DRAFT ESSAY: Ref: IHT 22 Mar '04 (Linda Greenhaus) Pending Supreme Court consideration of constitutionality of including the phrase 'under G_d' in the Pledge of Allegiance First of all, it's offensive to some persons of religious senibility. I was in Belmont, Massachusetts, Junior High School both before and after the phrase was introduced. It always struck me as presumtious -- who are the political leaders of the USA to assume that they are acting in accord with Divine Will. And indeed, the phrase was introduced during the waning McCarthy era, when rascalry still ran wild in the U.S. Congress. The U.S. Civil Rights movement, which was deeply spiritual, exemplified by Martin Luther King, Jr., had a otherwise lovely song, "We shall overcome", that included the phrase, 'G_d is on our side'. I always thought of the first (and maybe only) football game I attended as a spectator, Harvard vs. Columbia. My host asked his father, Whose side are we on. I assumed that meant, who are we supposed to root for; but realized that fans of each team chose seats on opposite sides of that mock-Coloseium. My friend Susie Harrison, a person of strong nondenomenational religious sensibility, was slogging through the M.A. in Teacher Education program at UCSB when we lived in Santa Barbara. She was quite upset when they were taught to teach that augmented Pledge of Allegiance. I tried to work out a sort of Reform reconceptualization that she could co-exist with rather that quit plans to teach public school. So I took a neo-Platonic notion [I think the neo-Platonists took off from the 7-fold remove of source in Diotama's speech in the Symposium; and from the descending symmetry that Eva Brann demonstrates in Plato's Republic] , and suggested that she rephrase it to herself: 'one nation under ____ -- way under'. (Milton, I think it is, says the same of Beelzebub, who remains an angel, albeit a fallen angel, and fallen so far that, although still a ruler, he is merely 'lord of the flies'. That is, the extent of the Fall is marked by a diminution of size, until he has diminished from Lucifer [lux -- feur, light to fire, I think] to Beelzebub, still a lord, but become so small, almost infinitely small, that he is merely 'lord of the flies' [the fly being the smallest thing a 'primitive' mind could imagine.]) [Ok, this looks like a long one. Let's slog on through this swamp. ] Greenhaus has written a good article, with many points to pick at. She argues that "before the justices can decide whether those two words rendered the pledge unconstitutional, they have have to answer a factual queastion that is entwined in extricably with the legal one: What exactly does it mean to pledge allegiance to 'one nation under G_d'. There's enough problematicity for a whole essay in that quote. First of all: 'what does it mean to pledge allegiance'. This takes us to ground worked by J.L. Austin, and brings in modes of thought from Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations. [I'm not clear how much Austin was influenced by Wittgenstein; he was at Oxford while W. was at Cambridge, but it took maybe a decade for W.'s thought to sink in; his students grasped it crudely. And Austin was a spirited, independent thinker; so there may be more parallelism than derivation. As for W. being influenced by Austin -- I think he lacked the necessary sense of humour; Austin's work is spirited and playful, in an understated, rather 'donnish' way. ] One point that ordinary language analysis brings out is that most speech-acts are meaningful only insofar as they are extraordinary. I think this point could be made in terms of the 'information theory' of that time (Bell Labs or whatnot) -- that if a speech act occurs too frequently, it becomes part of the background 'noise'. So, eg, W. in PI II (Section x, if memory serves) sketches an analysis of Moore's paradox, 'The cat is on the mat, but I don't believe it'. Austin could make a similar point: In response maybe to the sort of Ryle-Malcolm notion that, eg: 'I know that X' means: 'X is true' and 'I believe that X'. one would say, in response: If I say something, it is IMPLICIT that I believe it [or that I feign to believe it]. So to say 'X but I don't believe that X' is to contradict myself -- It is not an explicit contradiction of the p(not-p) form; nor even of pq(not-q) (where p is the explicit 'the cat is on the mat' and q is 'I believe that the cat is on the mat') nor of the form pr(not-r) where p entails r but rather of the form: ps(not-s) where s is neither conjoined with nor entailed by p, but is (in an as-yet unexplicated sense) 'implicit' in p. [I'm writing awfully slowly and roundabout this morning; must be a cheap brand of coffee. The thought ain't bad, but the wording's circumlocutious, like. Maybe because my fingers are stiff, and it ain't even cold. Got to invent something at least as fast as a typewriter that don't require all those muscles. They say there's a virtual keyboard now. Can't think faster than you type, leastwise not and remember much of what you intended to say]. So