarvis DeBerry, NOLA.com | the Times-Picayune: Stop pretending that the 'n-word' doesn't refer to black people
U.S. Financing New TV Channel to Combat Nigerian Radicals
"The State Department is financing a new 24-hour satellite television channel in the turbulent northern region of Nigeria that American officials say is crucial to countering the extremism of radical groups such as Boko Haram," Ron Nixon wrote Friday for the New York Times. "The move signals a ramping up of American counterinsurgency efforts to directly challenge the terrorist group, which abducted nearly 300 Nigerian schoolgirls in April.
"State Department officials acknowledged that setting up an American-supported channel could prove challenging in a region where massacres, bombings and shootings by Boko Haram are common, and where the American government and Western educational programs are far from popular. The group has been known to attack media organizations in Nigeria.
"The new television channel, to be called Arewa24 — arewa means north in the Hausa language — is financed by the State Department's Bureau of Counterterrorism, and it is expected to cost about $6 million. State Department officials would discuss the program only on the condition of anonymity, and offered sparse information about it. But details have emerged in publicly available contracting documents and in interviews with people familiar with the effort. . . ."
"The prisoner exchange that freed U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl from the Taliban in Afghanistan gets a more negative than positive reaction from the public," the Pew Research Center reported on Monday.Reactions to Bergdahl Case Divided Along Partisan Lines
"Overall, 43% say it was the wrong thing for the Obama administration to exchange five Taliban prisoners for captive soldier Bergdahl, while fewer (34%) say it was the right thing to do; 23% do not offer an opinion.
"The new national survey by the Pew Research Center and USA TODAY, conducted June 5-8 among 1,004 adults, finds that while this specific prisoner exchange is viewed negatively on balance, most think the U.S. has a responsibility to do all it can to free captive U.S. soldiers in general, regardless of the circumstances of their capture.
"Overall, 56% say the U.S. has a responsibility to do all it can to return an American captive soldier, no matter what the circumstances; 29% say that because Bergdahl left his post, the U.S. was not obligated to do all it could to secure his release.
"Reactions to the Bergdahl case are deeply divided along partisan lines. Fully 71% of Republicans think the prisoner exchange was the wrong thing to do, while just 16% say it was the right thing to do. Democrats, by more than two-to-one (55% to 24%), have a positive opinion of the agreement. . . ."
David A. Love, the Grio: Bowe Bergdahl: Guilt by association with Obama
Tony Norman, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Bergdahl case unleashes all the hypocrites
Clarence Page, Chicago Tribune: What matters most is bringing the GI home
Eugene Robinson, Washington Post: Six points concerning Bowe Bergdahl
Noah Rothman, mediaite.com: Susan Rice Scolds Media for Trying Bergdahl in 'Court of Public Opinion'
Bob Ray Sanders, Star-Telegram, Fort Worth, Texas: A soldier's story still in search of an ending
Chuck Arnold, Music Critic for People, Exits
Chuck Arnold, music critic for People magazine for 13 years, is leaving to "explore opportunities elsewhere," he told Journal-isms on Monday.
"I left voluntarily. It was my decision," Arnold said by email. "I was at People for 17 years. I was the music critic there for 13 years. I decided to leave and explore opportunities elsewhere, but I plan to stay in the music mix, whatever comes next…I'm 43. Before People, I worked at YM magazine and the Philadelphia Daily News."
Asked what he would like to be remembered for at People, Arnold replied, "Being the music critic for 13 years!"
Meanwhile, Time Inc., which includes People among its stable of magazines, began trading Monday as an independent company. David Carr and Ravi Somaiya reported Sunday for the New York Times, "According to two people with knowledge of the strategy, leaders at the company met with editors of Time Inc. publications last week and told them they were expected to make deep cuts in staffing and other areas — totaling 25 percent of editorial costs — in the coming months. . . ."
Time Inc. publications also include Essence magazine and People en Español.
Office of FCC's Clyburn Was Catalyst for Black Ownership Deal
The office of Mignon Clyburn, a commissioner of the Federal Communications Commission, played a role in linking Nexstar Broadcasting Group, Inc., with black media entrepreneur Pluria Marshall Jr. The two parties announced on Friday that Nexstar had agreed to sell Marshall's company three television stations.
Responding to a question about how Nexstar found him, Marshall told Journal-isms by email, "Commissioner Clyburn's office made several recommendations on possible individuals to work with."
Clyburn messaged Journal-isms, however, that "I personally did not make any recommendations." Adonis E. Hoffman, Clyburn's chief of staff and senior legal adviser, said by telephone that Nexstar representatives came to lobby him in March on the controversial issue of joint services agreements, under which one station provides services, such as advertising sales, to another. The FCC was moving to ban such arrangements.
On the way out of the meeting, a Nexstar representative said the company would be interested in finding a minority buyer. Hoffman mentioned Marshall and an Atlanta business. "It was as casual as that," he said. The representatives were familiar with Marshall. Nexstar followed up.
Marshall was asked about an assertion that Nexstar chose a black-owned company as a way to operate three of its stations under thinly disguised shared-services or "sidecar" agreements, under which one station provides services, such as advertising sales, to another. The FCC last month voted 3-2 for the ban but made an exception if the arrangement furthered diversity.
"When the newly invigorated FCC stepped in and threatened to swat the deals down, Nexstar got creative and recruited black media entrepreneur Pluria Marshall Jr. as a 'black beard,' " the subscription-only NewsBlues site asserted on Monday. "Pluria Marshall Jr. will front the three stations in name only, and Nexstar will finance the $58.5 million sale with its own money."
Marshall replied in his email, "You obviously don't know me. I am a seasoned media executive and hands on manager. I run everything I own, always have. The sidecar transactions of the past have been derailed by Chairman [Tom] Wheeler. Our transaction is totally different in form and scope."
The National Association of Black Owned Broadcasters said Monday that it had questions about the deal, but that it approved.
Jim Winston, NABOB executive director, said in a statement, "This is the type of transaction NABOB was hoping to see as a result of the new JSA [joint services agreement] rule. Pluria Marshall, Jr. is the type of person, with a long history in radio station ownership and operation, who has the potential to become a successful television station owner and operator. This appears to be the kind of transaction that should receive a waiver of the rule."
The stations involved, all FOX-affiliated, are KMSS-TV in Shreveport, La.; KPEJ-TV in Odessa, Texas; and KLJB-TV in Davenport, Iowa. As president and chief executive officer of Equal Access Media Inc., Marshall owns several newspapers serving African American and minority communities, including the Houston Informer, Texas Freeman, the Los Angeles Wave Newspaper Group and the Los Angeles Independent Publications Group.
If the deal is approved, it would nearly double the tiny number of black-owned, full-power commercial television stations.
Meanwhile, Jessica J. Gonzalez, executive vice president and general counsel of the National Hispanic Media Coalition, is listed among the witnesses to testify Wednesday before a House Communications and Technology Subcommittee hearing on "Media Ownership in the 21st Century."
"Hispanic moviegoers are the most important audience in the United States, according to a diverse panel of experts who spoke Sunday at the Produced By Conference in Los Angeles," Lucas Shaw reported Sunday for the Wrap. "They go to the movies more often and in larger groups, they spend more at concession stands and they talk about movies more on social media, panelists said. . . ."
"Calling it a change in strategy, impreMedia has stopped publishing the print edition of its Texas weekly Rumbo," Veronica Villafañe reported Monday on her Media Moves site. "The company quietly acknowledged to its employees via email just this past Friday, June 6, that the final run of the Houston-based paper was a week earlier — Friday, May 30th. . . .
"Sundra Hominik, an experienced journalist and editor, will be joining GateHouse Media Delaware as its new executive editor, effective June 23," the Sussex Countian in Georgetown, Del., reported on Thursday. It also said, "GateHouse Media Delaware publishes the twice-weekly Dover Post, along with weeklies that include the Hockessin Community News, Middletown Transcript, Smyrna/Clayton Sun Times, Milford Beacon, and Sussex Countian.
