The rising stars of American politics

I'm sure that many of you are wondering what's going to happen in the 2016 presidential election, likely to be a race between either Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders (for the Democrats) and whichever of the 2,781 people who have declared they're seeking the Republican nomination manages to come out ahead.  I can't get all that worked up about it, myself.  I've been through this process enough times that to me, most politics seems to boil down to "meet the new boss, same as the old boss."  And every time someone is elected and there are dire predictions by the opposition about what's going to result, what ends up happening is...

... pretty much what always happens in government.  Namely, bureaucratic gridlock.  For example, take all the hoopla about how Obama is going to repeal the Second Amendment and steal everyone's guns.  This has been a running theme of the anti-Obama cadre for what, seven years now?  And if you look around you, you'll find that everyone is as heavily armed as ever, and the Second Amendment is still firmly in place.

If Obama wants our guns, dude better get his ass in gear.  He's only got a little over a year left.

Now, I won't say that politics doesn't matter.  You can definitely see the situation in the Middle East having gone a different direction had the Bush administration not launched a war against Iraq and Saddam Hussein, for example.  Whether it would have been better or worse is a matter of contention, but I don't think anyone can argue that it made a difference.

But that's the thing, isn't it?  Whoever gets elected, we still have the chaotic nature of world events to deal with, and the inherent unpredictability of how everyone's going to respond.  Add that to the treacle-like speed of progress in the halls of government, and it's no wonder that politics, when viewed from above, looks like a giant, extremely slow-moving pinball game.

[image courtesy of photographer Tom Arthur and the Wikimedia Commons]

Of course, that doesn't stop people from being curious about where things are going.  And I'm here to tell you today that you can relax.  It's all settled.  We know who's going to win in 2016.

Because the psychics have weighed in.

Three psychics were interviewed in The Washington Post, and gave their prognostications about the outcome of the election.  And because at this point they've got as much chance of being right as anyone else, I present to you: the results of the 2016 American presidential election.

First, we have the wisdom of "Angel Eyedealism," who has pink hair and says that astrology is "pseudoscience based upon two exact sciences."  Which should give you confidence right there that she knows what she's talking about.  And Ms. Eyedealism says that she drew up "natal charts" for Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush, and Donald Trump, and in her opinion, Clinton is a shoo-in.

"Hillary has Jupiter in the ninth house, the house of politics, now, and it is heading to conjunct her M.C. [medium coeli, or "middle of the sky"]," Eyedealism said. "I'm getting goosebumps."

Ooh, me too!  I always feel that way when I get conjuncted by Jupiter!

Clinton's looking good in other respects, too.  "Jupiter has already conjuncted Pluto, so she has luck and power behind her, and it will conjunct Saturn, so she's serious...  She has luck and a motherfucking plan."

So that's pretty unequivocal.

Bush, on the other hand, doesn't have much going for him except that he got conjuncted by an asteroid, or something, which sounds kind of painful.  And Uranus is in his Eighth House, which apparently means people will be giving him money.  But otherwise, he's not showing up very well, astrologically.  Trump, on the other hand has a "trine," which means three planets making an equilateral triangle.  This is good, for some reason, but she still thinks he won't win.

And what about all of the other people who were born in New York City on the same day as Trump? the interviewer asked.  Why aren't they all filthy rich, running for president, and sporting a hairstyle that looks like they're wearing a roadkill possum on their heads?

"Remember, not everyone lives out the potential of their chart," Eyedealism said.  "We have choices.  Some people who could have been Donald Trump made choices not to be."

Which certainly seems like a good choice to me.

Then, we turn to Angelia Johnson, a numerologist.  "I have been a psychic professional healer and adviser for over 25 years," Johnson told the reporter, "and have now graduated to psychic matchmaking."

So you can see right away that she's completely qualified to select the next president of the United States.

And Johnson's also going for Clinton, even though Jeb Bush's "number is a three."  "Because he's a three, he's connecting with people mind, body and spirit," Johnson said.  "His heart chakra is viving."