ok: An immigrant becomes a citizen, and pledges allegiance for the first time. It is a true and solid momemnt. In Alexander Nevsky, a noble offers his sword to the Monarch, who takes it, kisses it, and returns it. A solemn moment. The noble actor gazes up at Eisenstein's camera with a fervent gaze. So suppose that Noble comes in the next morning, and wants to go through the same shtick. As R. Shlomo could say: Doesn't go, right. Imagine the scene: The Noble's Liege Lord is no longer sitting on the throne in regal robe, waiting graciously to accept a pledge of like fealty. That was yesterday; it's been done. Instead, he's maybe eating mutton in is underwear; so he belches, and says [albeit in Czarist Russian, not neo-Yiddish], Hey Schmendrik, what are you handing me your sword for; I have a carving knife. That is: a pledge of allegiance is something that is done once; by definition, since a pledge is binding -- to vow is to bind oneself; the Hebrew makes that quite clear -- it need not be repeated; much less the very next day. (That's parodied in the poem, 'The Constant Lover'.) So here we were in public school, reciting that ruddy pledge every morning, at 08:15 I think. How much did it mean to us. It became just another rote routine, something one might as well put up with. Incidentally, we also recited the Lord's prayer. The Catholic kids, in accord with the version in the Catholic New Testament (Douay Bible, if I recall) omitted the last phrase 'for Thine is the Kingdom and the Powr and the Glory forever and ever, Amen'. [Incidentally, I think one doesn't properly say 'Amen' to one's own prayer; I think 'Amen' derives from 'Emet', truth, and is a responsive validation of the prayer-leader's statement. I've seen the Indians do something similar; someone would make a point in the tipi, and then turn to another Indian of another tribe and say, 'Ain't that blood?', and the other would acknowlege the truth of it.] The Catholic's were of course following the version in their translation of the New Testament. The Lord's Prayer is of course by Jesus -- In those days, in Talmudic times, it was quite appropriate to propose new prayers; the Talmud records many that did and did not remain in practice until cofified in the Siddur. One could show that Jesus' 'Lord's Prayer'it as a quintessential-ization of some if not (as Jesus apparently suggested, if not claimed) of all Jewish prayers, especially the Kaddish. So reciting the Lord's Prayer is appropriate for all Christians, but not appropriate for Jews -- and in fact, quite inappropriate, because to say it is to go along with Jesus' claim that his teachings superceded, as a 'New Testament', the practices of Judaism. That is, Jesus was saying: don't read the Siddur [or whatever rudimentary predecessor of the Siddur was implicit then]; just say the Lord's prayer. But no-one in the Belmont School system, nor in our Jewish 'Temple', mentioned that Jewish schoolkids might be properly excused from saying the Lord's prayer. I think no stigma (pardon the expression) was taken in Catholic kids not saying those lines; everyone knew who was Catholic; and there was no apparent religious prejudice; we were all vulgar suburban Americans together [ except for me; I kept trying to fake it; an exile from my progressive co-educational private school, where intellecutality was taken for granted, not closeted.] Greenhaus mentions that a 1943 Supreme Court decisoin held that the pledge of allegiance was not obligatory. Now first of all: what right has anyone, especially a government institution, to oblige minor's to recite a pledge -- of allegiance, or anything else. Minors are below the age of assent, so much so that an underage woman who has sex is deemed to have undergone 'statuatory rape', and her partner may be severely punished. (In one court case, the boy was deemed a 'child molestor'.) In any event, I never heard that we were not obliged to recite the Lord's prayer. Although, as I recall, one could easily get away without saying it, because it was said sitting, I think with one's head bowed. Incidentally, both those practices are more Christian than Jewish; we typically pray standing; the head may be level, or elevated, or occasionally bowed. But as R. Zalman has pointed out, in Judaism there is no obligation nor custom to bow the head while praying. For that matter, it is a violation of Jewish custom (not of halacha, but of a custom so established that it is deemed equivalent to halahca) for a male above the age of puberty (and maybe of any age; I'm not clear on that) to pray with an uncovered head; yet no-one suggested that we should or even might cover our heads while saying the Lord's prayer before the start of daily classes in public school in the Belmont Massachusetts 1950's. As for the pledge of allegiance: we were surely never told that it was voluntary. It was said standing, with one's hand over one's heart, as I recall. To have not said it would have been noticeable, and I think would have provoked not merely comment but repercussions, at least from