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I ran for Idaho state senate in 2008--didn't win
I've written a number of history books, as well as scholarly and popular articles, (see my web page).
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They Do Things Differently Outside California
I just blogged this over at my Civilian Gun Self-Defense blog, but it's too good to leave off this one. From the June 25, 2004 Eugene, Oregon Register-Guard: COBURG - Three robbers in a black Cadillac held up an Interstate 5 gas station and threatened to kill the clerk, but she drove them off by blowing out the car's back window with her handgun, police said Thursday.
California plates? That explains it--they weren't expecting the victims to shoot back.
Officers stopped a car minutes later on Belt Line Road and arrested two men and a woman late Wednesday.
Three people drove into the Fuel-N-Go gas station at 33100 Van Duyn Road about 11:35 p.m. in a Cadillac with California plates, police Chief Mike Hudson said. One man went into the store, simulated a gun in his sweatshirt pocket and demanded money.
After the clerk handed over about $200 in cash, the chief said, the robber threatened to kill her anyway. That's when the clerk pulled out her own handgun.
The robber ran out of the store, and a male attendant fought with the robber, who again simulated a weapon. The female clerk fired one shot, breaking out the car's rear window, the chief said. The bullet lodged in the dashboard of the car.
James Madison, Rifleman
We tend to think of James Madison as Father of the Bill of Rights, and a lawyer, but there is another way to think of him: rifleman. From a letter he wrote to a friend named William Bradford, June 19, 1775, in William T. Hutchinson and William M.E. Rachal, ed., The Papers of James Madison (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962), 1:153: The strength of this Colony will lie chiefly in the rifle-men of the Upland Counties, of whom we shall have great numbers. You would be astonished at the perfection this art is brought to. The most inexpert hands rec[k]on it an indifferent shot to miss the bigness of a man's face at the distance of 100 Yards. I am far from being among the best & should not often miss it on a fair trial at that distance. If we come into an engagement, I make no doubt but the officers of the enemy will fall at the distance before they get withing 150 or 200 Yards. Indeed I believe we have men that would very often hit such a mark 250 Yds. Our greatest apprehensions proceed from the scarcity of powder but a little will go a great way with such as use rifles.
This claim is consistent with eyewitness accounts, on both sides, from throughout the Revolution, that riflemen were consistently capable of groups of several inches at distances of 100 yards, with some capable of comparable accuracy at distances of 300 yards.
Boston Catholics Grieving Over Churches Going Condo
This article from Fox News reports on how Boston Catholics are grieving as the Archdiocese sells off churches to pay the bills from the priest sex abuse scandal. I can understand their discomfort; it's a painful reminder that their church's leadership was not even as moral as the average secular person in America.
Some immoral acts are going to take place in those churches turned condos--but few will match the immorality of what took place before. I wouldn't compare these churches to brothels. That would be unfair. To the brothels. At least prostitutes in brothels are usually adults, and there by choice.
The leadership covered up criminal acts that damaged thousands (at least) of Catholic kids, destroying the morals of many, destroying the faith of others. In some cases, this depraved covering up of evil destroyed lives, by driving young men to suicide, because they did not know how to handle the conflict between what these perverts did, and their claim to be the earthly representatives of Jesus Christ.
The Catholic laity needs to clean up their clergy. I know that many are trying to do so, right now, and many others have been driven away by the conflicts that this evil caused. Don't stop until the last excuse-makers have stopped making excuses. There may well be a place for these people as laymen. That anyone could claim to be closer than the laity to Jesus Christ while covering up these sort of crimes just overwhelms me with disgust.
Bush Pulls Out Ahead
Fox News reports on a survey of 900 registered voters (which is the first of these polls that I have seen mention this limitation). In a two way race, Bush leads Kerry 48-42; in a three way race with Ralph Nader, Bush leads Kerry 47-40. Since the margin of error is +-3%, I think this means that a two race is still too close to call, but a three way race makes Bush the winner. (48-3=45; 42+3=45; 47-3=44; 40+3=43.)
Voters clearly think Bush is better able to handle security against terrorists, and Kerry is better able to handle domestic issues. This suggests to me that there is some significant number of Kerry voters who either:
1. Don't think terrorism is very likely.
2. Think it is likely, but it won't kill them.
3. Would rather be employed and dead instead of out of work and live.
I'm kidding about #3--but what else would you conclude?
The other interesting result is that a majority of Americans believe that there is a connection between al-Qaeda and Hussein--and the 9/11 Commission's apparent disagreement with that just damages the the Commission's credibility, instead of changing the minds of voters. Or at least you might come to that conclusion from reading the report.
Rebounding Economy
I was just able to buy some federal agency bonds due in May, 2006, with an annualized yield to maturity of a hair over 3%. Considering that federal agency bonds are just slightly less safe than Treasurys, that's pretty spectacular. They are callable bonds, which I tend to shy away from, but because they were selling below par (meaning that their face value is $10,000, but I actually paid $9,946 for them), even if they get called early, I will still get more than a 3% annualized yield.
Finally! Some Competition
The Hollywood Reporter tells us of something that I didn't think was possible: a film festival that isn't leftist! Just as his "Fahrenheit 9/11" opens nationwide, several filmmakers are readying documentaries aimed at debunking Michael Moore, and a new film festival is being planned that will feature such works as well as other documentaries well to the right of Moore's films.
Both of them? You understand my cynicism; I know lots and lots of multimillionaires (more than I count, even though I'm wearing open toed sandals today), and nearly all of them are leftists of the Michael Moore variety (although usually with better manners and more self-control). None of them are conservatives. I'm tempted to rewrite the classic joke about the Easter Bunny and the Honest Lawyer with a Rich Conservative Funder of Political Causes instead. (I have at least met a few honest lawyers, so I know that they do exist.)
Scheduled Sept. 9-11 in Dallas, the American Film Renaissance, as the festival will be known, has just been announced by co-founder Jim Hubbard, who said it is bankrolled primarily by some "big-time conservative donors."
Hubbard currently is negotiating to show two films critical of Moore.
Remember, it doesn't have to be a documentary to be interesting, entertaining, and make money:
The first is "Michael Moore Hates America," made by newcomer Michael Wilson and funded partially by Brian Cartmell, who made a small fortune when he sold his Internet domain registration company, eNic, to Verisign. The feature film, made for $200,000 and featuring appearances from Penn Jillette and John Stossel, among others, is looking for a theatrical and DVD distribution deal.
The second is the bigger-budget effort "Michael & Me" that was made by talk-radio star and soon-to-be TV host Larry Elder. The 90-minute documentary takes on Moore's 2002 anti-gun documentary, "Bowling for Columbine," Elder said.
"My film is a defense of those who own guns and of the Second Amendment," said Elder, whose "The Larry Elder Show" from Warner Bros. Prods. starts Sept. 13 on CBS affiliates in most major markets.
Elder said that he borrows liberally from Moore, including a "Bowling"-like animated segment that has Elder interviewing an obviously tense Moore. "He's sweating and sweating to the point he's reed thin, then he pulls out a gun and shoots me."
Moore didn't agree to an interview for either Elder's movie or Wilson's. "I did ambush him at a book signing in Santa Monica, and that's in the film," Elder said. "I asked him how many times Americans used guns for defensive purposes. He had nothing. No blooming clue."And the war on terror also is expected to be a dominant theme at the American Film Renaissance.
Remember when the bad guys in The Sum of All Fears were transformed from an Muslim crazy into a Russian neo-Nazi? I hate to tell you this, but that PC change made a "ripped from tomorrow's headlines" movie into hokum.
"Liberal Hollywood has basically ignored the subject," filmmaker Jason Apuzzo said. His entry to the festival is "Terminal Island" and stars his wife, Govindini Murty, with a cameo from Irvin Kershner, director of "The Empire Strikes Back" and "Never Say Never Again." Kershner, who Apuzzo is careful to note that he doesn't share the same politics as Apuzzo and Murty, nevertheless mentored the couple in the making of their film.
"Conservative messages don't have a chance in contemporary Hollywood," Apuzzo said. "But there's another side in Hollywood. We are small in numbers but passionate."
"Terminal Island" is a black-and-white feature film about a woman being stalked by a Muslim terrorist who is himself being stalked by a bounty hunter.
"When you shop a script like this around," said Murty, "studio execs say, 'Is this about Muslim terrorists? We don't want to touch it.' "
The important point: So why have a couple of lawyers from Texas created a film festival? "I've always been interested in the cultural and political messages in film," Jim Hubbard said. "To be frank, whenever there is such a message, it's liberal. For 40 years the left has had a near monopoly, and we're going to counter that."
Unfortunately, this will require conservatives with money (all four of you) to risk some capital, and invest in making some movies.
Mel Gibson demonstrated that you could make a Christian movie and an enormous amount of money. There are a lot of small movies that could be made for several million dollars, would almost certainly earn that investment back, make some money (maybe lots of money), and provoke some serious thought in the audience. I've mentioned before that Nat Brandt's The Town That Started the Civil War is a good example. Historical costume drama; action sequences with armed college students and professors surrounding the hotel; passionate figures insisting that "The laws of God take precedence over the laws of men"; swirling political intrigue; heart-warming reminders that the battle against racism is something that blacks and whites fight together.
Trying To Get Back To Your Roots?
I understand why some rappers get in trouble with the law over weapons, or drugs, or beating up their managers. Some of them were criminals before they became stars, and they don't have much reason to change their behavior, since they have turned those criminal personas into real wealth. But why would you feel the need to engage in an economic crime?NEW YORK (AP) - Rapper and actor DMX was arrested on charges that he and another man tried to steal a car in a parking lot at Kennedy Airport, authorities said.
DMX can't afford to buy any car he wants?
DMX, whose real name is Earl Simmons, and Jackie Hudgins were arrested Thursday night after Port Authority police interrupted a dispute between the two and another man whose car they allegedly tried to steal, authorities said.
A preliminary investigation indicated that Simmons may have identified himself as a federal agent, according to Tony Ciavolella, a Port Authority spokesman.
...
Simmons and Hudgins were arrested on charges of attempted robbery, criminal impersonation and criminal mischief, he said. They were in custody and were expected to be taken to central booking in Queens late Thursday.
If This Is The Best The Left Can Do...
They have near complete control over the news media: all the television networks except Fox; most daily newspapers of any size; most of the wire services. In spite of genuine bad news, and a lot of careful editing to emphasize that bad news, while ignoring good news, consumer confidence is rising: NEW YORK (Reuters) - U.S. consumer sentiment rose in June, according to a survey on Friday, on improved job prospects and a softening in soaring gasoline prices as the economy gained traction after a long period of weakness.
Here's more good news:
The University of Michigan's final survey of consumer confidence for June showed its sentiment index rose to 95.6 from a reading of 90.2 in May, according to sources who saw the subscription-only report.
Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a rise to 95.5 with increased optimism due to an improved employment picture, a generally healthy economy and a moderate decrease in the record gasoline prices seen in late May.
...
"It was a bit surprising in the first place when initial June sentiment rose as much as it did from May," said Steven Wieting, senior economist at Citigroup in New York.