Which sounds like maybe he should see a doctor.  

Chris Christie, on the other hand, has a third-eye chakra, and his number is a four.  Don't ask me why that's important, but Johnson would like to see a Clinton/Christie combo, not that that's likely.

Last, the reporter spoke with a Tarot card reader, Angela Lucy, who not only reads cards but is guided by the Archangel Michael.  "He's a big truth-sayer," Lucy says.  "No B.S. from Archangel Michael."

So right away, we're off to an authoritative start.  She did the Republican hopefuls first, or at least the top few, and found out that Jeb Bush, Rand Paul, and Donald Trump were "contenders," that Ben Carson was going to do "okay," and that there's something going on with Scott Walker's wife.  She didn't say what.  As far as the Democrats, she said that Clinton was in for some kind of emotional upset, and Sanders doesn't have the cojones (direct quote) to win.

So let's cut to the chase... who will win?  Lucy drew the "Wheel of Fortune" card, upside down.  Which means, "I get only a 10 percent chance and this card came upside down ... it means turning in reverse."

Whatever the fuck that means.

So in the end, we had two votes for Clinton, and one for things being up in the air.  I think we can all agree that this is a pretty definitive result, especially given that we cross-checked our results using not just one but two other methodologies.  That's how the scientific method works, right?

Me, I'm longing for the days when Pat Paulsen used to run for president.  Anyone my age will probably remember Paulsen, a comedian who threw his hat into the ring every presidential election between 1968 and 1996, and actually got votes every time from people whose attitude was "I'll vote for anyone but the clowns who are actually running."  We need someone with Paulsen's commitment to the process.  Someone with cojones.  Someone whose heart chakra is viving.  Someone who has trines in all of their asteroid conjunctions.

Someone who has a vision, who is clear-minded, and who knows exactly how to give us four more years of the same bureaucratic gridlock that has made America great since its founding.

Magical amulets vs. prayer beads

Back in 2012, the spells-and-charms crowd got their knickers in a twist over a decision by eBay to discontinue the selling of "paranormal services."

Even skeptics gave the policy change a wry eye, because although they prohibited the sale of spell-casting, they continued to allow the sale of spell books, crystal balls, amulets, and so on.  So the whole thing had more to do with potential wrangling over the return policy than it did with critical thinking, or frankly, with reality.

And just this week, another company has followed suit, putting in place a different curious double standard.  Etsy has declared a change in policy that prohibits the sale of items with purported magical powers.  The policy states:

In general, services are not allowed to be listed or sold on Etsy. There are a few exceptions noted below that are allowed as they produce a new, tangible, physical item.... Any metaphysical service that promises or suggests it will effect a physical change (e.g., weight loss) or other outcome (e.g., love, revenge) is not allowed, even if it delivers a tangible item.

Already, purveyors of crystals and candles for spells have been told that they can't sell their magical wares.  And vendors of such stuff are pretty pissed off.  One wrote:

The entire point of buying stones/herbs/oils is for their metaphysical effects in my community!  If I can't list these correspondences, then why would any witch/pagan buy them from my shop?  Witches and Pagans want to buy stones from people with knowledge about their magickal properties.

Righty-o.  Magick.  Which is, of course, different from magic.  I'm sure you can hear the significance of that final "k."

[image courtesy of photographer Thierry Baubet and the Wikimedia Commons]

Now, you may be wondering why a rationalist like myself isn't fist-pumping and saying "right on, Etsy!"  Seems like I'd be behind this 100%, doesn't it?  But I have to admit to some hesitation, because the new policy disallows goods that claim to have magical powers...

... while continuing to allow goods that claim to have Christian magical powers.

For example, take a look at the page for this St. Christopher medal, that can be yours for only $10, and which states the following:

This is a beautiful St. Christopher pendant that will look wonderful on your favorite necklace and will comfort you knowing that the Patron Saint of Safe Travels is taking care of your safety.  The medal measures 1" x 1" and reads "Saint Christopher Protect Us".  Backside is blank.  Chain is not included.