"An Ethiopian journalist branded a 'terrorist' and currently serving an 18-year prison sentence has been awarded the 2014 Golden Pen of Freedom," William Turvill wrote Monday for Britain's Press Gazette. "Eskinder Nega . . . has been jailed on at least seven occasions in his country. On the latest occasion, he was locked up for challenging the laws used against him and speculating that the Arab Spring uprisings could be repeated in Ethiopia. He wrote on these subjects despite already having had his journalism 'licence' taken away from him. . . ." Turvill also wrote, "The award, from the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA), was presented today in Turin, Italy, during the opening ceremonies of the 66th World Newspaper Congress, 21st World Editors Forum and the 24th World Advertising Forum. . . ."
"Stanton Tang succeeded in his desire to move west," Rick Gevers reported Saturday for his weekly television newsletter, referring to KOLO-TV in Reno, Nev. "We told you a few months ago that Stanton was leaving his job as ND of WZZM-TV in Grand Rapids, MI, so he could move west to be closer to family. He served four years as ND in Grand Rapids, and five years before that as EP. He's also worked in Las Vegas, Sacramento and Phoenix. He replaces JENNIFER HARDY who left to become ND at WAAY-TV in Huntsville. Stanton will be the eighth ND in 12 years for this Gray TV owned ABC affiliate."
"CNBC anchor Carl Quintanilla will join HBO's Emmy-winning Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel," Marisa Guthrie reported Monday for the Hollywood Reporter. "The announcement came Monday from HBO and Gumbel." She also wrote, "Quintanilla's role at CNBC will not change; he'll continue to anchor weekday programs Squawk on the Street and Squawk Alley. . . "
"After four years on the sidelines, I am happy to announce that I am back in the broadcast news game!" Mike Woolfolk wrote Sunday to his Facebook followers. "I just completed my first weekend as a reporter for WXYZ-TV in Detroit. I grew up watching 7 Action News and it is truly a dream come true to have the chance to work at that station in my hometown.. . ." (video) Woolfolk left WACH-TV in Columbia, S.C., where he was an anchor, in 2010.
"A million Latinos living in the Washington, D.C., area can watch a half-hour news/public affairs show tailored just for them. In Spanish and/or English," Paul Greeley reported Monday for TVNewsCheck. "The show is called Hispanic Agenda in English, Agenda in Spanish, and is Washington's only bilingual news program. Recorded weekly at WJLA, the ABC affiliate, Agenda airs entirely in English on Washington's NewsChannel 8 cable channel (co-owned with WJLA), and then entirely in Spanish on Telemundo affil WZDC. The program features bilingual anchor Alejandro Negron, as well as a team of bilingual reporters from WJLA and WZDC, and all guests and panelists are also bilingual. . . ."
"Journalist Adam Baron was deported from Yemen in early May, after being told that he was no longer welcome in the country," Cora Currier reported Wednesday for Columbia Journalism Review. "His departure was bemoaned and protested by commentators and journalists in the US and Yemen who appreciated and depended on his regular coverage for McClatchy, the Christian Science Monitor, and others. The only American with a journalism visa, Baron covered drone strikes and counterterrorism as well as Yemen's complex internal political situation in the years since its Arab Spring uprising. Not long after he left, another foreign journalist, Iona Craig, who writes for the Times of London and elsewhere, decided to leave, 'of my own accord,' she wrote. . . .
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Journal-isms is published on the site of the Maynard Institute for Journalism Education (mije.org). Reprinted on The Root by permission.


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§85. Enlarged Conception of the Church. Augustin, Wiclif, Hus, Luther.
Köstlin: Luthers Lehre von der Kirche. Stuttgart, 1853. Comp. his Luthers Theologie in ihrer geschichtl. Entwicklung, II. 534 sqq.; and his Martin Luther, bk. VI. ch. iii. (II. 23 sqq.). Joh. Gottschick: Hus', Luther's und Zwingli's Lehre von der Kirche, in Brieger's "Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte." Bd. VIII., Gotha, 1886, pp. 345 sqq. and 543 sqq. (Very elaborate, but he ought to have gone back to Wiclif and Augustin. Hus merely repeated Wiclif.)
Comp. also on the general subject Münchmeyer: Das Dogma von der sichtbaren und unsichtbaren Kirche, 1854. Ritschl: Ueber die Begriffe sichtbare und unsichtbare Kirche, in the "Studien und Kritiken" for 1859. Jul. Müller: Die unsichtbare Kirche, in his "Dogmatische Abhandlungen." Bremen, 1870, pp. 278–403 (an able defense of the idea of the invisible church against Rothe, Münchmeyer, and others who oppose the term invisible as inapplicable to the church. See especially Rothe's Anfänge der christl. Kirche, 1837, vol. I. 99 sqq.). Alfred Krauss: Das protestantische Dogma von der unsichtbaren Kirche, Gotha, 1876. Seeberg: Der Begriff der christlichen Kirche, Part I., 1885. James S. Candlish: The Kingdom of God. Edinburgh, 1884.
Separation from Rome led to a more spiritual and more liberal conception of the church, and to a distinction between the one universal church of the elect children of God of all ages and countries, under the sole headship of Christ, and the several visible church organizations of all nominal Christians. We must trace the gradual growth of this distinction.
In the New Testament the term ejkklhsiva (a popular assembly, congregation) is used in two senses (when applied to religion): 1, in the general sense of the whole body of Christian believers (by our Lord, Matt. 16:18); and 2, in the particular sense of a local congregation of Christians (also by our Lord, Matt. 18:17). We use the equivalent term "church" (from kuriakovn, belonging to the Lord) in two additional senses: of a denomination (e.g., the Greek, the Roman, the Anglican, the Lutheran Church), and of a church edifice. The word ejkklhsiva occurs only twice in the Gospels (in Matthew), but very often in the Acts and Epistles; while the terms "kingdom of God" and "kingdom of heaven" are used very often in the Gospels, but rarely in the other books. This indicates a difference. The kingdom of God precedes the institution of the church, and will outlast it. The kingdom has come, is constantly coming, and will come in glory. It includes the government of God, and all the religious and moral activities of man. The visible church is a training-school for the kingdom. In many instances the terms may be interchanged, while in others we could not substitute the church for the kingdom without impropriety: e.g., in the phrase "of such is the kingdom of heaven" (Matt. 5:3; Mark 10:14); or, "thy kingdom come" (Matt. 6:10) or, "the kingdom of God cometh not with observation, ... the kingdom of God is within you" (Luke 17:20, 21) or, "to inherit the kingdom" (Matt. 25:34; 1 Cor. 6:10; 15:30; Gal. 5:21); or, "the kingdom of God is not meat and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Ghost." A distinction between nominal and real, or outward and inward, membership of the church, is indicated in the words of our Lord, "Many are called, but few are chosen" (Matt. 22:14), and by Paul when be speaks of a circumcision of the flesh and a circumcision of the heart (Rom. 2:28, 29). Here is the germ of the doctrine of the visible and invisible church.
The Apostles' and Nicene Creeds include the holy catholic church and the communion of saints among the articles of faith,676676 Yet not in the strict and deeper sense in which the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are articles of (saving) faith; hence the preposition εἰς, in, is omitted before ecclesiam, and the following articles, at least in the Latin forms (the Greek Nicene Creed has εἰς). and do not limit them by the Greek, Roman, or any other nationality or age. "Catholic" means universal, and is as wide as humanity. It indicates the capacity and aim of the church; but the actualization of this universalness is a process of time, and it will not be completed till the whole world is converted to Christ.677677 The term "catholic" (καθολικός, from κατὰand ὅλος, whole, entire, complete) does not occur in the New Testament (for the inscrip-tions of the Epistles of James, Peter, John, and Jude, ἐπιστολαὶ καθολικαί, or simply καθολικαί, are no part of the apostolic text, but added by transcribers), and is first used as an epithet of the Church by Ignatius of Antioch, the enthusiast for episcopacy and martyrdom (Ad Smyrn., c. 8), and in the Martyrium of Polycarp (in Eusebius, II. E., IV. 14). It was applied also to faith, tradition, people, and became equivalent with Christian, in distinction from Jews, idolaters, heretics, and schismatics.
