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Labels: book reviews Hundreds of thousands of skaters, their cheeks as red as apples in the freezing temperatures, took to the ice, and hospital wards were filled with dozens of people with fractured arms, sprained ankles and broken legs. Train engineers were ordered to go slowly to avoid hitting skaters who clambered across railway tracks to get from one frozen canal to another. Even the minister of defense, an avid skater, fell and broke his wrist. His ministry announced that the national defense remained in safe hands, even if one of them was in a cast. In the 19th century, when Hans Brinker, the hero of the novel in which he tries to win a pair of silver skates, coasted along Holland's ice, the canals froze almost every year. But water pollution and climate change have made this so rare that today a boy of 15, Brinker's age, may never have seen a frozen canal, or at least remember one. Until, that is, this year. "For us, it's in our genes," said Gus Gustafsson, 68, a retired insurance executive, explaining why he and his wife had rushed out to buy new skates and take to the ice under a cloudless blue sky. "It was like a frenzy that came over people, including lots of kids, like my granddaughter, who is 5." With thousands of others, they skated northeast toward the cheese capital, Gouda, then toward Utrecht. With an influx of immigrants, the country has been struggling to maintain what it considers its Dutch soul, and Gustafsson was one of many here who thought the skating experience enabled the Dutch to reconnect with their identity. "There were only Dutch people on the ice," he said. "I saw no people of Arab descent." Labels: global warming An employment tribunal ruled that the national counselling service Relate was entitled to dismiss Gary McFarlane after he said that encouraging gay sex went against his devout religious beliefs. The decision prompted Christian groups to demand a rethink of religious discrimination laws, following a string of other high-profile cases in which courts have found against Christians who claim they have suffered as a result of standing up for their beliefs. Andrea Williams, director of the Christian Legal Centre, which supported Mr McFarlane in his claim, said the religious discrimination law was "in danger of becoming a dead letter", while the Christian Institute said there was a growing feeling among churchgoers that religious discrimination laws only applied to Muslims and other minority faiths. Legal experts suggested the ruling had left discrimination laws in "a confused state" by giving the impression that "gay rights trump Christian rights" when they directly oppose each other. Mr McFarlane, 47, brought his claim for unfair dismissal after he was sacked in March 2008. The father of two had joined Relate in 2003 and had given relationship advice to homosexual couples in the past. But in 2006, after he qualified as a psychosexual therapist, he made it clear to his employers that his strong Christian beliefs meant he did not feel able to give sex therapy advice to homosexuals. Fellow counsellors objected to his stance and claimed his views were homophobic, and in March 2008 he was sacked. Labels: homosexuality Labels: cars Tim Larsen, a lawyer for the Housing Authority, said Tuesday the agency never intended to enforce its 2005 ban against law-abiding gun owners and has never done so, even though the lease provision covered legal as well as illegal weapons. "Our intention was to go after people who were engaged in criminal activity," Larsen said. Labels: gun rights Labels: homosexuality Labels: book reviews Labels: book reviews Last September, when her auction came to light, she had received bids up to £162,000 ($243,000) but since then interest in her has rocketed. The student who has a degree in Women's Studies insisted she was not demeaning herself. Miss Dylan, from San Diego, California, USA, said she was persuaded to offer herself to the highest bidder after her sister Avia, 23, paid for her own degree after working as a prostitute for three weeks. She said she had had a lot of attention from a wide range of men, including "weirdos", "those who get really graphically sexual about what they want to do to me" and "lots of polite requests from rich businessmen". Labels: decline and fall of Western civilization, feminism Labels: homosexuality Of all the points Obama addressed during a meeting last January with our editorial board, the one that gave him pause was his answer to a question about what he might do to address the coming crises in Social Security and Medicare. Obama had suggested that a Social Security tax increase might be needed to offset the imbalance between revenue and benefits. He came back to make it clear that he was talking about possibly raising the ceiling on income that is subject to the Social Security tax (now $106,800) and not the tax rate (now 6.2 percent per worker, with an employer match). Obama was blunt. He did not want any misunderstanding leading to a news story that would have him advocating an increase in the tax rate - which would lead to a TV commercial. "And it wouldn't be from us," he said. Such is the sensitivity associated with talking about reforming the giant entitlement programs. Obama deserves credit for volunteering one of the tough-but-necessary reforms in the heat of his primary battle with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. At a news conference last week, Obama pledged to make Social Security and Medicare reform "a central part" of his administration's strategy to constrain federal spending. He did not offer details.