"To see confidence rise in a period where gasoline prices were moving up, the international and political news has not been confidence-building, for them to cite improvement in the labor market and income conditions is a pretty interesting sign," he said.
The expectations index rose to 88.5 in June from 81.6 in May, most likely in line with the pickup in the jobs market over the past few months.
The current conditions component rose to 106.7 from 103.6.WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. home resales jumped unexpectedly by 2.6 percent to a record high in May as an improving job market fueled home buying while mortgage rates remained relatively low, a trade association said on Friday.
Oh yeah, there's some bad news in that report, which I expect Kerry to use as a sign of the failure of the Bush Administration's policies:
Sales of previously owned homes rose to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 6.80 million units in May from a downwardly revised 6.63 million unit pace in April, the National Association of Realtors said.
Analysts had been expecting a 6.50 million unit rate.
"You've got the best of all worlds -- you've got a growing economy that's creating jobs, you've got low interest rates. The stars are still aligned for the housing sector," said NAR chief economist David Lereah.The median sales price of a pre-owned home also climbed 10.3 percent from the same period a year ago to $183,600.
Secretary of the Treasury Snow at least makes the right noises about the deficit: TAMPA, Fla. (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary John Snow said on Friday that over-sized government deficits were a potential threat to the economy but said the Bush administration was committed to cutting them.
I wish it were something that the President could do all by himself. But there is this problem with pork-barreling Congresscritters as well. I wish I had a solution to that. Unfortunately, pork-barreling is a bipartisan problem.
Responding to questions from a small group of businessmen at a printing plant in Tampa, Snow said that Washington recognized the risk from excessive deficits but said: "We in the administration are committed to bringing the deficit down, and we will."
Snow added: "If it isn't dealt with, there's a real price to be paid in terms of ... confidence in the government."
Too Much Whitney Houston
You are probably aware that the music industry settled a CD price-fixing suit by sending money out to consumers. What you may not be aware is that they also agreed to send out CDs to libraries and schools. What they sent has turned out to be rather comical: SEATTLE (AP) - The Puget Sound Educational Service District, serving 35 school districts, received 1,300 copies of Whitney Houston's soaring rendition of the "Star-Spangled Banner," a disc that includes only one other song, "America the Beautiful."
Of course, another way of looking at this is to remember the situation some years ago when Canada shipped many tons of cheese to a refugee camp on the Cambodian border--where the local population did not know what cheese was. "Thank you for the soap, but it doesn't wash very well."
...
Other discs have raunchy rap unsuitable for school libraries, and some librarians said it looked like the music companies were dumping stale inventory.
"Really, you can never have too many Whitney Houston CDs," joked district spokeswoman Karen Farley.
...
The Spokane-based educational service district is about halfway through its 5,900 CDs, which seem to lean heavily to classical music, including multiple copies of Mozart's "The Marriage of Figaro."
"It seems like a very diverse selection," said spokesman Steve Witter. "I suppose if you want them to appreciate the '60s - we have everything from Mel Torme to the Jefferson Airplane."
The CDs were selected by experts and educators for their lasting significance, and attorneys general for the states involved signed off on the list, said Gary Larson, a spokesman for Washington Attorney General Christine Gregoire.
"We did not just give carte blanche to the recording industry to provide any CDs they had left over in their warehouse," Larson said. To qualify, CDs had to have been on industry charts for 26 weeks or to have peaked in the top half of the charts.
Librarian Lara Weigand from the Tacoma Public Library is dubious that even half of the 1,325 CDs sent to her 10-library system meet that criteria: She said she doesn't need 57 copies of "Three Mo Tenors," based on a 2001 PBS special about African-American tenors.
"It was well-received, but if you were making core lists of everything a library should have, the CDs shipped would generally not be on them," Weigand said.
Even the New York Times Is Now Admitting Bin Laden/Iraqi Connections
From this morning's paper: Contacts between Iraqi intelligence agents and Osama bin Laden when he was in Sudan in the mid-1990's were part of a broad effort by Baghdad to work with organizations opposing the Saudi ruling family, according to a newly disclosed document obtained by the Americans in Iraq.
And from part 2:
American officials described the document as an internal report by the Iraqi intelligence service detailing efforts to seek cooperation with several Saudi opposition groups, including Mr. bin Laden's organization, before Al Qaeda had become a full-fledged terrorist organization. He was based in Sudan from 1992 to 1996, when that country forced him to leave and he took refuge in Afghanistan.
The document states that Iraq agreed to rebroadcast anti-Saudi propaganda, and that a request from Mr. bin Laden to begin joint operations against foreign forces in Saudi Arabia went unanswered. There is no further indication of collaboration.
...
The document, which asserts that Mr. bin Laden "was approached by our side," states that Mr. bin Laden previously "had some reservations about being labeled an Iraqi operative," but was now willing to meet in Sudan, and that "presidential approval" was granted to the Iraqi security service to proceed.
At the meeting, Mr. bin Laden requested that sermons of an anti-Saudi cleric be rebroadcast in Iraq. That request, the document states, was approved by Baghdad. Mr. bin Laden "also requested joint operations against foreign forces" based in Saudi Arabia, where the American presence has been a rallying cry for Islamic militants who oppose American troops in the land of the Muslim pilgrimage sites of Mecca and Medina.
Now, this particular document doesn't provide later information, but to suggest that the connection wasn't on-going, in light of the other pieces of evidence that have popped up, is just partisan politics.
But the document contains no statement of response by the Iraqi leadership under Mr. Hussein to the request for joint operations, and there is no indication of discussions about attacks on the United States or the use of unconventional weapons.
The document is of interest to American officials as a detailed, if limited, snapshot of communications between Iraqi intelligence and Mr. bin Laden, but this view ends with Mr. bin Laden's departure from Sudan. At that point, Iraqi intelligence officers began "seeking other channels through which to handle the relationship, in light of his current location," the document states.
This Is Really Quite Astonishing
The Saudi government is offering foreigners the right to carry arms for self-defense: RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) - Foreign residents of Saudi Arabia will be allowed to carry guns, the police minister announced after a series of militant bombings, attacks and kidnappings targeting Western workers in the kingdom.
This is really an indication of how seriously the Saudis want to keep foreign workers.
"In principle, a citizen has the right to carry a licensed weapon, and so does the resident. If he senses danger, he can carry a personal weapon as he does in his country," Prince Nayef said late Wednesday.
A Western diplomat had said some embassies and foreign companies had asked Saudi authorities to ease rules barring private security guards from carrying weapons. Nayef's comment appeared to be a response to the requests.
Under Saudi law, foreigners - even security guards - cannot have weapons, while Saudis must apply for a permit. Nayef's comments suggested foreigners would be allowed to seek permits, though he did not elaborate.
There are those who think the best thing we can do is have American workers leave, and let the Saudi royal family stew in its own juices. To some extent, they helped to create the al-Qaeda mess by not pursuing bin Laden in exchange for bin Laden leaving Saudi Arabia alone. In addition, the cynical use of the Wahabbi form of Islam by the Saudi government to keep their masses hating the West--instead of the corrupt Saudi royal family--has played a major part in creating the problem we are fighting today. As my wife observed, "If we pull out and stop buying their oil, what will the Saudis do with it?"
The problem, unfortunately, is that even the U.S. went Green, stopped buying oil from the Saudis, this would not solve the problem. A collapsing economy would guarantee al-Qaeda success in overthrowing the Saudi government, and there are many nations that would be quite willing to buy al-Qaeda/Saudi oil. France, for example, would gladly sell nuclear weapon technology to them, if they got a good enough price on the oil, and a promise that its own Islamic population would be encouraged to be quiet.
I really don't want to see the Saudi royal family in power there--but we can't very safely let them get overthrown by al-Qaeda. That would give al-Qaeda something it doesn't have right now: a government; a multibillion dollar a month income stream; and a military. The Saudis have made noises about gradually approaching democracy; let's hope it happens.
Another Constitutional Right Has Been Found in Berkeley!
The beginning of the story I can't really argue with too much: BERKELEY, Calif. — Residents of this left-leaning city will have a chance to vote in November on whether they think prostitution should be a crime.
I agree that it would be better for prostitution to be legal, and subject to regulation (as is the case in many Nevada counties), than to create the mess that is typical in many cities: prostitutes soliciting on the streets, thus creating a really disagreeable situation where customers assume that any woman out at night is looking for customers; prostitutes leaving discarded condoms on the streets; the increased risk of STD transmission by those who aren't bothering with condoms; pimps, the lowest scum of the universe, even below trial lawyers, in my opinion; corrupt vice cops taking bribes in cash and services.
An advocacy group announced Wednesday it had gathered nearly 3,200 signatures, about 1,000 more than needed to get the initiative on the ballot.
The measure would have little more than symbolic value, since it wouldn't undo laws against prostitution. But Robyn Few, head of the Sex Workers Outreach Project (search), said a win at the polls would send an important message.
But the story concludes with the discovery of a new right: Few, who recently completed six months house arrest on federal charges of conspiring to commit prostitution, said decriminalizing prostitution is a civil rights issue.
Well, let's see, in the aftermath of the Lawrence decision, who can seriously argue that it isn't a civil rights issue?
What really ticks me off is that rights that are explicitly guaranteed by the Bill of Rights--like the right to keep and bear arms--are regularly ignored or denied by the courts, and by most law professors. Yet suddenly, all sorts of rights that aren't explicit, and for which the evidence is pretty strongly that that they weren't even considered rights in 1789--are suddenly in vogue.
Not Just One Chemical Weapon Shell...
From FoxNews: In an exclusive interview with FOX News’ Brit Hume, Charles Duelfer (search) — whose ISG is leading the hunt for weapons of mass destruction — said terrorists in Iraq are “trying to tap into the Iraqi WMD intellectual capital.”
...
He also told Fox News that about 10 or 12 sarin and mustard gas shells have been found in various locations in Iraq.
The shells are all from the first Gulf War era and thus weakened, though intelligence sources say they’re still dangerous.
Amusing Idaho Code Title
BURGLARY WITH EXPLOSIVES. Actually, they mean safecracking, and there are good reasons to treat this more seriously than simple burglary. Still, when I first saw the title of the section, my only thought was, "Burglary with explosives? Is that like an extreme sport version?"
Not funny, but somewhat interesting is the punishment for rape in Idaho: it can be as little as one year in prison--or life in prison, "in the discretion of the District Judge, who shall pass sentence." I don't know how often rape gets a life sentence here, but it's interesting that this is one of the options.
I do know that "Lewd conduct with minor child under sixteen" can get a life sentence, and I have read recent Idaho Supreme Court decisions where someone received life plus fifteen years for two counts. California, this obviously isn't (see California Penal Code 286 and 288, which each range from three to eight years).
Moral Decline on the Bench
I won't even hint at why this judge was removed from the bench; you'll have to click over if you are open-minded enough (the ACLU will doubtless file suit on behalf of the judge on "freedom of expression" grounds, and then file suit on behalf of the defendant in the murder case). It's repulsive at several levels: a lack of professionalism; a juvenile notion of what's important; general moral decline. My biggest surprise was that this wasn't one of Jerry Brown's appointees to the California courts.
