Found on my friend's list, I can think of several people on the FL who would probably enjoy this as well.



(This appears to be intended solely as a teen-accessible educational video with no ties to the current Tea Party movement.)

I'm currently working on learning VC#. I have a page about it and programmed a version of the solitaire game Canfield. :) I'm rather proud of it, despite its simplistic look in the Grand Scheme. The UI is rockin' it old skool. If you're interested, feel free to check it out.

Also, recently, I did a site redesign, so wander around at will. :)

Comments/questions/problem reports welcome.

Was Barbara Bush's father Aleister Crowley?

I doubt it, but it's humorous to think about. Especially given how often Ministry made Al Crowley references when criticizing the two Presidents Bush.

This morning, my random mind noticed that <3 for "love" implies that love is for 2 people (less than 3, after all), which made me think that maybe polyfolk should exchange {2,} pendants for Valentine's Day. ;)

I must have Doctor Who on the mind. First, yesterday, I saw the headline Uncle Who Vouched for Terror Suspect Arrested and thought, "Uncle Who? Is that Doctor Who's mother's brother?" Then today I misread the headline Clinton calls for more Haiti aid at Davos as "... from Davros" and wondered when the leader of the Daleks had become so philanthropic.

Just how tough IS Detroit?

This tough: State preschool programs save $1B a year in crime, education costs

Those are some bad-ass toddlers we're keeping off the streets!

(The article is really about how prekindergarten is an investment for long-term education and employment chances, but I like my interpretation better. :) )

News sources misrepresent research study reports often, but FoxNews hit it out of the park with this this graphic, based on this poll. I recall seeing this when it first came out, but looking at it a month later now, I see even more wrong with it. Here's as comprehensive a list as I can muster:

The graphic itself
-- The total is over 100%. This is because FoxNews actually added "very likely" and "somewhat likely" and reported it as "somewhat likely," while also reporting "very likely."
-- What FoxNews reports as "not very likely" is a combination of "not likely" and "not very likely."
-- FoxNews doesn't report the 15% "not sure," thus further underrepresenting the negative responses.
-- The question is changed, which should be obvious from the mismatch between the question (apparently a yes/no) and the answers (apparently a scalar). However, it goes farther: The original question asks about "some scientists," but FoxNews leaves out the word "some"; at least some respondents would interpret, say, 5% of scientists as "some scientists," but not as "scientists."

Problems with the questionnaire
-- Apparently, the topline (on which FoxNews reported) is based on all 1000 respondents, including the 50% who say they don't watch the topic closely, or who aren't sure. So half the respondents are admitting they just don't know enough to be commenting, but they're apparently included in the results. It would have been more appropriate for Rasmussen to (at least also) report the results of questions 2 to 5 on question 1.
-- Q2 asks about whether there's agreement in the scientific community. This primes the pump for Q3 by establishing the notion that the issue is controversial and that, therefore, some scientists would have an impetus to exaggerate.
-- Q3 does not ask *how* or *which* scientists have falsified data. Perhaps there are some respondents who feel that it's the anti-global warming scientists who are faking or exaggerating. Also, Q3 asks about "theories and beliefs," not "theories"; "beliefs," being a more emotional and subjective word, is likely to cause some respondents to answer differently.

Problems with FoxNews' selectiveness
-- A fair inference from the FoxNews graphic is that most people don't think that global warming is a serious issue. However, the majority of those expressing an opinion--46% of 82%--said it is. So rather than report on the actual issue (global warming), FoxNews is revealing through its behavior that the scandal of the climate scientists' email is a deliberate smokescreen. Yes, say the majority of people: Some scientists probably falsified their data. But, say the majority of people: Global warming is a serious problem.
-- Also, by failing to report on q2, FoxNews leads viewers to believe that all of the scientists believed to be falsifying data are supporting the theory of global warming, when that might not be the case.

All in all, an excellent case study on how to completely lie with statistics.