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John Buchan's The Thirty-Nine Steps and Prester John
The Thirty-Nine Steps was published in 1915, and is the first novel in the Richard Hannay series--and I would say is even a bit more exciting of an adventure than Greenmantle. Our hero is on the lam from both the police and international intriguers, using his wits to escape from the villains, and eventually, setting everything right. I can see why it was made into one of Hitchcock's early films--as well as several other adaptations. I can't remember the Hitchcock version terribly clearly, but my impression is that it didn't follow the novel that closely--because the novel is exciting and spell-binding in a way that the movie really wasn't.
Before The Thirty-Nine Steps, however, Buchan wrote Prester John, published in 1910. While there are some rather un-PC things said in The Thirty-Nine Steps about Jews, it is pretty clear that this is one character's opinion, and one that was pretty typical in that period. There's nothing to lead you to believe that Buchan felt that way. Prester John is another matter.
It is set in South Africa, and there are parts of it that definitely reflect a white man's burden view of Africa. While Buchan makes it clear that there are injustices that have been done to the Africans by the whites, there is still a pronounced Colonial view of them as children--with the implication that this is not a cultural problem, but something racial. And yet, Buchan does for the Africans what he does for the Germans and Muslims in Greenmantle: he recognizes that they are human beings, and that there is a range of character in all races. The enemy leader in Prester John is a great danger to white South Africa--but his aspirations are, in their own way, noble.
Nonetheless, if you read Prester John as a period piece, it tells you quite a bit about the views of race that were common in that time--and it is nonetheless a rousing adventure story, rather along the line of the 1930s serials that the Indiana Jones movies so lovingly re-created. And unlike The Thirty-Nine Steps and Greenmantle, which are carefully and thoroughly realistic, Prester John at times crosses the line into not quite believable--but still loads of fun to read! You may find yourself struggling in places with his use of Afrikaans, but I was able to figure out many of the words from context or by looking for German cognates.
I can't tell if Buchan built this story around a somewhat real historical incident or not. He refers to it repeatedly as the "Kaffir Revolt" but there's plenty of such named events in South African history. The 1873 one mentioned in this December 31, 1873 New York Times article is too early, so perhaps he is referring to the 1894 "Kaffir Revolt" that I found referenced in the August 15, 1894 West Australian, p 5. (While the word "Kaffir" to refer to black South Africans was originally not offensive, and continued to be widely used into the 20th century, I'm told by a white South African friend that the term is now equivalent to "nigger.")
By the way, because these novels are now out of copyright, many are available for free from books.google.com. Here's Prester John. And The Thirty-Nine Steps. And here are all three novels in the Hannay series in one volume: The Thirty-Nine Steps, Greenmantle, and Mr. Standfast (which I have not yet read).
Dutch Ice Skating on Their Canals
Yup, this global warming thing is causing a revival of national identity. From the January 16, 2009 International Herald Tribune:For the first time in 12 years, the Netherlands' canals froze this month, bringing the Dutch, who like their tulips in neat rows, a heady mix of pandemonium and euphoria.
Record cold in the Deep South, too. This January 16, 2009 Associated Press report tells us:Forecasters said temperatures in the upper Midwest could turn into the coldest in years as Arctic air keeps spilling southward from Canada. The cold snap has claimed at least six lives and contributed to dozens of traffic accidents. One death involved a man in a wheelchair who was found in subzero temperatures stuck in the snow, a shovel in his hand, outside his home in Des Moines, Iowa. He died at a hospital.