If You Have Kids, You Probably Made The Same Mistake I Did On Your 2003 Taxes
I just received a notice informing me that I failed to account for the Advance Child Tax Credit on my 1040. Remember that little check you received part-way through 2003, as a way of getting the economy pumped up? Well, that was an advance on the child tax credit--it wasn't a gift. Somehow, TurboTax failed to alert me to the fact that I needed to record that, and I certainly wasn't thinking about it when I did my taxes.
The World Changes--And Often Not For The Better
Professor Walter Williams of George Mason University has written a couple of columns praising Bill Cosby for his willingness to address the self-destructive behavior of black culture in America: Bill Cosby and I differ in age by one year -- I'm older. We both spent part of our youth, in the 1940s and 1950s, growing up in North Philadelphia's Richard Allen housing project. Being poor then was different from being poor now. My sister and I were rare among Richard Allen's residents. Our parents were separated, but nearly every other kid lived in a two-parent household. Black teen pregnancy was relatively rare and just a tiny fraction of today's. During those days, many residents rarely locked their doors until the last person came home. Hot summer nights saw many people fearlessly sleeping in their yards or on their balconies.
Cosby's remarks at the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education (1954) are really, really gutsy:
Today, less than 40 percent of black children live in two-parent families, compared to 70 percent and 80 percent in earlier periods. Illegitimacy, at 70 percent, is unprecedented in black history. Between 1976 and 2000, over 50 percent of all homicides in the United States were committed by blacks, and 94 percent of the time, the victim was black. These are devastating problems, but are they caused by racism, and will spending resources fighting racial discrimination solve them?
Don't give me any of that legacy-of-slavery nonsense unless you can explain why all of these problems were not worse during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, at a time when blacks were much closer to slavery, were much poorer, faced more discrimination and had fewer opportunities.
With all the opportunities available today, unavailable when Cosby and I were youngsters, black youngsters who dedicate themselves to academic excellence are attacked both verbally and sometimes physically for "acting white" and for being "Oreos" and "brainiacs." California Berkeley professor John McWhorter says, "Insidious anti-intellectualism is the prime culprit in the school-performance gap between whites and blacks, which cuts across class and income lines." He adds that the rap music culture "retards black success by the reinforcement of hindering stereotypes and by teaching young blacks that a thuggish adversarial stance is the properly authentic response to a presumptively racist society." Cosby: "With names like Shaniqua, Taliqua and Mohammed and all of that crap, and all of them are in jail. Brown vs. the Board of Education is no longer the white person's problem. We have got to take the neighborhood back. We have to go in there -- forget about telling your child to go into the Peace Corps -- it is right around the corner. They are standing on the corner, and they can't speak English."
What no one wants to confront is that the self-discipline problems that Bill Cosby is concerned about in the black community are just more severe forms of the same problems that are now afflicting the entire American society.
And on teen sex, Cosby said, "Hey, you have a baby when you are 12; your baby turns 13 and has a baby. How old are you? Huh? Grandmother! By the time you are 12, you can have sex with your grandmother, you keep those numbers coming. I'm just predicting."
Cosby went on to say, "What is it -- young girls getting after a girl who wants to remain a virgin? Who are these sick black people, and where do they come from, and why haven't they been parented to shut up? This is a sickness, ladies and gentlemen."
This Makes The Laci Peterson Murder Case Seem Downright Normal
Why has the Scott Peterson trial received so much attention, while this far more disturbing and interesting case been ignored nationally? When Glenn Taylor Helzer told Dawn Godman he wanted her to kill in God's name, she considered it a blessing.
Guardian angels circled, Godman recalled in court recently, as she sat with Helzer in a car outside the Mormon Temple in Oakland and listened to his plan to hasten Christ's return to Earth. She said he made her feel like a child in its parent's arms.
Such was the portrait of Glenn Taylor Helzer that emerged during his brother Justin Helzer's murder trial, which ended June 16 with his conviction on 11 counts, including murder, extortion and kidnapping, and will in all likelihood be presented as jurors, beginning today, consider Justin Helzer's state of mind when he killed.
...
Although it was Justin Helzer on trial, Glenn Helzer weighed heavily in the proceedings. Justin Helzer, 32, had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. Jurors, therefore, must consider whether he knew right from wrong as the "Children of Thunder" fatally bludgeoned and shot five people in 2000. Should they find Helzer was sane, they will then decide whether he should be put to death.
...
The trial also illuminated the bizarre relationships among the three people involved in the crimes, and those too are sure to be revisited during the sanity phase. Justin Helzer was portrayed as a shy, Spartan young man whose older brother often told him, "I'm No. 1, and you're No. 2." Godman was a lonely woman who as a child found comfort in the forests of the Sierra foothills and as an adult sought salvation for a speed habit, failed marriage and attempted suicide.
And then there was Glenn Helzer, a former stockbroker with a magnetic personality who wanted to defeat Satan and stretched beyond all reason the Mormon belief that people can communicate directly with God.
The Helzers met Godman on Memorial Day 1999 at a murder mystery dinner in a Mormon temple in Walnut Creek. The Helzers, raised by devout parents in Martinez but excommunicated in 1998 for drug use, were dressed entirely in black and didn't seem to fit in.
...
As he did with everyone close to him, Glenn Helzer forced Mendoza and Godman to attend self-awareness classes. He believed the program "began a process of breaking down people's walls ... so they would be more open to his ideas," Godman testified.
And so she spent four days in a windowless room with about 30 other people who confronted their demons with the help of a facilitator who Godman said reminded her of Glenn Helzer. She finished two of the program's three "levels" before Helzer said he'd take over the lessons.
That, she said, was when she realized Glenn Helzer was a prophet. She mentioned it to Justin Helzer, who agreed with her.
Before long, Glenn Helzer was laying ambitious plans. They included a bizarre plot to train Brazilian orphans to slaughter the leaders of the Mormon Church so he could become its prophet, and "Transform America," a self-help group to foster "a state of peace and joy" and defeat Satan, Godman recalled.
They needed money to carry out "Transform America." They decided to blackmail one of Glenn Helzer's former clients. Their first victim wasn't home, so they chose Ivan and Annette Stineman, a retired Concord couple. They extorted $100,000 from the couple and killed them.
The next day, they eviscerated and dismembered the bodies. Glenn Helzer let his brother do most of the dirty work, Godman said.
Fahrenheit 9/11 Ads Banned Under McCain/Feingold?
Apparently the Federal Elections Commission is considering banning advertising for Michael Moore's new pack of lies after July 30th, because it is, as Moore unabashedly admits, an attempt to influence the election. As I observed in my February 1, 2004 Shotgun News article, "Why This Supreme Court Can’t Be Trusted": What was the First Amendment supposed to protect? First and foremost, its
At least if the FEC is consistent on this, and treats ads for Moore's pack of lies like other forms of political advertising intended to influence the election, there will be some justice, as the left gets hoist by their own petard. But I have this odd feeling, since the Supreme Court has been taken over by a pack of leftists, that they will find some way to exempt advertising for Moore's movie from this ban.
purpose was to protect political speech. There have always been some gray areas on this, with questions as to what constitutes incitement to riot, what is obscenity, and what are the limits to libel. At least in the last few years, the Supreme Court has taken a very, very broad view of what is protected free speech. Last year, in Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition (2002), they ruled that virtual child pornography—-that is, computer graphics depictions of sex involving children, but in which actual children do not appear—-is protected by the First Amendment’s freedom of the press.[2] Two years ago, the Supreme Court struck down a Massachusetts law regulating tobacco advertising within 1000 feet of a school, again, on free speech grounds. The law, among other problems, was “overbroad” in the speech that it prohibited.[3] In 1989, the Supreme Court ruled that burning of the American flag was constitutionally protected free speech.[4] With decisions like this, BCRA’s [Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act] provision prohibiting political groups from running political ads should have been a no-brainer. Alas, it was a no-brainer: the majority of the Supreme Court did not use their brains. They decided that Congress has the authority to prohibit “issue advocacy” advertising on radio and television[5]-—in effect, the right to tell the NRA, the ACLU, and dozens of other political groups, to shut up and sit down.
So what is the effect of this change in the law? There are groups that can still run radio and television advertising just before the election. The candidates themselves can do so. Oh yes, there is one other group that also gets to run “issue advocacy” ads—-except this group doesn’t have to pay for the ads at all. That’s because they are called “news broadcasts.” That’s right. CBS, ABC, NBC, and CNN—-four organizations that hate guns and hate gun owners—they get to broadcast news coverage for sixty days before the election, and their position on gun control is pretty obvious.
2 Ashcroft et. al. v. Free Speech Coalition et. al., 535 U.S. 234 (2002), available at
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=000&invol=00-795; last accessed December 16, 2003.
3 Lorillard Tobacco Co. v. Reilly, 535 U.S. 235 (2001), available at
http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=us&vol=000&invol=00-596; last accessed December 16, 2003.
4 Texas v. Johnson, 491 U.S. 397 (1989), available at http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/cgibin/getcase.pl?navby=case&court=US&vol=491&invol=397; last accessed December 16, 2003.
5 McConnell et. al. v. Federal Election Commission et. al. (2003), 85.
Stem Cell Research
James Lileks again has a crisp and witty column, this time about Kerry's push for federal funding of stem cell research: John Kerry doesn't just talk to foreign leaders; he counsels with Nobel science laureates as well. Kerry wants to lift the ban on federal money for experimenting on human embryos, and 48 of the nation's finest eggheads agree: President Bush's stance on the issue puts "ideology over science."
I've done my best to follow the stem cell research controversy, but I confess that I have a lot of other matters requiring my immediate attention, so perhaps I don't fully understand the problem, but as I understand it, Bush has decided that the 48 stem cell lines already in use are all that the federal government will allow to be used. They have already been taken, and rather than throw them away, we might as well use them--but no more.
Ideology, in this case, means "a deeply held belief." It's peculiar, but true: Some people have a strange, amusing hang-up about the sanctity of human life, and they don't like vivisecting human embryos for any reason. Not even if the experiment brought Ronald Reagan back to life and restored his brain.
To these "ideologues," slicing and dicing embryos is almost like setting up baby farms so we have a steady supply of fresh organs. Silly ideologues! After all, if we'd listened to the superstitious fools in the 18th century no one would ever have dissected a human body, right?
Are these ideologues taking a page from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and Earth First!, burning down labs, threatening doctors, setting the embryos free to live in the wild? No. They are declining to spend federal money on the matter. Private investors are perfectly able to throw billions into this field if they wish. John Ashcroft will not show up in his Cotton Mather costume and block the door.
...
In a speech in Denver, Kerry said, "We need a president who will once again embrace our tradition of looking toward the future and new discoveries with hope based on scientific facts, not fear." What fear is the senator talking about? Does he think Bush is terrified that stem cells will grow 50 feet tall, stomp around and crush whole cities? What fear is the senator talking about? Kerry goes on:
"Franklin Roosevelt built great national laboratories. Abraham Lincoln created the National Academy of Sciences. President Eisenhower established the White House science adviser. President Kennedy started America on the path that ended up with a man setting foot on the moon. And President Clinton helped lead us to a map of the entire human genome."