(NB: I've been debating on YourSay on Facebook. Some of the commenters there, as throughout the Internet, are disturbing in their beliefs, but it gives me the opportunity to refresh and focus my own positions.)

The United States does not current have, and never has had, an official language. However, almost all government business is conducted in English, and the overwhelming majority of citizens speak English. There are three major positions with regards to the issue of language usage and the United States government:

1. English should be required for permanent residency, and no government documents should be provided in any language other than English (basically, the "English First" position).


2. The government should offer every opportunity to citizens and potential citizens who want to learn English, and in so doing tacitly discourage the exclusive use of other languages, but should provide important documents in major foreign languages.


3. The government should do nothing, and let free market forces pressure citizens who want to be successful outside their diaspora communities to learn English. The government should provide document translations in whatever languages are requested.

For the most part, the status quo is somewhere between the second and third positions (although basic English is currently required for non-naturalized citizenship). Government documents are generally provided in English, but a good number are also provided in Spanish, and some in a variety of other languages. Medical care is a particularly touchy subject, which I'll get to later.

At the ideological heart of the first position, in my experience and perspective, is bias against the Spanish language and, by extension, Mexicans specifically and Latinos in general. A growing number of private companies offer automated telephone services in Spanish as well as English, as evidenced by the now ubiquitous "Press 1 for English." It is, in short, bigotry. Related to the first two positions above are these statements of belief:

1. It bothers me when people speak a language other than English because I don't like not being to understand what other people are saying.


2. I think people should learn the dominant language, which is English in the United States, because it greatly helps them to succeed in society.

The response to the first position should be a hearty: So what? If someone isn't talking to you, what difference does it make if you can understand what they're saying. The issue becomes relevant in commercial situations, where I want to do business with someone but I can't understand what they're saying. In those cases, though, the businessperson has presumably made the choice of going into business without being communicative in English. I can then make the choice to do business with them or not. Likewise, if I run a business and a customer can't communicate with me, I can choose to not do business with them (with the exception below).

The second position, at any rate, is based on the notion that a primary goal of the government should be to provide support and services for self-improvement on the theory that individual success translates into societal success. However, there are situations where the government, despite its efforts to encourage English as a universal, should nonetheless provide support in other languages.

For one thing, immigration is not always an individual act. Immigrants frequently come to this country as families, including grandparents who have to choose between coming with their only children or staying behind, alone and retired and with financial restrictions. By forcing fluent English as a requirement for residency here, those immigrant families would be given fewer options.

Most important, though, is the issue of health care. Medicine uses specialized language that even many native speakers of English have difficulty with. The "basic English" requirement for citizenship would still mean many foreign-born citizens would have trouble understanding medical instructions provided in English. And even basic instructions that are misunderstood, such as "Take these twice a day" understood as "take these every two days," can have serious ramifications.

Personally, I think the status quo is the appropriate route, and I think that most (not all) people who support the English First direction are motivated largely by bigotry against the Mexican Menace that certain forces have built up as an economic hobgoblin. We haven't really deviated much from the current state of affairs through the history of the country, generally providing government documents only in English except when deemed necessary by experts in a specific arena. The only major shift I'm aware of is the fairly recent clarification that the legal onus for providing language-appropriate medical care is on hospitals, not patients. And yet, English First seems to be gaining, or at least maintaining, traction. Its apparent contemporaneity with the appearance of the Mexican Menace hobgoblin is what leads me to my conclusion.

A comment I made on YourSay over on Facebook, in a discussion on the Second Amendment, preserved here for future reference:

I find it interesting that, in every single discussion on this topic, all most people talk about is guns. The Second Amendment isn't limited to guns, it refers to "arms," which Noah Webster's 1828 dictionary defines as "weapons of offense, or armor for defense and protection of the body" (http://1828.mshaffer.com/d/word/arms). There are legal limitations on knives, on bows and arrows, on maces, and so on, and yet there don't seem to be people obsessing with "They'll pry my broadsword from my cold, dead hands!"

