One of the many frustrations of this particular hobby is the presence of folks who consistently say things that boil down to the following: Where do you get your information? This past spring, in a discussion elsewhere, I made the observation that the median household income was around $50,000. A fellow commenter wrote that he did not believe that was the actual figure (I do not remember if he thought it was lower or higher; I just recall that he contested the figure). Now, as someone who pays attention to things like this, I had seen that figure bandied about for a while, but I decided to check it out for myself by going to the Census Bureau's website and looking it up for myself, and sure enough, there it was. So, I provided the link.
In this particular instance, the person in question routinely wonders where I find the information I use, how I go about finding it, questions the sources I use, blah-blah-blah. The last one I cannot help; like the extreme skeptic in Descartes who questions even his own existence, at some point the questioning itself becomes absurd. Matters of fact are just that, and whether they come from The National Review or The Nation, they are what they are.
Today, I had the misfortune of reading a column by George Will. From the headline, I figured it would become a subject of discussion during the next day or so, and reading it now is a good way of preventing me feeling stupid when other people are talking about it. The column, concerning a potential Supreme Court case regarding affirmative action, includes links to two amicus briefs. Will is also kind enough to provide the names of the people who have submitted the briefs. Since I had not heard of these people, I sought to learn who they were, if they'd ever written anything relevant, or otherwise accessible, and check it out for myself.
I opened a new tab in Windows, and pressed the "Home" button on my toolbar. My homepage is a personalized Google search box.
I realize that some people just wonder where all this stuff comes from, all this information, all these facts, all this access to all these crazy things called writings and articles and such. Since Google is so easy to use, and since pretty much anyone can use it, though, continuing in ignorance on any topic, or questioning a factual claim without checking it out for oneself, or seeking background information or past, relevant, information on individuals whose names appear in the news or on the Web is more a sign of laziness than anything else.
Each of these words is a link to the Google search results for the names in Will's article. How anyone wishes to proceed from here is up to them.
I do hope the implications of this lesson are clear. If you have a question about anything, no matter what it is, you can do this, too. Go to Google. Type in the word or phrase that troubles you. Press enter. Voila! The only thing you have to do now is sift through the results for what seems relevant. For that, you need judgment, discernment, and a willingness to be challenged and deal with contradiction and ambiguity as you sift the various matters Google provides for you. Getting going, though . . . that's easy.
I highly recommend this approach for anyone who wishes to find out stuff. You don't believe a claim someone has made, regarding a matter of fact, or a quote from someone? Google. It's that simple.
Thursday, December 01, 2011
Wednesday, November 30, 2011
Learning Something New
Last night's Roman's class introduced something completely new. Studying chapter 7 - as convoluted and odd, yet historically important a part of the Bible as one can think - the author of the study guide, Pamela Eisenbaum introduced the possibility that, in this chapter, St. Paul is not writing in a straightforward first-person voice, but rather using a particular device drawn from the ancient practice of rhetoric. I was intrigued, to say the least, but knowing absolutely nothing about the detailed practice of rhetoric in contemporaneous literature (including sibling epistolary literature, which was quite common), I contacted a blogger and Facebook friend of mine who is a student of rhetorical criticism. He was kind enough to respond with the suggestion I check out the "Rhetoric" tag on his blog.
Talk about an embarrassment of riches! I offer just these two posts as examples of how an understanding of rhetoric, its structure and rules, and the various ways it can be used, can open up the world of the Bible in new and exciting ways. While I read "Rhetoric" years ago as a humble philosophy grad student, and can say that it was something that was used in a formal way in antiquity, with rules and principles that both the speaker/writer and hearer/reader would understand without needing to be prodded, that is the extent of my understanding. So, one of the many projects I am now setting for myself is to re-read Aristotle, peruse some more of Joel's blog posts on this specific matter, and, I hope, come to a more rich, more deep understanding of St. Paul, his writings, and what it can mean for us today.
Talk about an embarrassment of riches! I offer just these two posts as examples of how an understanding of rhetoric, its structure and rules, and the various ways it can be used, can open up the world of the Bible in new and exciting ways. While I read "Rhetoric" years ago as a humble philosophy grad student, and can say that it was something that was used in a formal way in antiquity, with rules and principles that both the speaker/writer and hearer/reader would understand without needing to be prodded, that is the extent of my understanding. So, one of the many projects I am now setting for myself is to re-read Aristotle, peruse some more of Joel's blog posts on this specific matter, and, I hope, come to a more rich, more deep understanding of St. Paul, his writings, and what it can mean for us today.
Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Sully's Problem
I suppose this is one of those "blogger insider" things that most of the rest of humanity cares little about. All the same, when an influential writer in any field removes any pretension of intellectual respectability, it might be time to talk about it.
Andrew Sullivan is an accomplished writer and political commentator. He was editor of The New Republic, once upon a time the most respected liberal political journal out there. He has been writing a column called "The Daily Dish" at The Atlantic for years now. "Sully", as he is known, is also openly gay, a fact he often exploits for sympathy points from his audience.
I first started reading his name, then reading his column, during the 2008 Democratic primaries. While many liberals held a grudge against the Clintons from the 1990's, Sully's venom, spewed only at then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, was not contaminated by the usual liberal complaints regarding welfare reform and other heresies her husband practiced during his Presidency. The reality, as detailed in this 2008 piece from Shakesville, is Sullivan couldn't hide his contempt at the fact that Hillary Clinton is a woman:
Fast forward three years or so, and we learn that Sully is now raising the tattered banner of race and IQ. Fellow Atlantic writer Ta-Nehisis Coates provides details and some context.
Schlepping for the pseudo-science linking race and intelligence reveals Sully as not only a misogynist, but a bigot as well. This may sound harsh, but the reality is simple enough. The pedigree of the "blacks are dumber than whites" idea is old. And rotten to the core. That The Bell Curve attempted to give it a fine sheen of intellectual respectability doesn't disguise the reality that it is no different than craniometry. As with Sullivan's insistence that evidence regarding naming this or that person liberal or conservative is irrelevant, having made up one's mind about an issue without reference to any facts is the garden variety definition of "prejudice", pre-judging.
It is an important thing to expose this kind of thing, call it what it is. Whether it's some kind of visceral hatred of women, or this or that particular woman; or a long-time expressed support for long-debunked ideas regarding race, Sullivan has a history of antipathy to both women and racial minorities that betrays what lies in his sad little heart.
Andrew Sullivan is an accomplished writer and political commentator. He was editor of The New Republic, once upon a time the most respected liberal political journal out there. He has been writing a column called "The Daily Dish" at The Atlantic for years now. "Sully", as he is known, is also openly gay, a fact he often exploits for sympathy points from his audience.
I first started reading his name, then reading his column, during the 2008 Democratic primaries. While many liberals held a grudge against the Clintons from the 1990's, Sully's venom, spewed only at then-Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, was not contaminated by the usual liberal complaints regarding welfare reform and other heresies her husband practiced during his Presidency. The reality, as detailed in this 2008 piece from Shakesville, is Sullivan couldn't hide his contempt at the fact that Hillary Clinton is a woman:
Sully calls Hillary's candidacy a "corruption of feminism," and says that ads recorded by Bill to support Hillary are a "sad, final betrayal of feminism."Folks "in the know" have understood that Sully has issues with women. He is kind enough to flaunt them.
Certainly, Sullivan shows a great respect for feminism. Looking at his site right now, he's running a letter from an unnamed reader that compares her unfavorably to Eva Perón. Another correspondent says she's got big balls. Yet another worries that Bill Clinton will be a corrupt freelancer in a Hillary Clinton administration, worries that evidently didn't apply to Hillary, or, for that matter, Laura. Certainly all these correspondents are pro-feminist, right?
But let's not stop there -- let's look at all of King Andrew's fine contributions to women's rights. Sullivan, of course, endorsed the rabidly anti-choice Ron Paul for President. He has referred to differing women's differing opinions on Clinton as "Paglia women vs. Steinem women," in which says he's "long sided with Camille Paglia." He defended Larry Summers from women angry at him for suggesting that women aren't as smart as men, saying "Scientists are finding out more and more about the differences between the male and female brains. One thing that endures across cultures and populations is a male edge at the very top of the bell curve for spatial and mathematical reasoning." And in a 2000 article in the New York Times, Sullivan praised testosterone, and said, "Since most men have at least 10 times as much [testosterone] as most women, it therefore makes sense not to have coed baseball leagues. Equally, it makes sense that women will be under-represented in a high-testosterone environment like military combat or construction. ... [G]ender inequality in these fields is primarily not a function of sexism, merely of common sense."
So clearly, Andrew Sullivan is a feminist, and a strong one.
Fast forward three years or so, and we learn that Sully is now raising the tattered banner of race and IQ. Fellow Atlantic writer Ta-Nehisis Coates provides details and some context.
Andrew's ahistorical approach to race and intelligence has always amazed. The contention, for instance, that "research is not about helping people; it's about finding out stuff," may well be true in some limited sense. But it's never been true, in any sense, of race and intelligence. In the 19th century helping out white people (however that is defined) was very much the point of intelligence research. Into the early 20th century, the rise of eugenics was equally linked the field to the advancement of "people." Even the intelligence theorists whom Andrew, himself, has advanced over the years are motivated by a desire to presumably help people, if only in the form of deciding how a society should expend its limited resources.A commenter on Coates' piece provides even further context regarding Sullivan's footsie-playing with academic hood-wearers:
Advocates of the "p.c. egalitarianism" theory, such as Andrew, evidently believe that the notion that black people are dumber than whites is a cutting edge theory, as opposed to a long-held tenet of slave-holders and white supremacists. They present themselves as bold-truth tellers who will not bow to "liberal creationists." In fact they are espousing firmly established views that date back to the very founding of this country.
My introduction to Andrew Sullivan was some ten years ago. The right wing talking point du jour was that the media was proven to be liberal because it identified conservatives as "conservative" more often than it identified liberals as "liberal". Even apart from the silliness of this argument, an actual linguist used actual academic tools to perform actual research and found not only that the assertion of fact is untrue, but indeed that it had the facts backwards. A minor frenzy followed among the usual commentariat. Sullivan's contribution was that he didn't know the facts, but he knew the correct conclusion so the facts didn't actually matter. I have never for the life of me understood why anyone with any pretension to seriousness has ever taken him seriously.When Tucker Carlson said of then-Sen. Clinton that "there's just something about her that feels castrating, overbearing, and scary" and " I have often said, when she comes on television, I involuntarily cross my legs", he was mocked for his hostility. Sullivan, for some reason, continues to have a certain cache among some liberal commentators, including Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo and Matt Yglesias.
Schlepping for the pseudo-science linking race and intelligence reveals Sully as not only a misogynist, but a bigot as well. This may sound harsh, but the reality is simple enough. The pedigree of the "blacks are dumber than whites" idea is old. And rotten to the core. That The Bell Curve attempted to give it a fine sheen of intellectual respectability doesn't disguise the reality that it is no different than craniometry. As with Sullivan's insistence that evidence regarding naming this or that person liberal or conservative is irrelevant, having made up one's mind about an issue without reference to any facts is the garden variety definition of "prejudice", pre-judging.
It is an important thing to expose this kind of thing, call it what it is. Whether it's some kind of visceral hatred of women, or this or that particular woman; or a long-time expressed support for long-debunked ideas regarding race, Sullivan has a history of antipathy to both women and racial minorities that betrays what lies in his sad little heart.
Monday, November 28, 2011
The Practice Of Discipline
John Wesley's great gift to posterity was the practice of mutual accountability within a framework of the disciplined practice of the faith. In the face of an apostate church, Dietrich Bonhoeffer came to understand that the roots of discipleship lie in discipline. Writing in a Lutheran context, there could have been fewer things more shocking than both to discover then to insist that to be a Christian believer means to be a follower, that this following is not this thing or that thing, but quite specific things, rooted in the call and Christ to follow, always knowing the cross lies before us.
The Cost of Discipleship is a marvelous little work to be reading at Advent. Part of preparing our lives for the coming of the Messiah is recalling, and making that memory a living thing in our own daily round, that we, like those folks so long ago, were all waiting. In a world beset by the dual tyrannies of Rome and the apostate King Herod, a world where the slightest whisper of holiness of heart and life was understood as a threat, a time when God seemed silent, the only way to be sure one was being faithful seemed to be a persistent practice of piety not as an end in itself, but as a means toward union with God.
We flail and flutter about, seeking ways to breathe the Spirit in to moribund churches. We mourn the sense of loss, the lack of any direction, the inability to sense any hope in our common life. We rail against the stupidity and corruption of our leaders. We mourn preventable deaths that the powerful insist are necessary; human sacrifice continues to be practiced in the name of economic efficiency, but that doesn't make it any less human sacrifice.
So, our times really aren't that different.
Except for this.
We Christians already know the end of the story.*
If we in the Church are floundering and flailing and moaning and whining and feel hopeless and lost, we are forgetting that this whole Advent season should be reminding us that God is on the Way, because God, in Christ, has already been here. When we recall this together, we are already beginning the process of discipleship. As we move through this season to the celebration of the birth of Jesus, we do it together. In this daily movement, we hold one another up, recall one another to the life of love and service that is the way of he Christ child. As we feel others around us reminding us of our duty to continue to follow even as the world around us seems insistent that such following leads nowhere, we should be thankful to the call to surrender our lives, together with those who have gone before us as witnesses, to those who are with us on the Way, hoping against hope that even now, in the midst of all the troubles, we can see that single candle so we do not have to curse the darkness.
Discipleship exists in the tension between the individual and the community. This Advent season is a nice time to recall that tension, and that it serves us all well through mutual reinforcement. The Way isn't easy. But, we aren't alone. In the midst of the dust and dirt and sense of loss, we should still be able to see the tiny baby who leads us.
*I'm stealing this from Lisa's sermon yesterday. I hope she doesn't mind.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
Varieties Of Ignorance
I was recently reminded that it is impossible to argue with ignorance. Why I even made the attempt is beyond me. Yet, ignorance is a sneaky devil, cropping up not only in discussions of religion and politics, where it is like kudzu, spreading almost too fast to control. One can find it most anywhere.
