The Guild 3-15-2005 Beware the Ides of March

Forget Friday the 13th. Ignore ladders, black cats, broken mirrors and spilt salt. Think instead of today, March 15, and beware.

As superstitions go, being wary of the ides of March is certainly more unusual. Yet the day does have a certain resonance.

In the complicated world of the Roman calender, there were 45 public festivals (not bad compared to the UK's eight bank holidays), as well as the ides of each month, days which were sacred to Jupiter.

The Julian calendar, established by Julius Caesar, gave us the basis of our system of 365 days a year and 366 in a leap year. But for the most part, the Roman festivals of his time have had their day.

The ides of March, however, is one day that continues to appeal, marked because that was the date that Julius Caesar was assassinated in the senate, in 44BC.

Its modern-day memory is thanks, like so many things, to Shakespeare's way with words.

In act one, scene two of Julius Caesar, Caesar asks a soothsayer what the future holds.

Caesar: Who is it in the press that calls on me? I hear a tongue, shriller than all the music Cry "Caesar!" Speak. Caesar is turn'd to hear. Soothsayer: Beware the ides of March.

Although today the reference will not be understood by everybody, David Ewing Duncan, author of The Calendar, wrote that it was not always so.

A Roman saying "four ides" (meaning four days before the ides) would be just as clear to other Romans as someone saying March 11.

And furthermore, the system lasted 2,000 years, well into the Renaissance, he wrote. This meant Shakespeare could include the line, and expect his audience to know what he meant.

However, just four hundred years later, the ides seems set only to survive as a literary and historical reference - in spite of it being the date by which debts (including Caesar's) were usually settled.

Professor Eileen Barker, of the London School of Economics, said it was a shame but the ides probably only had significance for schoolchildren reading Julius Caesar.

"I was thinking about this when I saw what date it was, and I thought no wonder I'm feeling awful," she said.

One significant historical event that fell on the ides of March is, perhaps, worth noting. It was on this day in 1876 that Test cricket was born.

Beware, Mo Dowd is out and about promoting the paperback version of her book...

Here is a summary of her appearance on Imus this a.m. as posted by barsetLINK, POST #1207

THANKS BARSET for reporting this.

Dowd found Republicans talking about God, mercy, religious faith, offensive. "If a Martian landed...he would definitely think this is a theocracy."

Imus to Dowd, "Weren't you raised Catholic?"

Dowd: Oh, yes, I was convent bred. When I have trouble sleeping at night, my mother tells me to say the rosary. Snort, snort.

.......Back to Bush and war. Imus: Maybe they were right, Maureen." Babble. Dowd, sounding apopletic, "at the Gridiron dinner Bush (never "President Bush.") winked at me as if to say, 'I've got your number, but I win.'

Dowd: I will never change my mind about how he tricked the American people into going to war in Iraq. I will never change my mind about that."

Imus: Not even if things are going well?

Dowd: I will never change my mind. Nothing will ever change my mind.

Ah, Rene, glad to hear she's gotten a better hair color. I hope she retires and gets married and raises kids in Texas. I think that'd make her happy. Hollyweird is just too weird.

Speaking of weird, how 'bout that Michael Jackson? I took the day off and caught a pic of him looking stoned getting out of his car again today. Every time I see him on tv I catch myself yelling "Pervert!"

DS - you definately should take in the Northeast. September is the best time -- all the beach tourists are gone (their kids have to go back to school, then). October's also nice but too cold to get in the water. However, the trees are beautiful. Otherwise go in June - mid to late June -- it's before the kiddies get out of school so most people aren't yet down on the Cape. Traffic isn't bad.

Good morning, and let's start with an anecdote about the "party of the working man":

IT'S one thing to get elected to high office with an outspoken wife — it's quite another to get into a tony country club. Case in point: Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.), an applicant to the blue-blooded Chevy Chase Club in suburban Washington. He's been on probation since his wife, Susan, was overheard yelling at the staff on more than one occasion. "She's really teed off on some of the help," said one member. Bayh, whose name is often brought up as a possible presidential candidate, had enjoyed club privileges while his application was being considered. (Page Six)

Is it just me, or does anyone else sense an imperious resemblance between Susan Bayh and Teresa Heinz?

The Beaste travels to Texas to fatten her coffers (no, this isn't a snide remark about her ankles):

McALLEN — Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-New York, visited the McAllen home of bank chairman and real estate developer Alonzo Cantu on Tuesday for a private, $500-a-ticket luncheon that raised as much as $125,000 for her 2006 re-election campaign.

The former first lady and current New York senator last visited McAllen on Aug. 18, 1999, for a $1,000-a-plate fund-raising breakfast at Cantu’s home. That event raised more than $200,000 for her high-profile Senate race against conservative Republican and then-New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

The Tuesday fund-raiser was closed to the news media. Clinton’s Senate offices in Washington, D.C., and New York City did not return messages seeking comment, nor did the Washington, D.C., office of her principal campaign committee, Friends of Hillary.

Not even the executive director of the Hidalgo County Democratic Party was aware of the exact details of the event. Armando Garza was aware of the fund-raiser, but said it was scheduled to be held in the evening.

"She was here and she’s gone," said McAllen business owner Martha V. Hinojosa, 46, who attended the fund-raiser with her 18-year-old daughter. "Most people thought it was going to be in the evening."

Hinojosa met the senator for the first time during Clinton’s two-hour visit Tuesday and was impressed by what she saw in the woman many regard as the frontrunner for the Democratic Party’s 2008 presidential nomination.