The mediaeval schoolmen distinguished three stages in the catholic church as to its locality,—the militant church on earth (ecclesia militans), the church of the departed or the sleeping church in purgatory (ecclesia dormiens), and the triumphant church in heaven (ecclesia triumphans). This classification was retained by Wiclif, Hus, and other forerunners of Protestantism; but the Reformers rejected the intervening purgatorial church, together with prayers for the departed, and included all the pious dead in the church triumphant.
In the militant church on earth, Augustin made an important distinction between "the true body of Christ" (corpus Christi verum), and "the mixed body of Christ" (corpus Christi mixtum or simulatum). He substitutes this for the less suitable designation of a "twofold body of Christ" (corpus Domini bipartitum), as taught by Tichonius, the Donatist grammarian (who referred to Cant. 1:5). These two bodies are in this world externally in one communion, as the good and bad fish are in one net, but they will ultimately be separated.678678 De Doctr. Christ., III. 32 (in Schaff's "Nicene and Post-Nicene Library;" Works of St. Augustin, vol. II. 509). To the true or pure church belong all the elect, and these only, whether already in the Catholic Church, or outside of it, yet predestinated for it. "Many," he says, "who are openly outside, and are called heretics, are better than many good Catholics; for we see what they are to-day; what they shall be to-morrow, we know not; and with God, to whom the future is already present, they already are what they shall be hereafter."679679 De Bapt. contra Donat., IV. 5. For a fuller exposition of his doctrine of the church, see his Donatist writings, and Reuter's Augustin. Studien (1887). On the other hand, hypocrites are in the church, but not of the church.
It should be added, however, that Augustin confined the true church on earth to the limits of the visible, orthodox, catholic body of his day, and excluded all heretics,—Manichaeans, Pelagians, Arians, etc.,—and schismatics,—Donatists, etc.,—as long as they remain outside of fellowship with that body. In explaining the article "the holy church," in his version of the Creed (which omits the epithet "catholic," and the additional clause "the communion of saints"), he says that this surely means, the Catholic Church;" and adds, "Both heretics and schismatics style their congregations churches. But heretics in holding false opinions regarding God do injury to the faith itself; while schismatics, on the other hand, in wicked separations break off from brotherly charity, although they may believe just what we believe. Wherefore, neither do the heretics belong to the Church Catholic, which loves God; nor do the schismatics form a part of the same, inasmuch as it loves the neighbor, and consequently readily forgives the neigbbor's sin."680680 De Fide et Symbolo, c. 10 (in Schaff's ed., III. 331). It is well known that this great and good man even defended the principle of forcible coercion of schismatics, on a false interpretation of Luke 14:23, "Constrain them to come in."
In the ninth century the visible Catholic Church was divided into two rival Catholic churches,—the patriarchal church in the East, and the papal church in the West. The former denied the papal claim of universal jurisdiction and headship, as an anti-Christian usurpation; the latter identified the Church Catholic with the dominion of the papacy, and condemned the Greek Church as schismatical. Hereafter, in Western Christendom, the Holy Catholic Church came to mean the Holy Roman Church.
The tyranny and corruptions of the papacy called forth the vigorous protest of Wiclif, who revived the Augustinian distinction between the true church and the mixed church, but gave it an anti-Roman and anti-papal turn (which Augustin did not). He defined the true church to be the congregation of the predestinated, or elect, who will ultimately be saved.681681 Tractatus de Ecclesia, c. I., "congregatio omnium praedestinatorum ... Illa est sponsa Christl ... Jerusalem mater nostra, templum Domini, regnum coelorum et civitas regni magni." Then he quotes the distinction made by Augustin, to whom he refers throughout the book more frequent-ly than to all other fathers combined. This important tract was recently published for the first time from three MSS. in Vienna and Prague by the "Wyclif Society," and edited by Dr. Johann Loserth (professor of history in the University of Czernowitz), London (Trübner & Co.), 1886, 600 pp. But the same view of the church is taught in other books of Wiclif, and correctly stated by Dr. Lechler in his Joh. von Wiclif, Leipz., 1873, vol. I. 541 sqq. Nobody can become a member of this church except by God's predestination, which is the eternal foundation of the church, and determines its membership. No one who is rejected from eternity (praescitus, foreknown, as distinct from praedestinatus, foreordained) can be a member of this church. He may be in it, but he is not of it. As there is much in the human body which is no part of it, so there may be hypocrites in the church who will finally be removed. There is but one universal church, out of which there is no salvation. The only Head of this church is Christ; for a church with two heads would be a monster. The apostles declared themselves to be servants of this Head. The Pope is only the head of a part of the church militant, and this only if he lives in harmony with the commandments of Christ. This conception of the church excludes all hypocrites and bad members, though they be bishops or popes; and it includes all true Christians, whether Catholics, or schismatics, or heretics. It coincides with the Protestant idea of the invisible church. But Wiclif and Hus denied the certainty of salvation, as taught afterwards by Calvinists, and herein they agreed with the Catholics; they held that one may be sure of his present state of grace, but that his final salvation depends upon his perseverance, which cannot be known before the end.
Wiclif's view of the true church was literally adopted by the Bohemian Reformer Hus, who depended for his theology on the English Reformer much more than was formerly known.682682 The close affinity has recently been shown by Joh. Loserth, Hus und Wiclif; zur Genesis der hussitischen Lehre (Prag and Leipz., l884), and is especially apparent from a comparison of Wiclif's and Hus's treatises De Ecclesia. Wiclif's book exerted little influence in England, but became known in Bohemia in 1407 or before, and the reproduction of it by Hus created a great sensation. The arrangement, the ideas, and arguments of the two books are the same, and often the very language. Comp. Loserth's Introduction to Wiclif's De Ecclesia. From Hus it passed to Luther, Zwingli, and Calvin, who agreed in denying the claims of the papacy to exclusive catholicity, and in widening the limits of the church so as to include all true believers in Christ. But they distinguished more clearly between the invisible and visible church, or rather between one true invisible church and several mixed visible churches.683683 Luther first used the term "invisible." Zwingli first added the term "visible" in his Expositio christianae. fidei (1531): "Credimus et unam sanctam esse catholicam, h.e. universalem ecclesiam. Eam autem esse aut visibilem aut invisibilem." Zwingli was the only one among the Reformers who included the elect heathen in the invisible church. The clearest symbolical statement of the Protestant doctrine of the invisible and visible church is given in the Westminster Confession, ch. xxv. (Schaff's Creeds of Christendom, III. 657). The invisible church is within the visible church as the soul is in the body, and the kernel in the shell. It is not a Utopian dream or Platonic commonwealth, but most real and historical. The term, "invisible" was chosen because the operations of the Holy Spirit are internal and invisible, and because nobody in this life can be surely known to belong to the number of the elect, while membership of the visible church is recognizable by baptism and profession.
Important questions were raised with this distinction for future settlement. Some eminent modern Protestant divines object to the term "invisible church," as involving a contradiction, inasmuch as the church is essentially a visible institution; but they admit the underlying truth of an invisible, spiritual communion of believers scattered throughout the world.684684 Rothe (Anfänge der christl. Kirche, I. p. 101) says that the idea of a moral and spiritual union and communion of all believers in Christ, or of the communion of saints, is in the highest sense real (ist nach unsrer innigsten Ueberzeugung eine im höchsten Sinne reale), but cannot be called a church. He resolves and dissolves the church ultimately into the kingdom of God, which he identifies with the ideal state. As Protestantism has since divided and subdivided into a number of denominations and separate organizations, the idea of the church needs to be further expanded. We must recognize a number of visible churches, Greek, Latin, Lutheran, Reformed, Anglican, and all the more recent Christian denominations which acknowledge Christ as their Head, and his teaching and example as their rule of faith and duty. The idea of denominations or confessions, as applied to churches, is of modern date; but is, after all, only an expansion of the idea of a particular church, or a contraction of the idea of the universal church, and therefore authorized by the double Scripture usage of ecclesia. The denominational conception lies between the catholic and the local conception. The one invisible church is found in all visible denominations and congregations as far as true Christianity extends. Another distinction should also be made between the church, and the kingdom of God, which is a more spiritual and more comprehensive idea than even this invisible catholic church, although very closely allied to it, and usually identified with it. But we cannot anticipate modern discussions. The Reformers were concerned first of all to settle their relation to the Roman Church as they found it, and to reconcile the idea of a truly catholic church which they could not and would not sacrifice, with the corruptions of the papacy on the one hand, and with their separation from it on the other.