That's right. He helped lead us to the map. "Over here, boys! I spy a sequencing pair that might govern the pineal gland! Shazaam!" And what has President Bush done? Besides put us on the path that will end up with Americans on Mars? Nothing!
Nothing! Granted, the latest budget increases science R&D by 7 percent. Take out the moneys targeted for defense and homeland security initiatives, and it's a 4 percent raise. But to hear Kerry talk you'd think Bush was sending everyone who wore a white lab coat and thick black glasses to Gitmo.
Let me throw an analogy that strikes me about this. During World War II, the Nazis did all sorts of really evil things in the name of "science." A lot of it, especially the "ethnographic" research was garbage science, based on false premises, using nothing that was identifiably scientific method. A lot of it was just an excuse to cause pain and suffering, with no pretense of repeatability: How many blows with a rifle butt does it take to kill someone?
But some of the research, such as the experiments dunking people in freezing water, seeing how long it takes to rewarm them, what is the success rate by various methods, was actually pretty respectable science. It was morally reprehensible, because these were prisoners, and the Nazi scientists didn't care in the least whether their "test subjects" lived or died.
For a very long time, there has been controversy about whether to use the data or not. Some argue that to do so, considering the method by which this data was gathered, justifies evil.
Others argue that if the science was valid, because we have no way to morally repeat such experiments, we should use the data. It was horrible that people were tortured and murdered to perform these experiments--but it would be even more horrible if the suffering of the victims wasn't used by scientists today.
I share the "don't use it" crowd's horror. But I agree with the "this data was bought at a horrifying price, it's wrong not to use it" crowd's position. And that's where I stand on the stem cell issue.
Larry Niven wrote a number of "organlegger" stories, set in a future where serious criminals are executed by being disassembled for their organs, so that others may live. Of course, with time, the demand for replacement organs causes this penalty to be expanded to more and more crimes, eventually reaching the jaywalkers. Niven was making a mildly humorous point--until I saw some moron Ohio legislator introduce a bill requiring those executed by the state to turn over their organs for transplant. Then I got a little scared.
I am concerned that the pursuit of embryonic stem cells might well lead us down the road towards either economic pressures or social pressures to abort children (oops, I mean, "stem cell donor tissue"). That unnerves me a lot. I am reluctant to ban first trimester abortion (at least as long as it enjoys the level of support that it does), but I sure don't want to encourage it.
UPDATE: Ann Coulter has a column that isn't quite as funny as usual, but makes some important points about stem cell research: Most peculiar, the passing of America's most pro-life president is supposed to be a clarion call for conservatives to support the disemboweling of human embryos -- in contrast to that heartless brute President Bush always prattling on about the value of human life. Someone persuaded poor, dear Nancy Reagan that research on human embryos might have saved her Ronnie from Alzheimer's. Now the rest of us are supposed to shut up because the wife of America's greatest president (oh, save your breath, girls!) supports stem-cell research.
Ironically, the always market-oriented Ronald Reagan would probably have asked his wife, "Honey, if embryonic stem cell therapy is such a treasure trove of medical advances, why isn't private research and development funding flocking to it?"
President Bush has never said that fetal stem cells cannot be used for research. He said "federal money" cannot be used to fund such research. If leading scientists believed fetal stem-cell research would prove to be so fruitful in curing Alzheimer's, why is the private money not pouring in hand over fist? Do you realize how many billions a cure for Alzheimer's would be worth, let alone all the other cures some are claiming fetal stem-cell research would lead to? Forget Alzheimer's -- do you know how much middle-aged men would pay for a GENUINE baldness cure? Then again, Porsche sales would probably fall off quite a bit if we ever cured baldness.
But you can't blame Nancy. As everyone saw once again last week, she's still madly in love with the guy. She'd probably support harvesting full-grown, living humans if it would bring back Ronnie. Of course, I thought it was cute and not creepy that she consulted an astrologer about Reagan's schedule after he was shot. That didn't make astrology a hard science. But liberals who once lambasted Nancy for having too much influence on Reagan's schedule now want to anoint her Seer of Technology.
Germaine Greer At It Again
It's always fun to see what the world's most prominent feminist intellectual is up to, as part of her apparent campaign to utterly discredit feminism. From a Down Under newspaper: GERMAINE Greer this week went on BBC television and appealed for help.
Now, like nearly all good leftists, Greer has spent much of the last two years arguing that overthrowing Hussein's torturocracy is evil, but it's nice to see that as part of her campaign for feminism, she has decided to support the most fiercely anti-woman wing of Islam.
"It's about time, I reckon, we resuscitated the Communist Party."
No one on the panel with her blinked at this evil idea -- although whether because they agreed with it or thought Greer was crazy and best ignored, I can't tell.
I'd understand if some thought the latter. On the same show, Greer, famed for leading the feminist revolution with her The Female Eunuch, offered a nutty excuse for Saudi Arabia's ban on women driving cars.
"I get a bit worried about certain heavily veiled ladies driving because they have no peripheral vision at all," she said. "You can understand why in some countries they are not allowed to drive."
Pay Careful Attention: I Am Going To Agree With a Labor Union Official
It appears that Chinese cars will be exported to the U.S. by 2010: DEARBORN, Mich. (Reuters) - Cars built in China's low-cost labor market could start pouring into the United States in large volumes by the end of this decade, a senior U.S. trade official said on Wednesday.
Competition and free markets are a good thing, but I will say, China is hardly an example of a free market. It is certainly freer than it was 30 years ago, but the transformation from socialism to kleptocracy means that the worst of socialism (corrupt government protection of industries and individuals with influence) and the worst of capitalism (greed) without the restraining influence of a representative government to restrain the governmental corruption, or the restraining influence of a competitive and free market to restrain abuse by employers.
Al Warner, director of the Office of Automotive Affairs at the U.S. Department of Commerce, made the prediction in a Reuters interview after speaking about China to an auto industry conference in this Detroit suburb.
"I don't think you can argue with the low-end cost equation, Warner said.
...
None of that is good news for the United Auto Workers, and UAW President Ron Gettelfinger made that clear at the Dearborn, Michigan, conference not long after Warner spoke.
The Detroit-based UAW, long considered one of the world's most powerful trade unions, has suffered steep declines in its membership in recent years as automakers shift manufacturing and other jobs overseas.
"No worker anywhere can compete with the painfully low wages and terrible working conditions endured by so many workers in China. And, as we all know, China is becoming a growing world power in the auto industry," Gettelfinger said.
...
"Workers around the world are suffering from a global race to the bottom," Gettelfinger added, saying auto workers all over the world faced a serious threat from China and its "reservoir of repressed, low-cost labor."
Property Rights & Government
Cass Sunstein, visiting blogger at Volokh Conspiracy, asserts that property exists only because of government, and therefore the libertarian argument against the welfare state is untenable: What Holmes is saying here is that even though property is exchangeable, it doesn't arise from value; it's a creation of law. And that's simply a matter of fact.
I would agree that at a certain high level of property, this is true. But property can exist in anarchy--large accumulations become rather difficult, however, as I argued a few weeks back. Some readers have disputed this, suggesting that there are economies of scale in protecting property. If so, one would expect that wealthy people would be among the bigger enemies of Big Government, instead of major political funders of it (think George Soros, Warren Buffett, and Bill Gates).
I am not an anarchist or even a libertarian (although I have some sympathy for their concerns), but I do recognize that there is some merit to the idea that property, especially in large concentrations, is a result of government enforcing laws. I am also supportive of the concept of the welfare state--although not the form of it that leftists and liberals love so much. The reading list that I inflicted on my students for Constitutional History last fall included this selection from Blackstone's Commentaries , which includes among the rights of Englishmen: The law not only regards life and member, and protects every man in the enjoyment of them, but also furnishes him with every thing necessary for their support. For there is no man so indigent or wretched, but he may demand a supply sufficient for all the necessities of life, from the more opulent part of the community, by means of several statutes enacted for the relief of the poor, of which in their proper places.
Not surprisingly, the legal realist critique that Sunstein dislikes was in its ascendancy as social Darwinism replaces the dominant Christian worldview in American society.
Libertarian critiques of the welfare state are fundamentally different from conservative critiques. The libertarian argues that it is not the government's job to redistribute income, even for a good purpose (preventing starvation, providing education, making everyone happy). The conservative argues that certain activities of the welfare state are legitimate governmental activities, because they reflect the shared Judeo-Christian values of our society. (Whoops! Make that "reflected"--they only reflect the shared values of the population, not the lawyers and judges who actually run the society now.)
The conservative disputes not the principle of the welfare state, but the implementation details. Preventing starvation is laudable; an implementation that ends up buying heroin instead of groceries is not. Preventing ignorance by educating the young is laudable; the public schools in many big cities are engaged in fraud if they have a sign that says "school." Providing a roof over the heads of a family with no money is a laudable goal; giving cockroach-infested hotels $2000 a month to put a family into a single room because the owners contribute heavily to the mayor's election campaign, is fiscally irresponsible, abusive to the "beneficiaries," and corrupt. Helping single mothers avoid prostitution is laudable; creating a system that encourages them to remain dependent creates enormous evil.
Student Evaluations
Eric Rasmussen has some thoughts about the problems of student evaluation of faculty. Many of his points make perfect sense to me--in particular, the problem of professors who make their students contented, rather than educated.
Evaluations from teaching Constitutional History this last fall finally got to me, and I am generally pretty pleased with the results. On a 4 point scale, the average was 3.51. (And this was my first semester teaching!) One evaluation complained about Boise State using too many adjuncts--but as I read the complaint, I realized it wasn't really a complaint about me, but about Boise State being too cheap to use adjuncts.
As it happens, I taught Constitutional History because the tenure-track professor who was going to teach it didn't feel completely comfortable doing so. As Clint Eastwood said in Magnum Force, "A man's got to know his limitations." It wasn't that Boise State was too cheap, but that they wanted the most qualified person to teach the class.
Another student was concerned that I was rather opinionated. (Really? Me? Can you imagine?) I will tell you that I worked very hard to make sure that I discussed a variety of points of view where particular lectures impinged on current political opinions. With respect to the Lochner decision, I found that some of my students were more prepared to defend the reasoning than I was--contrary to what you might think.
I will say that having been on the giving and receiving side of student evaluations, I do think that there is a real danger that a professor who demands a lot out of his students is going to get dinged by some of the students for that. But I demanded a lot out of my students, and it seems to have generated some respect, not revenge. (Of course, I had them turn in the evaluations before I returned their research papers.)
There are professors who get dinged pretty badly on student evaluations because they are disorganized, boring, or engage in blatant political activity in the classroom. I've had examples of all of these over the years, and I have never hesitated to express my opinion on student evaluations. I would hope that a professor would, if he heard this enough, spend a little time reconsidering how he is teaching.
Still, I think there is some merit to listening a bit more to other faculty, and a bit less to students. The students are there to learn, and learning isn't always fun. Sometimes it hurts, and sometimes it involves considerable effort.
My wife had one professor who, she suspected, was becoming a little senile. He was not just disorganized, he was forgetful, and sometimes it seemed as though he had completely lost his chain of thought. For the first time ever, there was a professor sitting in on his class. I believe that he retired soon thereafter.