It wears all sorts of masks. On the one hand, of course, we have the fundamentalist, ignorant equally of science and Biblical interpretation, screeching on everything from the age of the Universe to sexual ethics, without any reference at all to anything but their own prejudices, guesses, and poorly informed reading of the Christian scriptures.
My favorite ignorant folks are the New Atheists. These are the people who parade their ignorance like one of those balloons at the Macy's Parade. They know nothing of church history. They know nothing of Christian doctrine, the varieties of expressions of faith - Catholic, Orthodox, Evangelical (Lutheran), Reformed, Anglican, Anabaptist. The insist one need not read the Bible, Christian theology, church history, or anything else related to religion to understand it is wrong. Like young earth creationists and other fundamentalist ignoramuses, they say the things they do about religion out of a deep well of ignorance.
They have spawned a kind of weird child who crops up in the weirdest places in comment threads. These are the folks who, for some reason, see the "enemy" in any and every discussion as religious folks who, they insist, believe in something they all call (I have seen this so often over the past five or so years it cannot be a coincidence) "the sky fairy". Like creationists who insist that scientists are secret antinomians, bent on destroying human moral life by convincing us we are "only animals", these folks seem to think they understand what religious folk (and here, religion is conflated with Christianity, an insulting and ignorant position) think without any reference to anything Christians or Jews or Muslims or Hindus or Buddhists or followers of Shinto or Santeria or anything else actually believe.
Duncan features comment threads in Philadelphia papers' on-line editions as a source of humor. Folks making comments on articles regarding various urban issues such as the perennial matter of parking, public transportation, residential density, crime, and so on have a tendency, to be polite, to speak without actually understanding the issue at hand. Freedom of speech surely means that folks who don't know anything can talk about whatever they wish. Prudence and humility would seem to suggest there is a certain virtue to keeping one's yap shut on a matter about which one knows nothing.
Now, I am ignorant about the vast majority of matters in the world around me. Ask me a question about, say, diagnosing a problem with an automobile, and I'd be lost. I can replace the inner workings of a toilet tank, but I can't do plumbing, and wouldn't know where to begin. If my computer were to go on the fritz, I wouldn't dream of taking it apart and trying to fix it myself; I'd either send it off for repairs or buy a new one.
There are discussions on these, and thousands of other topics on the internet. I do not engage them, not because they are stupid topics, or boring, or irrelevant. It would probably be wise for me to learn a few tricks about diagnosing car problems. I've tried and it just doesn't work with me. Which is why I am grateful there are people who can tell, from a certain knocking or shaking or pulling, what, precisely, is the matter with my car and how to go about fixing it.
I have often wondered why it is that people who are as ignorant of religion and politics feel this isn't a barrier to participation in discussions about them. I wouldn't go to the retired machinist across the street if I had a toothache. He's a really great guy, has a sweet dog and a mouthy cockatiel, but he isn't a dentist. If he demonstrated some knowledge of dentistry, I might go to him and ask his advice about a problem - a loose filling, say, or receding gums - and accept the information he gave me. Since I happen to know that, while a nice guy who knows all sorts of things, he doesn't know anything about dentistry, I am wise not to heed suggestions he may have on tooth care.
For some reason, we don't think the same approach applies to matters like religion or politics, or social or cultural discussions. This is not to suggest that "only" "experts" should speak on these matters (God, how I've heard those lines before!). I do not like the word "experts", and most self-proclaimed ones are blowhards. I am saying, however, that if you wish to write about, say, the efficacy of tax cuts and their economic impact, spend ten minutes with Google and read up on what folks who know economics are actually saying. Read a bunch of people, too!
Last week, I read an article in the New York Times that claimed the Pentagon had no contingency in the face of looming, drastic budget cuts. Apart from being a bit of a muddle, something about the article and its central point didn't pass the smell test with me. I did something that makes perfect sense. I emailed someone I know who knows something about budgeting in public agencies, and after a cursory reading, this person let me know the story was, to be generous, really really bad.
For some reason, whether it's a discussion about reading the Bible, or talking about a particular theological position, or the effects of tax cuts on public revenue or the Occupy movement, there are people who think they can say whatever pops in to their minds, type it, send it out on to the internet, and, hey! like magic, they have contributed to public discussion. Instead of thinking, "Man, I just broadcast to the world that I don't know my ass from my elbow."
Simple word of advice: If you're going to write about something, learn something about it. It saves readers headaches from beating their heads against various walls.
It wears all sorts of masks. On the one hand, of course, we have the fundamentalist, ignorant equally of science and Biblical interpretation, screeching on everything from the age of the Universe to sexual ethics, without any reference at all to anything but their own prejudices, guesses, and poorly informed reading of the Christian scriptures.
My favorite ignorant folks are the New Atheists. These are the people who parade their ignorance like one of those balloons at the Macy's Parade. They know nothing of church history. They know nothing of Christian doctrine, the varieties of expressions of faith - Catholic, Orthodox, Evangelical (Lutheran), Reformed, Anglican, Anabaptist. The insist one need not read the Bible, Christian theology, church history, or anything else related to religion to understand it is wrong. Like young earth creationists and other fundamentalist ignoramuses, they say the things they do about religion out of a deep well of ignorance.
They have spawned a kind of weird child who crops up in the weirdest places in comment threads. These are the folks who, for some reason, see the "enemy" in any and every discussion as religious folks who, they insist, believe in something they all call (I have seen this so often over the past five or so years it cannot be a coincidence) "the sky fairy". Like creationists who insist that scientists are secret antinomians, bent on destroying human moral life by convincing us we are "only animals", these folks seem to think they understand what religious folk (and here, religion is conflated with Christianity, an insulting and ignorant position) think without any reference to anything Christians or Jews or Muslims or Hindus or Buddhists or followers of Shinto or Santeria or anything else actually believe.
Duncan features comment threads in Philadelphia papers' on-line editions as a source of humor. Folks making comments on articles regarding various urban issues such as the perennial matter of parking, public transportation, residential density, crime, and so on have a tendency, to be polite, to speak without actually understanding the issue at hand. Freedom of speech surely means that folks who don't know anything can talk about whatever they wish. Prudence and humility would seem to suggest there is a certain virtue to keeping one's yap shut on a matter about which one knows nothing.
Now, I am ignorant about the vast majority of matters in the world around me. Ask me a question about, say, diagnosing a problem with an automobile, and I'd be lost. I can replace the inner workings of a toilet tank, but I can't do plumbing, and wouldn't know where to begin. If my computer were to go on the fritz, I wouldn't dream of taking it apart and trying to fix it myself; I'd either send it off for repairs or buy a new one.
There are discussions on these, and thousands of other topics on the internet. I do not engage them, not because they are stupid topics, or boring, or irrelevant. It would probably be wise for me to learn a few tricks about diagnosing car problems. I've tried and it just doesn't work with me. Which is why I am grateful there are people who can tell, from a certain knocking or shaking or pulling, what, precisely, is the matter with my car and how to go about fixing it.
I have often wondered why it is that people who are as ignorant of religion and politics feel this isn't a barrier to participation in discussions about them. I wouldn't go to the retired machinist across the street if I had a toothache. He's a really great guy, has a sweet dog and a mouthy cockatiel, but he isn't a dentist. If he demonstrated some knowledge of dentistry, I might go to him and ask his advice about a problem - a loose filling, say, or receding gums - and accept the information he gave me. Since I happen to know that, while a nice guy who knows all sorts of things, he doesn't know anything about dentistry, I am wise not to heed suggestions he may have on tooth care.
For some reason, we don't think the same approach applies to matters like religion or politics, or social or cultural discussions. This is not to suggest that "only" "experts" should speak on these matters (God, how I've heard those lines before!). I do not like the word "experts", and most self-proclaimed ones are blowhards. I am saying, however, that if you wish to write about, say, the efficacy of tax cuts and their economic impact, spend ten minutes with Google and read up on what folks who know economics are actually saying. Read a bunch of people, too!
Last week, I read an article in the New York Times that claimed the Pentagon had no contingency in the face of looming, drastic budget cuts. Apart from being a bit of a muddle, something about the article and its central point didn't pass the smell test with me. I did something that makes perfect sense. I emailed someone I know who knows something about budgeting in public agencies, and after a cursory reading, this person let me know the story was, to be generous, really really bad.
For some reason, whether it's a discussion about reading the Bible, or talking about a particular theological position, or the effects of tax cuts on public revenue or the Occupy movement, there are people who think they can say whatever pops in to their minds, type it, send it out on to the internet, and, hey! like magic, they have contributed to public discussion. Instead of thinking, "Man, I just broadcast to the world that I don't know my ass from my elbow."
Simple word of advice: If you're going to write about something, learn something about it. It saves readers headaches from beating their heads against various walls.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
People Get Ready
Tomorrow we begin a new Church Calendar year, with the First Sunday in Advent. Similar to Lent, Advent is a season of preparation. Unlike Lent, we are not called to spiritual disciplines per se during Advent, no fasting or silence. We are, instead, to prepare our lives for the coming of the Son of God.
Every good story has a prologue. The stage is set, the questions and surprises that get the ball rolling, pulling us in to the story. Advent is nothing more or less than God's prologue to the whole mystery of Salvation.
It is not just a time to look back. We are not only to consider Isaiah 40-55, Luke 1, Matthew 1. We are also to look around ourselves, in our lives here and how, hearing the words of St. Mary and St. Simeon as declaring realities here and now, realities we are to see, words in which we are to trust. Most of all, a path to follow on the way to meeting the living Lord.
We are also to look ahead. As the tradition has it, we live between the times. Between the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and the inauguration of the New Creation and the return of Jesus Christ in final victory and glory, gathering all who have laid their lives before him, healing this wounded creation, so that we can sit around the table God has prepared for all of us.
In this last Spirit, then, as we move from the declaration that Christ is King, that our profession of the Divine Triune Life reaches not only in to our hearts and lives, but out to all creation, so, too should we now confess our failure to anticipate the coming promised so long ago. Setting aside the fantasies of the ignorant, or the apocalyptic visions of the pathological, the dreams of a river of blood, we should instead be living each day in the footsteps of the one who leads the Way, knowing that it brings us to an end that is greater than we can imagine. A world where all creation is in harmony. Where the God of Life sits in the Temple, and light and justice and peace and life rule.
We are to be about the business of making this reality because we believe - we do not know; we believe - that it is already a reality in the resurrected Son of the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit. We are not to kick against the pricks of fallen creation that screams in rage and fear at the very mention of the holiness and healing brought about by Jesus Christ. Rather, we are to rejoice at the rage of the powers and principalities for that means we may yet be on the only Way that leads to true life.
Folks, in order to get ready, the first thing we need to do is set our feet on that road. We need to remember that road is long, there are all sorts of dangers and distractions, and every step will be agonizing for us.
But . . . oh, my, the promise that each of us and all of us, our communities and societies and all creation will be gathered before the Throne, washed in the blood of Christ, who stands our only advocate. While you're decorating and shopping and preparing for parties and getting those stupid year-end letters sent out, remember - none of that is real preparation. Keep looking out in the world around all of us, be looking for those signs that say, "Be of good Cheer, Christ is coming soon." Live that out in as many varieties as possible.
And be glad.
Every good story has a prologue. The stage is set, the questions and surprises that get the ball rolling, pulling us in to the story. Advent is nothing more or less than God's prologue to the whole mystery of Salvation.
It is not just a time to look back. We are not only to consider Isaiah 40-55, Luke 1, Matthew 1. We are also to look around ourselves, in our lives here and how, hearing the words of St. Mary and St. Simeon as declaring realities here and now, realities we are to see, words in which we are to trust. Most of all, a path to follow on the way to meeting the living Lord.
We are also to look ahead. As the tradition has it, we live between the times. Between the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead and the inauguration of the New Creation and the return of Jesus Christ in final victory and glory, gathering all who have laid their lives before him, healing this wounded creation, so that we can sit around the table God has prepared for all of us.
In this last Spirit, then, as we move from the declaration that Christ is King, that our profession of the Divine Triune Life reaches not only in to our hearts and lives, but out to all creation, so, too should we now confess our failure to anticipate the coming promised so long ago. Setting aside the fantasies of the ignorant, or the apocalyptic visions of the pathological, the dreams of a river of blood, we should instead be living each day in the footsteps of the one who leads the Way, knowing that it brings us to an end that is greater than we can imagine. A world where all creation is in harmony. Where the God of Life sits in the Temple, and light and justice and peace and life rule.
We are to be about the business of making this reality because we believe - we do not know; we believe - that it is already a reality in the resurrected Son of the Father in the power of the Holy Spirit. We are not to kick against the pricks of fallen creation that screams in rage and fear at the very mention of the holiness and healing brought about by Jesus Christ. Rather, we are to rejoice at the rage of the powers and principalities for that means we may yet be on the only Way that leads to true life.
Folks, in order to get ready, the first thing we need to do is set our feet on that road. We need to remember that road is long, there are all sorts of dangers and distractions, and every step will be agonizing for us.
But . . . oh, my, the promise that each of us and all of us, our communities and societies and all creation will be gathered before the Throne, washed in the blood of Christ, who stands our only advocate. While you're decorating and shopping and preparing for parties and getting those stupid year-end letters sent out, remember - none of that is real preparation. Keep looking out in the world around all of us, be looking for those signs that say, "Be of good Cheer, Christ is coming soon." Live that out in as many varieties as possible.
And be glad.
Friday, November 25, 2011
Caveat Emperor
What better day to take a moment and wonder whether or not, in the pursuit of economic stability, we aren't selling our birthright for a mess of pottage?
This last, in particular, was a warning cited again and again in The Federalist Papers. It also became the mantra of proponents of expanded democratic rights during the Jacksonian era. It withered during the Gilded Age at the end of the 19th century when the states and the United States Senate and the Supreme Court worked in lock-step to keep growing rage at the very obvious social and economic disparity at bay. One would have thought the lessons from the Great Depression would have sunk so deep in to our collective political bones we would not need this discussion again. Alas, a combination of greed, ignorance, and collective forgetfulness has created conditions that leave us staring at the very easy, very obvious solutions, and declaring them either impossible or, what seems worse, dangerous to our political and economic order.