Okay, can someone explain to me how this is any different than selling an amethyst crystal whose quantum vibrational frequencies are supposed to bring you success in the romance department?  And making it clear that this wasn't just an oversight, consider what happened to one vendor of magic... um, magick:

I give the example of the seller who just this week was told to change the title of her listing from "Archangel Protection Spell Kit" to "Archangel Protection PRAYER Kit" by an Etsy rep.  A spell and a prayer are basically the same thing, putting an intention out into the Universe.

They're also basically the same thing in the sense that neither one works.  But of course, adding that to the policy would put Etsy directly in the firing line of Fox News, who are always casting about for more ammunition for their "war on Christianity" trope that they flog every single night.  So you can understand why the Etsy Board of Directors are taking a pass on this one.

But even so, I'm finding myself in the awkward position of siding with the witches.  Until someone can show me how a rosary is any different from a magic wand, I find it hard to defend selling one and prohibiting the other on the basis of its being a "tangible object... suggest(ing) a physical change or other outcome."

Anyhow, if you're selling your mystical charms and potions via Etsy, you might want to think about moving to a different outlet.  Or, conversely, you could simply cast a spell on the Board of Directors and get them to change their policy.  That'd sure show them.

The extraterrestrial pantheon

One of the things that perplexes me about woo-woo beliefs is how specific they can get.

You don't just think there's an afterlife, you have intricate details about what heaven and hell are like.  You're not just superstitious, you think putting an acorn in your window will keep your house from getting struck by lightning. You don't just have a belief that the positions of the stars and planets control your life, you believe that people who were born when Mars is in Aquarius tend to like phone sex.  (I'm not making this up.)

So I'm left thinking, "How do they know all of this?"  I can understand being generally prone to goofy beliefs; it's amazing what a combination of confirmation bias and wishful thinking will do.  What I don't understand is how you get from generalized woo-woo to having access to minuscule details.

Take, for example, the website that I was sent a couple of days ago by a reader of Skeptophilia.  Accompanied by a note that said, "Bet you thought there was just one!", I was given a link to site called "The Six Alien Species Currently Fighting for Control Over Earth," in which we find out that Earth is apparently the prize in a six-way extraterrestrial game of "Risk."

First, we have the Sirians, who supposedly helped the Egyptians and Mayans build the pyramids, and were also in contact with the "Atlanteans."  Because, you know, there's nothing like bringing in a fictional civilization to beef up your claims that Earth has been visited by aliens.  The Sirians, we hear, are a highly technological civilization that comes from "the Sirius B star system."

You'd think the "highly technological" part would be obvious, right?  I mean, if they've come here from Sirius, 8.6 light years away, they're not traveling in a horse-and-buggy.  But there's a problem with a civilization coming from Sirius B; Sirius B is a white dwarf, meaning that it is a stellar remnant left behind after the calamitous death of a red giant star.  Any planets that orbited Sirius B were fried long ago, and the tiny star left behind is of low enough luminosity that there's no way it would warm a planet's surface enough to sustain life, even if any life survived the initial cataclysm.

But we won't let little things like facts interfere.  Let's find out about the five other alien species, shall we?

Next we have the "Short Grays," made famous in the historical documentary Close Encounters of the Third Kind, and which are also known as "Zeta Reticulums."  Evidently because that's the star system they come from.  They are "the authors of most alien abductions" and have "telepathic abilities (that) allow them to constitute a type of hive mind consciousness."

Then we have the "Tall Grays," who of course are more powerful than the "Short Grays," presumably because they're taller.  They are "the ambassadors of most meetings between human and alien forces" and "are keen on developing a stable human-gray hybrid race," which I'm hoping that they're doing by genetic manipulation, because otherwise we're talking hot human/Tall Gray sex, and as open-minded as I like to think I am, that's just creepy.