Luther received a copy of Hus's treatise De Ecclesia from Prague in 1519.685685 Under the date of Oct. 3, 1519, he informed Staupitz that he had received from Prague letters of two priests, "una cum libello Joannis Hus." De Wette, I. 341. An edition of the Tractatus de Ecclesia was published at Mainz and Hagenau in 1520. He was driven to a defense of the Bohemian martyr in the disputation at Leipzig, and ventured to assert that Hus was unjustly condemned by the Council of Constance for holding doctrines derived from Augustin and Paul. Among these was his definition of the universal church as the totality of the elect (universitas praedestinatorum).
Luther developed this idea in his own way, and modified it in application to the visible church. He started from the article of the Creed, "I believe in the holy catholic church," but identified this article with the "communion of saints," as a definition of the catholic church.686686 This identification may be questioned. The holy catholic church corresponds rather to the church visible, the communion of saints to the church invisible. The communion of saints means that inward and spiritual fellowship of true believers on earth and in heaven which is based on their union with Christ. It is their fellowship with God the Father, the Son, and the Spirit (Comp. 1 John 1:3; 1 Cor. 1:9; Phil. 2:1), and with each other, a fellowship not broken by death, but extending to the saints above. A most precious idea.
"The saints in heaven and on earth
But one communion make;
All join In Christ, their living Head,
And of his grace partake."
The article of the communio sanctorum (as well as the epithet catholica) is a later insertion, and not found in the creeds before the fifth century. See Schaff, Creeds of Christendom, I. 22 and II. 52. The oldest commentators understood it of the communion with the saints in heaven. According to the Catechism of the Council of Trent, it means "a community of spiritual blessings," especially the sacraments enjoyed in the Catholic Church. A more comprehensive and satisfactory exposition is given by Pearson on the Creed, Art. IX., and in the Westminster Confession, Ch. XXVI. He explained the communion (Gemeinschaft) to mean the community or congregation (Gemeinde) of saints. He also substituted, in his Catechism, the word "Christian" for "catholic," in order to include in it all believers in Christ. Hence the term "catholic" became, or remained, identical in Germany with "Roman Catholic" or "papal;"687687 The German proverb, ."Das ist um katholisch zu werden" (This is to turn Catholic), describes a condition of things that drives one to desperation or madness. while the English Protestant churches very properly retained the word "catholic" in, its true original sense of "universal," which admits of no sectarian limitation. The Romanists have no claim to the exclusive use of that title; they are too sectarian and exclusive to be truly catholic.
Luther held that the holy church in its relation to God is an article of faith, not of sight, and therefore invisible.688688 In his second Commentary on the Galatians (Erl. ed., III. 38): "Recte igitur fatemur in symbolo, nos credere ecclesiam sanctam. Est enim invisibilis, habitans in Spiritu, in loco inaccessibili, ideo non potest videri ejus sanctitas." But as existing among men the true church is visible, and can be recognized by the right preaching of the gospel or the purity of doctrine, and by the right administration of the sacraments (i.e., baptism and the Lord's Supper). These are the two essential marks of a pure church. The first he emphasized against the Romanists, the second against what he called Enthusiasts (Schwarmgeister) and Sacramentarians (in the sense of anti-sacramentarians).
His theory acquired symbolical authority through the Augsburg Confession, which defines the church to be "the congregation of saints in which the gospel is rightly taught, and the sacraments are rightly administered."689689 Art. VII., "Est autem ecclesia congregatio sanctorum [Germ. ed., Versammlung aller Gläubigen], in qua evangelium recte [rein] docetur, et recte [laut des Evangelii] administrantur sacramenta." Comp. the Apol. Conf., Art. VII. and VIII. The same definition is substantially given in the Anglican Art. XIX. It would exclude the Quakers, who reject the external sacraments, yet are undoubted believers in Christ. The Calvinistic Confessions (e.g., Conf. Belgica, Art. XXIX.) and characteristically to those two marks a third one, the exercise of discipline In punishing sin. Worship and discipline, rites and ceremonies, are made secondary or indifferent, and reckoned with human traditions which may change from time to time. The church has no right to impose what is not commanded in the Word of God. In such things everybody is his own pope and church. The Lutheran Confession has always laid great—we may say too great—stress on the unity of doctrine, and little, too little, stress on discipline. And yet in no other evangelical denomination is there such a diversity of theological opinions, from the strict orthodoxy of the Formula Concordiae to every form and degree of Rationalism.
How far, we must ask here, did Luther recognize the dominion of the papacy as a part of the true catholic church? He did not look upon the Pope in the historical and legal light as the legitimate head of the Roman Church; but he fought him to the end of his life as the antagonist of the gospel, as the veritable Antichrist, and the papacy as an apostasy. He could not have otherwise justified his separation, and the burning of the papal bull and law-books. He assumed a position to the Pope and his church similar to that of the apostles to Caiaphas and the synagogue. Nevertheless, whether consistently or not, he never doubted the validity of the ordinances of the Roman Church, having himself been baptized, confirmed, and ordained in it, and he never dreamed of being re-baptized or re-ordained. Those millions of Protestants who seceded in the sixteenth century were of the same opinion, with the sole exception of the Anabaptists who objected to infant-baptism, partly on the ground that it was an invention of the popish Antichrist, and therefore invalid.
Nor did Luther or any of the Reformers and sensible Protestants doubt that there always were and are still many true Christians in the Roman communion, notwithstanding all her errors and corruptions, as there were true lsraelites even in the darkest periods of the Jewish theocracy. In his controversy with the Anabaptists (1528), Luther makes the striking admission: "We confess that under the papacy there is much Christianity, yea, the whole Christianity, and has from thence come to us. We confess that the papacy possesses the genuine Scriptures, genuine baptism, the genuine sacrament of the altar, the genuine keys for the remission of sins, the true ministry, the true catechism, the Ten Commandments, the articles of the Creed, the Lord's Prayer. … I say that under the Pope is the true Christendom, yea, the very élite of Christendom, and many pious and great saints."690690 "Ich sage, dass unter dem Papst die rechte Christenheit ist, ja der rechte Ausbund der Christenheit, und viel frommer, grosser Heiligen." (Von der Wiedertaufe, Erl. ed. XXVI. 257 sq.) The Roman Catholic Möhler does not fail to quote this passage in his Symbolik, p. 422 sq. He says of Luther's conception of the church (p. 424), that it is not false, but only one-sided (nicht falsch, obgleich einseitig). He virtually admits the Protestant distinction between the visible and the invisible church, but holds that the Catholics put the visible church first as the basis of the invisible, while the Protestants reverse the order.