The health of the American economy is not the gauge by which we determine the health of our polity. Giving free reign to private institutions to determine our public policy at the expense of the common good has been a recipe for disaster. Continuing this trend in the face of disastrous failure; continuing to listen to the voices of those who created the conditions in which we live long after these voices have lost any credibility; continuing to insist that supporting the private good of some large private institutions is key to advancing the public good, regardless of any evidence to support it; all these create the false political stalemate that is, in fact, the on-going stranglehold by large private institutions over the public sector whose mandate is to serve all of us. With a strength enhanced by fear and rage, the result is our current malaise and legislative deadlock that is easily overcome, given only slightly more backbone.
Our democratic institutions have always been frail; in the face of concerted effort by private interests who have amassed the kind of power and influence we see here and abroad, they seem to teeter on the brink of collapse. Funny enough, the answers are simple enough and easy enough, and fully in line with the best of our traditions. That we just cannot find the wherewithal to force them through reluctant legislatures should be enough evidence for even the biggest skeptic that our democracy, like our economy, is sick. It isn't a mortal illness by any means. We should take care, however, not to delay doing what really needs to be done in order to return it to robust health.
[C]onsider the interview that Alex Stubb, the minister of Europe for Finland’s right-wing government, gave to the Financial Times last weekend. The six euro-zone nations with AAA credit ratings, said Stubb, should have greater say in Europe’s economic affairs than the other 11 euro members. The political rights of Southern and Eastern Europe would be subordinated, essentially, to those of Germany and Scandinavia — or to credit rating agencies, which are threatening to downgrade France (thereby reducing the number of decision-making euro nations from six to five).What we in America are experiencing is little more than the result of accepting the lie that our state institutions should serve the financial interests of corporate power. With the conflation of bourgeois democratic liberalism and a species of corporate capitalism, we have lost the reality that the common good is more than simple prosperity, that our institutions serve the common good, and that accumulated wealth equals massed power and is a danger to the health of our polis.
What Stubb is proposing, and what the markets are doing, is, in essence, extending to the realm of once-equally-sovereign nations the one-dollar-one-vote principle that our Supreme Court enshrined in its Citizens United decision last year. The requirement that one must own property to vote — abolished in this nation in the early 1800s by the Jacksonian Democrats — has been resurrected by powerful financial institutions and their political allies.
This last, in particular, was a warning cited again and again in The Federalist Papers. It also became the mantra of proponents of expanded democratic rights during the Jacksonian era. It withered during the Gilded Age at the end of the 19th century when the states and the United States Senate and the Supreme Court worked in lock-step to keep growing rage at the very obvious social and economic disparity at bay. One would have thought the lessons from the Great Depression would have sunk so deep in to our collective political bones we would not need this discussion again. Alas, a combination of greed, ignorance, and collective forgetfulness has created conditions that leave us staring at the very easy, very obvious solutions, and declaring them either impossible or, what seems worse, dangerous to our political and economic order.
The health of the American economy is not the gauge by which we determine the health of our polity. Giving free reign to private institutions to determine our public policy at the expense of the common good has been a recipe for disaster. Continuing this trend in the face of disastrous failure; continuing to listen to the voices of those who created the conditions in which we live long after these voices have lost any credibility; continuing to insist that supporting the private good of some large private institutions is key to advancing the public good, regardless of any evidence to support it; all these create the false political stalemate that is, in fact, the on-going stranglehold by large private institutions over the public sector whose mandate is to serve all of us. With a strength enhanced by fear and rage, the result is our current malaise and legislative deadlock that is easily overcome, given only slightly more backbone.
Our democratic institutions have always been frail; in the face of concerted effort by private interests who have amassed the kind of power and influence we see here and abroad, they seem to teeter on the brink of collapse. Funny enough, the answers are simple enough and easy enough, and fully in line with the best of our traditions. That we just cannot find the wherewithal to force them through reluctant legislatures should be enough evidence for even the biggest skeptic that our democracy, like our economy, is sick. It isn't a mortal illness by any means. We should take care, however, not to delay doing what really needs to be done in order to return it to robust health.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
No Turning Back
Along with leading a class called Christian Believer, I am also taking the Invitation to Romans, part of the short-form Disciple Bible Study series. Tuesday evening, we were discussing the typological use of Adam in Chapter 5, the question of original sin, death, and the sticky wicket of the universal efficacy of Christ's sacrifice and the penalty for Adam's sin.
The grace of Jesus Christ being the subtext of so much of Romans, mention was made of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship. The leader of the class asked me to read a famous passage from the Introduction:
I was reminded of the reality of the depth and power of Bonhoeffer's message - similar in so many ways to our own Wesleyan heritage of disciplined discipleship as a signifier of the mark of the cross on our lives - when I discovered my name brought up in a discussion elsewhere. Apart from so much else I find . . . troubling . . . about all of this, the lack of any understanding that we are to begin our understanding of what it is to follow Jesus Christ within a context of already having heard that call and answered it, of setting aside our nets, our tax collector's rolls, leaving our family and friends behind without condition or question or desire to fulfill some other obligation prior to setting our feet squarely behind those of the one who calls us.
It isn't the bigotry, which should be assumed. It isn't the quite palpable hatred, either. Rather, there is not a single mention of Jesus Christ. Not one. Somehow, a bunch of folks are talking about God and God's will and doing it without a single reference to Jesus Christ, who embodies God's will for us, a will for life, for freedom; a life of death and single-minded devotion and submission to the discipline of the one who's Way we follow.
It breaks my heart to consider the magnificent pearl of the Gospel cast before these swine. I am saddened to think that it is so easy to answer this call. To set aside all that was, all that made them who they are, to erase from their lives all that would cause them to stumble, and just start walking. Sure, the journey isn't easy. Good Lord, anyone thinking that should have their head examined! But, in the following, keeping one's eye fixed on the one whose lead we follow, whose voice first stirred us from our slumber, what could be easier? What else could make sense?
Having heard the voice of Christ in my own life, I have stopped hemming and hawing, making excuses and tripping over my fear. Way leads on to way, as Tolkien said, and the road ahead is dusty, and long, and the only thing I can do, the only thing that makes sense, is to see the one who called me walking along in front of me, casting the occasional grin over his shoulder at me. I know he knows I'm back here, and I glance away when his eyes flash at me. I keep going because, I see him walking, the holes through his feet not slowing him one bit, the fact that my life is responsible for those holes not dimming the love in his eyes.
Why make mountains out of non-existent molehills? Why not just sing the old refrain, "I have decided to follow Jesus/No turning back, no turning back"?
The grace of Jesus Christ being the subtext of so much of Romans, mention was made of Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship. The leader of the class asked me to read a famous passage from the Introduction:
Cheap grace is the preaching of forgiveness without requiring repentance, baptism without church discipline, Communion without confession, absolution without personal confession. Cheap grace is grace without discipleship, grace without the cross, grace without Jesus Christ, living and incarnate.The book is, in essence, an elaboration of this passage. The movement between the costliness of the sacrifice of Christ, and the graciousness of the sacrifice; from the way we are called, called to leave all we have, venturing forth only because our names have been called, following without knowing whence the road will lead; from the fear and rejection and death that awaits us, to the joy and peace and life that is the essence of being a disciple of Jesus Christ - this is what the book concerns itself with.
Costly grace is the treasure hidden in the field; for the sake of it a man will gladly go and sell all that he has. It is the pearl of great price to buyw hich the merchant will sel all his goods. It is the kingly rule of Christ, for whose sake a man will pluck out the eye which causes him to stumble, it is the call of Jesus Christ at which the disciple leaves his nets and follows him.
Costly grace is the gospel which must be sought, again and again, the gift which must be asked for, the door at which a man must knock.
Such grace is costly because it calls us to follow, and it is grace because it calls us to follow Jesus Christ. It is costly because it costs a man his life, and it is grace because it gives a man the only true life. It is costly because it condemns sin, and grace because it justifies the sinner. Above all, it is costly because it cost God the life of his Son: "ye were bought at a price," and what has cost God much cannot be cheap for us. Above all, it is grace because God did not reckon his Son too dear a price to pay for our life, but delivered him up for us. Costly grace is the Incarnation of God.
I was reminded of the reality of the depth and power of Bonhoeffer's message - similar in so many ways to our own Wesleyan heritage of disciplined discipleship as a signifier of the mark of the cross on our lives - when I discovered my name brought up in a discussion elsewhere. Apart from so much else I find . . . troubling . . . about all of this, the lack of any understanding that we are to begin our understanding of what it is to follow Jesus Christ within a context of already having heard that call and answered it, of setting aside our nets, our tax collector's rolls, leaving our family and friends behind without condition or question or desire to fulfill some other obligation prior to setting our feet squarely behind those of the one who calls us.
It isn't the bigotry, which should be assumed. It isn't the quite palpable hatred, either. Rather, there is not a single mention of Jesus Christ. Not one. Somehow, a bunch of folks are talking about God and God's will and doing it without a single reference to Jesus Christ, who embodies God's will for us, a will for life, for freedom; a life of death and single-minded devotion and submission to the discipline of the one who's Way we follow.
It breaks my heart to consider the magnificent pearl of the Gospel cast before these swine. I am saddened to think that it is so easy to answer this call. To set aside all that was, all that made them who they are, to erase from their lives all that would cause them to stumble, and just start walking. Sure, the journey isn't easy. Good Lord, anyone thinking that should have their head examined! But, in the following, keeping one's eye fixed on the one whose lead we follow, whose voice first stirred us from our slumber, what could be easier? What else could make sense?
Having heard the voice of Christ in my own life, I have stopped hemming and hawing, making excuses and tripping over my fear. Way leads on to way, as Tolkien said, and the road ahead is dusty, and long, and the only thing I can do, the only thing that makes sense, is to see the one who called me walking along in front of me, casting the occasional grin over his shoulder at me. I know he knows I'm back here, and I glance away when his eyes flash at me. I keep going because, I see him walking, the holes through his feet not slowing him one bit, the fact that my life is responsible for those holes not dimming the love in his eyes.
Why make mountains out of non-existent molehills? Why not just sing the old refrain, "I have decided to follow Jesus/No turning back, no turning back"?
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
Grateful
As you all probably know, Facebook has invited people to spend each day of November giving thanks for something. In principle, this is a wonderful thing. In practice, it seems to be appalling, awful.
The things for which I give thanks, the things in my life for which I am grateful are few. First and foremost, for life itself, the daily surprise and challenge. For my lovely wife, who only grows more beautiful each day. For my daughters, a constant source of surprise and joy and laughter. The three of them together are evidence of the reality of grace in my life, and I tell them this as often as possible.
I am thankful for the animals who share our home, for the ways I see different creatures living (well, usually sleeping, eating, or pooping) out their days, and the occasional nuttiness of the cats, and the simple, unadorned love our dog has for all of us and each of us.
I am thankful for the ability to appreciate beauty. Whether it's the beauty of my daughters' smiles, of my wife's come-hither look, a painting, a photograph, or a piece of music, wouldn't our lives be empty if we couldn't take in an experience and see that glimmer of transcendence we choose to call "the beautiful" within it?
These are the things for which I give thanks, in private, in silence or in inadequate words, to God. Everything else I have in this life is just so much stuff, really. Junk that can clutter up the mind and heart.
I wish you all, and each of you, a wonderful Thanksgiving. Enjoy the fellowship with family and friends around the table. Please, for God's sake, don't muck it up by trying to talk politics. Spend tomorrow, rather, in relative peace and quiet, listening to others, to their lives and experiences. Revel in the tumult of a busy house full of people. And in and through it all, give thanks, whether to God - however you might call the deity you name - or to one another, for the simple, most important joys in life.
The things for which I give thanks, the things in my life for which I am grateful are few. First and foremost, for life itself, the daily surprise and challenge. For my lovely wife, who only grows more beautiful each day. For my daughters, a constant source of surprise and joy and laughter. The three of them together are evidence of the reality of grace in my life, and I tell them this as often as possible.
I am thankful for the animals who share our home, for the ways I see different creatures living (well, usually sleeping, eating, or pooping) out their days, and the occasional nuttiness of the cats, and the simple, unadorned love our dog has for all of us and each of us.
I am thankful for the ability to appreciate beauty. Whether it's the beauty of my daughters' smiles, of my wife's come-hither look, a painting, a photograph, or a piece of music, wouldn't our lives be empty if we couldn't take in an experience and see that glimmer of transcendence we choose to call "the beautiful" within it?
These are the things for which I give thanks, in private, in silence or in inadequate words, to God. Everything else I have in this life is just so much stuff, really. Junk that can clutter up the mind and heart.
I wish you all, and each of you, a wonderful Thanksgiving. Enjoy the fellowship with family and friends around the table. Please, for God's sake, don't muck it up by trying to talk politics. Spend tomorrow, rather, in relative peace and quiet, listening to others, to their lives and experiences. Revel in the tumult of a busy house full of people. And in and through it all, give thanks, whether to God - however you might call the deity you name - or to one another, for the simple, most important joys in life.
Monday, November 21, 2011
The Cult Of The Cop
I have a feeling some of what I'm going to write is going to upset some folks.
I couldn't care less.
You see it on TV cop shows. You hear it in news reports. You get it from currently serving police officers.
Cops have a tough job. They're out there, putting their lives on the line. Every day could bring a situation that puts their lives, the lives of their fellow officers, or the lives of members of the public at risk. They have to make split-second decisions, and are trained to make the right ones. No one who isn't a cop can possibly understand.
To all of this I really have only one response - Phooey.
Can we chat here? Just for a moment? A quick scan of the Wikipedia article on the history of municipal policing in the United States (I know that Wikipedia isn't the most reliable source, but this particular article is well-sourced) reminds readers that, for most of the time we've had publicly-funded police departments (less than two hundred years now) they were viewed with suspicion by the public. As in most societies, the police served the interests of power. Their attitude toward the poor, toward various marginalized populations in general, was hostile. Violence, while uncoordinated, was rampant.
