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Recently I saw a news item about polar bears. No, actually, it was NOT about how the polar bears are drowning because of Al Gore's SUVs and private jets.
Rather, it was a story that said scientists have determined that polar bears evolved from other bears very recently, in the evolutionary scheme of things.
What's the significance? I find it fascinating when put up against the way that polar bears are literally a poster child for the global warming faith. Consider how evolution would explain the existence of the polar bear. According to the evolutionary way of thinking, the polar bear evolved with its special adaptations to live in an Arctic climate. Why was there a need for the bears to evolve? Apparently, the climate was changing and the bears' habitat was getting colder.
And, the scientists now say, this all happened about last week, in the evolutionary time frame.
But now we are worried because polar bears are threatened as their habitat again changes, becoming warmer -- maybe simply returning to the way it used to be last week, back before the polar bears evolved from other bears.
There is concern that polar bears will become extinct. But maybe we're looking at it wrong. Maybe there are no polar bears. There are just bears. And when necessary, some bears become adapted to a colder habitat. If the habitat warms, there will be fewer of those bears, and more of the "other" bears. And when the climate cools again, we'll get more "polar" bears. Isn't that consistent with evolutionary science?
I think I've written before that it's really creationists who should be the ones concerned about extinctions and "climate change." I mean, if you believe that the Earth and everything on it were made in their present state by God and everything is "supposed" to be a certain way, then you should be worried about messing up God's plan and killing off some of His creations or messing up His climate. (Except that if God wants it a certain way, we're powerless to mess up His plans.) But if you think everything evolved by chance out of nothing over billions of years, well, then, who's to say that there are even "supposed" to be polar bears? Or what the climate is "supposed" to be?
The polar bear -- held up as the emblem of dreaded climate change -- is itself a fairly recent creation of... climate change (At least according to science, and there's nothing global warmists trust more than science.). Isn't there some irony here? The polar bear itself seems to be evidence that climate change is natural and inevitable.
Easy come, easy go, Mr. Bear.
Prepare to Assimilate Yourselves
Even if you're not a big Star Trek fan, you may be familiar with the Borg. They're an alien race -- though not really a race of their own. How they "reproduce" is to capture other beings and transform them into new Borg, by means of mechanical and cyber implants. When "resistance is futile" and the Borg are about to take their new captives, they announce, "Prepare to be assimilated."
What TV viewers immediately noticed about the Borg was the strange outward appearance of these new man/machine creatures. But that was only a superficial aspect of the Borg. What's really amazing, is that they all have their minds linked into one "hive" consciousness.
At one point, a human/Borg is recaptured by the Enterprise, whose crew sets out to "rescue" her by removing her Borg-ness and returning her humanity. But while the ship's doctor can easily enough remove the implants from her body, her return to humanity is far from easy. Cut off from "the collective mind," it is as though she suffers anxiety attacks. She feels frightened. Cut-off. All alone.
I thought about the fictional Borg the other day when I noticed a human sporting a prominent communications device affixed to her head. But my first thoughts were superficial. Yes, this person was augmenting herself with the attachment of a device. Her appearance reminded me of the Borg. But did it go deeper than just outward appearances?
Many people these days seem dependent on being constantly connected. Cell phone. E-mail. Facebook. They must be constantly in touch about the most inconsequential minutia. People feel anxious and cut-off if they aren't constantly part of their "hive." Some people appear to exhibit withdrawal symptoms if they can't regularly check their electronic devices.
I just saw another example. I started this post, went to a movie, and just got back. On the sidewalk on the way to the theater, I saw a father and child coming out from the previous movie. He was paying no attention to the child, and had his head down, studying his device. Okay, maybe he's a world-famous brain surgeon and he was involved in a life-saving correspondence, but that's not likely. So I have to ask, what terribly important things were transpiring in his world while he was in a movie theater for two hours during the middle of a Saturday? Were there really issues that demanded his immediate attention?
I very much doubt it. Anything he was engrossed in was likely trivial. But he was letting it be more important than devoting his attention to his child.
We are Borging ourselves
I wonder, when the creators of the Star Trek universe created the Borg 20 years or more ago, did they have something like this in mind? Were they predicting where we were heading? Were the Borg intended to be like Dr. Frankenstein's monster -- a cautionary tale of the dangers of science and technology? Or did the writers merely conceive of the the Borg and the loss of individuality and privacy as a great imaginary nightmare? Something so terrifying that we would never want it to happen -- and thus never let it happen.
If so, the joke's on them, because we seem to be moving in that direction very willingly.
We're assimilating ourselves.
I've thought for a long time that the global warmists are adherents of a religion, and as time passes, I just see more and more evidence of it. They mock those who don't "believe." When science gets in the way of their beliefs, they're suddenly able to dismiss the facts. What matters is that they are true believers, and as such, they believe that we face the eternal fires of earthly damnation if we don't repent and change our ways.
That belief is all important. It comes first. Then, science must be used to support the pre-existing belief.
"Climate science" reminds me an awfully lot of "creation science."
First, let me say that I believe the universe has a heavenly Creator God. I've analyzed the arguments otherwise, and frankly, I just don't have enough faith to be an atheist. That everything came from nothing in some sort of miraculous (!) confluence of randomness and coincidence is just too wild of a yarn for me to swallow.