one's fellow-students. As for the inserted ammendment phrase 'under G_d' -- I think I sometimes didn't say it, and sometimes mumbled through it, and I think many did -- mostly because it completely dirupts the rhetoric flow of the Pledge of Allegiance. Incidentally, the phrase -- 'one nation, indivisible' -- is politically tendentious; an affirmation of the winning position in the Civil War: that the sovereign states, having voluntarily joined the United States, could never secede from that union. Clearly the phrase 'under X' entails that X exists. In formal logic it would come out: There is an X, and there is a Y, and Y is under X. The Bush administration, whoever they are -- George Bush is the Original Clueless Joe -- does not argue that the phrase does not entail that X exits. It argues that to recite the pledge "is no more a religous acdt than pocketing a coin imprinted with 'in G_d we Trust' . Both are simply partriotic acknoledgments of 'the nation's religious history and of the 'undelniable historical fact that thenation was founed by indiviudals who believed in G_d', an empirical statment that poses no threat to the separation of church and state." Well, there's a bushel of eels for you. Slippery critters, eels. And Bushie's. Well, reciting that pledge is not precisely a religious act -- like reciting the Credo, or the Shma -- but it's more like a religous act than is pocketing a U.S. coin with that bit of ambiguous piety. I mean, for starters: Is it religious to affirm 'in G_d we trust'. It's not clear, of course what it means. I live near the community of Gimzo. 'Gimzo' comes from 'Gam ze l'Tova', the religous affirmation, whatever befalls, that 'this too is for the best [ie, can lead to something good] -- a point that can be carried too far, and is taken to absurdity in Voltaire's 'Candide', with Dr.Pangloss affirming that 'everyting is for the best in the best of all possible worlds'. [I don't recall who Voltaire was parodying -- Leibniz? ] On the other hand, the Rabbi's, I suppose commenting on that passagae in Shmot where the LORD says to Moshe , Why are you crying out to ME -- raise you rod that the waters may part -- state: It is assur [usually translated: forbidden] to rely on a miracle. To which I would add: assur is misleadingly translated forbidden. It doens't mean: I'm exercising my personal perogative to not let you. Rather, it means: it won't work; there's a natural (spiritual, not physical) law in play here: even if you try it, and even if everyone on earth and even in Heaven would like you to be able to do it. It means: If you rely on a miracle -- well, the train will arrive on schedule, but you won't be able to get on board. I experienced that repeatedly on the beach on Rodos. An opportunity would arise, and I would find myself apparently physically unable to cross the street or to open my mouth to accept it. I can't say why. Assur comes from -- tied (tied up, or bound, I suppose.) It's a bit like saying: I plane can't take off if there's no gas in the tank. Reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, at least when I was in school, could not be termed a voluntary act. Nor could it be said that the constraint was merely one of peer pressure. There was not physical coercion, but the pressure was clearly institutional. The teacher, backed by the Principal, and the entire school system, and behind it the government, made it clear that this was what one was to do. If I recall, the pledge was read over the school-wide speaker-system; but maybe I misremember; it if was not, it was led by one's Home-room teacher. I recall no-one not saying it. I went one year to school in California, Berkeley and then Pasadena. I don't recall it being said there, but maybe I misremember. To be bona fide voluntary, rather than merely legally voluntary, it would have to be an opt-in situation. That is, one who wished to say it would have to get up, leave the Home-room (the place of assembly for all students at the start of the school-day), and go to the Pledge Hall -- like any other extra- curricular activity. Peer pressure is a matter of minor things -- what colours and types of clothes to wear, how one reacts to ribaldry, the use of words, especially slang. The pressuer to recite the Pledge of Allegiance was a matter of much more than peer pressure. Again: a pledge must be said voluntary, by a competent person (so that excludes minor's). It is a sort of vow; and as such, is ordinary a one-time affirmation. A required pledge said daily would appear to be an incorrect use of the term. One's world simply cannot be coereced; it must be given voluntarily, otherwise it has no force. Indeed, to give one's word is -- well, a sort of intentionally superfluous ceremony (and so Jesus said, simply: Let your yea be yea, and your nay be nay.) A pledge of allegiance is then related logically to swearing 'to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth' in court. [ Incidentally, that pledge too is obligatory, and concludes with the as-yet-unchallenged phrase 'so help me G_d'. The Quakers do not take oaths; do not swear. ( So also, no Quaker should recite the Pledge of Allegiance, with or without that ammendment.) In deference to them, the phrase 'I swear (or affirm)' was added. Now properly, an affimation is not merely a statement; it is an endorsement of what has previously been said of one. So I can not affirm that I will do X unless someone has said, preferably in my presence, Oh, don't worry about Joe, he'll bear true faith and Allegiance to y'all. Then someone turns to me and says, 'That true, Joe?' and I can answer, 'Ayup, reckon so , best's I can, may the good LORD give me strength.'