The professionalization of police departments, including specialized training, an emphasis on community relations, coincided with an increase in the para-militarization of police tactics. By the time we reached the 1990's, rather than one or two specialized units (modeled after the Special Weapons And Tactics, or SWAT, units of Los Angeles), most police forces had some training in military tactics, increased firepower which included military style weapons, and the hierarchy of police forces became much more rigid, similar to military practice.
At the same time, there was an increase in the belief that this was necessary. The 1970's and 1980's saw a rapid rise in violent crime, and a general sense of social decay, particularly in urban areas. Rather than address these matters proactively, city authorities relied upon their newest tool, paramilitary police departments, to control their unruly populations.
Events on September 11, 2001 sealed, in many ways, the cult of the heroic cop. Which is not to deny that police officers that day, and every day, act in ways that are, indeed, heroic. It is not to deny that many communities, in particular those in areas most effected by high crime, want a police presence. After 9/11, however, being anything other than nearly worshipful of police officers became something more than counter-cultural. It seemed an insult to the men and women who died that day trying to help so many people escape the terrible events in New York.
We are living in different times. Violent crime is down, and has been on a downward trend, for over a decade now. In the mid- to late 1990's, it was thought this was a product of better economic times. Even as our economy has burbled and broiled since the collapse first of the tech bubble, then the housing bubble, those rates have fallen and other explanations have been floated, with no definitive answers*.
The various videos and photos of events at the University of California at Davis, symbolized by this photo of University Police Officer John Pike calmly and methodically pepper-spraying a group of students who are sitting down, posing a threat to no one, is starting a discussion, long overdo, on the increased use of military tactics and the overuse of violent reactions on the part of police.
A group of writers at Atlantic magazine is addressing the whole matter of police tactics in the wake of what is, quite clearly, a misuse of official violence.
We have to be able to talk about this issue without (a) insulting or alienating the thousands of police officers who go about their jobs with dignity and professionalism; or (b) forgetting that the institutions of the municipal, county, state, and federal police force exist to maintain the social and economic status quo. Which is not to claim in any way that there aren't really people out there who are dangerous, a threat to others, to society at large, or to the communities in which they live. Rather, we need to make sure we keep focused on the matter of police tactics, in particular the overemphasis on paramilitary training and response.
This is not to call in to question the need for police officers, police forces, or even, on occasion, the need for a strong response in the face of violent activity. Rather, it is to raise the issue of what we, as communities, as a larger society, want to be, how we wish to have those who work to protect legitimate public ends, legitimate matters of public safety and security, act in response to various situations.
Walking along and pepper spraying a bunch of college students who are sitting on the ground, posing a threat to no one, isn't the answer. I hope these recent events, and their widespread witness thanks to the ubiquity of video cameras, cell phones, and the Internet may well begin the process of talking about policing without falling in to the trap of the cult of the cop.
*Personally, I lean toward the demographic explanation. The population cohort that commits most crimes, rather than being far larger than others, as it was through the 1970's and 1980's, is relatively even with others. A smaller number of people who tend to commit crimes means a smaller number of crimes is being committed.
I couldn't care less.
You see it on TV cop shows. You hear it in news reports. You get it from currently serving police officers.
Cops have a tough job. They're out there, putting their lives on the line. Every day could bring a situation that puts their lives, the lives of their fellow officers, or the lives of members of the public at risk. They have to make split-second decisions, and are trained to make the right ones. No one who isn't a cop can possibly understand.
To all of this I really have only one response - Phooey.
Can we chat here? Just for a moment? A quick scan of the Wikipedia article on the history of municipal policing in the United States (I know that Wikipedia isn't the most reliable source, but this particular article is well-sourced) reminds readers that, for most of the time we've had publicly-funded police departments (less than two hundred years now) they were viewed with suspicion by the public. As in most societies, the police served the interests of power. Their attitude toward the poor, toward various marginalized populations in general, was hostile. Violence, while uncoordinated, was rampant.
The professionalization of police departments, including specialized training, an emphasis on community relations, coincided with an increase in the para-militarization of police tactics. By the time we reached the 1990's, rather than one or two specialized units (modeled after the Special Weapons And Tactics, or SWAT, units of Los Angeles), most police forces had some training in military tactics, increased firepower which included military style weapons, and the hierarchy of police forces became much more rigid, similar to military practice.
At the same time, there was an increase in the belief that this was necessary. The 1970's and 1980's saw a rapid rise in violent crime, and a general sense of social decay, particularly in urban areas. Rather than address these matters proactively, city authorities relied upon their newest tool, paramilitary police departments, to control their unruly populations.
Events on September 11, 2001 sealed, in many ways, the cult of the heroic cop. Which is not to deny that police officers that day, and every day, act in ways that are, indeed, heroic. It is not to deny that many communities, in particular those in areas most effected by high crime, want a police presence. After 9/11, however, being anything other than nearly worshipful of police officers became something more than counter-cultural. It seemed an insult to the men and women who died that day trying to help so many people escape the terrible events in New York.
We are living in different times. Violent crime is down, and has been on a downward trend, for over a decade now. In the mid- to late 1990's, it was thought this was a product of better economic times. Even as our economy has burbled and broiled since the collapse first of the tech bubble, then the housing bubble, those rates have fallen and other explanations have been floated, with no definitive answers*.
The various videos and photos of events at the University of California at Davis, symbolized by this photo of University Police Officer John Pike calmly and methodically pepper-spraying a group of students who are sitting down, posing a threat to no one, is starting a discussion, long overdo, on the increased use of military tactics and the overuse of violent reactions on the part of police.
A group of writers at Atlantic magazine is addressing the whole matter of police tactics in the wake of what is, quite clearly, a misuse of official violence.
We have to be able to talk about this issue without (a) insulting or alienating the thousands of police officers who go about their jobs with dignity and professionalism; or (b) forgetting that the institutions of the municipal, county, state, and federal police force exist to maintain the social and economic status quo. Which is not to claim in any way that there aren't really people out there who are dangerous, a threat to others, to society at large, or to the communities in which they live. Rather, we need to make sure we keep focused on the matter of police tactics, in particular the overemphasis on paramilitary training and response.
This is not to call in to question the need for police officers, police forces, or even, on occasion, the need for a strong response in the face of violent activity. Rather, it is to raise the issue of what we, as communities, as a larger society, want to be, how we wish to have those who work to protect legitimate public ends, legitimate matters of public safety and security, act in response to various situations.
Walking along and pepper spraying a bunch of college students who are sitting on the ground, posing a threat to no one, isn't the answer. I hope these recent events, and their widespread witness thanks to the ubiquity of video cameras, cell phones, and the Internet may well begin the process of talking about policing without falling in to the trap of the cult of the cop.
*Personally, I lean toward the demographic explanation. The population cohort that commits most crimes, rather than being far larger than others, as it was through the 1970's and 1980's, is relatively even with others. A smaller number of people who tend to commit crimes means a smaller number of crimes is being committed.
Sunday, November 20, 2011
Contra Newt, Part 2
This is kind of turning in to a theme. I really don't want to pick on the guy. It isn't like he's gonna get the nomination. Still, a commenter wanted to know a few things:
I hate repeating myself, but I do not "hate" Gingrich. I know you don't quite understand this idea that political differences aren't something I consider as personal. I know you insisted, despite my repeated claims to the contrary, that I "hated" Pres. George W. Bush. I am not maniacal in my feelings about Gingrich, or anyone else in public life. As I say toward the end, I actually enjoy his presence in public life, because he adds a breath of crazed fun to it. My reasons for the things I saw about Gingrich are numerous, as I detail, with sources available to anyone who knows how to use a search engine.
Google, Art. It's this thing you use on the computing machine.
A good introduction to the life and times of Newton Leroy Gingrich is this profile in the New York Review of Books by Joan Didion. It was later collected in Political Fictions, an anthology of her political writings in NYRB from the 1988 Presdential elections through the 2000 elections. In this comment, I linked to a Frontline Online piece on Gingrich's personal peccadilloes, which, I was quick to point out, I do not believe counts in the balance against any candidate for the Presidency.
As for Newt's "ideas", he has published many books - he claims 24, with 13 bestsellers to his credit; it may be that high, I'm not sure - and I have actually perused several of them, read excerpts and synopses of others. It isn't difficult to do, when browsing in a bookstore, to pick up a random volume and pick through a few pages. I must say his turgid prose style is more than balanced for a fondness for the telling anecdote that, when given the tiniest bit of scrutiny turns out to have emerged from the land of Newt's ass. One of my favorites concerned an example he gave of the stifling effects of American federal bureaucracy. In one of Al Franken's books from the 1990's, he details a long claim by Gingrich that a man had invented a machine that had proved, through extensive field testing, to be superior in its outcomes in giving CPR to patients needing it. He dropped plans, so said the then-Speaker, because the process of applying for a patent, testing the effectiveness of it, having it vetted by various federal agencies became not only expensive, but seemed to the person who had invented it, delaying quick delivery of a device to the public.
The only problem with this little morality tale? It never happened. Furthermore, it actually becomes counter-productive to make stuff up. There are, to be sure, plenty of anecdotes about the stupidity of various government regulations, of the way socially beneficial new ideas are stymied and even killed by the mountains of red tape and the maze of agencies one navigates in order to achieve success. Why not rely on a real example? Why go to the trouble of making stuff up? That is the far more troubling question this raises. One would think conservatives, dedicated to truth uber alles would understand that.
Finally, in today's Washington Post, we have the other side of an argument on whether or not there is an anti-intellectual streak in the Tea Party. Friday had Kathleen Parker weighing in on what was called, in the column headline, the Palinization of the Republican Party. Today it's Nia-Malika Henderson and Perry Bacon Jr., two political reporters, making the case that Perry and Cain are falling and Newt is rising because of the Tea Party's understanding that the Republican candidate for President needs to have a bit more pepperoni between his or her ears than either Perry or Cain.
Someday I may repeat my frustration with the whole "anti-intellectualism" nonsense, a canard the liberals love because it allows them to pretend to be smarter than everyone else, which is usually annoying. Which is why this discussion is so vacuous to me. I wouldn't have commented on it at all, except I found a delicious Newtism at the very end, something that demonstrates Newt's lack of self-awareness, to be generous:
This might seem a small matter. It probably is. With Gingrich, however, there is such a large volume of these little things, they have added up over the decades to give a good impression to folks who follow stuff like this (I first heard his name and read a profile in a major news weekly about Gingrich in 1985 or so; some folks pay attention and remember stuff even longer than the internet, Art). That impression is easy enough to spell out clearly - for Newt, reality, like truth, like intellectual integrity and merit, is a tool to be used to force whatever outcome Newt desires.
I called Newt megalomaniacal, and I think that's fair. Not because I am any kind of psychologist; if I were, especially if I were, it would certainly be unethical to claim some kind of diagnosis of Gingrich. Rather, I think there is an abundance of evidence available to say with a certain amount of confidence that he has displayed a more-than-normal (even for a politician, for whom a healthy ego is necessary) sense of the grandiose when it comes to his abilities, his potential, the intellectual merit of his ideas and thoughts, and the potential impact upon our national life they, and he, represent. This, in and of itself, is hardly a disqualification for office anymore than a predilection for extracurricular sex is, or at least should be. It is the substance of Gingrich's bloated sense of self. In different historical circumstances, Newt would have spun out his life one of those mediocrities that populate higher education the way moles populate my backyard. He would set up guest speakers at whatever cow college he landed at, produce all sorts of events for students and faculty to engage at an intellectual level; all of them would be poorly attended, and he would rail against the unfairness of it all. All the while treating his female graduate assistants as repositories for his seminal fluid.
I am not picking on Newt. In fact, I enjoy the attention he receives. It adds a certain amount of levity to what is otherwise a pretty dull political season. I know quite a bit about Newt, about his ideas, the history of his career in public life, and even some of his personal history. Even if I didn't, I have provided links here, and a good guide to finding out more if you, Art, wish to do so - Google. Seriously, man, I've told you many times that it's your friend.
The sick hatred you have for Gingrich is well known. What is NOT well known is any commentary on any of his ideas and why you disagree. Nothing from your "brilliance" indicating any flaw in any of his ideas. I doubt you've taken even a cursory look at anything he's proposed.
I hate repeating myself, but I do not "hate" Gingrich. I know you don't quite understand this idea that political differences aren't something I consider as personal. I know you insisted, despite my repeated claims to the contrary, that I "hated" Pres. George W. Bush. I am not maniacal in my feelings about Gingrich, or anyone else in public life. As I say toward the end, I actually enjoy his presence in public life, because he adds a breath of crazed fun to it. My reasons for the things I saw about Gingrich are numerous, as I detail, with sources available to anyone who knows how to use a search engine.
Google, Art. It's this thing you use on the computing machine.
A good introduction to the life and times of Newton Leroy Gingrich is this profile in the New York Review of Books by Joan Didion. It was later collected in Political Fictions, an anthology of her political writings in NYRB from the 1988 Presdential elections through the 2000 elections. In this comment, I linked to a Frontline Online piece on Gingrich's personal peccadilloes, which, I was quick to point out, I do not believe counts in the balance against any candidate for the Presidency.
As for Newt's "ideas", he has published many books - he claims 24, with 13 bestsellers to his credit; it may be that high, I'm not sure - and I have actually perused several of them, read excerpts and synopses of others. It isn't difficult to do, when browsing in a bookstore, to pick up a random volume and pick through a few pages. I must say his turgid prose style is more than balanced for a fondness for the telling anecdote that, when given the tiniest bit of scrutiny turns out to have emerged from the land of Newt's ass. One of my favorites concerned an example he gave of the stifling effects of American federal bureaucracy. In one of Al Franken's books from the 1990's, he details a long claim by Gingrich that a man had invented a machine that had proved, through extensive field testing, to be superior in its outcomes in giving CPR to patients needing it. He dropped plans, so said the then-Speaker, because the process of applying for a patent, testing the effectiveness of it, having it vetted by various federal agencies became not only expensive, but seemed to the person who had invented it, delaying quick delivery of a device to the public.