That must be one of the hardest things to do--to have to tell a colleague that it's time to get evaluated for mental competence, especially since retirement, from what I have read, often accelerates the process of decline.
No Advertisers At The Moment--Time to Beg!
I guess my readers aren't buying products from my advertisers, so do your part to accelerate that glorious day that I can do this (and write history books) full-time, and make a PayPal contribution.
Reporting News, Or Making News?
Iraq the Model also reports this interesting item: About a month ago, I was watching Al-Iraqyia TV. They were hosting a spokesman of the coalition and the secretary of the Muslim Sunni Cleric Council Harith Muthanna Al-Dhari. They were talking about the revolt in Falujah. That guy was an extremely anti-American fanatic cleric and he didn’t even try to hide his feelings. Still he had two valid points in his argument. They discussed the mutilation of the bodies of the four American contractors and the host asked the sheikh the following questions:
...
-Is it true that Fallujah harbor most of the ex-Baathists and Saddam followers and that these are the bulk of the so-called resistance?
-No, that’s absolutely not true. We were always against Saddam and his regime.
-Come on Saddam named Al-Anbar as one of the “white governorates” because its people didn’t take part in the uprising in 1991, and you have had many pro-Saddam demonstrations since the 9th of April there!
-Now that’s not true and let me tell you something you may not know. First there were only two demonstration supporting Saddam after he was caught and that’s how they happened: Soon after Saddam was captured, a reporter from one of the Arab satellite channels, and I don’t want to mention its name, came downtown, gathered a bunch of teenagers, handed each one of them 20US $ and gave them some pictures of Saddam. He then asked them to shout and dance and made a great report out of it. The same thing happened again in exactly the same manner!
You Aren't Going To See This On The Evening News
From the Iraqi blog Iraq the Model: Here’s a story from David Zadel, a marine in Iraq:
Make sure you visit Iraq the Model at least every week. It's good to know that there are Iraqis who appreciate what we are doing there.
I feel compelled to write of an experience that occurred a month ago. We had recently driven an insurgent force out of a small town north of Fallujah. The insurgent force left without fighting and the town was largely abandoned.
We had expended much effort clearing the town of the weapons and ammunition that the insurgent force had left behind. People in time occupied the town again and we were determined to provide security for those returning.
My platoon and I were on a security patrol in the countryside on the outskirts of the town when one of our vehicles became stuck on a narrow road bordered by a canal. It was in danger of rolling into the water. We had to stop our vehicles which can be very dangerous.
A family that lived nearby came out of their house and began to move toward our patrol. They were smiling and waving. There were children playing everywhere. The women prepared food and the eldest males met with us.
Our vehicle was badly stuck and we needed chains to remove it. At this point, the surrounding families joined us and showed us tremendous hospitality. This is remarkable because often times, local terrorists will sometimes intimidate those who help us or show us kindness.
Without prompting the men brought out shovels and began to dig out the wheels of our vehicle that were stuck. With much effort, working together, we succeeded in removing our vehicle from danger.
It then struck me. In the middle of the Al Anbar province, where so many Marines and Iraqis were dying together in such senseless violence, this one tribe reached out to us. During all that was transpiring around us, the maelstrom of violence in Fallujah, the negative reporting from self-righteous media, and mistrust that arises from unfamiliar cultures, there was this tribe that we shared smiles with and feelings of goodwill.
With a tremendous language barrier they acted without prompting, bribery and without fear of reprisals from terrorists. I believe what I witnessed was humanity in it's truest form. Through their actions alone they seemed to say "we know you are trying. You have shed blood for us and we thank you." When I return to America, I will tell all American civilians that ask: Iraqis are people of honor, compassion and strong family bonds. There is nowhere I would rather be than here.
A Marine
*David Zadel is a Lieutenant in the 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division in Iraq.
On Bar Exams
See Doug Kern's column at Tech Central Station. He says what I have long suspected, but then again, he's passed the bar: Congratulations, law school graduate! You've taken the first step on your path towards fortune and glory, and that throbbing sensation where your soul used to be won't bother you a bit in the years to come. (Remember: just a spoonful of humor helps the social parasitism go down.) With your J.D. degree in your case-briefing, note-taking hand, you now get to spend the summer cramming for that sixteen-hour, mind-numbing, cramp-inducing ordeal that all lawyers know and fear: the bar exam of your home state!
Until a few years back, you didn't need to have graduated from law school to take the bar exam in California. This had to change, because too many paralegals were passing it, based on many years of experience.
It's hard to say which is dumber: the fact that your law school failed to prepare you adequately for the bar exam, or the fact that you have to take such an absurd test at all.
After dropping as much as $100,000 and spending three years obtaining a law degree, you probably don't know enough law to practice it professionally; most law school graduates don't. Now perhaps you're wondering: if the point of law school was not to prepare you for the practice of law, just what was the point of law school? Easy: the point of law school was to make money for the law school. Mission accomplished! Oh, and as a secondary matter, the point of law school was to flatter the egos and delusions of the brainiacs who teach there. And that, young law school graduate, is why you can pontificate at endless length on theories of critical legal deconstructionist realism as touching upon Marxist feminist radical queer Afro-Latino post-structural comparative gender issues, but you still can't write a damn will.
...
Many an affluent lawyer would sink into the doldrums of mere middle-class comfort if the public learned the dirtiest secret of all: any intelligent, educated adult with a little exposure to the practice of law can perform about 60-75% of the legal tasks that lawyers now charge a fortune to perform. Most menial legal tasks aren't even performed by lawyers -- they're farmed out to legal secretaries, paralegals, and interns, with the lawyer's name attached as an afterthought. In each state, the Grand Old Men of Law set the bar exam pass rates based on the influx of lawyers that they deem tolerable in any given year. The net result? Fewer lawyers than what the market would otherwise produce, and thus higher fees and salaries for accredited lawyers. What's the purpose of flunking the bottom 33% of test-takers, as opposed to 25% or 50% or 5%? The answer starts with an "M" and rhymes with "honey."
Which reminds me of a scandal some years ago in the Philipines, where the Supreme Court set the passing score each year--and one year, they set the score just low enough for the son of one of the justices to pass.
How Al-Sadr Won In Iraq
Whoops! How he lost! The Washington Times has an article explaining how what leftists were hoping last month would defeat the U.S. turned around: "I've got to think this was a watershed operation in terms of how to do things as part of a counterinsurgency," said Brig. Gen. Mark Hertling, a West Point graduate and one of two 1st Armored assistant division commanders, in an interview last week as he moved around southern Iraq. "We happened to design a campaign that did very well against this militia."
Al-Sadr would have been better off to have not tried to fight. Those several thousand dead militia members are several thousand potential voters.
When the division got word April 8 that Sheik al-Sadr's uprising meant most 1st Armored soldiers would stay and fight, rather than going home as scheduled, it touched off a series of remarkable military maneuvers.
Soldiers, tanks and helicopters at a port in Kuwait reversed course, rushing back inside Iraq to battle the Shi'ite cleric's 10,000-strong army. Within days, a four-tank squadron was rumbling toward the eastern city of Kut. And within hours of arriving, Lt. Col. Mark Calvert and his squadron had cleared the town's government buildings of the sheik's so-called Mahdi's Army.
...
Gen. Dempsey first needed the locations of Sheik al-Sadr's rifle-toting henchmen. Average Iraqis, fed up with the militia's kidnappings and thievery, quickly became spies, as did a few moderate clerics who publicly stayed neutral.
Once he had targets, Gen. Dempsey could then map a battle plan for entering four key cities — Karbala, Najaf, Kufa and Diwaniyah. This would be a counterinsurgency fought with 70-ton M-1 Abrams tanks and aerial gunships overhead. It would not be the lightning movements of clandestine commandos, but rather all the brute force the Army could muster, directed at narrowly defined targets.
Last week, Sheik al-Sadr surrendered. He called on what was left of his men to cease operations and said he may one day seek public office in a democratic Iraq.
Gen. Hertling said Mahdi's Army is defeated, according the Army's doctrinal definition of defeat. A few stragglers might be able to fire a rocket-propelled grenade, he said, but noted: "Do they have the capability of launching any kind of offensive operation? Absolutely not."
The division estimates it killed at least several thousand militia members.
Rev. Moon Crowns Himself; Declares Himself Messiah in Dirksen Senate Office Building
I saw this on Fox this morning, and here's the Washington Post coverage of it. Too bizarre for summary.
A Lot Can Change From Monday To Tuesday
CNN's coverage of the question of whether Bush approved torture or not has some amazing admissions: Meanwhile, a source told CNN that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld never approved a controversial interrogation technique called "water boarding." That source had told CNN the opposite Monday.
Huh? "Look, let me make very clear the position of my government and our country," Bush said in the Oval Office.
So why did CNN's source suddenly change his/her opinion? Was this "source" actually not knowledgeable about what Rumsfeld had approved? Or was this source trying to damage the Bush Administration, and had to reverse course when the memos were released exposing this source's claims as being wrong?
"We do not condone torture. I have never ordered torture. I will never order torture. The values of this country are such that torture is not a part of our soul and our being."
Bush's comments to reporters came as the White House released documents that administration officials say show there was no policy allowing the abuse of prisoners.
Bush accepted advice from the Justice Department that the Geneva Conventions governing treatment of prisoners of war did not apply to al Qaeda or Taliban detainees captured in Afghanistan, but he ordered the military to follow the conventions "to the extent appropriate and consistent with military necessity," according to one of the memos released by the White House.
"Our values as a nation, values that we share with many nations in the world, call for us to treat detainees humanely, including those who are not legally entitled to such treatment," Bush wrote in the memo dated February 7, 2002. "Our nation has been and will continue to be a strong supporter of Geneva and its principles."
...
The documents released Tuesday, as described by administration officials, help to show what ideas were discussed versus what was actually rubber-stamped by the White House in terms of the legal limits of interrogation.
"We want to drive home what was approved and what was speculated about. It is a distinction that has been lost," one official told CNN.
Senior administration officials say there were a lot of "academic" musings or "opinion" memos written after the terrorist attacks about how to apply interrogation laws and rules to the war on terrorism.
One official said it was "uncharted territory," and people at various agencies were trying to figure out how to deal with its legalities.The memos to and from Rumsfeld show that though the water-boarding technique was on a list of requested aggressive tactics, Rumsfeld did not approve it, officials say.
Thanks to the Captain's Quarters for the link.
The list of requested aggressive tactics included:
Convincing a detainee that death or severe pain could be imminent for him or his family
Exposure to cold weather or water
Use of a wet towel or dripping water to induce a perception of suffocating.
Mild, noninjurious physical contact such as grabbing someone's arm, poking them in the chest or light shoving.
Only the fourth tactic -- mild, noninjurious physical contact -- was approved.
UPDATE: What's bizarre is to read the AP description of this information. It sounds like they are reading an entirely different set of documents.
More Pre-Bush Coverage of the Bin Laden Hussein Connection
From a 1999 CNN report: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein has offered asylum to bin Laden, who openly supports Iraq against the Western powers.