Next, there's the Reptilians, who come from Alpha Draconis, in the constellation of Draco the Dragon.  Of course.  Because what a group of stars looked like to a bunch of ancient Greeks who had been hitting the ouzo clearly would affect the kinds of life that would evolve on the planets orbiting those stars.  Be that as it may, the Alpha Draconians are "14 to 22 feet tall... (w)eighing an estimated 1,800 pounds."  Which is pretty badass.  Also, they have "tails, or even wings," which makes me wonder if the author has actually seen one.  Because you'd think you would be clear on that point, right?

Then there are the "Native Reptilians."  Here's where things get even more confusing, because apparently these are shape-shifting scaly dudes who "have infiltrated almost all aspects of human life and hold positions of power," and "built the financial system and influence all religions."  But if they're natives to Earth, then they're not aliens, right?

Cf. what I said earlier about not letting facts get in the way.

Lastly, we have the Annunaki, who come from a galaxy they call "Illyuwn."  They're the ones who created us, apparently; "through genetic manipulation and in vitro fertilization," we're told, "they upgraded the genus Homo to sapiens quality."

Well, all I can say is, they did a pretty piss-poor job.  If a super-powerful alien species altered our DNA to become a superior race, and as a result we still have Donald Trump running for president, I think the Annunaki should go back to Illyuwn and let someone more capable take over.

So there you have it.  Our alien overlords.  And if you were laughing while reading this, and thinking, "How does this person know all of this?", well, so was I.  But maybe your laugh will sound a little hollow when you ask the same question about how people know that god wants guys to grow beards and have sideburns (Leviticus 19:27).  Because a lot of the bible seems to me to be extremely detailed information about what's going on in the mind of a deity that no one has ever seen.

But that's religion, and that's different than believing in super-powerful beings who live in the sky and control our destiny, right?

Of course, right.

The young and the relentless

My mom was a deeply devout Roman Catholic and was politically a staunch conservative.  She had a strong sense of propriety (veering off into prudishness on occasion), and thought that etiquette and manners were a critical glue for social interactions.

But for all of her characteristics that would seem to many to be old-fashioned, she had one opinion that I can recall her voicing many times:  "My rights end where your nose begins."

In other words, I can disapprove of what you do, how you live your life, how you vote, what you believe, but I have no right to stop you from doing any of those things.

This is a point that a lot of folks seem to miss.  Such as person in Baltimore who objected to a neighbor's yard decoration of a rainbow-colored array of solar lamps.

Pretty, aren't they?  So what's to dislike?

They are, the "Concerned Home Owner" said, "relentlessly gay."  Here's the note that Julie Baker, the owner of the house with the lights, received:

Your yard is becoming Relentlessly Gay! Myself and Others in the neighborhood ask that you Tone It Down. This is a Christian area and there are Children. Keep it up and I will be Forced to call the Police on You. Your kind need to have Respect for GOD. 

A Concerned Home Owner.

This brings prudishness to a whole new level.  Now, we have to worry about offensively-colored solar lamps?

Myself, I think this phrase should become part of common parlance.  Consider how useful it could be:

• "I'm thinking of wearing this pink shirt.  Does it make me look too #RelentlesslyGay?"
• "I was in my car listening to the Oldies station on the radio, and ABBA came on.  I had my window rolled down, and now I'm afraid everyone in the neighborhood thinks I'm #RelentlesslyGay."
• "I decided not to hire an interior decorator to redo my living room, because you never know if you might get one who is #RelentlesslyGay."

Julie Baker, to her credit, is not fazed by her neighbor's disapproval.  She is leaving her #RelentlesslyGay solar lamps up, and in fact, is not #ToningItDown, she is #RampingItUp.  She has started a GoFundMe campaign to make her yard and house even gayer and more relentless:

Needless to say... I need more rainbows... Many, many more rainbows….

So, I am starting this fundraiser so I can work to make my Home even More "relentlessly gay" If we go high enough, I will see if I can get a Rainbow Roof!

Because my invisible relentlessly gay rainbow dragon should live up there in style! 

Put simply, I am a widow and the mother of four children, my youngest in high school and I WILL NOT Relent to Hatred. Instead, I will battle it with whimsy and beauty and laughter and love, wrapped around my home, yard and family!!!