And there is talk that it may snow on Inauguration Day in DC. I'm hoping that at some point Obama starts to talk about the dangers of global warming...but a shivering fit prevents him from finishing the sentence.
The cold weather has gripped the Midwest and Northeast for days, but as it crept farther South, some were growing worried. "We're afraid people will die in this kind of weather," said Anita Beaty, who works with the homeless in Atlanta, where temperatures dropped below the teens, some 20 degrees below normal lows in January. About 900 men packed a shelter that normally houses 700. Freezing temperatures threatened to kill picturesque Spanish moss hanging from Gulf Coast trees. Wind and choppy seas frustrated efforts to free an endangered right whale tangled in fishing gear off the Southeastern coast. And it was too cold to bet on dogs in West Virginia: A greyhound track shut down because of a predicted high of 7 degrees. Then again, the cold was testing even the heartiest winter-weather states. On Friday morning, it was minus 10 in Cleveland, minus 6 in Detroit and minus 11 in Chicago. In upstate New York, areas near Lake Erie received up to 2 inches of snow per hour. Quentin Masters wore two coats and long underwear to mail a gift at the post office in downtown Syracuse
....
It was so cold in Milwaukee that ice thawed at skating rinks. The subzero temperatures froze the ammonia tank needed to make ice at the indoor Pettit National Ice Center. Workers fixed the problem and two hockey rinks and the Olympic oval were expected to be ready for skaters later in the day.
The Continuing Effort to Force Perverts Out of Work
You know, the perverts who won't smile stupidly and say that they approve of homosexuality. From the January 9, 2009 Telegraph:
And just to really cause divided loyalties for the knee-jerk liberals--Mr. McFarlane is black.
Mr. McFarlane's feelings about homosexuality would doubtless make him less effective as a sex therapist for a gay couple--and I would think it would be pretty darn obvious, no matter how hard he tried. It is the same reason that I would not expect an ethical vegetarian (someone who is motivated by ethical, not health concerns) to be terribly effective working as a meat salesman for a food wholesaler.
Now, if there were few straight clients for Mr. McFarlane to counsel, there might be a strong case for his employer to let him go, because they wouldn't have enough work to keep him busy. But even in Britain homosexuals can't be such an overwhelming majority of the clients that this would be the case.
Hard Times In Boise
I whine sometimes about having to drive to Bend every third week to work, but then I remember, "I cried because I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet." I went to an event scheduled by the outplacement firm that HP retained to basically say hello to some of the job shop operations that were interviewing--and the place was pretty crowded not just with the former HP people I know that still don't have any job, and a bunch of new people laid off by Micron and EDS. (There are rumors that HP just laid off some more people.)
I have tried not to whine about the drive to Bend, and I guess that I should consider myself fortunate that I am too busy to catch up on watching re-runs of Law and Order.
The Time To Buy Used Luxury Cars
It is definitely now. I am absolutely shocked not just by how cheap used Jaguar X-types are, but even the bigger and very fast Jaguars. Under $30,000 for a 2005 Jaguar XJR with less than 30,000 miles on it. I actually went over to the dealer to get a seat belt adjusted, and uou would have a hard time figuring out that it wasn't new.
San Francisco Housing Authority Backs Down
At least partly because they knew that the Heller decision opened the door to the courts finding that the Second Amendment was a limitation on state and local laws, San Francisco Housing Authority has abandoned their ban on the ownership of firearms and water pistols in public housing. From the January 14, 2009 San Francisco Chronicle:The San Francisco Housing Authority has agreed to allow its residents to own guns in a settlement of a National Rifle Association lawsuit that followed last year's U.S. Supreme Court ruling on the right to bear arms.
And worse, these lying scum now claim that they never intended to enforce it:
In papers filed Monday with a federal judge, the Housing Authority agreed not to enforce a provision it added to tenant leases in 2005 prohibiting the possession of guns and ammunition. The ban will now apply only to illegal gun ownership, like possession of a machine gun or possession of a firearm by a convicted felon.