And this 1999 report from the Guardian: Saddam Hussein's regime has opened talks with Osama bin Laden, bringing closer the threat of a terrorist attack using chemical, biological or nuclear weapons, according to US intelligence sources and Iraqi opposition officials.
If you want to claim that the U.S. government has been making up this stuff since the Clinton Administration, fine. To claim that Bush made all this up to start a work with Iraq is just demonstrably false.
The key meeting took place in the Afghan mountains near Kandahar in late December. The Iraqi delegation was led by Farouk Hijazi, Baghdad's ambassador in Turkey and one of Saddam's most powerful secret policemen, who is thought to have offered Bin Laden asylum in Iraq.
The Saudi-born fundamentalist's response is unknown. He is thought to have rejected earlier Iraqi advances, disapproving of the Saddam Hussein's secular Baathist regime.
More Good News From Iraq
Part 3 is here, and part 4 is here. I can't summarize either list; there are simply too many pieces of good news that you aren't going to see in your local newspaper.
And Why Did You Take This Job, Miss?
I've always been a little uncomfortable with this notion that sexual banter and jokes alone constitute sexual harassment. I've worked in places where crude and sexually explicit jokes were a big part of the workplace. I can still remember my disappointment with one company where I worked where some of the employees made a birthday cake that used cupcakes as breasts, and chocolate sprinkles for pubic hair. (But because the employees who made this cake were females, I guess this was okay on Planet Feminist.) Still, I do think that there needs to be something more than just vulgarity to constitute sexual harassment, or many employers will be sued into non-existence in no time, since sexual vulgarity is something of the norm in America today.
This lawsuit is a fine example of both the danger of the broad definition of sexual harassment, and of someone that clearly needed to research the job that she was taking: Free-speech groups want the California Supreme Court to overturn an appellate ruling that allowed a writers' assistant for the TV comedy "Friends" to pursue a sexual harassment claim because of bawdy banter between the show's writers.
I would love to be the defense attorney who got to cross-examine the plaintiff:
The appeals court said a plaintiff in a sexual harassment case "does not need to be a direct victim" and can pursue a sexual harassment claim exclusively on the basis of hearing speech at work that is sexual in nature. Ms. Lyle, have you ever watched Friends before you took the job? What were you expecting the writers to be talking about while writing this show? Quantum mechanics?
UPDATE: I just received a pointer to the complaint, which is here, and very coarse and crude. If a true description of the situation:
1. This is definitely not within any sort of legitimate story conference area, since much of this isn't even relevant to the script writing, and some of the accusations involve clear sexual discrimination (not hooking up her computer, for example).
2. I have always had a very dark view of the morality of the people in the entertainment industry. But not this dark. Maybe it's time to resume writing Puritan Guerilla.
What Exactly Does This Story Mean?
It sounds quite worrisome at first glance: SAN FRANCISCO -- A study says children and pregnant women who drink milk from some California cows could be at risk from a toxic chemical used in rocket fuel.
But let's analyze this claim a little. They found it in 31 out of 32 samples. That's not a huge sample size. What was the distribution of brands? Were the samples all whole milk, or were the samples distributed across whole milk, 2%, skim milk?
The Environmental Working Group's research says they may be exposed to unsafe levels of perchlorate, which has been linked to thyroid damage. For fetuses, infants and children, disruptions in thyroid hormone levels can cause lowered IQ, mental retardation, loss of hearing and speech, and motor skill deficits.
The group found the rocket fuel chemical in almost every sample tested -- 31 out of 32 samples purchased from grocery stores in Los Angeles and Orange counties. The average level of perchlorate in the samples was 1.3 parts per billion -- just above the Environmental Protection Agency's currently recommended safe dose of 1 parts per billion.
The study itself at the Environmental Working Group website at least gives a bit more information. It turns out that 14 of the samples were below the 1 ppb level, and three of the samples were in the 1.0 to 1.1 ppb range. They code the brands, rather than tell you which brands were highest or lowest--something that could provoke a dramatic market preference for the lowest levels of milk.
When you read the fine print, you also find out that California's perchlorate drinking water goal is 6 ppb--quite a bit higher than for milk, and far above the 3.62 ppb that the highest milk sample EWG tested found. I can't quite figure out why milk needs to be so dramatically lower in perchlorates than drinking water. There might be a good reason, but I'm not seeing it in the EWG report.
The EWG report repeatedly mentions rocket fuel as the source for environmental perchlorates, which seems a bit strange. They are a common oxidizer--why just mention rocket fuels? This report indicates that they are common in a number of fertilizers, and in match production. Another report indicates that "Perchloric salts (ClO4-) have been used extensively as missile propellants, wet digestions, organic syntheses, electro-polishing of metals, animal feed additives, explosives, pyrotechnics, and herbicides. In addition, it has been found as a contaminant in certain fertilizers or Chilean saltpeter." So why does the EWG report not mention these other sources? Are they trying to come up with a method to get all those nasty defense industries to shut down? Or are they appealing to the fiercely anti-military prejudices of the environmental movement?
Post-Americans
Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies has a column about Utah Congressman Chris Cannon's re-election campaign, and the struggle over immigration: Cannon is way ahead of his opponent, former state legislator Matt Throckmorton, according to separate polls published Sunday by the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News. This is to be expected, since Cannon is a wealthy incumbent (with a personal fortune of as much as $12 million), he's outspent his challenger 9-to-1, he's avoided any conventional scandal, and his brother is the head of the state Republican party. Although Throckmorton may yet pull off an upset, it's likely that he's too poor — and too decent — to do what's needed to win against an opponent like Cannon.
I will confess that my sentiments about illegal immigration have changed substantially over the last twenty years.
So why all the ink, why the lead editorial with 25 column-inches of smears, innuendo, and half-truths? (Full disclosure — some of it's about me personally.) Why the belabored efforts to paint pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, anti-tax traditionalist conservatives like congressmen Tom Tancredo and John Hostettler as part of a cabal of ChiCom-loving, baby-killing white supremacists?
Because for post-Americans, there can be no legitimate opposition to their open-borders views. To the degree that Cannon is facing political trouble, it must be because his opponent is "running hard on xenophobia," as the Journal writes, "courtesy of deep-pocketed restrictionists." (Attention any "deep-pocketed restrictionists." Call me!) To concede that supporters of more moderate immigration levels and tighter enforcement might be anything other than racists or "humanity-is-a-virus" leftists would be to acknowledge the legitimacy of a nationalist, as opposed to a post-nationalist, worldview; in other words, to admit that borders have value, rather than being awkward anachronisms that interfere with business.
My principal concern is security; if half a million people illegally cross our border every year, it's pretty darn difficult to see if any of them on our terrorist watch list. We can't make illegal immigration stop, of course, if but if making a serious effort to enforce our laws reduced the illegal immigration flood, we would at least occasionally stop some terrorists from entering the U.S. As things now stand, we don't stand a chance of doing so. This seems to me to be more than a sufficient reason to make a serious effort at shutting off illegal immigration; everything else is strictly frosting on the cake.
The frosting, however, should be sweet enough to interest liberals, populists, and leftists, if their primary concern is helping poor Americans. You can't triple the number of unskilled laborers in an economy without reducing wage rates. Senator Kerry talks about raising the minimum wage to $7 per hour. How about removing several million illegal immigrants from the labor pool? An American could be bussing dishes at the restaurant, or cutting your lawn--and with less competition for those jobs, I expect that the current minimum wage might well become irrelevant.
Unfortunately, this is the problem: corporate interests like having that big supply of cheap labor, especially labor that is a little reluctant to report workplace safety or labor law violations for fear of la Migra. The Republican Party (at least, parts of it) doesn't want to upset a group that is finally beginning to contribute to Republicans instead of Democrats.
So why is the left so intent on assisting businesses in exploiting cheap labor? Because they hope to turn those illegal aliens first into legal aliens (through amnesties, like the last one), and then into citizen-voters. (Of course, San Francisco is trying to skip one of the steps, by allowing illegals and legal non-citizen residents to vote.) Unskilled Americans looking for work? You are out of luck.
It would be nice if there were a political party that actually cared about poor Americans, instead of just pretending to care.
Why Did Iran Seize The British Boats?
It made no sense to me, except as the actions of an overzealous local commander. Michael Ledeen over at National Review argues that it was part of the Elect Kerry strategy of the mullahs: There's a perfectly straightforward explanation for the whole episode: The Brits were laying down a network of sensors to detect the movement of ships toward major Iraqi oil terminals. The Iranians considered that a bit of a threat. So they attacked.
This actually makes lots of sense.
And why, you might ask, did the Iranians feel threatened?
Because they were planning to attack (or have their surrogates attack) the oil terminals, silly.
And why attack the oil terminals?
Because they want to defeat President Bush in November, and they figure if they can get the price of oil up to around $60 a barrel, he'll lose to Kerry.
Not to mention a considerable side benefit: At $60 a barrel, they can buy whatever they may be lacking to get their atomic bombs up and running.
It's Not About Free Speech, Is It?
Thomas Sowell's recent column reports on yet another effort to suppress free speech: With all the noise being made -- from traffic noise to Al Gore's ranting -- you might never suspect that there was a National Day of Silence. What you might also not suspect is that this day is observed in schools and colleges across the country, where students agree to remain silent for a day in order to show support for homosexuals.
For all that homosexuals and their apologists insist that they are pursuing freedom, it is pretty clear that they are not supporting freedom for anyone but themselves.
The idea is that people who are sexually different have been silenced by society and that the students who observe the National Day of Silence are showing that they are on the side of the gays, lesbians, etc. The schools themselves promote and cooperate with this exercise, allowing students to hand cards to their teachers when they do not respond to questions asked in class.
Theoretically, this is a protest against the silencing of people because of their sexual orientation. But only theoretically is this about free speech.
A sophomore at a San Diego high school discovered the hard way just how theoretical the concern about free speech is. He did not agree with the view of homosexuality being promoted by his school and wore a T-shirt that said so -- silently. Yet he was suspended.
The front of his T-shirt said: "I will not accept what God has condemned" and the back said: "Homosexuality is shameful."
On what grounds was he suspended? The school's speech code bans statements that promote "hate" or "violence."
I Know That This Won't Go Over Well in the Blogosphere...
From FoxNews: WASHINGTON — In the latest effort to curb indecency over the airwaves, the Senate on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved raising the maximum fines for broadcasters and personalities who cross the line.
There are a lot of bloggers, both liberal and libertarian, who think it is so cool to see nudity, raunchy behavior, and vulgarity on broadcast television. But guess what? When you see the Senate vote for something 99-1--and consider that there are a lot of Democrats (the party of Hollywood) in the Senate--this tells me that voters are getting the message across to their elected representatives.
Under the measure passed by a 99-1 vote, the maximum fine for both broadcasters and entertainers would increase to up to $275,000 per indecent incident, up from $27,500 for license holders and $11,000 for personalities, for a maximum fine of $3 million a day.
The House passed a similar bill calling for $500,000 fines for indecent incidents, and differences between the two must be worked out.
If it is really important to you to hear Howard Stern pretending to be so cool by behaving like sixth graders did when I was that age, there's always cable TV. If it is really important to you that Janet Jackson do a striptease, there's always cable TV. There comes a certain moment when the little boys need to grow up, and stop trying to show off by using obscene language and crudity as a proof that they are all grown up.