. [ Like most essays in applied philosophy, critiques of political myths, this essay is difficult and tiring to write. It's very difficult to stand up in intellectual fight against a bit of stupidity. Like Don Quioxote II jousting with a man of molasses. Or going mano-a-mano with an amoeba. ] The Pledge of Allegiance is surely stupid; only the Bushie's could try to defend it. It was patched in in the Eisenhower-Nixon administration, in an atmosphere of hyper-patriotic hysteria. So it's not really a pledge; and it's not really a pledge of allegiance. An applicant for citizenship may properly be required to pledge allegiance. This is done by an adult, voluntarily, once only. In an exceptional case, a citizen who had left to serve another country but then wished to return -- might be required to pledge allegiance. A citizen is not normally required to pledge allegiance. It happened in Berkeley, during the McCarthy era, that faculty at the University of California were required to sign a 'loyalty oath'. Some opposed it, I think in all cases on principle. Their arguments would be very relevant to this discusson. I think that at the time California had one of its periodic reactionary Governors, maybe Nixon. (I was on Sproul Plaza, I suppose in '60, when Nixon came to speak; I suppose as part of his campaign for President against Kennedy. It was quite a small crowd, I suppose he was within 20 yards of me. The band played a medly of tunes from Showboat, including 'It ain't necessarily so'. Nixon thanked "the orchestra" and I suppose went on to give a short speech. Those were innocent times. Some time later JFK came to UC Berkeley; he was President then, as I recall. I joined the picket line with the Trotskyists -- the issue was the war in SouthEast Asia (then it was only in Laos). I wanted to make and carry a sign saying 'No More Korea's' -- we had a little sign-making party at the Garson's house -- but Barbara Garson, (who later wrote MacBird, and also once shamed Cousin Joyce [ Dr. Joyce Malakoff Wallace, who became one of the first to research heterosexual transmission of AIDS, which for some reason led her to ride around Manhattan in a chauferred van, giving condoms to hooker's; the New Yorker had a good time writing that up ] into giving up fur coat, when Barbara Garson then wore) said No, you can't have a sign that says 'No More Korea's', because some people in our united-front picket line think the Korean War was a good thing So anyhow, we walked around in a little ellipse with our picket signs for a while -- joined by one very burly guy who carried a sign saying 'JFK Stinks' -- he was featured in the newspaper writeup -- Then we put down our signs in a neat pile and walked into the football stadium to look down at JFK, on a stage in the field, giving his speech. He was charming, of course, beginning his speech: Last week was an important one in world history -- he recounted two events, and then added, "and my wife had her first ride on a elephant." Greenhaus continues, in her article: The plaintiff, a professed atheist, claims, on behalf of his minor daughter, that to recite the pledge with the phrase in question is to take "one side in the quintessential religous qustion, 'Does G_d exist?'" -- a statement of "sectarian religious dogma". Well, not quite; though Chaim Grade makes a similar mistake in The Yeshiva , at the start of Part I. The narrative opens with is protagonist, Tzmech Atlas, in a deep if youthful existential crisis over his inability to firmly believe in the existence of a Supreme Being. Ben-Zion Gold, Rabbi of Harvard Hillel, once recounted that a young woman student came up to him and said she would have to drop out of Jewish religious activities, since she was not sure that she believed in a Supreme Being. Ben-Zion Gold , as he recounted, replied to her: Why deny yourself all the experiences of religous Judaism while you are making up your mind. The point is: this -- being preoccupied, as if it were a precondition of religiosity, with the question of whether or not a Supreme Being exists [though one would better ask: can one inelligibly affirm, or for that matter deny, that a Supreme Being 'exists' ] is a Catholic, I suppose Thomistic attitude; it is not particularly a Jewish one. Jewish religion is not a matter of credo; Jewish relgion is a way of life. One's religious standing as a Jew is not affected by what one does or doesn't say. One's Jewish identity is a