For proof he refers, strangely enough, to the very passage of Paul, 2 Thess. 2:3, 4, from which he and other Reformers derived their chief argument that the Pope of Rome is Antichrist, "the man of sin," "the son of perdition." For Paul represents him as sitting "in the temple of God;" that is, in the true church, and not in the synagogue of Satan. As the Pope is Antichrist, he must be among Christians, and rule and tyrannize over Christians.691691 Ibid. p. 258. Critical commentators have long since abandoned this interpretation. Whatever be the wider applicability of this passage, Paul certainly meant a "mystery of lawlessness" (not tyranny) already at work in his time (ἤδη ἐνεργεῖται, 2 Thess. 2:7), long before popery existed, or before there was even a bishop of Rome (unless it be Peter). Moreover, "lawlessness," which is the proper translation of ἀνομία, is not characteristic of popery, but the very opposite. If Paul refers to Rome at all, it is rather as a "restraining" force, τὸ κατέχον, vers. 6, 7 (Comp. Rom. 13:1). The term "Antichrist" occurs only in the Epistles of John, and he speaks of "many Antichrists" in his own day. In a wider sense all is antichristian that is contrary to the spirit and aim of Christ in any church or any age. Melanchthon, who otherwise had greater respect for the Pope and the Roman Church, repeatedly expressed the same view.692692 In his Judicium de Jure reformandi, 1525 ("Corp. Ref." I. 767): "It is written that the Antichrist will have a great and powerful reign in the last times, as Paul says, Antichrist will be seated and rule in the temple of God, that is, in the church." And again in the "Apology of the Augsburg Confession" (1530), arts. VII. and VIII. (Müller's ed., p. 152): "Paulus praedicat futurum, ut Antichristus sedeat in templo Dei, hoc est, in ecclesia dominetur et gerat officia." Luther came nearer the true position when he said that the Roman Church might be called a "holy church," by synecdoche or ex parte, with the same restriction with which Paul called the Galatian Christians "churches," notwithstanding their apostasy from the true gospel.693693 Com. in Ep. ad Gal. (Erl. ed., 1. 40 sq.): "Paulus vocat ecclesia Galatiae per synecdochen ... Sie et nos hodie vocamus ecclesiam romanam sanctam et omnes episcopatus sanctos, etiamsi sint subversi et episcopi et ministri eorum impii. Deus enim regnat in medio inimicorum suorum; item, Antichristus sedet in templo Dei, et Satan adest in medio filiorum Dei … Manet in romana urbe quamquam Sodoma et Gomorra pejore baptismus, sacramentum, vox et textus evangelii, sacra scriptura, ministeria, nomen Christi, nomen Dei."
He combined with the boldest independence a strong reverence for the historical faith. He derives from the unbroken tradition of the church an argument against the Zwinglians for the real presence in the eucharist; and says, in a letter to Albrecht, Margrave of Brandenburg and Duke of Prussia (April, 1532, after Zwingli's death): "The testimony of the entire holy Christian church (even without any other proof) should be sufficient for us to abide by this article, and to listen to no sectaries against it. For it is dangerous and terrible (gefährlich und erschrecklich) to hear or believe any thing against the unanimous testimony, faith, and doctrine of the entire holy Christian church as held from the beginning for now over fifteen hundred years in all the world. … To deny such testimony is virtually to condemn not only the holy Christian church as a damned heretic, but even Christ himself, with all his apostles and prophets, who have founded this article, 'I believe a holy Christian church,' as solemnly affirmed by Christ when he promised, 'Behold, I am with you all the days, even to the end of the world' (Matt. 28:20), and by St. Paul when he says, 'The church of God is the pillar and ground of the truth' (1 Tim. 3:15)."694694 De Wette, Briefe, IV. 354.
A Roman controversialist could not lay more stress on tradition than Luther does in this passage. But tradition, at least from the sixth to the sixteenth century, strongly favors the belief in transubstantiation, and the sacrifice of the mass, both of which he rejected. And if the same test should be applied to his doctrine of solifidian justification, it would be difficult to support it by patristic or scholastic tradition, which makes no distinction between justification and sanctification, and lays as much stress on good works as on faith. He felt it himself, that on this vital point, not even Augustin was on his side. His doctrine can be vindicated only as a new interpretation of St. Paul in advance of the previous understanding.
Calvin, if we may here anticipate his views as expounded in the first chapters of the fourth book of his "Institutes of the Christian Religion," likewise clearly distinguishes between the visible and invisible church,695695 Lib. IV., c. i., §§ 4 and 7. He speaks most eloquently of the ecclesia visibilis, as our mother in whose womb we are conceived to enter into spiritual life. and in the visible church again between the true evangelical church and the false papal church, which he assails as unmercifully as Luther; yet he also admits that the Roman communion, notwithstanding the antichristian character of the papacy, yea, for the very reason that Antichrist sits "in the temple of God," remains a church with the Scriptures and valid Christian ordinances.696696 Lib. IV., c. ii., § 12: "Antichristum in templo Dei sessurum praedixerunt Daniel et Paulus (Dan. 9:27; 2 Thess. 2:4): illius scelerati et abominandi regni ducem et antesignanum, apud nos facimus Romanum Pontificem. Quod sedes ejus in templo Dei collocatur, ita innuitur, tale fore ejus regnum quod nec Christi nec ecclesiae nomen aboleat. Hinc igitur patet nos minime negare, quin sub ejus quoque tyrannide ecclesiae maneant: sed quas sacrilega impietate profanarit, quas immani dominatione afflixerit, quas malis et exitialibus doctrinis, ceu venenatis potionibus, corruperit, et propemodum enecarit, in quibus semisepultus lateat Christus, obrutum Evangelium, profligata pietas, cultus Dei fere abolitus: in quibus denique omnia sic sint conturbata, ut Babylonis potius quam civitatis Dei sanctae facies illic appareat." Comp. IV., 7, § 25; and Calvin's commentary on 2 Thess. 2:3. So the Jewish synagogue under Caiaphas retained the law and the prophets, the rites and ceremonies, of the theocracy.
The Westminster Confession implies the same theory, and supports it by the same questionable exegesis of 2 Thess. 2:3 sqq. and Rev. 13:1–8.697697 Ch. XXV. 6: "The Pope of Rome ... is that Antichrist, that man of sin and perdition, that exalteth himself in the Church against Christ and all that is called God." And yet there are American divines who derive from this passage the very opposite conclusion; namely, that the Roman Church is no church at all, and that all her ordinances are invalid. An attempt to sanction this conclusion was made at the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church at Cincinnati in 1885, but failed. The Westminster Confession never calls the Roman Church Antichrist, but only the Pope, who is no more the Roman Church than the Moderator of the General Assembly is the General Assembly, or the President of the United States is the American people, or the Czar of Russia is Russia. The government is only one factor in the life of a nation or a church.
The claims of the Roman Church rest on a broader and more solid base than the papacy, which is merely the form of her government. The papal hierarchy was often as corrupt as the Jewish hierarchy, and some popes were as wicked as Caiaphas;698698 Dante locates them in the Inferno; and Möhler says, "Hell has swallowed them up." but this fact cannot destroy the claims nor invalidate the ordinances of the Roman Church, which from the days of the apostles down to the Reformation has been identified with the fortunes of Western Christendom, and which remains to this day the largest visible church in the world. To deny her church character is to stultify history, and to nullify the promise of Christ. (Matt. 16:18; 28:20.)
luther's views on the church fathers.
Walch, XXII. 2050–2065. Erlangen ed. LXII. 97 sqq. (Tischreden). Bindseil: Mart. Lutheri Colloquia (1863), 3 vols.
In this connection it may be interesting to collect from his writings and Table Talk some of Luther's characteristic judgments of the church fathers whose works began to be more generally known and studied through the editions of Erasmus.
Luther had no idea of a golden age of virgin purity of the church. He knew that even among the apostles there was a Judas, and that errors and corruptions crept into the Galatian, Corinthian, and other congregations, as is manifest from the censures, warnings, and exhortations of the Epistles of the New Testament. Much less could he expect perfection in any post-apostolic age. His view of the absolute supremacy of the Word of God over all the words of men, even the best and holiest, led him to a critical and discriminating estimate of the fathers and schoolmen. Besides, he felt the difference between the patristic and the Protestant theology. The Continental Reformers generally thought much less of the fathers than the Anglican divines.
"The fathers," says Luther, "have written many things that are pious and useful (multa pia et salutaria), but they must be read with discrimination, and judged by the Scriptures." "The dear fathers lived better than they wrote; we write better than we live." (Melius vixerunt quam scripserunt: nos Deo juvante melius scribimus quam vivimus. Bindseil, l.c. III. 140; Erl. ed., LXII. 103.) He placed their writings far below the Scriptures; and the more he progressed in the study of both, the more he was impressed with the difference (Erl. ed., LXII. 107). To reform the church by the fathers is impossible; it can only be done by the Word of God (XXV. 231). They were poor interpreters, in part on account of their ignorance of Hebrew and Greek (XXII. 185). All the fathers have erred in the faith. Nevertheless, they are to be held in veneration for their testimony to the Christian faith (propter testimonium fidei omnes sunt venerandi. Erl. ed. LXII. 98).