You want the broadcast media to have serious discussions about sexuality? Fine. But that wouldn't generate a market among the little boys that haven't quite grown up yet. Serious discussions would include the problems of STDs; of unexpected pregnancies; of difficult choices about abortion or adoption; of manipulation and emotional injury. And then you would have to actually be grown up about sex, instead of just pretending to be.
Why Is Lying A Bad Thing?
Because it is hard to keep straight who you told which lie to, and when. Clinton's memoirs now directly contradict his sworn testimony. According to the Washington Post! Clinton's own legal battle with independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr accounts for one of the book's more peculiar revelations. In his August 1998 grand jury testimony, Clinton said he began an inappropriate sexual relationship with Monica S. Lewinsky in "early 1996." His testimony, as was widely noted at the time, was in conflict with Lewinsky's story: She testified the relationship began on Nov. 15, 1995, in the midst of a government shutdown.
Starr's prosecutors, in their report to Congress, accused Clinton of lying about the date of their relationship in order to avoid admitting that he had sexual relations with an intern, as Lewinsky still was in the fall of 1995 before being hired for a paying job in the winter.
Without explanation, in his memoir Clinton departs from his grand jury testimony and corroborates her version: "During the government shutdown in late 1995, when very few people were allowed to come to work in the White House, and those who were there were working late, I'd had an inappropriate encounter with Monica Lewinsky and would do so again on other occasions between November and April, when she left the White House for the Pentagon."
Clinton aides yesterday said they could not explain the discrepancy, and his attorney, David Kendall, was traveling and did not return a call.
Devastating Criticism of Michael Moore's New Film
It's by Christopher Hitchens, a leftist with enough honesty to recognize that George Bush is less of a threat to leftist ideals than Osama Bin Laden. The beginning of the review is sharp; the remainder goes into a detailed analysis of Moore's disonesty: One of the many problems with the American left, and indeed of the American left, has been its image and self-image as something rather too solemn, mirthless, herbivorous, dull, monochrome, righteous, and boring.
...
Nonetheless, it seems that an answer to this long-felt need is finally beginning to emerge. I exempt Al Franken's unintentionally funny Air America network, to which I gave a couple of interviews in its early days. There, one could hear the reassuring noise of collapsing scenery and tripped-over wires and be reminded once again that correct politics and smooth media presentation are not even distant cousins. With Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, however, an entirely new note has been struck. Here we glimpse a possible fusion between the turgid routines of MoveOn.org and the filmic standards, if not exactly the filmic skills, of Sergei Eisenstein or Leni Riefenstahl.
To describe this film as dishonest and demagogic would almost be to promote those terms to the level of respectability. To describe this film as a piece of crap would be to run the risk of a discourse that would never again rise above the excremental. To describe it as an exercise in facile crowd-pleasing would be too obvious. Fahrenheit 9/11 is a sinister exercise in moral frivolity, crudely disguised as an exercise in seriousness. It is also a spectacle of abject political cowardice masking itself as a demonstration of "dissenting" bravery.
How Did I Miss This Story?
And why didn't this get more attention? A shipment of "yellowcake" shows up in Rotterdam; apparently from Iraq: AMSTERDAM, Netherlands — The U.N. nuclear watchdog confirmed Friday that Iraq was the likely source of radioactive material known as yellowcake (search) that was found in a shipment of scrap metal at Rotterdam harbor.
Isn't that interesting?
Yellowcake, or uranium oxide, could be used to build a nuclear weapon, although it would take tons of the substance refined with sophisticated technology to harvest enough uranium for a single bomb.
A spokeswoman for the International Atomic Energy Agency said the Rotterdam specimen was scarcely refined at all from natural uranium ore and may have come from a known mine in Iraq that was active before the 1991 Gulf War.
"I wouldn't hype it too much," said spokeswoman Melissa Fleming. "It was a small amount and it wasn't being peddled as a sample."
The yellowcake was uncovered Dec. 16 by Rotterdam-based scrap metal company Jewometaal, which had received it in a shipment of scrap metal from a dealer in Jordan.
Company spokesman Paul de Bruin said the Jordanian dealer didn't know that the scrap metal contained any radioactive material. He said the dealer was confident the yellowcake, which was contained in a small steel industrial container, came from Iraq.
Amusing Description of Being a "Hessian"
You will recall from American history class that the German principality of Hesse supplied many mercenaries for the British, attempting to suppress the American Revolution. Actually, it was more than just Hesse that did this. In reading Don Higginbotham's The War of American Independence, he has an amusing description of how these principalities did their recruiting: To meet their quotas for George III, some of the princes almost literally rounded up every stranger in sight. Youthful Johann Gottfried Seume, a student from Leipzig, was kidnapped while passing through the domain of of the landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, "this seller of human souls." His captors destroyed his "academic papers (proof that I had been a student), my only means of identification." Placed in a Hessian regiment, he found a student from Jena, a bankrupt merchant from Vienna, a lace maker from Hanover, a monk from Wuerzburg, and a magistrate from Meninger.... Once aboard British transports, Seume reported, they were "packed like sardines." Since sometimes as many as six men slept in a single bunk, the occupants all lay in the same position. "And when we we thus had sweated and roasted enough on one side, the man on the right end called out, 'Everybody turn!' and so, everybody turned over."
New Articles Up On My Website
All of these are under the Popular Magazines & Newspaper Articles page.
"All For the Want of a Nail," Shotgun News, April 20, 2004, 69.
How the Bellesiles lies about the history of guns in America were spread around the world by the Department of State.
"Nuisance Lawsuits and Assault Weapons," Shotgun News, May 1, 2004, 22-23.
Why the NRA had to kill the nuisance lawsuit ban bill.
"The Dangers of 'Reasonable Regulation'," Shotgun News, May 10, 2004, 9.
Two cases that illustrate the necessity for, and the hazards of allowing "reasonable regulation" of gun ownership.
"Concealed Handgun Laws: A Smorgasbord," Shotgun News, June 1, 2004, 11.
News about concealed handgun laws in Washington State, Kansas, and Minnesota.
"Innocents Betrayed," Shotgun News, June 10, 2004, 11.
A review of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership's new movie, Innocents Betrayed.
"How Many Defensive Gun Uses?" Shotgun News, July 1, 2004, 20-21.
The problems of measuring civilian defensive gun uses.
Why Isn't This Couple on Jerry Springer?
And not just because they are gay, but surrogate parenting, violence, a woman with eight kids. From the Lexington, Kentucky Leader-Herald: The two Lexington gay men who made worldwide news by parenting quadruplets and then a fifth child have separated amid allegations of domestic violence that a judge dismissed, according to court records.
Lexington attorney Michael Meehan declined to comment yesterday on Fayette Circuit Family Court Judge Kim Bunnell's decision earlier this month to reject his petition for a domestic violence order against his former partner Thomas Dysarz.
Bunnell ruled on June 1 that there was "insufficient evidence" to issue a domestic violence order. Such an order would have put restrictions on Dysarz's interaction with Meehan. Court records show separate addresses for the men.
Meehan has custody of his biological children -- the quadruplets born to Meehan and surrogate mother Brooke Verity on July 26, 2002.
Dysarz, who has custody of his biological child, Brandon Lane Dysarz, born in January, declined to comment yesterday.
Brooke Verity, the surrogate mother who gave birth to all five children, could not be reached for comment.
Verity, who has three children of her own, initially agreed to conceive a child with Meehan because she thought he and Dysarz would be good parents, she has said.
...
In November 2002, anti-gay Kansas minister Fred Phelps traveled to Lexington to protest the quadruplets' baptism at the Cathedral of Christ the King.
In response to Phelps' protest, some Central Kentucky residents rallied around the men and launched a counter-demonstration, Rally for a Hate-Free Lexington.
Last year, Verity tried unsuccessfully in Jessamine County Circuit Court to terminate her parental rights to the quadruplets.
James Lileks Must Have More Honest Friends
Lileks writes well (at least more engagingly than I do), and I think he has more honest Democratic friends: For the last few weeks I’ve had this gnawing belief that bin Laden got lucky by attacking during Bush’s term. Conventional wisdom says the opposite, because Bush fought back. But he’s the enemy now. I ask my Democrat friends what they’d rather see happen – Bush reelected and bin Laden caught, or Bush defeated and bin Laden still in the wind. They’re all honest: they’d rather see Bush defeated. (They’re quick to insist that they’d want Kerry to get bin Laden ASAP. Although the details are sketchy.)
I have acquaintances (I probably wouldn't call them friends) who clearly regard Bush as a greater enemy than bin Laden, and the Patriot Act as a deeper affront to human rights than using plastic shredders to rip living people apart. (Note: there is a bit of criticism of how Bush has done some of these steps that I consider legitimate criticism, as opposed to traitorous rage.) Most of these people didn't feel this way two years ago. What changed?
I think, more than anything else, it is that the left no longer worries about terrorist attacks. When they worried about dying in a biological weapon attack, the left (and most Democrats that I know are definitely "the left") were prepared to grudgingly back our government's efforts--or at least avoid unnecessary carping. Now that their memories have become a little clouded by time, and they perceive bin Laden as a distant threat, Bush has become their bigger enemy.
I find it interesting that Democratic members of Congress, by and large, are being careful to criticize particular policies and implementation details of what the Bush Administration has done in Iraq. There's no question in my mind that they have made some substantial mistakes along the way. No surprise; we haven't occupied and liberalized (in the broad sense of "liberal") a significant nation in fifty years. The last time we did it, Germany was a bit of a mess for at least a year, and we had the advantage of scaring the Japanese witless with nuclear weapons.
In addition, large numbers of the most seriously crazy German and Japanese had committed suicide, or died in suicidal attacks as the war ended. I suppose if we had killed hundreds of thousands of die-hard Baathists in combat during the invasion, we would be having far fewer problems now--and Bush would have been called a butcher by the left.
The Democrats that are trying to tar Bush as a liar and crook are generally either those representing hard left constitutencies (Senator Kennedy, for example), or who were running for President--and knew that they really have no other issue likely to inflame Democratic voters. Even the economy, which I suspect John Kerry thought was going to be his ticket to the White House, has turned around. Kerry has to play the Iraq card, because he doesn't have anything else to motivate the hard left of the Democratic Party into writing $1000 checks to his campaign, and $5000 checks to the DNC. (The hard left of the Democratic Party, of course, has lots of money to spend.)
You Can't Have It Both Ways
I keep getting told that homosexuals are just like everyone else, and that the anonymous promiscuity is just a nasty stereotype. Yet the complaint on this set of arrests is that it targets homosexuals: Accusations of sexual profiling and entrapment arose after a Michigan State Police sting operation at a Holt-area restroom late last week.
Look, if this sort of behavior isn't a fundamental part of male homosexuality, why are these arrests being portrayed as an attack on all homosexuals? You can't have it both ways. If this cruising for anonymous sex in rest areas is an atypical behavior that homosexuals do not condone, gay activists shouldn't be complaining about it, anymore than gun rights activists would complain about police making arrests for sales of guns to felons. If arresting guys for this sort of behavior is an attack on homosexuals (not just arresting criminals who happen to be homosexuals), then homosexuals need to stop pretending that they are "just like everyone else."