Many people are pathologically obsessed with guns and hide behind the Second Amendment to defend their position.

ETA: A follow-up comment I made to someone saying that he favors the Second Amendment because he lives in the country and doesn't feel comfortable waiting for the cops:

As far as I can tell, your reasoning is the primary purpose for the Second Amendment: When it was written, so many people lived in remote areas and communication across distances was time-consuming, so "Call 911" wasn't an option for fighting crime and foreign invasion. The government was relying on people to be able to stand up as individuals to fight those sorts of crises. All this talk of the Second Amendment being about supporting insurrections against the US government was secondary to most Founding Fathers' thoughts, if present at all.

My point is, other weapons would be effective in those sorts of crises; usually not as effective as guns, but in some cases maybe even more effective. I really do think that a lot of people -- not everyone! -- who go on and on about the Second Amendment (particularly the insurrectionist interpretation) really just have an unhealthy obsession with guns.

If that offends individuals, perhaps that should be a cause for self-reflection.

Personal addendum here: I don't like guns. If someone were to accuse me of having an unhealthy obsession with guns, I'd readily agree.

Quite some time ago now, I made an ill-conceived post on race in which I argued that most people (myself included) are racist. I have since considered and reconsidered that post (which is currently private, by the way), most recently in light of the brouhaha over Harry Reid's comments.

Before going further, I invite you to watch the video below:



The video talks about two distinctions, but I think there are really three. To define some terms:

-- A racist thought is a thought which discriminates on the basis of race.
-- A racist act is an act which discriminates on the basis of race.
-- A racist is someone who consistently and without apology has racist thoughts and does racist acts.

I don't accept the necessity of power in the definition of "racist"; people without power can be racist, have racist thoughts, and do racist things. However, I acknowledge that the problems of racism of any sort is usually greatly compounded by the presence of power.

Let's look at Harry Reid specifically. What he said (in 2008) was that Obama would make a good candidate because, although he was black, he was light-skinned and didn't have a "Negro dialect." Where is the racism?

The most obvious place is in the word choice. "Negro" has fallen out of usage among serious sources in favor of "black" or (specifically about US race relations) "African American." There was a time (in Reid's life) that "Negro" was a perfectly acceptable term; the SCOTUS ruling for Loving v Virginia, for instance, uses it multiple times, and that was written the year after Reid entered politics. These days, though, it's considered to be derogatory, only a skip away from "nigger."

Did Reid use "Negro dialect" because he honestly thought that that was an acceptable term? I think it's important to note that he was using the term as an adjective, so claims that he knows that "Negro" is inappropriate are weakened by that; it's possible that "Negro dialect" is the appropriate linguistic term, and only someone with linguistics knowledge would know for sure that it isn't (the appropriate term, last I was aware, is "African-American Vernacular English" or AAVE, although "Black English" is also used). Even so, I think it was sloppy of Reid, and he should indeed have known better than to say it.

A less obvious place is in the idea that Reid was saying that he, personally, preferred Obama over a darker-skinned black or an AAVE speaker because of those features. Reid may well have that thought, but I don't think that was the intent of his words. It seems more plausible that Reid's point was that he felt *most Americans* preferred Obama because of those features.

So Reid wasn't, I think, being substantively racist against Obama or against blacks; instead, I think his primary message was that he thinks that many (white) Americans are racist enough for it to affect their votes, enough to have it change the outcome of the election. He was, in other words, being racist against (some) whites.

How many is "many"? It might sound like he means "most." However, Presidential elections are a numbers game, and the last few elections have been fairly close. If just 20% of the voting public refused to vote for a dark-skinned black man regardless of his stances, that would be enough to change the outcome.

I've seen commentary that suggests that Reid was suggesting that conservatives are racist, but in truth, Reid's comment really doesn't say much about conservatives. Reid wasn't talking nearly as much about Obama's fitness for the office (where conservative racists would be obstructionist) as about his electability. Presidential races are consistently won by appeal to moderates; conservatives wouldn't have voted for Edwards or Clinton, either.

