Posted: 26 Oct 2015 05:10 AM PDT
By Susan Grigsby / Daily Kos
Of the differing schools of thought on the origins of Halloween, I prefer the one that roots it in ancient Celtic tradition. And since no one seems to know for sure, why not? According to the American Folklife Center, Halloween originated with the ancient pre-Christian Celtic celebration of Samhain.
The festival observed at this time was called Samhain (pronounced Sah-ween). It was the biggest and most significant holiday of the Celtic year. The Celts believed that at the time of Samhain, more so than any other time of the year, the ghosts of the dead were able to mingle with the living, because at Samhain the souls of those who had died during the year traveled into the otherworld. People gathered to sacrifice animals, fruits, and vegetables. They also lit bonfires in honor of the dead, to aid them on their journey, and to keep them away from the living. On that day all manner of beings were abroad: ghosts, fairies, and demons--all part of the dark and dread.
As the Catholic Church moved into the British Isles, the Celtic New Year holiday was pre-empted to honor All Saints and Martyrs (the Hallowed), especially those who did not have a specific date set aside for them. Since the Celtic festival continued unabated, the Church then introduced All Souls day wherein prayers for the dead were said on the following day, November 2. [Read more...]
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Posted: 26 Oct 2015 11:07 AM PDT
By Doug Porter Gretchen Newsom announced her intention to run for Mayor of San Diego during the Sixth Biennial County Democratic Convention on Saturday, October 24th. She’s got a tough road in front of her. Incumbent Kevin Faulconer is a public relations machine. He gets out of bed in the morning, and a press release crediting him with saving the world overnight (hey, the sun rose!) gets emailed. He’s got no major scandals swirling around him, is considered to be a rising star in the GOP, and has a proven ability to sidestep controversy. Challenger Gretchen Newsom is not well known outside activist circles. She was among those considered as the interim replacement for Faulconer’s city council seat, is President of the Ocean Beach town Council, and works for the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. Today I’ll take a look at what else there is to know about the candidate, her values and the implications of her candidacy. [Read more...]
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Posted: 26 Oct 2015 05:11 AM PDT
By Jim Miller with Ian Duckles Last week I had the pleasure of seeing Thomas Piketty speak on economic inequality at UCSD. In his talk, Piketty hit on the central themes of his seminal work, Capital in the Twenty-First Century: how our current level of economic inequality is now back to where it was before the “great compression” of the mid-twentieth century when union density, progressive taxation, and educational policies helped produce the high point of the American middle class. He underlined how there is no economic benefit to our current level of excessive inequality and that it is the product not of any “natural” function of the free market economy, but rather several decades of wrong-headed ideology, destructive politics, and bad policy. During the question and answer session following his presentation, a well-heeled older gentleman prefaced his question about why the “lower 50 percent” don’t just vote out the bad policies with, “this audience, we’re all the top 10%,” which drew a few laughs from people, many of whom were likely debt-ridden students, teaching assistants, campus workers, and lecturers whose income doesn’t come close to landing them in that realm. That there may have been a ragtag group of professors and students from lowly City College in attendance was not even in the speaker’s imagination. I couldn’t help but think how UCSD is a perfect microcosm of the macroeconomic inequality that Piketty was talking about and that the class-blind commenter was a perfect manifestation of the very elite ideology that serves to enforce our deep level of inequality. But of course, it’s not just at UCSD where this is an issue but across the entire landscape of American higher education, where what used to be one of the most solid middle-class professions in the country is in the process of being hollowed out, bit by bit. [Read more...]
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Posted: 26 Oct 2015 05:11 AM PDT
By John Kiriakou / OtherWords Hillary Clinton is wrong about Edward Snowden. Again. The presidential candidate and former secretary of state insisted during the recent Democratic debate that Snowden should have remained in the United Statesto voice his concerns about government spying on U.S. citizens. Instead, she claimed, he “endangered U.S. secrets by fleeing to Russia.” After accusing Snowden of stealing “very important information that has fallen into the wrong hands,” she added: “He should not be brought home without facing the music.” [Read more...]
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Posted: 26 Oct 2015 05:10 AM PDT
By Susan Grigsby / Daily Kos Of the differing schools of thought on the origins of Halloween, I prefer the one that roots it in ancient Celtic tradition. And since no one seems to know for sure, why not? According to the American Folklife Center, Halloween originated with the ancient pre-Christian Celtic celebration of Samhain.
The festival observed at this time was called Samhain (pronounced Sah-ween). It was the biggest and most significant holiday of the Celtic year. The Celts believed that at the time of Samhain, more so than any other time of the year, the ghosts of the dead were able to mingle with the living, because at Samhain the souls of those who had died during the year traveled into the otherworld. People gathered to sacrifice animals, fruits, and vegetables. They also lit bonfires in honor of the dead, to aid them on their journey, and to keep them away from the living. On that day all manner of beings were abroad: ghosts, fairies, and demons--all part of the dark and dread.
As the Catholic Church moved into the British Isles, the Celtic New Year holiday was pre-empted to honor All Saints and Martyrs (the Hallowed), especially those who did not have a specific date set aside for them. Since the Celtic festival continued unabated, the Church then introduced All Souls day wherein prayers for the dead were said on the following day, November 2. [Read more...] |