"She talked with a lot of enthusiasm about trying to put the Democratic Party back together. She spoke about Democrats opening the lines of communication."

Hinojosa said the senator also reiterated that the $5 trillion budget surplus the United States had while her husband, Bill Clinton, was president has turned into a $6 trillion deficit under the Bush administration.

Clinton also warned that Republicans "want to take us back to the days before FDR" and "want to end Social Security," Hinojosa said.

The senator also told those in attendance that she and former President Clinton "like the Valley," that he was "doing well after his surgery" and that he "was a little bit jealous because she was here and he wasn’t," Hinojosa added.

She estimated 250 people attended the luncheon at Cantu’s lavish home. The board chairman of Lone Star National Bank and president of Alonzo Cantu Construction Inc. said he was in a meeting and unavailable to discuss her visit when The Monitor contacted him Tuesday afternoon and evening.

Documents filed with the Federal Election Commission indicate Cantu, through Friends of Hillary, gave $2,000 to the senator’s reelection campaign on Dec. 27, 2004.

Garza, of the Hidalgo County Democratic Party, said Cantu’s friendship with the Clintons dates back to the 1992 presidential race.

"Alonzo Cantu was always very helpful, and so they developed a friendship over the years," Garza said. "During President Clinton’s first run, as well as his re-election bid, he was a staunch supporter and helped raise funds in the area for President Clinton."

Garza said the Rio Grande Valley benefits any time a high-profile person such as Sen. Clinton visits the region.

"I think it’s always good to have the national attention that we can get from something like this. I think it’s very important that business leaders in this community have ties to national leaders like Sen. Clinton, because that makes it a lot easier to communicate our needs and our situations, whatever they may be.

"We just wish that they wouldn’t just come here and raise all the money and then take it all out of state. I would hope that they would remember us and try and help us in our fund-raising efforts as well here locally. But it’s the price we pay to have the national attention that we can get."

http://www.themonitor.com/SiteProcessor.cfm?Template=/GlobalTemplates/Details.cfm&StoryID=6323&Section=Valley

And Austin:

AUSTIN — Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton on Tuesday told supporters at a Central Texas fund-raiser that they need to work at the grassroots level on 2006 Democratic campaigns to help oust Republicans in the U.S. Congress.

"We have to do everything possible," said Clinton, D-NY. "We've got to be ready to fight back."

Speaking to a crowd of several hundred people at the Austin home of Garry Mauro, the former Texas Land Commissioner who ran for Texas governor in 1998, Clinton said the Bush administration is following a "radical, reactionary agenda."

"I think a lot of Americans are waking up to that," she said.

Clinton said Democrats must be patient and steadily show support for Democratic candidates if the party is to regain power.

Supporters paid $100 to $500 each to attend the event, which raised money for the former first lady's 2006 re-election campaign. Mauro, who has been friends with the Clintons for 30 years, said 500 people had signed up to attend.

After the event, the senator headed to another fund-raiser at the home of Roy Spence, founder and president of GSD&M, a multibillion dollar advertising firm in Austin.

Ann Lewis, a spokeswoman for Clinton's political action committee, said the group did not set fund-raising goals for the Texas stops.

Former President Clinton, who is recovering from an operation to remove scar tissue and fluid that developed after his heart bypass surgery six months ago, did not attend the Austin events.

"He'll be better than ever," his wife said of his recovery.

http://www.dailysentinel.com/news/content/gen/ap/TX_Hillary_Clinton.html

I wish she'd make up her mind. If Bush is pushing a "radical reactionary" agenda, why has she been acting as though she - as a born again moderate - supports it?

I don't have many "pet peeves" but I discovered one on Monday. It's the grocery store. If you give it some thought, you realize how unefficient shopping for food is.

You wander through the store (mine's being totally remodeled now, so every time I go, I can't find ANYTHING w/o a 3 hour tour), putting items you want into your cart. Sounds good, right?

Then you go to checkout and take every item OUT of your cart and put it on the conveyor belt to be rang up. Then the sacker bags everything and puts it back in your cart.

Then you take it out to your car and UNLOAD it all into your car. Drive home. UNLOAD it all into the kitchen and put it away.

Man, that's redundant and a waste of time and energy.

So here's my idea. We set up a different kind of grocery store. You can go in and browse the normal way AND the store offers the option of computer "bagging."

In other words, I can go on their website, select the items I want from a menu, give them a day and time I want to pick them up (already bagged and the entire list charged to my credit card at the time I place the order). I drive up to the "delivery lane" or "take out lane" or whatever you want to call it, give them my number (which the computer has assigned me) and they bring my bagged groceries out to the car.

I think this could make millions. Advertisers wouldn't get too tweaked because they could run ads off the store's web page. If you wanted to still shop "the old fashioned way" you could. What do you guys think?

Well, I'm breathing a sign of relief, my children are now ALL home.

There was a shooting on the grounds of our Senior High this afternoon close to dismissal time, and all the district buildings were locked down. The perp was described as a mentally challenged individual, who was NOT a student. He had a job interview with a local tire shop not far from the school, and was upset because he wasn't hired.

The other details are sketchy, but some sources have said he entered the school and began verbalizing his frustration and /or began making threats. The police were called when it was noted he had a weapon. When he left the building, he tried shooting it out with police, and lost. Our local hospital reported he's deceased.

Thank God none of our kids were injured, and kudos to the police.

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