So, if anything, Reid was insulting moderates (and liberals) by suggesting that a significant number of them would be swayed by Obama's skin tone.

Now, is it true, or is it a projection of Reid's own racist thinking onto the general public? If the latter, Reid's not alone: Biden suggested as much when he called Obama "clean and articulate." I'm sure many people felt more inclined to vote for Obama than they would have for either a more stereotypically "BLACK" candidate or for a white man with the same platform and charisma, because Obama is a "safe" token, some love-me liberals can vote for and say, "We're so cutting edge, we have a black President!" Did it effect the outcome of the election? Really, it's hard to say, in large part because we're so afraid of discussing race honestly that most of us are used to lying to ourselves about the subject.

Going back to my earlier post, though, and tying it in with Reid, I don't think I (or Reid) am racist after all. I have occasional racist thoughts, which occasionally manifest in racist acts such as being more wary around blacks than whites, but these things don't make "a racist"; nor does Reid's comment.

The video, though, makes the most crucial point: At the end of it all, it doesn't matter whether someone is "a racist" or not. What matters is whether we're trying to overcome our own racist thoughts and acts. Was Reid sincere in his regret over his comments? Obama indicated acceptance of the apology. Now, rather than get into a semantic debate about whether Reid is "a racist" or whether he just "said a racist thing," I think it would be more productive to explore the issues themselves.

Today, the Federal courts entry the fray on Prop 8 in California. California's ban on same sex marriage will probably end up in the Supreme Court. Hopefully this is the next step towards national recognition of same-sex marriage, rather than yet another setback.

Both sides have been making emotional arguments based on legal irrelevancies. The opposing side cites God's alleged hatred of homosexuality (while pooh-poohing comments about the myriad other sins cited in the Bible that are legally protected or ignored by today's civil laws); it also makes easily dismissed slippery slope arguments about incest, pedophilia, and bestiality. The supporting side talks about love, as if love alone is the basis for our marriage laws.

Setting aside these arguments, there are two basic clusters of issues that ought to have bearing on the civil recognition of marriage contracts. These arguments also appear in the rhetoric on the subject, but tend to linger under the currents, drowned out by the emotional ones. These clusters are:

• Marriage is for procreation: Marriage encourages healthy child-bearing and child-rearing by supporting financially and emotionally stable household creation.



• Marriage is a family law short-cut: Marriage allows a quick, inexpensive, and time-tested way for adults who are not related by blood to indicate a legal relationship for purposes such as inheritance, hospital visitation, sharing of household, and end-of-life decisions.

The first view is put forward by opponents, who insist that the reason why we have complex couple-based marriage laws in this country is to protect children. The ideal situation, they argue, is for a child to be raised by a father and a mother. Rightly, they fear that if marriage were dropped as a legal institution, many more fathers would walk off than do now, leaving pregnant women or new mothers to fend for themselves or relying on the governmental welfare system. Gay couples obviously can't have biological children without the involvement of external parties; even in that case, gay couples can't provide a biological male parent and a biological female parent. In reality, the veracity of this claim is still not certain. Early studies of children raised by same-sex parents suggest, though, that it's bogus; such children don't appear to exhibit any problems inherent from the gender of their parents. It appears at this point that the liberal perspective--that the most important thing for a child's well-being is to be raised by *loving* parents--appears to be the most accurate one. And of course gay couples can and should expose their child to a range of other loving, trusted adults, just as straight couples can and should.