The only problem with this little morality tale? It never happened. Furthermore, it actually becomes counter-productive to make stuff up. There are, to be sure, plenty of anecdotes about the stupidity of various government regulations, of the way socially beneficial new ideas are stymied and even killed by the mountains of red tape and the maze of agencies one navigates in order to achieve success. Why not rely on a real example? Why go to the trouble of making stuff up? That is the far more troubling question this raises. One would think conservatives, dedicated to truth uber alles would understand that.
Finally, in today's Washington Post, we have the other side of an argument on whether or not there is an anti-intellectual streak in the Tea Party. Friday had Kathleen Parker weighing in on what was called, in the column headline, the Palinization of the Republican Party. Today it's Nia-Malika Henderson and Perry Bacon Jr., two political reporters, making the case that Perry and Cain are falling and Newt is rising because of the Tea Party's understanding that the Republican candidate for President needs to have a bit more pepperoni between his or her ears than either Perry or Cain.
Someday I may repeat my frustration with the whole "anti-intellectualism" nonsense, a canard the liberals love because it allows them to pretend to be smarter than everyone else, which is usually annoying. Which is why this discussion is so vacuous to me. I wouldn't have commented on it at all, except I found a delicious Newtism at the very end, something that demonstrates Newt's lack of self-awareness, to be generous:
“One of the Republican weaknesses is that we rely too much on consultants and too much on talking points, and we don’t rely enough on actually knowing things,” he said in an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network. “If you’re going to lead the country and change history, you better know a heck of a lot before you start, because there’s not much time for learning on the job.”(emphasis added)The portion in italics is what leaped off the screen, smacked me in the face, then proceeded to tickle me until I had to pee. The same man who said this, once upon a time wrote the following:
Language: A Key Mechanism of ControlCan we stop right here for just a moment? Please note both the title of this memo and who wrote it. Are you with me on this so far?
Newt Gingrich's 1996 GOPAC memo
As you know, one of the key points in the GOPAC tapes is that "language matters." In the video "We are a Majority," Language is listed as a key mechanism of control used by a majority party, along with Agenda, Rules, Attitude and Learning. As the tapes have been used in training sessions across the country and mailed to candidates we have heard a plaintive plea: "I wish I could speak like Newt."This is the bulk of the preamble. In essence this memo is a piece of political consulting, and actually produces a list of talking points, rooted in the idea that, as the title says, language is a key mechanism of control. About that list . . .:
That takes years of practice. But, we believe that you could have a significant impact on your campaign and the way you communicate if we help a little. That is why we have created this list of words and phrases.
This list is prepared so that you might have a directory of words to use in writing literature and mail, in preparing speeches, and in producing electronic media. The words and phrases are powerful. Read them. Memorize as many as possible. And remember that like any tool, these words will not help if they are not used.
While the list could be the size of the latest "College Edition" dictionary, we have attempted to keep it small enough to be readily useful yet large enough to be broadly functional. The list is divided into two sections: Optimistic Positive Governing words and phrases to help describe your vision for the future of your community (your message) and Contrasting words to help you clearly define the policies and record of your opponent and the Democratic party.
Optimistic Positive Governing WordsSo, the guy who complains about political consultants and talking points once upon a time offered political consultation and talking points.
Use the list below to help define your campaign and your vision of public service. These words can help give extra power to your message. In addition, these words help develop the positive side of the contrast you should create with your opponent, giving your community something to vote for!
active(ly)
activist
building
candid(ly)
care(ing)
challenge
change
children
choice/choose
citizen
commitment
common sense
compete
confident
conflict
control
courage
crusade
debate
dream
duty
eliminate good-time in prison
empower(ment)
fair
family
freedom
hard work
help
humane
incentive
initiative
lead
learn
legacy
liberty
light
listen
mobilize
moral
movement
opportunity
passionate
peace
pioneer
precious
premise
preserve
principle(d)
pristine
pro- (issue): flag, children, environment, reform
prosperity
protect
proud/pride
provide
reform
rights
share
strength
success
tough
truth
unique
vision
we/us/our
Contrasting Words
Often we search hard for words to define our opponents. Sometimes we are hesitant to use contrast. Remember that creating a difference helps you. These are powerful words that can create a clear and easily understood contrast. Apply these to the opponent, their record, proposals and their party.
abuse of power
anti- (issue): flag, family, child, jobs
betray
bizarre
bosses
bureaucracy
cheat
coercion
"compassion" is not enough
collapse(ing)
consequences
corrupt
corruption
criminal rights
crisis
cynicism
decay
deeper
destroy
destructive
devour
disgrace
endanger
excuses
failure (fail)
greed
hypocrisy
ideological
impose
incompetent
insecure
insensitive
intolerant
liberal
lie
limit(s)
machine
mandate(s)
obsolete
pathetic
patronage
permissive attitude
pessimistic
punish (poor ...)
radical
red tape
self-serving
selfish
sensationalists
shallow
shame
sick
spend(ing)
stagnation
status quo
steal
taxes
they/them
threaten
traitors
unionized
urgent (cy)
waste
welfare
This might seem a small matter. It probably is. With Gingrich, however, there is such a large volume of these little things, they have added up over the decades to give a good impression to folks who follow stuff like this (I first heard his name and read a profile in a major news weekly about Gingrich in 1985 or so; some folks pay attention and remember stuff even longer than the internet, Art). That impression is easy enough to spell out clearly - for Newt, reality, like truth, like intellectual integrity and merit, is a tool to be used to force whatever outcome Newt desires.
I called Newt megalomaniacal, and I think that's fair. Not because I am any kind of psychologist; if I were, especially if I were, it would certainly be unethical to claim some kind of diagnosis of Gingrich. Rather, I think there is an abundance of evidence available to say with a certain amount of confidence that he has displayed a more-than-normal (even for a politician, for whom a healthy ego is necessary) sense of the grandiose when it comes to his abilities, his potential, the intellectual merit of his ideas and thoughts, and the potential impact upon our national life they, and he, represent. This, in and of itself, is hardly a disqualification for office anymore than a predilection for extracurricular sex is, or at least should be. It is the substance of Gingrich's bloated sense of self. In different historical circumstances, Newt would have spun out his life one of those mediocrities that populate higher education the way moles populate my backyard. He would set up guest speakers at whatever cow college he landed at, produce all sorts of events for students and faculty to engage at an intellectual level; all of them would be poorly attended, and he would rail against the unfairness of it all. All the while treating his female graduate assistants as repositories for his seminal fluid.
I am not picking on Newt. In fact, I enjoy the attention he receives. It adds a certain amount of levity to what is otherwise a pretty dull political season. I know quite a bit about Newt, about his ideas, the history of his career in public life, and even some of his personal history. Even if I didn't, I have provided links here, and a good guide to finding out more if you, Art, wish to do so - Google. Seriously, man, I've told you many times that it's your friend.
Friday, November 18, 2011
Mind's Eye Of Newt
Since I do not believe polls mean anything, I refuse to speculate as to whether or not Newt's recent rise in said meaningless polls is or is not correct. All the same, since some media outlets put stock in such drivel, it does give us all a chance to revisit our most silly, megalomaniacal politician. Public life offers a spectacle of personality disorders, from the mildly OCD to the outright psychopathic. In Newton Leroy Gingrich, we have the joy of sitting back and watching a man swallow his entire political career whole, with his head firmly resting as far up his ass as possible. Photos don't do the picture justice.
I was reminded of this fact - Newt's best friend, from his own perspective, is Newt; Newt's worst enemy, from the perspective of the rest of humanity, is Newt - when I heard the teaser to this story. I was glad I was making good time so I didn't have to listen to it. It's hard to drive when you're laughing so hard you're doubled over, tears streaming down your face.
I have to wonder if he figures cheating on his various wives with female staffers was all their fault. They just couldn't keep up with his manliness, his desires, his prowess.
Seriously, there is something so deranged in this, it should be remembered going forward. It isn't even rewriting history, because Newt, I firmly believe, sees this as the reality with which he dealt in 1998. Anyone paying attention back then knows it resembles those halcyon days of the second term of Pres. Clinton as much as the Disney version of The Alamo resembles the siege of that mission.
Should Newt make it through the first round of primaries and caucuses (caucki?), we should expect more of these kinds of professorial reflections. The kind of question-free zone in which Gingrich continues to walk - did Brian Naylor do no research at all before producing this story? Did he actually quote someone saying Gingrich is a man full of ideas, professorial in his approach to public life in the same way as Pres. Obama? How could he do this without spit taking all over his keyboard? - may well serve the Republic well. After all, if he winds up with Republican nomination, Obama cake-walks to re-election. In our current historical moment, electing a Republican would be even more disastrous than maintaining the status quo. Gingrich, having slightly less discipline in his personal and professional life than a pithed frog, would certainly provide four years of entertainment, including a whole cycle of female staffers emerging from his office tousle-haired and flushed. I say this only because his personal history is against him, not because I wish these poor women to be subjected to his version of "Serving the President".
I just wish we could stop reading and hearing stories about how full of ideas Gingrich is. Seriously. He isn't. He opens his mouth, whatever falls out gets printed, and that's it. The filter that most people use most of the time, that little voice that says, "Don't say that! It's just nuts!", has no power over Gingrich. The guy said that Susan Smith, the South Carolina woman who drowned her children, was an example of the results of Democratic social engineering. He said the Columbine HS shootings in 1999 were an example of what happens when we have Presidents getting blow jobs in the Oval Office (as opposed to disgraced former Speakers getting them wherever they can grab the two minutes it takes for him).
Part of me hopes the guy does it, gets the nomination, and just cuts the last frayed moorings to reality. On the other hand, I really, really, really want him to just go away, take his second trophy wife and returns to some public college in Georgia and rails against government all the while pulling in a high salary from the government.
I was reminded of this fact - Newt's best friend, from his own perspective, is Newt; Newt's worst enemy, from the perspective of the rest of humanity, is Newt - when I heard the teaser to this story. I was glad I was making good time so I didn't have to listen to it. It's hard to drive when you're laughing so hard you're doubled over, tears streaming down your face.
"If you look at the totality of what we accomplished, I had a pretty good speakership. I'd rather have done that than been a caretaker," he said. "I did burn out my party. There's no question [that] by the spring of 1998, they were just tired, and they didn't want to fight anymore, and they didn't want to have any new ideas — I actually had a senator say to me, 'We're not doing any ideas this year.' "I love this. It's like looking at the world through crap-colored glasses. Newt got the heave-ho because he just wore out those poor House Republicans with his new ideas, his legislative accomplishments, his bold leadership.
I have to wonder if he figures cheating on his various wives with female staffers was all their fault. They just couldn't keep up with his manliness, his desires, his prowess.
Seriously, there is something so deranged in this, it should be remembered going forward. It isn't even rewriting history, because Newt, I firmly believe, sees this as the reality with which he dealt in 1998. Anyone paying attention back then knows it resembles those halcyon days of the second term of Pres. Clinton as much as the Disney version of The Alamo resembles the siege of that mission.
Should Newt make it through the first round of primaries and caucuses (caucki?), we should expect more of these kinds of professorial reflections. The kind of question-free zone in which Gingrich continues to walk - did Brian Naylor do no research at all before producing this story? Did he actually quote someone saying Gingrich is a man full of ideas, professorial in his approach to public life in the same way as Pres. Obama? How could he do this without spit taking all over his keyboard? - may well serve the Republic well. After all, if he winds up with Republican nomination, Obama cake-walks to re-election. In our current historical moment, electing a Republican would be even more disastrous than maintaining the status quo. Gingrich, having slightly less discipline in his personal and professional life than a pithed frog, would certainly provide four years of entertainment, including a whole cycle of female staffers emerging from his office tousle-haired and flushed. I say this only because his personal history is against him, not because I wish these poor women to be subjected to his version of "Serving the President".
I just wish we could stop reading and hearing stories about how full of ideas Gingrich is. Seriously. He isn't. He opens his mouth, whatever falls out gets printed, and that's it. The filter that most people use most of the time, that little voice that says, "Don't say that! It's just nuts!", has no power over Gingrich. The guy said that Susan Smith, the South Carolina woman who drowned her children, was an example of the results of Democratic social engineering. He said the Columbine HS shootings in 1999 were an example of what happens when we have Presidents getting blow jobs in the Oval Office (as opposed to disgraced former Speakers getting them wherever they can grab the two minutes it takes for him).
Part of me hopes the guy does it, gets the nomination, and just cuts the last frayed moorings to reality. On the other hand, I really, really, really want him to just go away, take his second trophy wife and returns to some public college in Georgia and rails against government all the while pulling in a high salary from the government.
Thursday, November 17, 2011
An Annoying Personal Reflection
Tomorrow night is my last night at the job I have had for the previous five years. Leaving has been a long time coming. I needed all sorts of assurance and reassurance from the Rev. Mrs. that jumping without any visible net was OK. Once I got it, though, I didn't hesitate.
I won't bore you with the irrelevant details. I have been searching for new work, and thanks to Lisa I check each day for new opportunities. I won't deny a certain amount of trepidation in the prospects of waking up on Saturday knowing I am, of my own volition, among the unemployed.
At the same time, for the first time since I graduated from college, I am actually setting goals for my life, planning, and working toward accomplishing those goals. This is really what I want to write about.
When I graduated from Alfred University back in the dim, dark days of 1987, I had been accepted at the Public Policy Analysis program in the Political Science department at the University of Rochester. Two years there would pretty much guarantee me a nice, cushy wonk job. From there, it seemed that the skies were blue, the forecast sunny, and the world would be a field of oysters.
It didn't turn out that way for me. Between September, 1987 and early summer, 1990, my life seemed out of anything resembling control. Looking back, I raced to the notion of ordained ministry in much the same way the old joke about people joining the French Foreign Legion: I wanted to forget. My first year in seminary taught me this, at the very least - I was not cut out for pastoral ministry. I suppose at the time I was going through this realization, it was a bit traumatic, but I really don't remember it that way. In fact, just the opposite. My three years at Wesley were a marvelous time. I learned a great deal, felt myself anchored spiritually, and, most important, was surrounded by a group of people I still consider the best friends I have ever had and will ever have.