matter of maternal descent only; it is independent even of 'conversion' to another faith. Incidentally, it would be difficult and I think not possible for anyone orthodox to say that pledge with that ammendment. Orthodox Jews don't even write the name of the name of G_d, much less say it. Further, orthodox Judaism has its own set of prayers, and while personal prayer may be added in one's own language, to recite a prayer established by others would be quite problematic for an orthodox Jew; and would I think come under the category of avoda zora; that is, forbidden devotion. So it simply won't do for the Bush folks to claim that this, the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance as ammended, is not a religious statement: to someone of religious sensibility, it is a religious affirmation; even though to someone of non-religious sensibility it might not seem so. As for the Bushie's claim that the Pledge, having become by routine a mere formulaic repetition, no longer has religious content, regardless of its words -- well, that's chutzpadike disingenuity; and anyhow, one could say the same for any prescribed prayer. As for the comparison with pocketing the coin-of-the-realm, despite the fact that U.S. coins bears a religous motto -- the citzenry needs must deal in the coin of the realm; but there is no need for them to stand up each day and recite a quaisi-religious formula. One cannot precisely say that an atheist takes hold of a legal tender coin 'involuntarily', but nor would one say that he does so 'voluntarily' [except under extraordinary circumstances, eg, Judas accepting the 30 pieces of silver]. It is just something one does to get by in a world not entirely of one's liking nor entirely under one's control. As for the Bushie's claim that the Pledge of Allegiance merely serves as a reminder of the religiosity of our founding fathers: that is contrived roundabout apologetics; and maybe historically inaccurate as well. And surely Congress did not establish that ammendment to the pledge to make a point in historic intellectual history. So the primary argument of the plaintiff seems to hold. The ammended pledge is not intended as a denial of all that atheists stand for (and a summary judgement of all that agnostics hold indeterminable); but it does presuppose the contrary of their position. And it surely was intended to impose an affirmation of (pan- denominational) religiosity upon the populace. I think it was meant to validate government decisions, by presupposing Divine acquiesence; rather than to humbly subordinate government decision-making to universal 'religious' values. (I mean, as Kerry suggested in a burst of candor, the George Bush Jr. Frankensteinian Golem [ to take a notion from the Bread and Puppet Theatre of the '60's] is a Great Liar. Humble George has arrogated half the world.) If the ammended Pledge were the latter -- a sort of Islamic self-abnegation to the Will of Heaven -- it might properly be recited by senior government officials each day; not by schoolchildren. [The Bushie notion of the USA as the world's defender of democracy and civilization is a bit droll; USA democracy has become almost totally corrupted -- USA national elections are a battle of superstious cartoons, like Plato's 'Idols of the Markeplace'. And USA culture has produced a large measure of vulgarity, relative to Islamic culture. I mean: Big Macs and Neon signs vs. Islamic calligraphy, religious architecture, religious storytelling, and miniatures. ] If the USA government were restrained by 'yirat HaShem', Fear (Awe) of Heaven, it would never have bombed Vietnam. Nor Afghanistan. Incidentally, Israel requires an oath of allegiance, I think only of its MK's; and I think primarily in the context of dual citizenship. (Upon becoming an MK, one must renounce dual citizenship.) So again: the U.S.A. Pledge does seem to violate the -- well, 'atmosphere' if not precisely the [very limited] sense, nor the spirit -- of the lst Constitutional ammendment that "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof" Of course -- to bring in J.L. Austin's most rudimentary terminology -- a pledge is not a statement; it is a performative. And practically speaking, at least in the perception of schoolchildren, it is a required performative (or 'speech-act'; Searle's term, if I recall). A statement may pose no threat to separation of church of state; the required utterance of statment does. The statement which one is required to utter does not in itself favour one religion over another (in contrast to the LORD's prayer, which favours Chistianity, especially over Judaism). But the requirement that one utter it does discriminate against at least orthodox Judaism. Greemhaus writes: "The Bush administration, which is defending the pledge, says its recitation is no more a religious act than pocketing a coin imprinted with 'In G_d we Trust'. Both are simply patriotic acknowledgements of the "the nation's religous history" and of the the "undeniable historical fact that the nation was founded by individuals who