Bill's Notes

To: James Wolcott

From: IndustrialBlog

Re: Your posts here and here.

I see from your resume you're from out of town. You know what I've noticed? It's never native New Yorkers who act like you. It's always people who thought you were too good for their home towns and better than all those folks they "left behind." Well, you weren't, and you aren't. That's all.

In interests of accountability, here is a list of predictions I made last December for 2006 and how they matched up:

10. Aliens will finally arrive, with great fanfare, on earth. After a thorough examination of our society, they will pronounce Islam the dumbest, most patently false, most obviously self-serving religion in the history of the universe.

Result: Nope. The only aliens were the kind called in PC terms, "Undocumented workers". No one said anything bad about Islam. Score 0-1.

9. The Democrats will win the midterm 2006 elections by keeping quiet, flying under the radar, and allowing the GOP to self-destruct.

Result: Yup. Pretty much exactly what happened. The Democrats simply shut up and played their guitar, and won. Score 1-1.

8. Andrew Sullivan will be miraculously healed of his homosexuality, and, in the confusion of his new heterosexuality, will propose to the first woman who sleeps with him. It'll be Maureen Dowd. She'll turn the proposal down.

Result: Nope. Andrew's still an unrepentant, practicing queen, and no one proposed to Maureen Dowd. Score 1-2.

7. The Palestinians will announce free elections, elect moderate politicians, and seek accommodation and peace with Israel. "Terrorism is so 2001," one Hamas official will say.

Result: Nope. Some moderate stuff happened, though. And then there was a war. Score 1-3.

6. The New York Jets will get Reggie Bush, somehow, and be on track by year's end to make the playoffs. The Iggles will rebuild. The Cowboys will move to LA. The Houston Texans will improve. New Orleans will still be underwater.

Result: Close. The Jets and Eagles have had surprisingly good seasons, and both are on track to make the playoffs. The Houston Texans have improved. New Orleans is NOT underwater. Reggie Bush went to the Saints. Let's call it a tie. Score 1-3-1.

5. Jenna Jameson will show up at my front porch, having given up her career and converted to Roman Catholicism, and announce she wants to settle down and begin a serious relationship. With me. I'll say, "Friends first."

Result: Yes, this happened exactly as I said, and I reacted exactly as I said I would, and never posted about it or told anyone about it. Score 1-4-1.

4. A confession will be found in Mecca written by Mohammed, in which he declares he made the Koran up to justify doing whatever he wanted to do at the time. The body of Jesus of Nazareth will be found in a well-marked grave in Jerusalem. The Ark of the Covenant will be found, and it will turn out that there was an asterick after the first, fourth, sixth and seventh commandments. After the asterick on the bottom of the tablet, it said, "Just kidding. Actually, I liked the Egyptians better."

Result: Nope, but aren't you glad this did happen? Score 1-5-1.

3. People will start throwing away their cell phones, declaring, "They're just too rude." Many people will start walking everywhere. Time Magazine will proclaim a trend in a cover story, "The New Walking." No one will notice.

Result: Well, people do throw away cell phones and others have started walking. Let's give me this one. Score: 2-5-1.

2. Somewhere in the world, a woman will spontaneously and without prodding apologize for wrongdoing against a man.

Result: I'm sure it happened. Score 3-5-1.

1. IndustrialBlog will finally get linked by Instapundit. I won't post for three weeks afterward, until the instalanche is gone.

Result: Nope. Instapundit ignored me all year. What a poopyhead. Final score: 3-6-1! Not bad, eh?

IndustrialBlog: Where you find things out first.

Still very quiet. I know people are still checking this blog. Thanks for coming by. I've tried to write a few posts, but in each case decided the post needed more time and effort and thought than I was willing to put into it on vacation. Some examples:

1. There have been some posts elsewhere in the blogosphere about the richness and beauty of Arabic. According to some, Arabic is the utter pinnacle of language, and that's why God chose it for the Koran. One conclusion you can draw from what they are saying (and I'm not exaggerating) is that Arabic speakers possess a greater level of being than non-Arabic speakers. Which is an extraordinary thing to say. I didn't want to dismiss the idea as nonsense; I wanted to engage the idea itself.