Needless to say, I met my wife there. What more needs to be said, right?
Well, a whole lot, I think. Most of the past quarter century since that time leaving the cocoon of Alfred to the harsh reality of life has been spent denying even the possibility of making any kinds of plans for one's life. See, once upon a time, I had plans, and life and circumstances unforeseen intervened, and left my plans in a heap on the ground. One would have thought that being older and wiser (I know I'm older; I only hope I'm wiser) I might change my ways, but the voice of that much younger me, burned by an experience that should have left me me stronger, insisting that making any kinds of plans only collapse because life intervenes. As the saying goes, life sucks, right? So, just kind of float from day to day, hope for the best, and hunker down. Basically, that's been my approach to life since Ronald Reagan was President.
So much for all my preachments on courage, huh. If you're wondering, yes, I am quite aware of what a big, stinking hypocrite this makes me. It doesn't help that hypocrisy is the common cold of human failings.
So, here I am, a guy whose adult life has pretty much been dedicated to the proposition that doing anything long-term is impossible, who has stuck with his own personal status quo out of a trembling fear of the unknown taking flight over the abyss.
And, I have plans.
I've been doing the National Novel Writing Month, less with any thought of publishing the results than with the intent of developing the habit of sitting down, each day, and cranking out a minimum number of words. The goal - 50,000 words for November - isn't really "novel" length. At best, the lower end of the range. Furthermore, I have known since the first of November this was more an exercise in habit formation than anything.
And the habit has formed. Whether I really feel like writing or not, whether the words come easily or with difficulty, I sit and I write. It feels good to do that.
In the midst of this daily writing, I managed a couple weeks ago to write a short story. It is, I think, among the best things I have written. Response from alpha readers has been generally positive. With some polishing, I firmly believe it will land somewhere that will share the belief it is worth reading.
I believe that the best things, the most important things, have been said in fiction. The truth that lurks within the compounded lie of the novel is durable, tangible. Human. I have no interest in beating people over the head with ideas or my own political or religious point-of-view. Those kinds of books are both boring and annoying. The best stories make their point by being recognizably human. I do not believe I will ever write "the best stories". I do believe I have the capacity to write stories that include characters who are recognizably human in situations that are recognizably human.
So, that is my plan. When I finish the whole NaNoWriMo thing, I will go back and do a rewrite based on the input I've received from my alpha readers, then tuck it away, and turn my attention to something a bit more ambitious, even more than trying to write a fifty-thousand word novel in a month. If I feel the urge, I might write more and different things, too. The habit has settled upon my life, and plans and hopes are forming.
For the past five years I've been woodshopping here. Once upon a time, I thought this would be a vehicle to something more. It has become that; just not in the way I once imagined.
So, as I head out to my penultimate night at Sam Walton's emporium, I feel a mix of things. Most of all, for the first time since I was 21 years old and thought I had it made in life, I have hope because I have plans, and know what it will take to move forward.
I won't bore you with the irrelevant details. I have been searching for new work, and thanks to Lisa I check each day for new opportunities. I won't deny a certain amount of trepidation in the prospects of waking up on Saturday knowing I am, of my own volition, among the unemployed.
At the same time, for the first time since I graduated from college, I am actually setting goals for my life, planning, and working toward accomplishing those goals. This is really what I want to write about.
When I graduated from Alfred University back in the dim, dark days of 1987, I had been accepted at the Public Policy Analysis program in the Political Science department at the University of Rochester. Two years there would pretty much guarantee me a nice, cushy wonk job. From there, it seemed that the skies were blue, the forecast sunny, and the world would be a field of oysters.
It didn't turn out that way for me. Between September, 1987 and early summer, 1990, my life seemed out of anything resembling control. Looking back, I raced to the notion of ordained ministry in much the same way the old joke about people joining the French Foreign Legion: I wanted to forget. My first year in seminary taught me this, at the very least - I was not cut out for pastoral ministry. I suppose at the time I was going through this realization, it was a bit traumatic, but I really don't remember it that way. In fact, just the opposite. My three years at Wesley were a marvelous time. I learned a great deal, felt myself anchored spiritually, and, most important, was surrounded by a group of people I still consider the best friends I have ever had and will ever have.
Needless to say, I met my wife there. What more needs to be said, right?
Well, a whole lot, I think. Most of the past quarter century since that time leaving the cocoon of Alfred to the harsh reality of life has been spent denying even the possibility of making any kinds of plans for one's life. See, once upon a time, I had plans, and life and circumstances unforeseen intervened, and left my plans in a heap on the ground. One would have thought that being older and wiser (I know I'm older; I only hope I'm wiser) I might change my ways, but the voice of that much younger me, burned by an experience that should have left me me stronger, insisting that making any kinds of plans only collapse because life intervenes. As the saying goes, life sucks, right? So, just kind of float from day to day, hope for the best, and hunker down. Basically, that's been my approach to life since Ronald Reagan was President.
So much for all my preachments on courage, huh. If you're wondering, yes, I am quite aware of what a big, stinking hypocrite this makes me. It doesn't help that hypocrisy is the common cold of human failings.
So, here I am, a guy whose adult life has pretty much been dedicated to the proposition that doing anything long-term is impossible, who has stuck with his own personal status quo out of a trembling fear of the unknown taking flight over the abyss.
And, I have plans.
I've been doing the National Novel Writing Month, less with any thought of publishing the results than with the intent of developing the habit of sitting down, each day, and cranking out a minimum number of words. The goal - 50,000 words for November - isn't really "novel" length. At best, the lower end of the range. Furthermore, I have known since the first of November this was more an exercise in habit formation than anything.
And the habit has formed. Whether I really feel like writing or not, whether the words come easily or with difficulty, I sit and I write. It feels good to do that.
In the midst of this daily writing, I managed a couple weeks ago to write a short story. It is, I think, among the best things I have written. Response from alpha readers has been generally positive. With some polishing, I firmly believe it will land somewhere that will share the belief it is worth reading.
I believe that the best things, the most important things, have been said in fiction. The truth that lurks within the compounded lie of the novel is durable, tangible. Human. I have no interest in beating people over the head with ideas or my own political or religious point-of-view. Those kinds of books are both boring and annoying. The best stories make their point by being recognizably human. I do not believe I will ever write "the best stories". I do believe I have the capacity to write stories that include characters who are recognizably human in situations that are recognizably human.
So, that is my plan. When I finish the whole NaNoWriMo thing, I will go back and do a rewrite based on the input I've received from my alpha readers, then tuck it away, and turn my attention to something a bit more ambitious, even more than trying to write a fifty-thousand word novel in a month. If I feel the urge, I might write more and different things, too. The habit has settled upon my life, and plans and hopes are forming.
For the past five years I've been woodshopping here. Once upon a time, I thought this would be a vehicle to something more. It has become that; just not in the way I once imagined.
So, as I head out to my penultimate night at Sam Walton's emporium, I feel a mix of things. Most of all, for the first time since I was 21 years old and thought I had it made in life, I have hope because I have plans, and know what it will take to move forward.
Tuesday, November 15, 2011
The Real Challenge For The Occupy Movement
It was increasingly evident that the powers-that-be across the country were losing patience with the Occupy Movements in various places. For a couple weeks now, stories of police violence in Oakland have made it clear that the tolerance of the ruling classes in various places was disappearing.
It started Sunday in Portland, OR, and was telegraphed on Friday, when the mayor - who repeatedly made the claim he supported the Occupy movement - insisted that police were going to move in at one minute after midnight two days later. Since then Oakland (again) and last night in Manhattan, where police cleared Zuccotti Park. There are various videos abroad the show pretty clearly the police were none too gentle as they pushed the people out. They were, one and all, in riot gear, with state-issued truncheons and pepper spray. What good is it having all these toys if you can't play with them?
I have to admit that I am surprised at the sweep of officialdom's decision to act this broadly. At the same time, it isn't like it should be that surprising. What really troubles me, however, isn't the predictable reaction of state power to a growing, and popular, movement of popular democratic resistance. Instead, this article in particular, while certainly within a history of radical ideas, betrays the heart of the Occupy movement by identifying the institutions of state power with the interests of the people who make up that institution:
Yet, I am far more sympathetic with the following:
There is little doubt, I believe, that the mild-mannered, establishment commentator Charlie Pierce is correct, however, in his general description of what has happened over the past 24 hours:
The question that faces Occupy now is: Do protesters return to Zuccotti Park and the other public spaces they have taken over, in the face of the state making their feelings about the movement clear for all to see? If they do, then Occupy may well be on its way to overcoming the internal debates and divisions, some of the more important of which I highlighted above, and pose an even graver threat to the institutions that would stifle democracy.
It started Sunday in Portland, OR, and was telegraphed on Friday, when the mayor - who repeatedly made the claim he supported the Occupy movement - insisted that police were going to move in at one minute after midnight two days later. Since then Oakland (again) and last night in Manhattan, where police cleared Zuccotti Park. There are various videos abroad the show pretty clearly the police were none too gentle as they pushed the people out. They were, one and all, in riot gear, with state-issued truncheons and pepper spray. What good is it having all these toys if you can't play with them?
I have to admit that I am surprised at the sweep of officialdom's decision to act this broadly. At the same time, it isn't like it should be that surprising. What really troubles me, however, isn't the predictable reaction of state power to a growing, and popular, movement of popular democratic resistance. Instead, this article in particular, while certainly within a history of radical ideas, betrays the heart of the Occupy movement by identifying the institutions of state power with the interests of the people who make up that institution:
Individual officers and even groups have expressed support of certain struggles--most notably, for a time during the occupation of the Wisconsin Capitol last winter. Some participants in Occupy Wall Street, despite regular police attacks, have chanted, "Police are the 99%!"What makes my discomfort with this even deeper is I pretty much agree with it, at least to a point.
But the truth is this: The police force is not, and cannot ever be, a force for social justice.
In reality, the police don't do the job that they do on TV: protect regular people from crime and violence. Instead, they serve and protect private property and the existing racist, sexist, and massively unequal social order.
Yet, I am far more sympathetic with the following:
Addressing government authorities, one occupy spokeswoman used the police aggression as an opportunity to refocus on the larger message of the movement:More of this kind or thing is needed. We need to address police officers as members of the working class whose jobs, too often, lead them to acts that are contrary to their own interests.
You claim to support us, and yet you tell your police force to destroy us. Peaceful citizens are being injured in the process. This is not democratic, this is autocratic. … We have said from day one that our fight is not with you, but rather with banks, irresponsible corporations, and a corrupt federal government. By camping outside the city hall, we gave you a choice to decide to stand with us and with working class Americans. Instead, you made the choice to protect unjust social and economic policies that are leading our nation into a state of financial ruin and institutionalized oppression.
There is little doubt, I believe, that the mild-mannered, establishment commentator Charlie Pierce is correct, however, in his general description of what has happened over the past 24 hours:
Your right to peaceably assemble for the redress of grievances, and how you may do it, and what you may say, will be defined by the police power of the state, backed by its political establishment and the business elite. They will define "acceptable" forms of public protest, even (and especially) public protest against them. This is the way it is now. This is the way it has been for some time. It's just that people didn't notice. And that was the problem with the Occupy protests. They resisted the marginalization — both literal physical marginalization, and the kind of intellectual marginalization that keeps real solutions to real problems out of our kabuki political debates.Now that the police have moved, en masse, across the country, the next step will determine whether Occupy will go the way of similar protests in Britain that ended after the Tory-led coalition government there sent the cops in to smash some heads, or if they will defy the police, the mayors, and the nonsensical political commentators. I would caution, by the way, that relying on the courts as a bastion of defense is a sketchy plan. They are as much a part of the apparatus of control as the police, who do their bidding.
The question that faces Occupy now is: Do protesters return to Zuccotti Park and the other public spaces they have taken over, in the face of the state making their feelings about the movement clear for all to see? If they do, then Occupy may well be on its way to overcoming the internal debates and divisions, some of the more important of which I highlighted above, and pose an even graver threat to the institutions that would stifle democracy.
Monday, November 14, 2011
Nonsense
Full confession - I do not read Ross Douthat. Not because he is conservative. Not because he is often skewered by folks like Tbogg and the folks at Sadly,No!. I don't read him because, by and large, I only have so many minutes in a day to dedicate to reading stuff. He is one who has slipped through the cracks, is all.
When the folks at Crooked Timber dedicated a post to a column Douthat wrote on the whole sad Penn State business, I thought it might be a nice idea to find out what it was Douthat had said. First, here's the key point in Douthat's attempt to understand what happened at PSU:
Here's what Belle wrote as a summary of Douthat:
In any event, some commenters at CT are up in arms that Belle wrote what she did about Douthat's column. Except, that is exactly what he said.
And it's bullshit. From beginning to end. To even imagine there are human beings who are intrinsically more in tune with the moral order of the Universe is a marvelous pagan idea. As Douthat describes events, he sounds far more like a classicist describing the role of hubris in Greek tragedy, instead of someone trying to make a serious moral point in some kind - perhaps Roman Catholic, although I can't imagine a serious Roman Catholic ethicist making any claim close to this - of a Christian context.
This is a kind of praising with faint damnation that envisions a Universe where good and evil, virtue and vice, are weighed in a balance. Furthermore, Douthat does a marvelous job reading Paterno's mind, divining all sorts of morally superior reasons for not coming forward, or moving more vigorously to investigate, allegations that a protege of his was buggering little boys in the showers. There is already enough evidence in the public record to make the case that, in fact, Paterno kept mum because he knew, if he pushed to hard, he could lose his job. Imagining he was acting out of an inherently superior sense of right and wrong is not only contradicted by serious ethical reflection. It is also contradicted by the evidence in the public realm.
I'm honestly not sure what Douthat was thinking when he wrote this particular column, beyond - perhaps - attempting to claim that there are individuals out there who are just morally better than others. If that is the case, he probably should have picked a different set of circumstances that the attempt to cover-up serial child rape. It's disgusting.