believed in G_d" an empirical statment that poses no threat to the separation of church and state. " [End Greenhaus quote.] A pledge is not an acknowlegement; those are different speech-acts. I do not know what, if anything, the phrase 'patriotic acknowlegement' means. "The nation's religious history" is not an especially creditable one: each state seemed restricted to a different denomentation: Quakers in Rhode Island, Catholics in Maryland, Roger Williams driven out of Massachusetts to Rhode Island. I do not know who should be said to have founded the U.S.A. I do not know what religious views the various signers of the Declaration of Independence, nor the delegates to the Constitutional Convention, held. Well, that's all the notes I have for now on the Pledge of Allegiance. I should tidy up these notes. My main points are: that a Pledge must be an exceptional event, usually a one-time event unless extraordinary circumstances intervene. A pledge that is repeated as a daily ritual would seem no longer to be a pledge. One might term it a 'patriotic ritual' [as distinct from a 'religious ritual'; so patriotism is recognized as a sort of pseudo-religion, a benighted expression of the religious impuluse, the impulse to transcend one's individuality.. And a minor cannot make a pledge; it can only be made by a competent adult (at whatever age one is deemed an adult: in Judaism, for boys, at age 13; for girls, insofar as females are considered adults, at age 12. And a pledge cannot be obligatory; it must be made freely and voluntarily. A forced oath, like a forced conversion, is not binding. [ I don't know what Judaism says of forced conversion; in halacha, even free and voluntary conversion is an impossibility; a Jew who has undergone baptism is a deemed a Jew with wet hair. Judaism is no more or less than a matter of matrilineal descent. So the Law of Return, especially as confirmed in the Brother Daniel case, is halachically incorrect. (It holds that a Jew who has converted to another religion is no longer deemed a Jew for purposes of the Law of Return. ) ] So it would seem that the Pledge of Allegiance cannot be required of schoolchildren. I gather that the 1943 Supreme Court decision made that point; but was then ignored by the U.S. Public School system. ] Of course the U.S. Supreme Court is not the ultimate authority on judicial questions; it is half-filled with Nixon's hacks: Clarence Thomas, an obstinate dunce who made good; and a few sophistic reactionaries, given to ingenious evasions of what's obvious. On the other hand, the U.S. Constitution don't say much after 200 years; neither would most of us. Nor is it sacrosanct; like Jefferson said, a healthy country needs a revolution every so often. So both liberal and reactionary Supreme Court Justices may tend to rationalize their political preference, where there's not enough in the Constution from which to derive an application to a present problem. Heck, Godel said that: whatever you're system, you're bound to bump into instances that can't be deduced from it. Thus here. If the Constitutional principle is that there is to be a complete separation of religion from government, then inserting a religious phrase in a pledge of allegiance to the (form of) government ("I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States and to the Republic for which it stands" -- 50 years since I last said that, and it's still stuck in my mind; talk of thought pollution) -- is clearly unConstitutional. But all the lst Ammendment says is: Congress shall make no law regarding an establishment of religion. And the inserted phrase favors no particular religious establishment; it applies to all. The plaintiffs would have it that religion as a whole is to be considered as an establishment of religion, in contrast to Atheism (which as supposed would claim recognition as an establishent of 'religion--not'). But this is strained. Inaction is not ordinarily, but rather only in exceptional circumstances, considered an alternate form of action. Most folks work, some folks don't; most who don't can't be said to work at not-working, unless eg they're on a sit-down strike, or actively unemployed (and believe me, to be officially unemployed in the USA is a very time-consuming occupation; one has to spend a day every few weeks providing employment for the unemployment bureaucracy, and then go out on facade job interviews of exploitative jobs). There have been groups of organized Atheists, but it's pretty 19th-century; one of those gross cultural fads like Nascar watching, whatever that is. Well, that's maybe about as far as I can take this for now. ================================================================= sa, Mevo Modi'in, 1 April '04; but being more nearly 10 Nisan, 4 days before the Exodus into religious freedom, which is the right to self-actualization, than, as it is too, April Fool's Day, especially at Moshav Mevo Modi'in or Meor Modi'in -- from which comes at least information, if not light. =================================================================