Cleveland's Rocks

A belated President’s Day tribute to both our nation’s 22^nd and 24^th President, Grover Cleveland. After beginning his career in Buffalo in 1859, Cleveland avoided service in the Civil War by paying a Polish immigrant to serve in his place. While Cleveland’s reputation as a lawyer grew, his substitute joined a New York battalion of Polish cavalrymen famous for always dropping their horses.

As Sheriff of Eerie County, the future president had to oversee the execution of two convicted murderers. He could have paid a deputy to act as hangman but performed the task himself apparently preferring to kill only in peacetime when the other guy couldn’t shoot back.

As President, the man from Buffalo once visited Piedmont Park.

Notice where his hands are.

One As The Hand

Booker T. Washington once spoke in Piedmont Park. Has he been there lately?

Why'd They Even Get a First Edition?

Thursday is Charles Darwin's 200th birthday.

Did you know Darwin married his cousin? The discoverer of Natural Selection limited his gene pool. I guess when you discover that all life has a common ancestry, incest is all relative.

Ever the gourmand, Darwin would often cook and eat some of the strange birds and animals he collected. In fact, his sequel to the Origin of Species was an exotic cook book titled Tastes Like Chicken. And to this day the Cobb County library is forced to put a disclaimer on saying "Why not just east chicken?!"

Also, Darwin died kinda stupid.

Denial Ain’t Just a Virulent Strain in Traditional Catholicism

The Pope has de-excommunicated a bishop who denies the Holocaust. Apparently all women are still unfit for the priesthood but a virulent anti-Semite deserves a second chance.

What to make of a Holocaust-denying priest? He doubts the Holocaust happened … but he's really sure about Jesus. You can trust him on that.

There's more physical, archival and eye-witness evidence of the Shoah. You can even go to Auschwitz and see the gas chambers. I'm pretty sure if you try going to Golgotha they've taken the cross down by now. There might be a cardboard one up for people to pose behind for pictures and stuff, but it's not the original.

But hey, who ya gonna believe: Ellie Wiesel or a vague 1^st Century author known only as "Mark" who heard it from a guy who heard it from a guy who swears he was there?

About the only way to cast further doubt on the Gospels would be to make them an Oprah's Book Club selection. Granted, Ellie Wiesel's book was once an Oprah's Book Club Selection, but that just shows how even Oprah's fallibility is not an infallible standard.

And even a Pope can F up.