If that was really the case, then why not write a provision that expelled criminals from public housing? Why write something that applied to the law-abiding? Because the goal of liberals has never been to punish criminals, but to punish their victims.
Yes, Just Like The Rest Of Us
Americans For Truth About Homosexuality has a nauseating post about an event scheduled to take place in the conference rooms of the Doubletree Hotel in Washington, DC, put on by a homosexual sadomasochistic group. It is far too rough for me to quote. But those who think that I am being a boring old fuddy-duddy about homosexuality really need to go over there, read it, and then ask themselves why these sort of events are common, not just in San Francisco on public streets, but almost everywhere that homosexuals have achieved critical mass. Then ask yourself, "Why is this depravity so common in the gay community, if they are 'just like the rest of us'?"
Idaho Progressive Direct Customers
If you are a Progressive Insurance direct customer (and not through an agent, as I am), you might want to know that they have apparently started to offer auto insurance discounts to those with advanced degrees. My daughter found this out while talking to a Progressive rep yesterday, and since her husband and her both have MSWs, this is a real advantage.
John Buchan's Greenmantle
It's a novel about spies who are out to dismantle a plot involving Islamic fundamentalists who are a threat to Western civilization...before it's too late. And it was published in 1916. The hero, Richard Hannay, appears in several of Buchan's novels, and this one is quite startling not just in the timelessness of the problem of Islam as threat, but in how tremendously unpropagandistic it is, considering when it appeared, in the middle of World War I. Buchan (who later became Governor-General of Canada) repeatedly reminds us that Germans aren't monsters; indeed, he even manages to create a sympathetic portrait of the Kaiser as someone caught up in events beyond his control. And this came out smack dab in the middle of World War I, when British propaganda was at a fever pitch in its denunciations of "The Hun."
It is an espionage adventure, with an American struggling with a stomach ulcer, a British Army colonel (from South Africa) pretending to be a Dutchman, and a complex plot involving figuring out who is doing what, where, and can they get there in time to stop it from happening?
I've read some other novels by Buchan before, but never one such a page turner. Another of Buchan's Richard Hannay novels, The Thirty-Nine Steps, was turned into an early Alfred Hitchcock film. Oddly enough, Greenmantle seems not to have enjoyed a similar film version--I can't imagine why. It would make for a rollicking adventure.
Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World
I'm enjoying Victorian/Edwardian literature at the moment. I've moved on from Doyle's Sherlock Holmes novels and stories to The Lost World, which is one of three Doyle novels built around the adventures of Professor Challenger--one of the least likable "heroes" that I think that a novel that I have read has ever featured. He's smart, but impulsive, short-tempered, arrogant, rude, and violent. And yet it is a rousing adventure tale. I doubt that I am spoiling anything when I tell you that the novel involves a isolated plateau in South America filled with Mesozoic species. But in the same way that Crichton's Jurassic Park can't be reduced down to something as oversimplified as "dinosaurs out of control" and "greedy software engineer" (something which exists only in fiction, I assure you), The Lost World is a deeper story of professional jealousy, and how love will drive people to do stupid things. And it's a lot of fun!
One interesting mention in the introduction is that there is a line in the book that really does make you wonder if Doyle might have had something to do with the Piltdown Man fraud. And yes, even if I had not been warned in advance, the line sticks out and demands your attention!
Like many of the Sherlock Holmes' stories, there are American connections--enough so that you find yourself wondering if Doyle did this because Americans were such an important part of his world, or if he was playing to what he knew would probably be the biggest part of his market.
This Smells Of A Social Science Experiment
This January 12, 2009 Telegraph news story at first just sounds like another reminder of the decline and fall of Western civilization:
I am almost afraid what she considers "weirdos" when you look at what she is proposing to do. But there's part of this story that smells like an elaborate social science experiment. No, I don't mean her remark:A student who is auctioning her virginity to pay for a masters degree in Family and Marriage therapy has seen bidding hit £2.5million ($3.7m).
Natalie Dylan, 22, claims her offer of a one-night stand has persuaded 10,000 men to bid for sex with her. She added: "It's shocking that men will pay so much for someone's virginity, which isn't even prized so highly anymore."