So far, she's raised $37,500.  That should pay for a lot of #RelentlesslyGay decorations.

And perhaps you have noticed by now the craziest thing about all of this:

Baker herself is straight.

Not, of course, that it should matter, but that was the little filigree that just sent me over the edge.  There are people who are so determined to use their own belief systems as a cudgel that they see everyone as the enemy.

The other thing that occurred to me is to wonder if Concerned Home Owner has actually read the bible, because there's this whole thing in Genesis 9... about rainbows:

And God said, This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.  And it shall come to pass, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud: And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh.  And the bow shall be in the cloud; and I will look upon it, that I may remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is upon the earth.  And God said unto Noah, This is the token of the covenant, which I have established between me and all flesh that is upon the earth.

So after the good and all-loving god drowned damn near every living thing on Earth, he said, "Oh, but hey, look!  Rainbows!  Meaning I won't ever do that again, I promise!  Still friends?"

All things considered, I'd rather have a rainbow be a symbol of being #RelentlesslyGay than a symbol of #DivineGenocide.  But that's just me.

So I'm off to eat some breakfast.  Black coffee, eggs, and bacon.  You know, food that's #RelentlesslyStraight.  Can't be too careful.  You never know who might be watching.

Scoring points from tragedy

There's a time for politicizing, for spin, and for debate.  There might even be a time for grandstanding.

But sometimes, all a moral and compassionate person needs to do is stand in solidarity with people who have experienced a great loss.  And that is where we should be, as a nation, with respect to the senseless tragedy that happened two days ago in Charleston, South Carolina, where a 21-year-old man murdered nine people at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church, apparently motivated by racism, hate, and the ideology of white supremacy.  "I'm here to shoot black people," the killer allegedly said.  "You've raped our women, and you are taking over the country...  I have to do what I have to do."

The Emanuel AME Church [image courtesy of the Wikimedia Commons]

Horrific, and hard to imagine that in the 21st century, we're still seeing such crimes occur, that racism is still an entrenched part of our society.  Those are the discussions we should be having today.

But not, apparently, if you work for Fox News.

The pundits over at Fox wasted no time in trotting out their "War on Christians" trope that they've been flogging for years, every time anything happens that threatens the unchallenged hegemony that Christianity has had in the United States ever since its founding.  And instead of treating the Charleston killings as what they are -- racially-motivated hate crimes -- Fox is spinning this as an attack motivated by hatred for Christianity.

They invited Earl Walker Jackson, a minister and unsuccessful candidate for both Senate and Lieutenant Governor in the state of Virginia, to give his opinion.  Jackson is an interesting choice, given that he has made statements in the past that call his sanity into serious question -- such as his claim that doing yoga will lead your to being possessed by Satan.  But apparently Fox, and Fox & Friends host Steve Doocy, thought that Jackson would be the perfect person to comment.

And Jackson fell right in with the Fox party line.  In a segment entitled "Attack on Faith," Jackson said:

Wait for the facts, don't jump to conclusions, but I am deeply concerned that this gunman chose to go into a church.  There does seem to be a rising hostility against Christians in this country because of our biblical views.  It is something we have to be aware of.  We have to create an atmosphere where people don't take out their violent intentions against Christians.  I urge pastors and men in these churches to prepare to defend themselves, at least have some people in there that are prepared to defend themselves when women and children are attacked.

Doocy concurred:

Extraordinarily, they called it a ‘hate crime,’ and some look at it as, ‘Well, because it was a white guy and a black church,’ but you made a great point earlier about the hostility towards Christians.  And it was a church.  So maybe that’s what they were talking about.  They haven’t explained it to us.

So, "I'm here to shoot black people" wasn't enough for you?  You have to jump on this as a chance to prop up your ridiculous persecution complex, trying to convince Christians -- who, allow me to point out, make up 74% of the citizens of the United States -- that they're some kind of embattled minority?

Or is it because your ideology won't let you admit that enculturated racism is still part of our society?