Of all the fathers he learned most from Augustin. For him he had the profoundest respect, and him he quotes more frequently than all others combined. He regards him as one of the four pillars of the church (the claims of Ambrose, Jerome, and Gregory, he disputed), as the best commentator, and the patron of theologians. "Latina nostra ecclesia nullum habuit praestantiorem doctorem quam Augustinum" (Bindseil, I. 456). "He pleased and pleases me better than all other doctors; he was a great teacher, and worthy of all praise" (III. 147). The Pelagians stirred him up to his best books, in which he treats of free-will, faith, and original sin. He first distinguished it from actual transgression. He is the only one among the fathers who had a worthy view of matrimony. The papists pervert his famous word: "I would not believe the gospel if the Catholic Church did not move me thereto," which was said against the Manichaeans in this sense: Ye are heretics, I do not believe you; I go with the church, the bride of Christ, which cannot err (Erl. ed., XXX. 394 sq.). Augustin did more than all the bishops and popes who cannot hold a candle to him (XXXI. 358 sq.), and more than all the Councils (XXV. 341). If he lived now, he would side with us, but Jerome would condemn us (Bindseil, III. 149). Yet with all his sympathy, Luther could not find his "sola fide." Augustin, he says, has sometimes erred, and is not to be trusted. "Although good and holy, he was yet lacking in the true faith, as well as the other fathers." "When the door was opened to me for the understanding of Paul, I was done, with Augustin" (da war es aus mit ihm. Erl. ed., LXII. 119).
Next to Augustin he seems to have esteemed Hilary on account of his work on the Trinity. "Hilarius," he says, "inter omnes patres luctator fuit strenuissimus adversus haereticos, cui neque Augustinus conferri potest" (Bindseil, III. 138). Ambrose he calls "a pious, God-fearing, and brave man," and refers to his bold stand against the Emperor Theodosius. But his six books on Genesis are very thin, and his hymns have not much matter, though his (?) "Rex Christe, factor omnium," is "optimus hymnus." He praises Prudentius for his poetry. Tertullian, whom he once calls the oldest of the fathers (though he lived after 200), was "durus et superstitiosus." Of Cyprian he speaks favorably. As to Jerome, he had to admit that he was the greatest Bible translator, and will not be surpassed in this line (Erl. ed. LXII. 462). But he positively hated him on account of his monkery, and says: "He ought not to be counted among the doctors of the church; for he was a heretic, although I believe that he was saved by faith in Christ. I know no one of the fathers, to whom I am so hostile as to him. He writes only about fasting, virginity, and such things" (LXII. 119sq.). He was tormented by carnal temptations, and loved Eustochium so as to create scandal. He speaks impiously of marriage. His commentaries on Matthew, Galatians, and Titus are very thin. Luther had no more respect for Pope Gregory I. He is the author of the fables of purgatory and masses for souls; he knew little of Christ and his gospel, and was entirely too superstitious. The Devil deceived him, and made him believe in appearances of spirits from purgatory. "His sermons are not worth a copper" (Erl. ed., LI. 482; LII. 187; LX. 189, 405; XXVIII. 98 sqq.; Bindseil, III. 140, 228). But he praises beyond its merits his hymn Rex Christe, which he wrongly ascribes to Ambrose (Bindseil, III. 149; comp. Daniel, Thesaurus Hymnol., vol. I. 180 sq.).
With the Greek fathers, Luther was less familiar. He barely mentions Ignatius, Irenaeus, Origen, Eusebius, and Epiphanius. He praises Athanasius as the greatest teacher of the Oriental Church, although he was nothing extra (obwohl er nichts sonderliches war). He could not agree with Melanchthon's favorable judgment of Basil the Great. He thought Gregory of Nazianzen, the eloquent defender of the divinity of Christ during the Arian ascendency, to be of no account ("Nazianzenus est nihil." Bindseil, III. 152). He speaks well of Theodoret's Commentary to Paul's Epistles, but unreasonably depreciates Chrysostom, the golden preacher and commentator, and describes him as a great rhetorician, full of words and empty of matter; he even absurdly compares him to Carlstadt! "He is garrulous, and therefore pleases Erasmus, who neglects faith, and treats only of morals. I consulted him on the beautiful passage on the highpriest in Hebrews; but he twaddled about the dignity of priests, and let me stick in the mud (Bindseil, III. 136; Erl. ed. LXII. 102).
Of mediaeval divines Luther esteemed Nicolaus Lyra as a most useful commentator. He praises St. Bernard, who in his sermons "excels all other doctors, even Augustin." He speaks highly of Peter the Lombard, "the Master of Sentences," and calls him a "homo diligentissimus et excellentissimi ingenii," although he brought in many useless questions (Bindseil, III. 151; Erl. ed. LXII. 114). He calls Occam, whom he studied diligently, "summus dialecticus" (Bindseil, III. 138, 270). But upon the whole he hated the schoolmen and their master, "the damned heathen Aristotle," although he admits him to have been "optimus dialecticus," and learned from him and his commentators the art of logical reasoning. Even Thomas Aquinas, "the Angelic Doctor," whom the Lutheran scholastics of the seventeenth century highly and justly esteemed, he denounced as a chatterer (loquacissimus), who makes the Bible bend to Aristotle (Bindseil, III. 270, 286), and whose books are a fountain of all heresies, and destructive of the gospel ("der Brunn und Grundsuppe aller Ketzerei, Irrthums und Verleugnung des Evangeliums." Erl. ed. XXIV. 240). This is, of course, the language of prejudice and passion.—His views on Augustin are the most correct, because he knew him best, and liked him most.
Melanchthon and Oecolampadius from fuller knowledge and milder temper judged more favorably and consistently of the fathers generally, and their invaluable services to Christian literature.
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text:
Источник: The Poets and Poetry of Europe. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Philadelphia: Carey and Hart, Chestnut Street, 1845. Translated by Ebenezer Henderson.
The Prophetess, having imposed silence on all intellectual beings, declares that she is going to reveal the decrees of the Father of Nature, the actions and operations of the gods, which no person ever knew before herself. She then begins with a description of the chaos; and proceeds to the formation of the world, and of that of its various species of inhabitants, giants, men, and dwarfs. She then explains the employments of the fairies, or destinies; the functions of the gods; their most remarkable adventures; their quarrels with Loke, and the vengeance that ensued. At last she concludes with a long description of the final state of the universe, its dissolution and conflagration; the battle of the inferior deities and the evil beings; the renovation of the world; the happy lot of the good, and the punishment of the wicked. – The text is taken from the edition of the Edda just published in Stockholm.
Give silence, all
Ye sacred race.
Both great and small,
Of Heimdal sprung:
Vol-father's deeds
I will relate,
The ancient tales
Which first I learned.
I know giants
Early born,
My ancestors
Of former times;
Nine worlds I know,
With their nine poles
Of tender wood,
Beneath the earth.
In early times,
When Ymer lived,
Was sand, nor sea,
Nor cooling wave;
No earth was found,
Nor heaven above;
One chaos all,
And nowhere grass:
Until Bör's sons
Th' expanse did raise,
By whom Midgard
The great was made.
From th' south the sun
Shone on the walls;
Then did the earth
Green herbs produce.
The sun turned south,
The moon did shine;
Her right hand held
The horse of heaven.
The sun knew not
His proper sphere;
The stars knew not
Their proper place;
The moon knew not
Her proper power.
Then all the powers
Went to the throne,
The holy gods,
And held consult:
Night and cock-crowing
Their names they gave,
Morning also,
And noon-day tide,
And afternoon,
The years to tell.
The Asas met
On Ida's plains,
Who altars raised
And temples built;
Anvils they laid,
And money coined;
Their strength they tried
In various ways,
When making songs,
And forming tools.
On th' green they played
In joyful mood,
Nor knew at all
The want of gold,
Until there came
Three Thursa maids,
Exceeding strong,
From Jotunheim:
. . . . .
Until there came
Out of the ranks,
Powerful and fair,
Three Asas home,
And found on shore,
In helpless plight,
Ask and Embla
Without their fate.