Michigan State Police said the sting, which took place on Thursday and Friday at the restroom on northbound U.S. 127, resulted in the arrests of 12 men on charges of criminal sexual conduct, indecent exposure and solicitation to commit an immoral act.
The arrests came shortly before the start of Michigan's Pride Weekend, area gay activists to believe targeting and profiling of gay men was involved in the sting operation.
"There has to be a connection between this operation and the weekend it was carried out," Todd Heywood, a Lansing resident who was briefly detained in the sting, said.
Though Heywood, a member of the gay-rights activist group Triangle Foundation, was not charged, he said officers made disparaging comments to him while targeting him for misconduct.
State Police Lt. Gary Nix said undercover officers were planted at the restroom in response to citizen complaints.
"We had received a number of citizen complaints," Nix, the Lansing post commander, said, adding officers have been stationed at the scene in the past. "People said they were being accosted, assaulted and propositioned and there were just people doing gross things in the restroom."
He said the operation wasn't implemented specifically for Pride Weekend, and said the sting was not an attack on the gay community.
"Some people want to put that spin on it," said Nix, adding suspects names have not been released. "This was not to target gay people. It was law enforcement against people committing lewd acts."
Nix said stings of this magnitude have taken place in the area before, but would not give specifics regarding where they took place or the number of officers involved. He also would not say the frequency of the operations or how many complaints police had received.
...
ACLU Lansing Chapter President Henry Silverman said undercover operations are generally viewed as harassment by members of the gay community.
"There is certainly a history on the part of police of singling out gays for particular actions," Silverman said, adding he had not heard of the particulars of Heywood's case.
Note that the complaints that led to the sting included being propositioned and assaulted--which really means aggressive homosexuals assuming that a guy using the restroom was a homosexual, and touching them. As much as a lot of people would like to assume that public indecency charges are "victimless crimes," the fact is that there is a whole collection of behaviors connected to public restroom homosexuality that do not qualify as "victimless."
The "we're making this up as we go along" right to privacy might be a pretty persuasive argument for having the government leave homosexuals alone--but it sure doesn't fly in a public restroom.
Fight Club (1999)
My son rented this, and recommended it. My daughter tells me it is very popular with her age group--almost a manifestos for twentysomethings. When it came out, I had read reviews that indicated that it was very, very violent, and since it didn't seem like a terribly thoughtful or important film, I didn't bother to see it.
Having now seen it, I would say that the reviews overhyped its violence. I can't recommend it--and I would rather my son hadn't seen it, at least not for a few more years, because of violence, nihilism, exaggerated and unrealistic sexuality, exposed genitals, muddled moral messages--but I can tell you that the previews for this movie really didn't do it justice. It is actually a much better film than the previews implied.
The first twenty minutes of the film are actually quite funny, where we see this twentysomething with a white collar job going to recovery groups: men recovering from testicular cancer; people living with tuberculosis; people dying of cancer. It is a pretty outrageous parody of groups that do provide very important emotional support for people struggling with great sorrows. What makes this funny is that this guy goes to them because he has severe insomnia, and for some reason, going to these groups and letting people cry on his shoulder--without ever admitting that he doesn't have any of their problems--solves his insomnia--or so he thinks. (I won't spoil the movie by telling you who, but there are fewer real characters here than you think.)
The core of the idea of the fight club, however, is where the film presents a serious and important idea: where do men get their identity in our society? What makes you a man? In a society where marriages don't last, many men provide only genetic information, a child support check, and an occasional summer visit to the previous wife's kids, what is the male role model? For a great many young men, the adult that has the most influence isn't Dad, but Mom.
Now, I don't think that Mom is a bad influence--but I do think that some of the differences between men and women reflect innate sexual differences, not just cultural norms. (My experience has been that many parents who grew up believing the feminist claim that "It's all taught" have changed their minds after raising both a boy and a girl.) What happens when those innate sexual differences that naturally make men (on average) more aggressive and violent than women aren't properly channeled by the correct role models?
Fight Club takes place in the secular urban world where materialism is the highest value--where the protagonist regards an Ikea furniture catalog as the adult equivalent of pornography. (The sequence where we look around his apartment/catalog--and they are one--is really quite inspired.) Our protagonist eventually rejects that materialism in a rather spectacular way, and it leads him down the path of confusion, and to the pursuit of violence as an end in itself. With an acquaintance he meets on business trip, he founds what they call "Fight Club"--where they fight bare knuckle just to feel something.
If this seems bizarre too you, it shouldn't. An awful lot of what we call "extreme sports" today are, I would suggest, an attempt by depressed people to feel something. For those of you who have never been depressed, it isn't: "I am sad." Depression is: "I don't feel much of anything." The adrenalin rush that comes from risking death--and surviving--or even just getting into a fight--makes you feel alive.
My daughter says that that "fight clubs" actually formed after the film came out. My son has been to parties where at least the participants put on boxing gloves--and one kid still ended up with a broken nose, and blood everywhere. Humans--especially teenagers--are so suggestible.
If you want to figure out where the depression is coming from, look at the homes from which so many kids come these days. When I was in high school, I don't think that there were more than a couple of kids I knew whose parents were divorced. Now, it's the norm. My wife, as a middle school teacher, saw the chaos that this creates for kids as they are forced to take sides between Mom, Dad, Stepmom, Stepdad, Stepsiblings, Grandparents, Grandstepparents, where they spend Christmas, etc.
Is your marriage having problems? You and your spouse will work through the divorce far sooner than your ten year old will. The protagonist in Fight Club describes how his father moved from city to city every six years, starting a new family. He says, "I don't know my father," but really, he means that there simply wasn't enough connection to know him as a father, instead of the guy who sends child support checks.
Without a meaning or purpose to life, what is left? There is the pursuit of fleshly pleasures, but all of these pleasures have their price, if you don't exercise considerable self-discipline. The hours spent in the gym (or worse, inducing vomiting), or the health consequences of obesity, are the price of regularly indulging in the pleasures of eating. Promiscuity's price includes lifelong STDs (such as herpes), life-ending STDs such as AIDS, and more often than not, emotional scarring caused by people who insist that they can have sex with no emotional connection. I've seen too many people, both guys and gals, who have insisted that it's purely pleasure--and yet their actions demonstrate that sex causes them to either fall in love with someone that they can't stand, or, as an alternative, start to treat sexual partners extraordinarily callously.
The fleshly pleasure enemy in Fight Club is consumerism--the mindless pursuit of high status goods that no one really needs. The price of consumerism is debt--and the need to work to manage that debt. (And before you ask, I bought my Corvette at a fire sale price during the 2002 desperate times; it has effectively no impact on my net worth or debt situation, compared to having a more pedestrian vehicle.) Consumerism--the purchasing of goods that you don't need, or whose pleasure is less than the pain that paying for them causes--is one of the great evils of our time.
What happens to a society where there is no deeper meaning to life than the pursuit of pleasure and material gain? Look at the 1990s bubble, and the wealth it created. Much of the wealth was real: real products, real improvements in people's lives. Some of the wealth was illusory: paper gains based on projections of future growth dreamed up by a CEO intent on separating investors from their money. I saw some of this wealth, both real and illusory, destroy people's lives in the 1990s: destroying marriages; corrupting young people; creating megalomaniacs who thought that they because they made several million dollars from working as an engineer, that this meant that they were smart enough to buy any business, and make a fortune--instead of bankruptcy.
American history has had a number of periods where we have swung from ideals that were unrealistically high to profound cynicism. The Civil War, in many respects, is among the high points of American idealism. Hundreds of thousands of young men died to defend (variously): "Liberty and Union Forever!" (as my great-great-great-grandfather wrote across the top of a letter); freedom for the slaves; or states' rights. The Gilded Age that followed was awash in obscene wealth and wretched poverty, and a cynicism that seems completely inverse.
The 1960s was another age of high ideals, first, the Civil Rights Movement, and then John Kennedy's "we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty." The antiwar movement's efforts to stop the war in Vietnam, while it fought that burden in Vietnam, was still a movement awash in idealism--and like the Civil War, the idealism of that period was a bit too far separated from the grubby details of what actually happened. It is no surprise that the following decade was the Disco Era--when the highest ideal that many people aimed for was, "I'll respect you in the morning."
Rupert Brooke's poem "Peace," written at the outbreak of World War I, shows this profoundly idealistic sentiment--of a sensitive young intellectual looking for a deeper meaning to life than the Edwardian era could provide: Now, God be thanked who has matched us with his hour,
This unrealistic view of war, and what it would accomplish, of course, died in the trenches and pointless deaths of a war that really had no overriding moral principle. The cynicism that followed made World War II unavoidable--and here there were overriding moral principles that someone like Rupert Brooke could well have celebrated in verse.
And caught our youth, and wakened us from sleeping,
With hand made sure, clear eye, and sharpened power,
To turn, as swimmers into cleanness leaping.
Glad from a world grown old and cold and weary,
Leave the sick hearts that honour could not move,
And half-men, and their dirty songs and dreary,
And all the little emptiness of love!
As I watched Fight Club, and I was struck by the prescient manner in which we see a cult of death form. It is one committed to destroying consumerist capitalism by bringing down its office buildings with bombs in the basements, and that follows a father figure, because these young men have no real fathers of their own. I thought of both al-Qaeda, and Hitler.
The father figure issue is important. My wife points out that enormous numbers of young men grew up in 1920s Germany whose fathers had died in the trenches. Hitler became their father figure in the concrete, and the SA and SS became their father figure in the abstract. Part of the social dynamic of gangs in America today is the absence of fathers; older gang members end up fulfilling, in an ugly and destructive way, that role of the son seeking approval of a father figure. There is a similar problem with child molesters taking advantage of approval seeking boys and girls, which is part of why the risk of molestation is substantially higher in homes without the biological father.
Hitler's SS worshipped death and obedience in the same way that the cult in Fight Club does, with the Death's Head as the icon of the SS. Palestinians even say directly, "We worship death" and are proud of it. I suppose that we should not be surprised.
Today, post-9/11, I find myself watching a film like Fight Club quite differently than I might have in 1999. There is something worth fighting for--something that is the highest ideal to which a man (or, for that matter, a woman) can aspire: a warrior fighting in a righteous cause. Pat Tillman is the poster boy for this, a man who put honor, courage, and his life above wealth and consumerism, but he has more than a hundred thousand lesser known brothers and sisters in the field today in Afghanistan and Iraq, fighting not just to fight, not just to feel alive (as motivates the protagonists of Fight Club), but fighting for the perservation of freedom. (A few members of our armed forces have thrown excrement on this shining ideal--and perhaps because they felt that they needed to take horrifying actions to obtain information to stop even worse crimes--but that doesn't destroy the validity of the ideals for which our forces fight.)
There were some very interesting and important ideas trapped inside of a pretty crude and sometimes silly movie. It's unfortunate that someone can't do a better job of addressing these problems: sons need fathers, and there is more to life than the selfish pursuit of pleasure.