No, we can't go there.  Not in a state where the Confederate flag is still flown over the state capitol building.

And Fox wasn't the only one who went in this direction.  Rick Santorum decided to use the murders to score political points in his run for the Republican nomination for president, as usual kowtowing to his supporters on the Religious Right and making not a single mention of race as a motivation for the murders.  In an interview on AM 970, a New York radio station, Santorum said:

All you can do is pray for those and pray for our country.  This is one of those situations where you just have to take a step back and say we — you know, you talk about the importance of prayer in this time and we’re now seeing assaults on our religious liberty we’ve never seen before.  It’s a time for deeper reflection beyond this horrible situation...   You just can’t think that things like this can happen in America.  It’s obviously a crime of hate.  Again, we don’t know the rationale, but what other rationale could there be?  You’re sort of lost that somebody could walk into a Bible study in a church and indiscriminately kill people.  It’s something that, again, you think we’re beyond that in America and it’s sad to see.

What other rationale could there be?  What, the apartheid-era South African flag on the killer's shirt in his Facebook photograph wasn't enough of a clue for you?

But I think what gets me most about all of this is the callous lack of compassion and empathy for the victims and their families.  This is beyond being tone-deaf; this is calculated, deliberate pandering.  For Santorum and the pundits on Fox & Friends, it was more important to latch onto this tragedy to advance their warped agendas than it was to step back and say, "The crucial thing right now is to stand together as Americans and repudiate racism and racially-motivated violence."

You have to wonder why that's so hard for them to say.  Afraid to lose some of their supporters, perhaps?

I don't know what else to say.  This repulsive use of a tragedy to gain political ground has left me feeling nauseated.  So I'll just add one more thing.  To Senator Santorum, and your allies over at Fox: if you can't find it in your hearts to offer unqualified support and solidarity with the families of the victims of this horrific attack, then kindly just shut the fuck up.

Borley Rectory, and the problem with anecdote

There's a reason skeptics have a problem with anecdotal evidence and eyewitness testimony.

It's not that that it's impossible that you saw a ghost, or Bigfoot, or an extraterrestrial spacecraft.  What we're saying is that we need more than your assurance that you did.  Not only do we have the potential for outright lies and hoaxes -- some of them very subtle and clever -- we have the fact that the human sensory apparatus more or less sucks.

To put not too fine a point on it.

I mean, it works well enough.  It keeps us sufficiently aware of our surroundings to stay alive.  But we're easily tricked, we miss things, we misinterpret what we see and hear.  As astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson put it, "The human perceptual system is rife with all sorts of ways of getting it wrong."

As an illustration, let's consider one of the most famous "haunted house" stories in the world -- the infamous Borley Rectory, of Borley, Essex, England.

Borley Rectory always shows up on those websites with names like, "Ten Most Terrifying Real Ghost Stories!", usually somewhere near the top of the list.  So here are the bare bones of the story, just in case you don't know it.

Borley Rectory was built in 1862 by Reverend Henry Dawson Ellis Bull, Rector of Borley Parish.  He designed the building to replace an earlier rectory that had burned down in 1841, and also to accommodate his wife and family of fourteen children, which indicates that Reverend Bull put a lot of stock in the "be fruitful and multiply" thing from the Book of Genesis.

Be that as it may, the parish was certainly steeped in history.  The parish church is thought to date to the 12th century, and the town was the site of Borley Hall, the ancestral seat of the Waldegrave family.  But here's where truth starts twisting in with fabrication; because the additional claim that the rectory had been built on the site of an old Benedictine monastery appears to have no basis in reality.

Which means that the tale that is the basis of the haunting also is of dubious provenance.  Because the story goes that a monk in the (almost certainly non-existent) monastery was having an affair with a nun from a nearby convent.  They made plans to elope, and had in fact arranged a coach driven by a friend of the monk's in order to get away, but the plan was discovered.

Sexual indiscretion by the clergy was a major no-no back then.  The coachman was beheaded, the monk hanged, and the nun bricked up in a wall inside the convent.