When the folks at Crooked Timber dedicated a post to a column Douthat wrote on the whole sad Penn State business, I thought it might be a nice idea to find out what it was Douthat had said. First, here's the key point in Douthat's attempt to understand what happened at PSU:
Bad and mediocre people are tempted to sin by their own habitual weaknesses. The earlier lies or thefts or adulteries make the next one that much easier to contemplate. Having already cut so many corners, the thinking goes, what’s one more here or there? Why even aspire to virtues that you probably won’t achieve, when it’s easier to remain the sinner that you already know yourself to be?Good so far? Paterno screwed up not because he is a fallible human being who acted out of a sense of self-interest and self-preservation, but a hero who, if he has fallen further, had already climbed higher than so many of the rest of us.
But good people, heroic people, are led into temptation by their very goodness — by the illusion, common to those who have done important deeds, that they have higher responsibilities than the ordinary run of humankind. It’s precisely in the service to these supposed higher responsibilities that they often let more basic ones slip away.
Here's what Belle wrote as a summary of Douthat:
The only reason Catholics like Joe Paterno and Darío Castrillón Hoyos are able to commit such uniquely awful crimes is because they are ethical in a way that run-of-the-mill godless folk cannot understand.N.B.: The Dario Castrillon Hoyos who is named was a heroic Roman Catholic bishop of Medellin, Colombia who, upon being raised to the Crimson and becoming the Vatican's point man on the pedophilia scandal, became the leader of those who denied the existence of such a scandal, tried to claim it was a uniquely American experience, and praised bishops who refused to denounce their priests to secular authorities.
In any event, some commenters at CT are up in arms that Belle wrote what she did about Douthat's column. Except, that is exactly what he said.
And it's bullshit. From beginning to end. To even imagine there are human beings who are intrinsically more in tune with the moral order of the Universe is a marvelous pagan idea. As Douthat describes events, he sounds far more like a classicist describing the role of hubris in Greek tragedy, instead of someone trying to make a serious moral point in some kind - perhaps Roman Catholic, although I can't imagine a serious Roman Catholic ethicist making any claim close to this - of a Christian context.
This is a kind of praising with faint damnation that envisions a Universe where good and evil, virtue and vice, are weighed in a balance. Furthermore, Douthat does a marvelous job reading Paterno's mind, divining all sorts of morally superior reasons for not coming forward, or moving more vigorously to investigate, allegations that a protege of his was buggering little boys in the showers. There is already enough evidence in the public record to make the case that, in fact, Paterno kept mum because he knew, if he pushed to hard, he could lose his job. Imagining he was acting out of an inherently superior sense of right and wrong is not only contradicted by serious ethical reflection. It is also contradicted by the evidence in the public realm.
I'm honestly not sure what Douthat was thinking when he wrote this particular column, beyond - perhaps - attempting to claim that there are individuals out there who are just morally better than others. If that is the case, he probably should have picked a different set of circumstances that the attempt to cover-up serial child rape. It's disgusting.
Sunday, November 13, 2011
A Few Words In Defense Of Michelle Bachmann's Whine
I don't pay attention to the Republican primary candidates' debates out of a sound sense of personal preservation. It seems, however, the latest dust-up might - despite my preferred attitude of bemused neglect - have some merit. Michelle Bachmann is complaining that last night's debate in South Carolina was weighted against her.
It's hubris. Stupid hubris.
"Polls" at this point in time - before a single vote has been cast - are meaningless. Considering current "polls" have Herman Cain in a statistical tie with Mitt Romney, one would think cooler heads would merely chuckle at them then insist on going about the business of constructing these debates with some sense. The constant tea-reading - it's Perry! no, it's Cain! Gingrich is up! Bachmann is down! - is meaningless drivel. Even Romney's pretty consistent high numbers are meaningless because there haven't been any primaries or caucuses yet. The playing field is level for one simple reason - the current crop of Republican primary candidates haven't had anyone vote for them yet.
So, basing the number of questions any particular candidate will face at any given time based on polls is ludicrous. A good answer here, a bad answer there, a misstep on this one, a clear, concise, knowledgeable response on that one - this, too could change the polls. Most sentient people understand this. None, apparently, work for CBS.
Putting in writing that the debate format is limiting opportunities for some candidates is monumentally stupid. It may well be the case that Michelle Bachmann deserves less attention than some other candidates. We have no way of knowing that unless we as the voting public are exposed to her ideas on specific topics. We can't be exposed to them if she has fewer questions addressed to her, and is allowed a shorter response time than other candidates.
There was a time when these debates were run by the League of Women Voters. Back in those halcyon days, the League made it a policy to just let candidates in, to have a moderator ask questions, then sit back and let them talk. Complaints over the way the League did things were perennial, especially when they had the temerity to refuse to block debate access to non-party and Third Party candidates. It would be preferable to have such institution do these things without any input from any of the candidates or news organizations. The candidates want to debate? Here's the format. Folks who show up will be asked whatever questions we want. Folks who don't show up, well, doesn't that tell us something about them?
I would be more sympathetic to Ms. Bachmann if she, and so many conservatives, hadn't spent decades whining about the liberal media. I would be more sympathetic if this whole incident didn't start before the debate was even over last night. Running as the perpetual victim of Big Blue Meanies who lie in wait ready to pounce is unbecoming, to say the least. Yet, she does have a point. No matter her standing the "polls", she deserved the right to have as many questions asked of her as other candidates did. It isn't "fair" to deny her time just because her poll numbers are low. Even if Josh Marshall thinks it is, or CBS, or anyone else.
Besides, according to the same site that thinks she got about as much attention as she deserved, she did manage a marvelous whopper.
Michele Bachmann told reporters in the spin room after Saturday night’s presidential debate here that her campaign has proof that, in the words of a Bachmann spokesperson, debate sponsor CBS News had “a pre-planned attempt to limit” the number of questions Bachmann was asked on stage.TPM, which is covering this latest bit of news, offers the following less-than-sterling defense of the decision by CBS to ask Rep. Bachmann fewer questions than other candidates:
Bachmann has an email from CBS News Political Director John Dickerson she says backs up her claims, but before the controversy could cook off, one debate co-sponsor — the South Carolina GOP — said Bachmann was barking up the wrong tree.
“The SCGOP had no input on how questions were developed or to whom they were addressed,” party Executive Director Matt Moore told TPM. “Congresswoman Bachmann seemed to receive a fair number [of] questions, and had ample opportunities to answer.”
That’s not how Bachmann saw it.
“Clearly, we received an email today, unintentionally, that CBS had an effort not to ask questions,” she said. “That was their effort, I don’t know why.”
“The email was targeted to me,” Bachmann said. “I don’t know if it was targeted to anyone else.”
CBS’s just hired political director, John Dickerson, wrote an email — apparently to CBS colleagues — noting that Bachmann probably wouldn’t get many questions tonight since she’s basically tanked in the polls. That’s not terribly surprising — also-ran candidates typically get less mic time in a multi-candidate debate.I have been immune for quite a while to the nonsensical "liberal media!!!" screeching from the right. This case, one would think, is evidence of the real problem with so much of our national political media. It isn't liberalism, or excessive Democratic partisanship.
--snip--
For some context, the TPM Poll Average puts Bachmann currently at 3.2% support nationwide among Republicans. So she’s creeping up on Gary Johnson territory. And well into Santorum-ville.
It's hubris. Stupid hubris.
"Polls" at this point in time - before a single vote has been cast - are meaningless. Considering current "polls" have Herman Cain in a statistical tie with Mitt Romney, one would think cooler heads would merely chuckle at them then insist on going about the business of constructing these debates with some sense. The constant tea-reading - it's Perry! no, it's Cain! Gingrich is up! Bachmann is down! - is meaningless drivel. Even Romney's pretty consistent high numbers are meaningless because there haven't been any primaries or caucuses yet. The playing field is level for one simple reason - the current crop of Republican primary candidates haven't had anyone vote for them yet.
So, basing the number of questions any particular candidate will face at any given time based on polls is ludicrous. A good answer here, a bad answer there, a misstep on this one, a clear, concise, knowledgeable response on that one - this, too could change the polls. Most sentient people understand this. None, apparently, work for CBS.
Putting in writing that the debate format is limiting opportunities for some candidates is monumentally stupid. It may well be the case that Michelle Bachmann deserves less attention than some other candidates. We have no way of knowing that unless we as the voting public are exposed to her ideas on specific topics. We can't be exposed to them if she has fewer questions addressed to her, and is allowed a shorter response time than other candidates.
There was a time when these debates were run by the League of Women Voters. Back in those halcyon days, the League made it a policy to just let candidates in, to have a moderator ask questions, then sit back and let them talk. Complaints over the way the League did things were perennial, especially when they had the temerity to refuse to block debate access to non-party and Third Party candidates. It would be preferable to have such institution do these things without any input from any of the candidates or news organizations. The candidates want to debate? Here's the format. Folks who show up will be asked whatever questions we want. Folks who don't show up, well, doesn't that tell us something about them?
I would be more sympathetic to Ms. Bachmann if she, and so many conservatives, hadn't spent decades whining about the liberal media. I would be more sympathetic if this whole incident didn't start before the debate was even over last night. Running as the perpetual victim of Big Blue Meanies who lie in wait ready to pounce is unbecoming, to say the least. Yet, she does have a point. No matter her standing the "polls", she deserved the right to have as many questions asked of her as other candidates did. It isn't "fair" to deny her time just because her poll numbers are low. Even if Josh Marshall thinks it is, or CBS, or anyone else.
Besides, according to the same site that thinks she got about as much attention as she deserved, she did manage a marvelous whopper.
“If you look at China, they don’t have food stamps,” she told the GOP debate moderators. “They save for their retirement.”I mean, come on. Why deny us the opportunity for more of this preciousness?
Saturday, November 12, 2011
Free With The Facts (UPDATE)
Whenever George Will puts on his Constitutional scholar hat, right-thinking people cover their eyes in shame. It may well be that the Stolen Valor Act of 2005 is an unconstitutional piece of crap. At the same time, the attempt at both the state and federal level to regulate certain speech-acts as beyond the bounds of Constitutional acceptability does have a certain amount of practical merit. No one should be surprised by Will's opposition to a set of rules and regulations that would disproportionately harm the political opportunities of conservatives. When it comes to slinging piles of poo until they stick, the Republicans are the alpha males of our little primate colony.
All one needs to consider is the following on-going meme - the socialism of President Barack Obama. Real socialists carry on about the perfidy, weakness, and general bag-carrying-for-business-and-banks of Pres. Obama and his Administration. No matter. We'll just repeat it and repeat it, and pretend it actually means something and, voila! There are significant numbers of conservative and Republican voters who believe our business-coddling President is V. I. Lenin in a better suit.
It is a dodgy thing, at best, to talk about regulating speech. It is impossible to look for guidance in these matters to the founding generation of our country, because they honored these things, by and large, in the breach. John Adams supported and signed the Alien and Sedition Act which, among other things, criminalized all sorts of political speech. We still have laws regulating seditious libel, for which truth is no defense (something I cannot fathom; there is no rational reason why truth isn't a defense when going after a public figure, except to protect the status quo, so, uh, duh). The Presidential election of 1800 makes our current politics look like a high school student council election by comparison, and the things said about Pres. Obama only approach the kinds of invective Adams tossed at Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, being a gentleman, managed to toss far less lethal poo at Adams.
All the same, our current speech-climate certainly favors those who have no scruples. Those who are quite willing to say anything and everything about candidates, about laws and bills before Congress, about the actual effects of legislation or policy preferences. Which means, in recent history, Republican candidates. The year-long campaign against the Affordable Care Act was an object lesson in the effectiveness of lying in politics. With false statements no longer constitutionally protected, we might well have a situation where the playing field between various parties and their policy preferences becomes level. Even more than removing money from the electioneering process through campaign finance reform, what would our politics look like if all parties were reduced to discussing issues knowing they could not, under penalty of law, make a false statement in the negative about their opponents or their policy preferences, nor could they make any false positive statements about themselves?
It would have a devastating impact upon the economy, because there would be a whole lot of people whose livelihood depends upon lying about public affairs who would suddenly find themselves unemployable. It would also be a nice statement about what kind of society we wish ourselves to be. It would set a minimal standard for our public discourse, now suffering from extreme strains of decrepitude.
Heck, Newt Gingrich might actually be asked a question such as, "Mr. Disgraced Former Speaker, if you truly believe that organs of state power are at the heart of so much of our national malaise, why do you spend an inordinate amount of time seeking to lead them?"
Yeah, I see how silly and utopian my position is.
UPDATE: Augh. I had completely forgotten that, yesterday, I saw this. Rather than rewrite the whole thing, I thought I'd tack it on the end here:
Right now, the Republicans at pretty much every level and their hired guns and willing stooges carry on that each and every attempt by others to regulate economic affairs is dangerous to the likelihood that economic prosperity will grow like some big snowball as it rolls through time, granting to our children and grandchildren greater rewards than we have received. This, of course, distinguishes us from those horrid socialist Europeans who only work 15 hours a week and make do on government welfare checks, smoking their smelly cigarettes and drinking their horrible coffee, wiping themselves with paper towels.
That the reality is the exact opposite of this caricature is no small bit of important information to have moving forward. One would think. Coddling Americans to believe ours is the greatest and bestest of all in everything is the social equivalent of insistently telling one's children that the Easter Bunny brings all that candy and eggs. When said children are college students. We would fare better as a country if we actually started from a position rooted in the reality of certain situations. You cannot design policies that work from false premises.
All one needs to consider is the following on-going meme - the socialism of President Barack Obama. Real socialists carry on about the perfidy, weakness, and general bag-carrying-for-business-and-banks of Pres. Obama and his Administration. No matter. We'll just repeat it and repeat it, and pretend it actually means something and, voila! There are significant numbers of conservative and Republican voters who believe our business-coddling President is V. I. Lenin in a better suit.