I mean her undergrad degree, and what she is going to use the money for:The student who has a degree in Women's Studies insisted she was not demeaning herself.
...to pay for a masters degree in Family and Marriage therapy
I'm skeptical that she's telling the truth about this.
Encouraging Harassment?
Professor Volokh points to this site that provides a way to plot the location and names of people that contributed money to California Proposition 8, which defined marriage as "one man, one woman." Professor Volokh well understands the danger of taking publicly available election contribution information, and combining it with available mapping software:I suspect this sort of technology may well make people much more reluctant to donate money to (or against) controversial propositions -- and may lead people to rethink whether the government should indeed mandate disclosure of such contributions, especially small contributions. In any case, I thought I'd note this.
I agree with Professor Volokh that there shouldn't be any laws against it--but it is pretty clear that the purpose of such efforts is to encourage at least economic retaliation against campaign contributors. There is a very real risk that some homosexual activists are going to use this information to engage in acts of vandalism, harassment, and violent crimes against Proposition 8 supporters. Anyone who puts together such a website and claims that this did not occur to them is obviously a liar.
I am really, really troubled by sites like this. We could lower ourselves to the level of homosexual activists, I suppose, by putting together a similar mash-up of those who contributed to the No on 8 campaign--and risk that some unhinged sorts might decide to use such a site to identify and attack homosexuals. That would not be right--but then again, it might be the only way to get the message across of how dangerous it is to do this sort of data extraction and mapping.
Grasping the Third Rail
I had heard that Obama was talking about fixing Social Security, and my first reaction was, "That will take some serious courage, and be the end of his hopes for getting anything done." Bush decided to "spend some political capital" on this after the 2004 election--and went down in flames. The harsh reality is that Social Security is the third rail of American politics; like the third, electrified rail of a New York City subway, touch it, and you die.
I understand why. There are a lot of Americans who are utterly dependent on Social Security, or at least heavily dependent on it. They are too old to go back to work full-time, and many are too old to go back to work part-time. (Heck, I'm only 52 and I'm already at an age where most employers won't seriously consider me.) Those who are now retired spent their working careers assuming that Social Security checks would be there, and planned their careers around that--and I can see why they regard this as a sacred trust, especially because many of the alternatives that are now available, such as 401(k) and IRA accounts, simply did not exist for many of these retirees when they were working.
But the ugly truth is that Social Security was always a Ponzi scheme--and FDR created it because an even more irresponsible proposal, the Townshend Plan, was enjoying widespread popularity at the time. Something is going to have to give. At least one of the following has to happen: Social Security taxes go up; benefits get scaled back; retirement age increases; at least part of the system is privatized so that the money is invested in the stock market; or we have enough children to keep the Ponzi scheme going. (Even if you don't have a moral problem with abortion, economics alone is a strong argument against it.)
Anyway, this column in the January 11, 2009 San Francisco Chronicle points out that Obama lacks Bush's courage:
Raising the ceiling on Social Security taxes probably makes sense, especially because Social Security benefits are not means-tested. If you make $250,000 a year, and retire within a few years of making a high income, you will get a very, very healthy Social Security check when you retire. Yes, if you make more than $34,000 a year (joint income), 85% of your Social Security check is taxable. But still, that means that a retired couple bringing in $50,000 a year in pensions, interest, and Social Security checks, is taxed at a lower rate than a working couple making $50,000 a year.
Raising the ceiling makes sense. People making millions of dollars a year (Hollywood Democrats, for example) can afford it--and people who are making $20,000 a year can't afford any increase in the Social Security tax rate. Social Security is among the most regressive of taxes. People at the very bottom (the ones that Democrats claim to care about) often pay only Social Security taxes--and they get hit very hard by this.
But raising the ceiling isn't going to solve the core actuarial problem of Social Security. It's not terribly courageous or effective. Obama better have something a bit more serious in terms of reform in mind. And he better have some rubber insulated and asbestos gloves when approaching the third rail.