Except... none of them existed, remember?  Because there's no evidence there ever was a monastery on the rectory grounds.

But that didn't stop the tale from growing.  Here's one account of what Reverend Bull et al. saw:

On July 28th, 1900, three Bull daughters reportedly saw a figure on a path, which later became known as the "Nuns Walk", to the rear of the rectory. They were joined by a fourth sister to help greet the stranger, but the apparition disappeared. Harry also told of seeing the nun, together with the phantom coach in which she had eloped. 

She was also seen wandering the grounds around the Rectory, in and out of the bushes, dressed in grey. There are reports of the Monk and Nun passing across the grounds. Several people said they observed "A lady in grey cloak" and "A gentleman with a sort of bald head, dressed in a long black gown."

Once the story of the haunting began to spread, others reported seeing spectral nuns and monks.  But that's not all.  A later rector of the parish, one Lionel Foyster, moved in in 1930 with his wife Marianne, and they began to experience poltergeist activity in addition to the continuing presence of ghostly figures loping about.  Marianne began to receive messages written on walls and scraps of paper, such as the following:

Both of the Foysters reported having peculiar experiences:

During the first year of their tenancy, Lionel described many unexplained happenings including; bell ringing, the appearance of Harry Bull [son of the first rector of Borley], glass objects appearing out of nowhere and being dashed to the floor, books appearing, and many items being thrown, including pebbles and an iron. After an attempt at exorcism, Marianne was thrown out of bed several times.

The Foysters eventually moved out, apparently because of Lionel Foyster's declining health, and afterwards no one could be found who was willing to live in the rectory, almost certainly because of its reputation.

And then Harry Price got involved.

Price was a psychic investigator of significant fame, who had founded the National Laboratory of Psychic Research as a rival to the more reputable Society for Psychical Research.  Price himself was a strange mixture of skeptic and sketchy.  He was instrumental in unmasking outright hoaxers such as Helen Duncan, who used cheesecloth and paper soaked in egg white to simulate "ectoplasm."  But his investigation of Borley Rectory, leading to the publication of a book by Price in 1940, was unequivocally in support of its having been haunted -- despite a stinging critique by researchers for the SPR who said that Price himself was a trained conjuror (which was true), and had "salted the mine" by faking some of the evidence from Borley, in collusion with Marianne Foyster, who "was actively engaged in fraudulently creating [haunted] phenomena."

Price, of course, denied any such thing, but further inquiries by the SPR left his role in the alleged haunting in serious question.  And the matter came to an unexpected close when the rectory burned in 1939 because of an accident with an oil lamp.

The remnants of the building were demolished in 1944.  But people still visit the site, and the adjacent cemetery, and still report ghostly appearances, lo unto this very day.

See what I mean about anecdote?  We have a story that started out with a most-likely-false claim of three executions on the rectory grounds, followed by what many believe was an outright hoax perpetrated by Harry Price and Marianne Foyster.  Blend that together with overactive imaginations, and the rather dubious quality of the human perceptual systems, and you have a mishmash out of which any kernel of truth -- if there is one there -- becomes impossible to discern.

So is Borley haunted?  The most honest answer is "there's no way to know for sure," with a strong corollary of "... but probably not."  There's nothing here that any unbiased individual would consider hard evidence, just tall tale piled upon unsubstantiated claim, mixed with "I heard that people saw ghosts there."

If this is "one of the best-authenticated haunted sites in Britain," as one website claimed, we've got some serious problems.

To return to my initial point, it's not that I'm saying that any of the claims of the paranormal are impossible.  What I'm saying is that thus far, no evidence I've seen has been convincing, at least not to someone who wasn't already convinced.  But despite all that, I'm hoping to visit Borley this summer.  My wife and I are spending two weeks in England in August, and I'm going to try to convince my wife to pop in to say hi to the spectral monks and nuns.  I'll definitely report back with anything we happen to see.

Not that it should make a difference.  Because eyewitness testimony is still subject to all of the caveats I've mentioned -- even if it comes from yours truly.