The second view is put forward by supporters, who insist that historical reasons are irrelevant given the number of childless heterosexual couples who are legally married. The opponents feel that legalizing same-sex marriage would amount to changing the definition of marriage. The reality, though, is that for a significant portion of the US population, the definition of marriage changed a long time ago. Same sex marriage amounts to explicit acknowledgment of this change. While many gay couples want to adopt, for many other gay couples the driving force behind wanting to get married is the same as that for most child-free married couples: Insurance, taxes, hospital visits, inheritance, and so on. Ironically, this is even more true now than before this issue first hit in Hawaii, because many states (such as Michigan) have passed laws or amendments effectively banning even existing civil unions, so the argument that gays could still go to a lawyer and, after hundreds or thousands of dollars, build rights somewhat similar to marriage is no longer true.

Another issue sometimes raised is that of equal protection under the law. The opponents of same sex marriage inanely insist that gays and lesbians currently have equal protection because, like heterosexuals, they are completely free to marry an unrelated adult member of the opposite gender, and that same sex marriage therefore qualifies as a special right (which it doesn't, because in areas with legal same sex marriage, heterosexuals are completely free to marry an unrelated adult member of their own gender as well, if they choose). Further, people who fail to identify as either gender are not logically able to marry anyone at all, so they don't in fact enjoy equal protection.

Unfortunately, this issue feels like just another ideological rift that might not be bridgeable. Conservatives will continue to generally feel that marriage is about providing stability for children, while liberals will continue to generally feel that marriage is about building families in the absence of blood. Marriage is truly about either, or both, depending on the couple. A truly blind system of justice would err to the liberal side on this topic: If straight couples who state no intent to reproduce (or who are biologically incapable of doing so) can get married, then there's no clear reason to prevent any two consenting adults who cannot have children of their own to marry.

Time will shortly tell, though, how blind the justice system currently is.

In response to the failed Christmas day bombing at DTW, the US has announced that it will be increasing security measure for passengers that don't actually fit the would-be bomber's profile.

That's right, kids. Under the increased measures, the bomber might still have gotten through the system.

Specifically, all travelers to the US from abroad will have an increased chance of random search, plus travelers coming from or through a "state sponsor of terrorism" will all have to undergo a more thorough search. Neither Nigeria nor the Netherlands are on the list of state sponsors of terrorism, though, so really, that guy would not necessarily have been searched under these new measures.

Huzzah.

Remember, what the terrorists want is for us to change our lifestyle. Thank goodness that's not happening. *eyeroll*

Meanwhile, in Ireland, it's now illegal to say something blasphemous. Unrelated to this story, natch, but good to see ours isn't the only government what's done lost its marbles.

It seems increasingly to me that a major philosophical difference between the pro-life position and the pro-choice position is the quantity of life vs the quality of life. Many people who favor the continuation of abortion as a choice make arguments about babies being unloved due to not being wanted by their mothers or being unhappy or uncomfortable due to health problems related to genetic conditions. Many people who seek abortion bans make arguments about every life being sacred, regardless of the situation. The pro-life position appears to be that it's a sin* to end any human life (until they've had the opportunity to sin through murder, rape, or some other heinous act, in which case, kill 'em now!), while the pro-choice position is largely that it's a sin* to bring to term a human life that would likely cause far more misery than joy, either for the child, for the mother, or both, when a more humane solution exists.

This coupled with the pro-life perception that human life begins at or near conception vs the pro-choice perception that "human" life begins at or near birth (that is, that fetal life is not yet human) makes it difficult for me to see the possibility that we'll ever fully bridge the philosophical gap.

* That is, immoral, not necessarily as a religious concept.

From time to time I get asked what Saturnalia is. So here it is. :)

Saturnalia is the Roman festival to Saturnus, Roman god of agriculture, strength, and justice. Like most of the polytheistic deities, the importance of his various attributes, as well as his lineage and his association with deities from other pantheons (such as the Greek Chronos) shifted around based on era and location.

In the Roman Empire, Saturnalia was celebrated around the time of the Winter Solstice. The number of days varied, but seven is one of the more common lengths, and the one observed by many modern Roman Reconstructionists, running from the 17th to the 23rd of December. At the household level, some of the modern Christmas observations are similar to the Roman Saturnalian ones: Houses would be decked with greenery and other froufrou, and simple gifts wold be exchanged (usually things like candles, nuts for gambling games, and children's toys).