It is a dodgy thing, at best, to talk about regulating speech. It is impossible to look for guidance in these matters to the founding generation of our country, because they honored these things, by and large, in the breach. John Adams supported and signed the Alien and Sedition Act which, among other things, criminalized all sorts of political speech. We still have laws regulating seditious libel, for which truth is no defense (something I cannot fathom; there is no rational reason why truth isn't a defense when going after a public figure, except to protect the status quo, so, uh, duh). The Presidential election of 1800 makes our current politics look like a high school student council election by comparison, and the things said about Pres. Obama only approach the kinds of invective Adams tossed at Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson, being a gentleman, managed to toss far less lethal poo at Adams.
All the same, our current speech-climate certainly favors those who have no scruples. Those who are quite willing to say anything and everything about candidates, about laws and bills before Congress, about the actual effects of legislation or policy preferences. Which means, in recent history, Republican candidates. The year-long campaign against the Affordable Care Act was an object lesson in the effectiveness of lying in politics. With false statements no longer constitutionally protected, we might well have a situation where the playing field between various parties and their policy preferences becomes level. Even more than removing money from the electioneering process through campaign finance reform, what would our politics look like if all parties were reduced to discussing issues knowing they could not, under penalty of law, make a false statement in the negative about their opponents or their policy preferences, nor could they make any false positive statements about themselves?
It would have a devastating impact upon the economy, because there would be a whole lot of people whose livelihood depends upon lying about public affairs who would suddenly find themselves unemployable. It would also be a nice statement about what kind of society we wish ourselves to be. It would set a minimal standard for our public discourse, now suffering from extreme strains of decrepitude.
Heck, Newt Gingrich might actually be asked a question such as, "Mr. Disgraced Former Speaker, if you truly believe that organs of state power are at the heart of so much of our national malaise, why do you spend an inordinate amount of time seeking to lead them?"
Yeah, I see how silly and utopian my position is.
UPDATE: Augh. I had completely forgotten that, yesterday, I saw this. Rather than rewrite the whole thing, I thought I'd tack it on the end here:
Social scientists have known for a couple of decades that, contrary to its national myths, the US is a country with low intergenerational economic mobility, by international standards. Back in 2001, when I reviewed The Real Worlds of Welfare Capitalism by Bob Goodin and others, I mentioned that this was already well known. More recent evidence has shown that social mobility is not only low but declining. Yet until recently, popular discussion in the US seemed impervious to this evidence.Imagine! An entire society impervious to evidence of a reality that should be all too clear. Like about global warming. Or the positive revenue effects of cutting tax rates.
Right now, the Republicans at pretty much every level and their hired guns and willing stooges carry on that each and every attempt by others to regulate economic affairs is dangerous to the likelihood that economic prosperity will grow like some big snowball as it rolls through time, granting to our children and grandchildren greater rewards than we have received. This, of course, distinguishes us from those horrid socialist Europeans who only work 15 hours a week and make do on government welfare checks, smoking their smelly cigarettes and drinking their horrible coffee, wiping themselves with paper towels.
That the reality is the exact opposite of this caricature is no small bit of important information to have moving forward. One would think. Coddling Americans to believe ours is the greatest and bestest of all in everything is the social equivalent of insistently telling one's children that the Easter Bunny brings all that candy and eggs. When said children are college students. We would fare better as a country if we actually started from a position rooted in the reality of certain situations. You cannot design policies that work from false premises.
Thursday, November 10, 2011
Empty Words Flowing From An Empty Head
Ron Paul, a true believer in the racial superiority of whites and the economic superiority of rich people telling the rest of us to suck it up and deal when the world makes lemons out of our lemonade stands, was asked to comment on Elizabeth Warren's recent comments that our social contract demands certain obligations from us even as it offers us opportunities for social and economic betterment. Paul's response - "Socialism!" - was so predictable, and the resulting revision and extension of his remarks so laughably inane, I thought they would make a good drinking game (every time he uses words like "market", "competition", "socialism" participants would have to drink; a ten minute interview would leave a heap of people waiting for the ambulance so they could have their stomach's pumped).
In the course of comments on Charlie Pierce's marvelous post on this same subject, a libertarian entered the fray to defend the idea that public services are socialist.
Things didn't go so well, mostly because the rest of the commenters were laughing at him too loud for him to be heard. That hurt his feelings so he took his toys and went home after telling us that we were mean and stupid and ugly. So there!*
A perennial complaint of mine has been the looseness, the vagueness, and occasional utter vacuity of our public discourse. Words that once meant stuff, words like liberal and conservative, freedom, socialism have become empty vessels, to be defined by whoever is using them. Never directly, of course. We have to guess that, say, when Ron Paul says that public education is socialism, he may or may not be talking about the same thing that Karl Marx or Vladimir Lenin (whose views on what constituted socialism were different, but that's the subject for another post) meant when they used the word socialist.
Now, obviously, one of the purposes of public rhetoric is to persuade, and persuasion is very often accomplished better when there is a confusion of terms. Folks who toss around words carelessly in order to get people to nod their heads and agree with them have accomplished their goal - "You like me! You really like me!" - but have made it that much harder to have a serious, honest discussion about matters or real importance.
When Ron Paul speaks, the English language dies a little bit. Language needs to have substance, referents, a common stock of mutually-agreed-upon definitions in order to be effective. Communication can only take place when all parties have at least general agreement that the words they are all using mean the same thing. Calling public education "socialist" fails utterly. Sitting and blabbing about home-schooling and vouchers and choice and competition are meaningless beyond stating one's personal preferences. Because there has yet to be a study conducted on the alleged benefits of competition in education that has borne out the claims of its proponents, intellectual honesty should, in a perfect world, force them to admit they support ideas that are about as useful as leeches in treating fevers.
The Constitution, for all its flaws, both originally and on-going, is a remarkable document. It is even more remarkable because it means none of the things Ron Paul thinks it means. Born from the minds and hard work and politicking of men steeped in an understanding republican ideals and virtues gleaned from reading Montesquieu, Locke, and other commenters upon the benefits of mutual obligation in human society, the Constitution is chock-a-block with references to the common good because that lies at the heart of the social contract represented by the Constitution. American society is not an experiment in economic freedom. It is, rather, an experiment in republican governance, which needs active participation among its various factions (to borrow a word from the Federalist Papers) always with an eye toward achieving certain ends for the benefit of all. Sometimes this is best done by voluntary organizations (De Tocqueville was a big pimper of the idea that, in the United States, voluntary associations worked to flesh out the social contract; he was conservative in the classical sense, wavered between an allegiance to monarchy and a kind of grudging admiration for American republican institutions without being blind to their flaws). Sometimes, the state in some form - local, county, state, or federal government institutions - has to intervene to achieve the ends all see as beneficial to the nation as a whole.
This language of republican civic virtue is dead, slaughtered by mindless blathering from people like Ron Paul whose minds are like old Commodore 64 computers, limited in their capacity to respond to inputs because their programs only contain certain programmed responses. I am underwhelmed by arguments of libertarians not because of any reflexive ideological principles. I am underwhelmed because they are vacuous, ignorant, and, when even partially implemented, corrosive upon our common life.
It is nice on occasion to laugh at the stupidity of Ron Paul, and to make the uninteresting and unremarkable observation that the things he says are without any political, historical, or intellectual merit whatsoever. It would be nice, however, if we had more people who insisted that recovering at least some of the language of republican virtue, of this sense of mutuality that lies at the heart of the American social contract, was necessary to heal the wounds inflicted by so many decades of stupidity.
*If you scroll down and read through all the comments and replies, you will see my Facebook avatar - a tarsier. I have decided, rather than use various pictures of myself or my family, that this tiny primate is the best representative for me in public discourse.
In the course of comments on Charlie Pierce's marvelous post on this same subject, a libertarian entered the fray to defend the idea that public services are socialist.
Things didn't go so well, mostly because the rest of the commenters were laughing at him too loud for him to be heard. That hurt his feelings so he took his toys and went home after telling us that we were mean and stupid and ugly. So there!*
A perennial complaint of mine has been the looseness, the vagueness, and occasional utter vacuity of our public discourse. Words that once meant stuff, words like liberal and conservative, freedom, socialism have become empty vessels, to be defined by whoever is using them. Never directly, of course. We have to guess that, say, when Ron Paul says that public education is socialism, he may or may not be talking about the same thing that Karl Marx or Vladimir Lenin (whose views on what constituted socialism were different, but that's the subject for another post) meant when they used the word socialist.
Now, obviously, one of the purposes of public rhetoric is to persuade, and persuasion is very often accomplished better when there is a confusion of terms. Folks who toss around words carelessly in order to get people to nod their heads and agree with them have accomplished their goal - "You like me! You really like me!" - but have made it that much harder to have a serious, honest discussion about matters or real importance.
When Ron Paul speaks, the English language dies a little bit. Language needs to have substance, referents, a common stock of mutually-agreed-upon definitions in order to be effective. Communication can only take place when all parties have at least general agreement that the words they are all using mean the same thing. Calling public education "socialist" fails utterly. Sitting and blabbing about home-schooling and vouchers and choice and competition are meaningless beyond stating one's personal preferences. Because there has yet to be a study conducted on the alleged benefits of competition in education that has borne out the claims of its proponents, intellectual honesty should, in a perfect world, force them to admit they support ideas that are about as useful as leeches in treating fevers.
The Constitution, for all its flaws, both originally and on-going, is a remarkable document. It is even more remarkable because it means none of the things Ron Paul thinks it means. Born from the minds and hard work and politicking of men steeped in an understanding republican ideals and virtues gleaned from reading Montesquieu, Locke, and other commenters upon the benefits of mutual obligation in human society, the Constitution is chock-a-block with references to the common good because that lies at the heart of the social contract represented by the Constitution. American society is not an experiment in economic freedom. It is, rather, an experiment in republican governance, which needs active participation among its various factions (to borrow a word from the Federalist Papers) always with an eye toward achieving certain ends for the benefit of all. Sometimes this is best done by voluntary organizations (De Tocqueville was a big pimper of the idea that, in the United States, voluntary associations worked to flesh out the social contract; he was conservative in the classical sense, wavered between an allegiance to monarchy and a kind of grudging admiration for American republican institutions without being blind to their flaws). Sometimes, the state in some form - local, county, state, or federal government institutions - has to intervene to achieve the ends all see as beneficial to the nation as a whole.
This language of republican civic virtue is dead, slaughtered by mindless blathering from people like Ron Paul whose minds are like old Commodore 64 computers, limited in their capacity to respond to inputs because their programs only contain certain programmed responses. I am underwhelmed by arguments of libertarians not because of any reflexive ideological principles. I am underwhelmed because they are vacuous, ignorant, and, when even partially implemented, corrosive upon our common life.
It is nice on occasion to laugh at the stupidity of Ron Paul, and to make the uninteresting and unremarkable observation that the things he says are without any political, historical, or intellectual merit whatsoever. It would be nice, however, if we had more people who insisted that recovering at least some of the language of republican virtue, of this sense of mutuality that lies at the heart of the American social contract, was necessary to heal the wounds inflicted by so many decades of stupidity.
*If you scroll down and read through all the comments and replies, you will see my Facebook avatar - a tarsier. I have decided, rather than use various pictures of myself or my family, that this tiny primate is the best representative for me in public discourse.
Wednesday, November 09, 2011
Rick Santorum Is A Horrible Human Being
I wasn't going to write or say anything about the spreading scandal at Penn State. At the heart of the scandal is the now established fact that former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky was caught, on at least one occasion, performing a sexual act with a child. Along with Sandusky, who should wear his testicles in a bag around his neck without actually severing them from his body, the scandal has brought down the athletic director, a vice-president and, today, legendary head coach Joe Paterno.
I wasn't going to say anything because . . . well, good Lord, what is there to say? Hooray they caught a pederast? Hooray the people who covered up the fact he might well be a serial pederast have lost their jobs (cold comfort to the molested children that some rich people have to live off their savings . . .).
Then, I read the following:
These were children who were raped, Mr. Santorum. The tragedy here isn't what's happened to Penn State athletics. The tragedy is what Penn State athletics, in the person of Jerry Sandusky, and later the others higher up the food chain who tried to shove it under whatever furniture was lying around, did to those children. That's the tragedy.
Even an immoral liberal like me understands that. Why can't a sanctimonious pus-bug like you?
I wasn't going to say anything because . . . well, good Lord, what is there to say? Hooray they caught a pederast? Hooray the people who covered up the fact he might well be a serial pederast have lost their jobs (cold comfort to the molested children that some rich people have to live off their savings . . .).
Then, I read the following:
Nine years ago, it seems, Rick [Santorum] sponsored, for the honor of "Congressional Angel in Adoption," Jerry Sandusky, the former Penn State assistant football coach who is presently accused of multiple acts of child molestation and rape, and whose long career as a predator may well bring down the whole football program at Santorum's alma mater. Obviously outraged, Santorum reached deep into the well of his anger and pulled up this bucket of mealy-mouthed slop:All these phony family values jerk-offs are now revealed to be nothing more or less than the moral equivalent of parasites, sucking the life-blood from our country even as they grow fat. Santorum doesn't even have the fortitude to mention that, you know, there might have been some children whose lives were ruined by this "Angel" Sandusky, and gee, it might be more horrible these kids have to live not only with this trauma but that it was covered up by people who had a legal responsibility, years ago, to report it to authorities?
"Look, I pray and hope that he [PSU coach Joe Paterno] didn't do anything he shouldn't have done, but it certainly looks horrible for the university, horrible for the football program and obviously people were fired, should be fired."
Of course, as the report above says, since the Penn State scandal broke, Santorum "has been circumspect in his comments about it. (He is not implicated in any way.)"
By contrast, here's what he once said about gay marriage:
"This is an issue just like 9/11. We didn't decide we wanted to fight the war on terrorism because we wanted to. It was brought to us. And if not now, when? When the supreme courts in all the other states have succumbed to the Massachusetts version of the law?"
These were children who were raped, Mr. Santorum. The tragedy here isn't what's happened to Penn State athletics. The tragedy is what Penn State athletics, in the person of Jerry Sandusky, and later the others higher up the food chain who tried to shove it under whatever furniture was lying around, did to those children. That's the tragedy.
Even an immoral liberal like me understands that. Why can't a sanctimonious pus-bug like you?
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Virtual Tin Cup