Group discount on exorcisms

There's no doubt that Mexico has become a pretty rough place to live, in the past couple of decades.

The crime rate is astronomical.  According to the demographics site Nation Master, Mexico ranks in the top five nations in the world for homicides and violence committed by youths.  They are #3 for number of prisoners per capita, and have a wealth gap that staggers the imagination -- 16% of the citizens of Mexico earn less than a dollar a day.  Corruption is rampant, the drug cartels are in charge of many cities, and the air and water pollution, especially in Mexico City, result in thousands of preventable deaths per year.

So all of those problems, what do you do?

You have a mass exorcism, that's what.

Because clearly what's doing all of this awful stuff is... demons.  At least that's what Cardinal Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, Archbishop Emeritus of Guadalajara, and his sidekick, Spanish priest and exorcist Father José Antonio Fortea, think.

With the permission of the Archbishop of San Luis Potosí, Jesús Carlos Cabrero, the "Grand Exorcism" was held in the Cathedral of San Luis a couple of weeks ago. "This celebration is a sacramental [sic] of the Church,," Cabrero said.  "During the ritual, some priests were present, and Cardinal [Sandoval] did me the favor of accompanying us, in response to an invitation I sent him."  The ceremony was conducted in private, Cabrero added, because otherwise, "morbid interests appear, and misinterpretations."

Hey, you're the one who thinks that demons are running rampant in your country, harming and killing innocent people.  How much more morbid can you get?

Cardinal Sandoval, however, was in full support of the event.  "The Great Exorcism is a prayer asking God to drive away the Enemy, to drive him away from these places.  From San Luis, first of all, and then from all of Mexico.  People should become aware of the very grave situation we are living through in Mexico, whose root is very deep, beyond human malevolence; it is the devil, who is very connected to death.  He is a murderer from the beginning...  Acts of revenge, now occurring between assassins and the government; deaths here, deaths there, and deaths everywhere.  This violence is nothing else but the Devil who is tearing us apart."

As far as how they know all of this, apparently they found out from one of the demons itself.  Roberto O'Farrill, a Catholic journalist and "demon specialist," said that during an exorcism of a devil from a guy named Ángel (I'm not making this up), the demon kind of spilled his guts regarding what is going on.

O'Farrill explained that "the demons possessing Ángel said, 'you are stupid, because She [the Virgin Mary] cast us out of Mexico, and now you with your stupid laws have allowed sacrifices to return to Mexico, human sacrifices. We don't want to say this but She is stepping on our head and forces us to.'"

"During that exorcism," O'Farrill added, "the Virgin Mary forces the demons to say that they have returned to Mexico, that there is once again an infestation, principally in Mexico City and in other parts of the country."

Well, that's proof enough for me.  Time to reboot the Inquisition, sounds like.

So anyhow, Cabrero and Sandoval had their Grand Exorcism on May 20, and in the four weeks since the ceremony, we've seen a miraculous decrease in... um... a heaven-sent... um...

Okay, nothing much has changed.  In fact, just last week, a bunch of "radical teachers" in the town of Tuxtla Gutierrez went on a rampage, and attacked and burned the headquarters of five different political parties, demanding, amongst other things, "100% pay raises."  A few days before that, 42 suspected drug dealers who had taken over a ranch in the state of Michoacán were killed in "sprays of machine gun fire" by police.  Violence has recently spiked in Tijuana during the lead-up to elections on June 7, with gang and drug related killings reaching record numbers, and including such grotesque horrors as "severed heads in an icebox."

So yeah, Cardinal Sandoval really seems to have those demons on the run.

But we can't have reality intruding on the worldview, after all.  Bad for business, in one of the most staunchly Catholic countries in the world.  Gotta keep having meaningless rituals so they can pretend they're actually accomplishing something, rather than throwing their accumulated wealth and resources behind things like remediating the crashing poverty and hiring more law enforcement.

And, of course, dealing with all of the "radical teachers."  Those sonsabitches are mean.