Communally, the primary characteristic of Saturnalia was the idea of misrule and the practice of taboos. Most famously, perhaps, was the practice of slaves becoming masters and vice-versa. Also, things like gambling which were normally illegal were permitted.

The Festival of Saturnalia did get a reputation for debauch while the early Christian church was developing. Part of this was justified, especially under Caesars like Caligula (the X-rated Bob Guccione film is not particularly off-base), but part of it was due to differing interpretations and moral values. Christianity started out much more conservatively than it is for most modern Christians, and that combined with an admittedly prurient flavor to the public Roman festivities led to exaggeration and misrepresentation.

The proper Roman greeting, analogous to "Merry Christmas," is "Io Saturnalia." But I'll take any greeting appropriate to the season, personally. :)

Welcome to my intermittently annual War on over Christmas post. :)

Once upon a time, I was the sort of person who got pissy when people said "Merry Christmas" to me. I wrote screeds on it; I confronted co-workers. At some point, I turned a corner and decided, hey, they want me to have a nice day, week, month, season. It's a positive sentiment.

It seems to me that we as a society of USians have largely turned a corner, too, in that most of the people who prefer to hear a generic "happy holidays" over a specific "merry Christmas" feel like they've been heard, even if people don't agree, and really it's not that much of an issue anymore for most people outside the liberal fringe, the ones who'll get offended about just about anything.

Now it's the other side's turn.

Over on Facebook, the Zynga games (Farmville, Cafe World, etc.) offer "holiday trees" instead of "Christmas trees." Whoa, nelly, did that ever generate some self-righteousness. Many stores forbid their employees from saying "Merry Christmas" out of fear of offending the "Happy Holidays" crowd, and that offends some of the "Merry Christmas" crowd. According to CNN, one Californian is trying to REQUIRE "public schools [to] give their students an opportunity to hear Christmas songs" (of course, that requirement could be satisfied by a field trip to just about any shopping mall in the United States in the month of December).

Christmas is largely a borrowed holiday. The date itself was probably chosen because of its proximity to either Saturnalia (Dec 17-23) or the birth of Mithras (Dec 25), or both; according to Luke 2:8, Jesus would have been born in late spring through early fall. This source, for instance, argues that Jesus was conceived at Hanukkah and born during the Feast of the Tabernacle, i.e., September-October. The early church, though, didn't generally pretend that December 25 was meant to be the day of Christ's birth, only that they needed a day to celebrate a mass in honor of Christ's birth (a Christ Mass), and December 25 was chosen for that purpose.

It's true that the tradition of cutting down a conifer, bringing it indoors, and decorating it with lights and baubles is indeed a Christian one. However, two things are important to keep in mind. First, the tradition borrows elements from earlier pagan traditions. Romans decorated their homes with greenery; Druids decorated trees (without cutting them down). Indeed, one of the origin myths of the conifer-as-Christmas-symbol involves Pope Boniface and a pine tree that grows from the roots of a cut-down Druidic oak tree (the other one involves Martin Luther deciding he loved how an evergreen made him feel during his daily winter constitutional that he brought one home to share with others). Secondly, the conifer has nothing to do with the nativity; it has symbolical meaning about the love of God shining through the darkness of winter, but pine trees aren't present in the nativity stories (and possibly weren't present in Bethlehem at the time regardless).

Other symbols associated with Christmas have pre-Christian origins as well. Gift-giving was practiced by both the Jews (Hannukah) and the Romans (Saturnalia). Garlands were used by the Romans. Mistletoe was sacred to the Druids, and played a major role in Norse mythology. Santa Claus has an analogue in Norse mythology, as well (Frau Berctha/Holda/Frauke).

