As many historians have written, Europeans in the Middle Ages lived with an almost childlike emotional intensity. There were stark contrasts between daytime and darkness, between summer heat and winter cold, between misery and exuberance, and good and evil. Certain distinctions were less recognized, namely between the sacred and the profane. 

A Los Angeles-based firm "is pouring millions of dollars into developing the Baghdad Zoo and Entertainment Experience, a massive American-style amusement park that will feature a skateboard park, rides, a concert theatre and a museum."  

A vicar is to apply for a drinks licence so he can sell wine and beer at his small village church. 

The Reverend Geraint ap Iorwerth could be made licensee of St Peter ad Vincula Church in Pennal, near Machynlleth, close to the Powys-Gwynedd border. 

from Crikey ….. 

Cardinal Pell throws thank you bash for Howard 

Alex Mitchell writes: 

Mr Gates said that he and President Bush had settled on the four-star general for the post because he is best suited to oversee American operations, not just in Iraq but also in Afghanistan and other areas where the United States is engaged in “asymmetric” warfare, a euphemism for battling terrorists and non-uniformed combatants.

The government and corporations are aggressively collecting information about your personal life and your habits.  

They want to track your purchases, your medical records, and even your relationships.  

This morning I received a message from Mark R. Picton via our website contact mechanism. 

Mark’s message appears below in full. 

‘Hi folks, 

A few days ago I registered to comment that the purported Reagan quote about Bush (from the reagan diaries …..) was a joke and did not come from the Reagan diaries. I see that the post has been removed and that (obviously) my comment didn't get published. 

The bushit administration is expected today to order commercial airlines & cruise lines to prepare to collect digital fingerprints of all foreigners before they depart the country under a security initiative that the industry has condemned as costly & burdensome.  

Readers have been shocked to learn that California has about 1 million citizens who are literally above the law.

Members of this group can drive their cars as fast as they choose.  

They can drink a six-pack of beer at a bar and then get behind the wheel and weave their way home.  

Ignorance in the United States is not just bliss, it’s widespread. A recent survey of teenagers by the education advocacy group Common Core found that a quarter could not identify Adolf Hitler, a third did not know that the Bill of Rights guaranteed freedom of speech and religion, and fewer than half knew that the Civil War took place between 1850 and 1900. 

That notorious entertainer, Alexander – call me “fishnets” – Clowner was treading the boards again yesterday. 

Mustering his vast diplomatic skill to condemn suggestions from last weekend’s Summit that Australia might become a Republic, the Adelaide hysteric said:  

Even as American and Iraqi troops are fighting to establish control of the Sadr City section of this capital, the Iraqi government’s program to restore basic services like electricity, sewage and trash collection is lagging, jeopardizing the effort to win over the area’s wary residents.

An American expert in torture techniques has denounced his government for allowing "waterboarding" to be practised against terror suspects, just as a graphic advertisement showing the brutal reality of the technique is unveiled to British cinema-goers. 

The head of Australians for a Constitutional Monarchy, Professor David Flint, says the selection of the governance panel at the 2020 Summit was a gerrymander worthy of an African dictatorship. 

Professor Flint told a Sydney lunch celebrating the Queen's birthday that the governance panel that called for an Australian republic was stacked with pro-republican delegates.