They had not yet
Spirit or mind,
Blood, or beauty,
Or lovely hue.
Odin gave spirit,
Heinir gave mind,
Lothur gave blood
And lovely hue.
. . . . .
I know an ash,
Named Ygg-drasill,
A stately tree,
With white dust strewed.
Thence come the dews
That wet the dales;
It stands aye green
O'er Urda's well.
Thence come the maids
Who much do know;
Three from the hall
Beneatli the tree;
One they named Was,
And Being next,
The third, Shall be,
On the shield they cut.
. . . . .
She sat without
When th' Ancient came,
The awful god,
And viewed his eye.
What ask ye me?
Why tempt ye me?
Full well I know,
Great Odin, where
Thine eye thou lost;
In Mimi's well,
The fountain pure,
Mead Mimir drinks
Each morning new,
With Odin's pledge.
Conceive ye this?
To her the god
Of battles gave
Both costly rings
And shining gold,
The art of wealth,
And witchcraft wise,
By which she saw
Through every world.
She saw Valkyries
Come from afar,
Ready to ride
To th' tribes of god;
Skuld held the shield,
Skaugul came next,
Gunnr, Hildr, Gaundul,
And Geir-skaugul.
Thus now are told
The Warrior's Norns,
Ready to ride
The Valkyries.
Heith she was named
Where'er she came;
The prophetess
Of cunning arts.
She knew right well
Bad luck to seethe,
And mischief was
Her only sport.
She murder saw,
The first that e'er
Was in the world,
When Gullveig was
Placed on the spear,
When in Harr's hall
They did her burn:
Thrice she was burnt,
Thrice she was born,
Oft, not seldom,
And yet she lives.
When all the powers
Went to the throne,
The holy gods,
And held consult:
What punishment
They should inflict
On th' Asas now
For bad advice;
Or whether all
The gods should hold
Convivial feasts:
Were broken now
The castle-walls
Of Asaborg,
By murderous Vanes
Who took the field:
Forth Odin flew
And shot around:
This murder was
The first that e'er
Was in the world.
When all the powers
Went to the throne,
The holy gods,
And held consult:
Who had the air
Involved in flames,
Or Odder's maid
To giants given:
There Thor alone
Was in ill mood;
He seldom sits
When told the like;
Broken were oaths
And promises
And all contracts
That had been made.
She knows where hid
Lies Heimdal's horn,
Full deep beneath
The sacred tree:
She sees a flood
Rush down the fall
From Odin's pledge:
Conceive ye yet?
. . . . .
The sun turns pale;
The spacious earth
The sea ingulfs;
From heaven fall
The lucid stars:
At the end of time,
The vapors rage,
And playful flames
Involve the skies.
She sees arise,
The second time,
From th' sea, the earth
Completely green:
Cascades do fall;
The eagle soars,
That on the hills
Pursues his prey.
The gods convene
On Ida's plains,
And talk of man,
The worm of dust:
They call to mind
Their former might,
And th' ancient runes
Of Fimbultyr.
The fields unsown
Shall yield their growth;
All ills shall cease;
Balder shall come,
And dwell with Hauthr
In Hropt's abodes.
Say, warrior-gods,
Conceive ye yet?
A hall she sees
Outshine the sun,
Of gold its roof,
It stands in heaven:
The virtuous there
Shall always dwell,
And evermore
Delights enjoy.


text:
The Chicago City Council has proved beyond doubt its aggressive hostility to the welfare of low-wage workers and low-income consumers by its approval of an ordinance that would forbid Chicagoans from legally entering into agreements to work for less than $10 an hour and $3 in benefits—even if they want to—with retailers with $1 billion in annual sales and stores of at least 90,000 square feet.
By prohibiting job-seekers from accepting terms of employment to the mutual benefit of aspiring workers and potential employers, the City Council has effectively requested that major employers like Wal-Mart and Target open fewer new stores in Chicago, and to make available fewer (and possibly no) new jobs. Additionally, the Council has asked Chicago's low-income consumers, who would benefit most from more discount retail outlets, to forgo significant increases in their quality of life.
As NYU economist Jason Furman wrote in Slate by way of crushing Barbara Ehrenreich in a debate about the effect of Wal-Mart on America's working class:
A range of studies has found that Wal-Mart's prices are 8 percent to 39 percent below the prices of its competitors. The single most careful economic study, co-authored by the well-respected MIT economist Jerry Hausman, found that grocery sales by Wal-Mart and other big-box stores made consumers better off to the tune of 25 percent of food consumption. That doesn't mean much for those of us in the top fifth of the income distribution—we spend only about 3.5 percent of our income on food at home and, at least in my case, most of that shopping is done at high-priced supermarkets like Whole Foods. But that's a huge savings for households in the bottom quintile, which, on average, spend 26 percent of their income on food. In fact, it is equivalent to a 6.5 percent boost in household income—unless the family lives in New York City or one of the other places that have successfully kept Wal-Mart and its ilk away.
Why does the Chicago City Council insist on harming workers by denying them their moral right to enter into work agreements on terms they find acceptable? Why does the Chicago City Council want to keep things from getting better for its city's poor?
[Cross-posted from Cato@Liberty]


text:
Looks of the Week
I hope that everyone had a lovely weekend! The weather is really starting to turn towards Fall here in San Francisco with crisp, clear days and shower-filled evenings. My favorite time of year!
Let's celebrate Monday coming to a close with a handful of fashionable looks from around the globe that'll have you as excited for Fall dressing and accessories as I am.
I love this look from head-to-toe. Pairing a floral blouse with a green & black polka-dotted high-waist pencil skirt was brilliant and those shoes are too cute!
Such a fun, eclectic look. The round retro frames suit her to a T, I love the print & pattern mixing with the tunic and leggings, and the leopard print mini Celine bag is a great final touch.
Leopard print shorts are a hard piece to pull off but this look perfectly combines the fun, eye-catching print shorts with a bright, but demure sweater & button-down combo. The addition of the lipstick red handbag and the black velvet smoking flats.


text:
This physical details of this story are true, though the interpretation is entirely my own. The names have been changed to protect the guilty. The very, very guitly. Enjoy.
Rupert always liked shocking 'mundanes,' members of that vast majority of people who sit home at night, every night, laughing it up over the scripted behavior of sitcoms. There was a time, we're told through textbooks of mosaics and vases of naked athletes, when actors were on par with beggars and con men, thought no higher than the urban campers that migrate through downtown Tempe by night and curl up on benches at the park just outside my flat, ogling the young Spanish mothers. But the ancient class of pretenders have become celebrities, usurping the role once held in our grandmother cultures by orators, warriors, politicians, and the beleaguered breed of poets. Rupert would not have considered himself any of these things. He once referred to himself as a "shockster," tagged with a chuckle, once when we split a bottle of wine on the roof of the Matthews Center. He chucked the bottle into orbit after we downed it, bursting like a star of broken glass on Cady Mall.
If he had more forethought, I would have called him a performance artist. Without his conversation, I would have debated his sanity. If he ever wrote his brain into a page, I would have described him as a writer of prophecies.
Unfortunately, Rupert was impulsive and hated writing. His life was built on spoken words and he could bullshit his way out of anything and often did. He once scored a one-night stand with a business sophomore after telling her she had nice teeth. He blasted epithets in the theater, not at the screen, but at other moviegoers, shouted across Mill Avenue to friends and foes alike, and was politely asked to leave various establishments under threat of calling the police. To know Rupert was to know an anarchist who hated anarchists, but wanted to throw a bit of chaos in the comfortable life of soccer marms and white-collar suburban middle-managers whose life goal was owning an SUV with 1.2% APR.
I can't remember how I met Rupert. Most of the players in my life slide up from the sides while I'm watching protagonist and heroine bicker center-stage. Pause. Sideline character becomes supporting actor, epigrammatic lines emerge into the venue, soaking into the brains of watchers, and the audience asks, "where did he come from?"
Rupert always stole his scenes.