The point being, while Christmas may be a Christian holiday, the notion of decorating one's house in cheery ways and giving gifts is broader than that. If someone wishes to acknowledge Christmas with "Merry Christmas," hey, go for it. If someone wishes to acknowledge some other holiday specifically, or holidays generically, there's plenty of justification for that, too. Either way, rather than getting sanctimonious because it's not the way you want to have someone wish you a nice day/week/month/season, why not just take it as a well-wishing and move on?

As for whether somebody has a holiday tree or a Christmas tree or a Yule tree or a Saturnalia tree or Bob the Happy Happy Mithras Tree, if it's in their own home (or free video game), what difference does it make? If a company gets overzealous in its sensitivity and forbids employees from uttering a particular phrase, well, oh well, that's their home and their right to make those sorts of rules, just as it's the customer's right not to shop there. There are places I don't shop because I don't agree with their management decisions. Such is life.

Io Saturnalia, y'all.

Okay, so. I'm working on converting my website into a cleaner format, and part of that is converting some sample puzzle diagrams from tables into images. I decide to create the tables in Excel and then paste them into Photoshop.

First WTH: I create the puzzle grid in Excel, select the section of the table I want, and copy-paste into Photoshop. I honestly figure this won't work, but why not, nothing ventured, nothing gained. Surprise! It pastes my Excel table, exactly as selected, as an image in Photoshop. W00t! This'll save me a lot of time and stress.

Second WTH: The puzzle I'm working on, Hashi (aka Bridges), requires circles around the numbers and then grid lines connecting the numbers. This is the part I've really been dreading, because it's such a freakin' pain in the ass to line up all those lines and such. I put the circles around the numbers and I draw the connector lines. I grunt and resign myself to an hour or two of carefully lining up the lines, zoom to 400%, and select one end of a connector line... and the nearest circle lights up with 8 connector handles! :-O Apparently Microsoft has added connector handle capability to Excel (as well as Word) as of the 2007 version. At least, I don't remember anything like this happening in the past except in PowerPoint (and Visio).

Coolio. My task is much easier now.

Someone turned the thermostat way down outside. We should probably call an HVAC repairperson.

Okay, so.

Lately I've noticed that there seems to be two fallbacks in the entertainment industry: Making versions of Dickens' A Christmas Carol which are substantively identical to each other, and making versions of Carroll's Alice books which are as different as possible from the source material while still claiming to be related.

Which leads me to the inevitable hybrid.

In Alice Scrooge, Alice Liddell is a spoiled little rich girl who thinks that Christmas is all about getting presents. She follows a white rabbit through a crack in her bedroom wall and winds up encountering three ghosts: Humpty Dumpty, who shows her her past Christmases; the Mad Hatter, who shows her how her friends are spending Christmas now; and the Red Queen, who shows her her future fate if she doesn't change her spoiled ways. Other characters from the Alice books will be placed liberally throughout, usually in combinations that are as illogical in the context of the books as possible. When Alice comes back out of the crack, she has changed her ways, and adopts a Cheshire cat from a nearby shelter.

THE END. And this will make it so that Hollywood never has to butcher either of these poor innocent literary works again.

There, I fixed it.

This is one of those topics where I started exploring one topic and wound up somewhere else. :)

It started here: Over on Facebook, some people are offended that Zynga games¹ offer a "holiday tree" instead of a "Christmas tree." There was a YourSay poll, the comments section of which is often populated by sanctimonious² Christians and irreverent² liberal heathen/atheist sorts. Anyway, one of the former posted the lyrics to "Oh Christmas Tree" to mock the notion that "Oh Holiday Tree" doesn't scan. I responded that the original German version actually translates to "Oh Fir Tree." This lead me to research whether the original "O Tannenbaum" makes any reference to Christmas at all.

The thing is, I'm still not sure about the original. When I went to Wikipedia, the initial answer was, no. First, a brief history.

