Vatican Secret :Library

[syrakusos]

No kidding... I am writing an article for my blog on "sanction of the victim." It's a story I have told here before: if I never gave a sanction to my destroyers, I would never have had a pizza because all the parlors in my neighborhood displayed John Kennedy and Pope John XXIII. So, I wanted a picture of Angelo Rancolli.

The URL for the Holy See is www.vatican.va -- they have a self-referential domain name: A is A.

So, I click on English. These guys publish more books per capita than anyone else in the world (See my blog on Literacy.) So, there, at the lower left about 9 o'clock where your eye starts scanning, it says "Vatican Secret Library." Myself, I don't know if it actually trumps the 97 entries under "Torture" in the CIA World Factbook, but it is up there with the icons, for sure.

Edited March 4, 2011 by Michael E. Marotta

[Philip Coates]

Michael, it's best to have a point in your posts that readers can follow: first you talk about sanction and pizza parlors, then about the vatican's url.

Finally you mention they have a secret library. So?

And you mention it's "up there with the icons". ???

Is this thread just a random 'dump' of what is passing through your brain at any time? Or is there a central point, somewhere you were going in your post.

I've seen many of your rambling posts over the years which have this coherence / tangentiality problem. You might want to read a book on composition. Study the chapters on unity and coherence.

Edited March 4, 2011 by Philip Coates

[syrakusos]

Michael, it's best to have a point in your posts that readers can follow ... You might want to read a book on composition. ...

Liberty Leading the People

As drawn by Phil Coates

Edited March 4, 2011 by Michael E. Marotta

[william.scherk]

>>Michael, it's best to have a point in your

>>posts that readers can follow: first you talk

>>about sanction and pizza parlors, then about

>>the vatican's url.

If I followed MM correctly . . . he is writing a blog article, wanted a picture of a Pope (Angelo Rancolli Roncalli aka Pope John XIII) to illustrate a point about 'Sanction of the Victim,' and visited the Vatican site to perhaps borrow an image. Certainly his post here can be seen as a ramble, but that is alright -- he is no doubt aware that he could have better edited his post to guide the reader to its interesting main points.

>>Finally you mention they have a secret library.

>>So?

I went to Vatican.va, looking for the "Vatican Secret Library." As it turns out, MM may have been subject to severe early-morning blears, since the actual link at nine-o'clock says "Vatican Secret Archives."

So, rambling, maybe. Incoherent, perhaps. Factually bleared, yes.

>>I've seen many of your rambling posts over the

>>years which have this coherence / tangentiality

>>problem.

I am pretty sure MM will take your helpful, positive critique on board. Myself, I rarely accept confident statements or claims made in this forum without verifying the information. Whether due to the blears or ideological strait-jacketing or half-assed research, some confident claims and statements turn out to be wrong in whole or in part.

I am reasonably certain that you, Phil, sometimes hesitate over responding to posts here on OL. I believe you once in a while say, "Is my intervention welcome, necessary, appropriate? Have I perhaps misjudged my role here? Do I want to be viewed as a constant scold? Do I give off an aura of invincible rectitude? Are my opinions incorrigible? Do I practice what I preach? Should I let one opportunity to correct another person's misdeeds go by . . . or should I enter a thread with my usual tone of hectoring superiority and omniscience?"

It is the fingerwagging, Phil. It is the pose. It is the bitterness barely concealed. It is the personal grievances and the unforgiving pettiness of your interventions. It is the scolding, mean-spiritness, the implacable righteousness and unadmitted hypocrisy. You quite often leave behind an impression that subverts your own stated aims and ideals. Whatever the good sense and good points in a given post, all too often the central points are marred by the presentation.

I wonder sometimes if you are capable of self-criticism, or if you inhabit a bubble, a self-reverential fiction -- in which you are the smartest, nicest, kindest, most reliable, most knowledgeable, clearest thinking toad in the pond. A perfect moral being, the Ur-Objectivist who Knows The Truth and Is Not Afraid To Proclaim His Holiness.

Here is a picture of the dude noted by MM:

[Mikee]

Damn.

William, when you're good, you're really, really good.

[anthony]

Damn.

William, when you're good, you're really, really good.

...and when he's bad, he's still very good.

(Knows how to put one word on top of another, this fella.)

[Philip Coates]

> you are the smartest, nicest, kindest, most reliable, most knowledgeable, clearest thinking toad in the pond. A perfect moral being, the Ur-Objectivist who Knows The Truth and Is Not Afraid To Proclaim His Holiness.

Thank you, that's very kind and not mean-spirited at all. I appreciate that.