2. Some thoughts on the War on Terror, including the conclusions of an ex-CIA agent's book, Imperial Hubris. Summary: I had mixed feelings about his diagnosis, and agreed almost completely with his cure. As y'all know, I was horrified by our country's reaction to 9/11. We have become, to a large extent, a sentimental, decadent nation, and I was shocked how deep the rot is. Let's just say, it's not surface rot. The cultural rot cannot be cut away. It has metastasized and gone very deep. But taking another cracking at saying what I've been saying for years is pointless. People know my opinion: Regardless of the merits of our opponents' charges against us (by opponents I mean Al Qaeda and their sympathizers), we needed to retaliate swiftly, ruthlessly and with such extremity in the days of 9/11 that we'd send the message never to attack us on our home turf. I'm not entirely convinced that we've sent that message (we may have sent that message anyway — I really don't know.) And btw, I consider it bullshit that the nation was united after 9/11.

3. An attempt to answer The Western Seminarian's question to me about how things change in the Roman Catholic Church. He admitted it's a congregationalist kind of question, and I agree. I think the question itself is kind of the problem ... and am reluctant to talk about the Roman Catholic Church as if it's just another denomination. And I wanted to make sure that if I did that, I wouldn't insult other readers, such as my friend Paul B., a Presbyterian minister and all around gentleman.

4. A family-related post or two ... but then I figured that's not cool. FTR, my nieces and nephews are very nice.

5. A post about the term "friends with benefits." What the term means is (1) that you've either got yourself a ho, or (2) you're someone's ho, and in either case, if you're seriously using this term, you're too socially retarded to realize it.

6. A post on this recent trend of calling President Bush "the worst ever." It's moronic. To quote Chairman Mao when asked about whether the French Revolution was a good or bad thing, "It's too soon to tell."

7. The following Bill Hicks joke, which is a bit misogynistic and I've avoided posting for fear of appearing, uh, misogynistic: "I've learned a lot about women. I think I've learned exactly how the fall of man occured in the Garden of Eden. Adam and Eve were in the Garden of Eden, and Adam said one day, 'Wow, Eve, here we are, at one with nature, at one with God, we'll never age, we'll never die, and all our dreams come true the instant that we have them.' And Eve said, 'Yeah... it's just not enough is it?'"

8. Something about the passing of James Brown and Jerry Ford. RIP.

9. Decide whether to close Industrial Blog and start a new blog, under my own name, as part of a personal home page. No, I'm not doing MySpace.

10. Report once again I'm actually sleeping. While I'm a lifelong insomniac, I have to note that I sleep more poorly when I'm living alone in a house.

11. My Christmas gift to myself: A 5-quart Chantal stock pot that I've given as a gift to three other people, all of whom loved it. I recognized it as a great thing, but I didn't have one.

12. Oh yeah, I paid off my car. Pray that I don't smack it up. Last time I paid off my car, the day after the last payment was due, I got hit by a pickup. The car survived, I should note.

13. I read, of all things, The Devil Wears Prada. As someone who runs an editorial department, this gave me a few ideas about how to treat the people who work for me :) I loved the tyrant's dismissal: "That's all."

14. It's nice to have cash. It feels so great, like a higher state of being :) , to know I can pay my bills and still save for a rainy day. Thank God.

15. Christmas service here at Annunciation Church in Longwood, FL, was remarkable and beautiful. My Jewish aunt came with me. She dipped her finger in the holy water as we left and said, "It didn't burn ... so I guess I'm OK."

16. Remind people that Industrial Blog is specifically meant to include fragments. Feel free to "steal these ideas" and run with them.

17. Also, tell people that the "Sharpen Your Romantic Judgment" post has an in-joke. At one newsletter company for which I worked, there was a feature called "Sharpen Your Judgement". It involved dramatized legal cases and contained a Set-up, Decision, and Analysis section similar to the ones I'd written. I didn't say it was a funny joke. But it amused me.

18. Write your own.

That's all, gentle readers. Enjoy your days and loved ones. Peace out.