According to Georg Büchmann³, between 1550 and 1580, this stanza appeared:
O Tanne, du bist ein edler Zweig,
Du grünest Winter und die liebe Sommerzeit
Wenn alle Bäume dürre sein
So grünest du, edles Tannenbäumelein

A more widely quoted^{3, 4} source is Melchior Franck's 1614 song, including the stanza:
Ach Tannenbaum, ach Tannenbaum, du bist ein edler Zweig!
Du grünest uns den Winter, die liebe Sommerzeit.

The first stanza of the modern song was actually part of an 1819 broken-hearted poem by Joachim August Zarnack, who was comparing the steadfastness of the fir tree, green even in the winter, to the fair-weather love of his maiden⁵:

( Zarnack's original )

In 1824, Ernst Anschütz took the first stanza and added two of his own. However, sources differ on what the third line of Anschütz's original is, and therein lies the rub. There are no mentions of Christmas in the rest of the work:

( O Tannenbaum as it's sung today )

The line that differs is given alternately as "Wie oft hat schon zur Winterzeit" ("how often already has, in wintertime,") or "Wie oft hat nicht zur Weihnachtszeit" ("how often has not, at Christmastime,"), with the following line being "a tree like you raised my spirits!"

What's curious about this is that the two lines appear to exist in quantum space. References mention one or the other exclusively (note that I wrote the footnote on Wikipedia, assuming it's there when you visit), acting as if it's the original and there's no other form.

Several sources mention that Hitler pushed the song as part of his attempt to secularize Christmas, so first I theorized that he replaced "Weihnachtszeit" with "Winterzeit,"⁷ but then I found a 1917 book on Google Books with "Winterzeit."⁸ Then I wondered if "Weihnachtszeit" hadn't been added in post-war to reclaim the Christian symbols, but I found another book from the same year, on the same publisher with "Weihnachtszeit."⁹

Spock with a beard.

So for now I feel like I'm at a dead-end. The other interesting peccadillo of this difference is that "schon" always goes with "Winterzeit" and "nicht" with "Weihnachtszeit."¹⁰ That is, I haven't found either "Wie oft hat nicht zur Winterzeit" or "Wie oft hat schon zur Weihnachtszeit."¹¹

I'm still interested in the original question, which is whether "O Tannenbaum" originally referenced Christmas overtly (it's a published source, it ought to be available somewhere), but now I'm even more curious about why the sources I've found haven't commented or even acknowledged the two versions, both of which seem widespread still.

1. The poll was about Farmville, but I only play Cafe World, which has the same situation
2. This is a restrictive adjective, not a descriptive one
3. http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/O_Tannenbaum
4. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O_Tannenbaum
5. http://de.wikisource.org/wiki/O_Tannenbaum_%28Zarnack%29
6. Sometimes "grün"
7. Sometimes "Winterszeit"
8. Leitfaden der deutschen Sprache, W. H. Gohdes & E. R. Dodge, Henry Holt, 1917
9. German Poems for Memorizing, Oscar Carl Burkhard, Henry Holt, 1917
10. One recent book uses "doch"
11. A source on denglish says that "nicht" here is not meant to be negative, but rather as a rhetorical device; in English, this would generally be presented as a question, "How often has a tree like you not been able to cheer me?", while the German is an exclamation, at least in this case

I've recommended Sony Reader instead of Amazon Kindle to people in the past, and some have told me that the Reader didn't have Mac support. I'm not sure how long it's supported Mac, but the Dec 11 release will support Snow Leopard (10.6) as well as Windows 7.

Also, they're converting all support to ePub format. Their previous default format was proprietary, although they released an update some time ago that allows the Reader to read ePub files gotten elsewhere. Now all new and redownloaded files will be in ePub format. This effectively deprecates their proprietary format, and I assume that means they'll eliminate it eventually. ePub is an industry-wide document format that's basically XHTML with a file bundler.

They also have or will have soon direct wifi download support. Sony clearly have Kindle directly in its sights, and although early indications were that Reader may be another Betamax, these are interestingly aggressive stirrings.