Too much coffee in our systems while he paid the check. He always had money it seemed. Just enough cash to survive, I thought, but he always had a bill in the beat-up wallet I'm sure he lifted from some thrift store, more than likely with slight of hand than with a receipt. On our treks, we never stopped at a bank, and he job was fuzzy something or other, so I knew he was a dealer; coupled with the number of strangers that would stop him in bars or on the street to say hello.
Start parenthesis. Here I insert the fable of the stork among crows for those of you with a lofty moral compass and no dangerlove. I never dealt in any organized sense, but materials illegal fell my way from time to time, the floorscore of my acquaintances as it were, and I passed on the substances I wasn't into with a marginal profit.
Rupert though, always had a story about getting roughed up for one reason or another, and he could read tags, gang signs, and knew what areas of town to not head into looking for trouble. I was far more naive so he kept an eye out for me. End parenthesis
Too much coffee and he had finished more than a pack of Marlboroughs. I'm not one for cigarettes and can barely tell the difference between a filter and the other end; being the heir to a registered nurse can do that to a boy. The waitress had a smooth butt and a nice smile in a dull midwestern sense. One of those flat states that ends in a vowel that no one remembers driving through, despite gas station receipts proving otherwise. Rupert always overtipped for good service or a pretty face; he knew a serious waitress, like a poet, could make a ten dollars stretch a week.
The water glasses were just chunks of ice now, and Rupert and I sucked the sweat off the cubes like ants milking aphids.
"Wanna pick a fight?"
The room is half-packed. In a booth to the left are three kids, younger or older than us by a few months, suburban black kids in sweaters and baggy jeans cleaned and pressed by mothers or girlfriends or young wives, and they're not up for a friendly tussle with strangers. To the right is a family of four, Homer in a maroon polo, digital watch ticking down the seconds to his inevitable heart attack, Marge in her Friday "we're going out honey" blouse. Bart and Lisa pick off the remnants of the children's menu burgers with cute names aimed at the youngest youth market. College couples abound elsewhere in pairs or quads, but I'm not up for dropping soft-skinned science majors desperately trying to score subtlety with their newest virgin targets, or roughing up goofball boyfriends in front of girlfriends far too good and fine for them, but doomed to imitate the cartoon breeders to our right.
"Sure," I quietly say, thinking we'll head outside and spill drinks on thick-necked frat boys sauced on overpriced Long Islands.
Keep in mind, dear reader, that I am by no means a warrior, nor is Rupert, and I only fight back in self-defense. Rupert, conversely, saw confrontation as means to an end, if only that end is to pass the time with some shared excitement. There was no humor in a knockdown, drag-out fight where one party incurs a debt with their health insurance behemoth. It was always about the subtlety of the confrontation, the maneuvering, the drama. It was a chess game, Rupert said, to agitate a normal person into throwing the first punch, then getting the fuck out before the law arrived to ruin the experiment.
Rupert is instantly standing, his chair tumbling backward behind him toward the empty table behind us. Legs spring and he is suddenly airborne and our table is the deck of an aircraft carrier. He skids across it at full speed, wheels missing the non-existent tow cable and the ice cubes become frozen projectiles tumbling across the floor. His hands plant on my shoulders, taking me over in the chair to the floor. My torso topples back, my head does not, but locks halfway to floor, so my skull does not dribble across the court.
I distinctly remember hearing the one black kid facing us shout, "shit!" as I tumbled.
Rupert's knee is planted on my chest, fists wailing. He has a ten-year-olds smile, not at the thrill of assault, but the reaction of the crowd. Homer is dumbstruck; he's only seen shit like this on every single one of his 500 channels except PBS. Now in reality, he's unsure whether this is scripted or sports. Marge repeats the same two-word prayer over and over to her deity, while Bart and Lisa get to see R-rated violence for free.
Rupert's dive broke a glass he never did pay for.
Fists flying, his into me, mine into him, but he's pulling punches. (No permanent damage kiddo, not that pretty face). I'm returning body blows but have no momentum due to the floor. I block whatever else I can. The black kids have half-stood, unsure of the proper moment to intervene in what does not seem to be their affair. College couples have all turned their attention away from banal small talk and sexual pursuits to watch Rupert (apparently) beat the living daylights out of a me, pinned to the floor.
Later, Marge would be heard to remark: they seemed like two nice, quiet young gentlemen, before the recent unpleasantness.
Rupert lands an excellent shot across my jaw, jerking my face to the right into wet carpet. I start laughing uncontrollably, more out of shock than design; perhaps some long repressed survival tactic to distract opponents in a tense situation.
Rupert begins laughing too and his punches fall softer until they halt altogether.
By now, management and the cook staff have been alerted by the commotion and emerge into the dining room , appraising the scene. One of the black kids has emerged from the booth. Two college kids have split from their dates in moral outrage and to demonstrate their virility. Hormones flow. Adrenaline. Testosterone. Estrogen.
Rupert backs off me, grabbing me up by the arm in a single fluid motion. I stabilize. I glance at Bart, letting him see that the wounded hero is still alive after the commercial break, despite the cliffhanger postulated minutes before.
Rupert faces the stunned crowd, even more stunned that the scene ended so abruptly. He bows slightly, and shouts, "thank you, you've been great."
Afterwards, I informed him that when I told the story years later, I would remember him saying something humorous and dramatic. In reality, though, after he pulled me up, he shouted something far more lowbrow, like "fuck", or "run", or "now" and he bolted, halfhazardly dragging me with him, toward the waiting area.
Inbound customers hover like Vietnamese Hueys for the next hostess in the foyer as Rupert, then I, dash past. Rupert halts just long enough to grab a handful of peppermints from a basket on the hostess stand. Some fell out on the way, skidding across tile like carnival hockey pucks.
He slams shoulder-first through two doors and I followed, laughing hysterically the entire way.
We hauled toward Rupert's pickup. He took the helm, I leapt into the bed and we disappeared into the night, while bruises formed like medals in our skin.


text: Walters Monocular 1.0 Diopter Reading Cap Lens Manufacturer: Walters Low Vision Optics For near distance tasks Shortens the focal distance of the Walters monocularLarger diameterWalters monocular sold separately SKU: 607016 Weight: Length: Width: Height: Availability: Our Price: $22.95 Availability: Temporarily out of stock but available for order Qty: Add to cart Add to wishlist Email a friend Ask question about product Details The Walters Low Vision 1.0 Diopter Reading Cap Lens shortens the focal distance of the Walters monocular to help you perform near distance tasks. This reading cap lens is sold separately from Walters Low Vision monoculars, which feature the highest quality optics designed to produce clear images with minimal distortion. Walters monoculars also feature close focus capability and several Walters Low Vision accessories are available to provide customization that fits your needs. Product tags Low vision (1008) , 1 diopter (4) , Reading Cap Lens (11) , Magnifiers (632) , Walters Low Vision Optics (114) , Monoculars (116)


text:
Inside Higher Ed reports that the number of students who rent textbooks is increasing. Interestingly, e-books have not caught on — most students are still using printed textbooks (though iPads might change that).
When I teach intro, I have always suggested to my students that if they are going to major in psychology, it is a good idea to purchase and keep their intro textbook. My argument has been that it will be a good reference for their upper-division classes, which might assume that they already know certain concepts. For example, when I teach an upper-division class in motivation and emotion, I assume that my students understand classical and operant conditioning (and I tell them in the syllabus that they should go back to their intro textbook and review the relevant sections).
A downside of this advice is that textbooks are very expensive. Renting a book, or selling one on the used market after the term ends, is a way for students to reduce costs.
Anyway, what this got me wondering is whether it's still helpful or necessary for students to keep their intro textbooks. Is there enough good info on the internet now that they could just google whatever topics they need to review? A few years ago I looked around on the web for a well-written, introductory-level account of classical conditioning and wasn't impressed with what I found. I still don't think I'd assign the current entry for classical conditioning as a review. But with the APS Wikipedia project, for example, maybe things will get better soon.
I remember finding my intro textbook especially helpful when I studied for the psychology GRE, but not many undergrads will go on to do that. Next time I teach an upper-division class I'll probably ask my students how much use they've gotten out of their intro text afterward.


text:
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