So, I believe the Bible when it tells us that God made the Universe. The Bible is true. Yet, I think perhaps the Bible is -- how can I say it? -- perhaps not a complete and fully-detailed account of how God did that. I think there's more to the story. Details have been left out.
Yet there are those who wish to believe that the Bible can be used as a complete history of the world and as a science textbook. Some of them, in an attempt to prove that point of view, engage in what is called "creation science" -- an attempt to reconcile the literal Bible and contemporary science. I used to cheer for this group, thinking that they were on the right track and would be vindicated. But that was years ago, when I was quite young. The trouble is, they tend to cherry pick their science. They'll point to something that might be used to support their case, but ignore 10 things that contradict it.
And that's exactly what I see happening with the "climate science" people. They have chosen their true belief, and they are intent on using science in only one way -- to support their claims and their evangelical zeal.
Does science contradict their position? No matter. Just ignore it. (And label anyone who won't a "heretic" or a "non-believer.") Pay no attention to the fact that the glaciers aren't melting. Pay no attention to the record cold snaps. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!
And pay no attention to the fossil record. Oops, that would apply to the creation scientists.
But you can see where it gets hard to tell the two apart.
You've Come a Long Way, Baby. Now Can I Have Some Cash?
I don't have pay TV, but I'd heard a lot about the AMC show "Mad Men" and wanted to see it. I was fortunate enough to get it on DVD for Christmas, and recently I watched the first three episodes.
The setting is a Madison Avenue advertising agency in 1960. One of the things the show is known for is how politically incorrect it is -- at least by 2010 standards. Perhaps most shockingly, everybody smokes. Even the "good guys"! (Wait, I'm actually not sure at this point if there are any "good guys.") Almost as shocking as people smoking is the way the "girls" in the office are treated. They seem to be there for the pleasure and convenience of the male executives. But oddly enough, the "girls" don't seem to mind. In fact, a career goal appears to be landing an executive so a girl can quit her job in favor of housekeeping and child-rearing.
Though the differences between then and now are really played up and probably exaggerated for effect, we're supposed to always be thinking: "How things have changed!" And they have.
But just how much, exactly?
I'm thinking today of all the young women who are living with their boyfriends. The guy gets someone to sleep with and, most likely, someone to keep house for him. In exchange, he . . . um. . . what? He doesn't even have to make a commitment. Wasn't that part of the obsolete, old-fashioned system? A man made a legally-binding commitment to a woman (and to her children)?
I thought the women's movement demanded more for women and more from men. How's that workin' out, sister?
I look around, and I see men getting all the benefits of marriage, without the "cost." They don't have to give anything up, and their women still give them everything they want. In addition, it's becoming increasingly common for the woman in a couple to earn more money than the man. So, women are bringing home the bacon, frying it up in the pan, doing the dishes, and then serving up a little "dessert," all for a man who doesn't even care enough to marry them.
Is this progress?
They used to tell the girls, "Why will he buy the cow if he can get the milk for free?" That advice seems to have been forgotten. These days, women are giving away the milk for free, then they're cleaning the barn, baling the hay, and doing the chores.
Sometimes I'll hear some woman lamenting that the man she lives with won't make a commitment and marry her. I just shake my head.
Why should he?
According to a recently-released poll which has been widely reported, Americans are becoming more isolationist, especially the younger Americans.
That should come as no surprise. It's all about the pendulum. Things go back and forth. Simply put, that's because the world is not perfect and there are no perfect solutions. We try something for awhile and then see that the world still isn't perfect, so then we try something else.
The youngest generation is especially susceptible to this, because everything is new to them. As they become adults, leaving behind the protected and relatively "perfect" and "safe" world of childhood, the realize that the world is not perfect. There are lots of problems. Since they have no sense of history, they reason that the current plan we are following is the reason things aren't perfect. If we change -- it matters not to what -- then things will be better, they think, because they assume that the current plan of action is the cause of the imperfections in the world.
What they don't understand is that the current course of action may in fact be limiting -- as much as possible -- the imperfections in the world. And that a different course of action will eliminate fewer imperfections, making the world an even less perfect place.
And because they usually have no sense of history, they don't realize that many of these alternatives ideas have been tried -- sometimes repeatedly -- with poor results. For example, there were those 20 years ago who thought we should appease and negotiate with Saddam Hussein, with no understanding of how that had worked with Hitler. Now, they think we should appease and negotiate with Iran.
I recently came across this great quote from President Calvin Coolidge which applies well to this topic: "It is characteristic of the unlearned that they are forever proposing something which is old, and because it has recently come to their attention, supposing it to be new."
Obama promised recently that he will "never stop fighting for policies that will help restore home values."
Once again, I'm confused. I thought a huge part of our economic downturn was blamed on the "housing bubble," in which house prices were over-inflated, and evil mortage lenders sold people overly-optimistic mortgages that they couldn't make payments on, eventually ending up in foreclosure.
Why would the president want to intentionally reinflate the bubble?
The Government Can't Raise Children; That's the Schools' Job
I recently read an interesting Wall Street Journal piece about orphanages. The author, Richard B. Mckenzie, had been raised in an orphanage, and defended the institutions, citing his own experience, along with statistics he said that show the "orphans" do better than the general population.
Orphanages, though, are passe. They're considered old-fashioned. Inhumane. Draconian. Mckenzie writes:
When Newt Gingrich suggested in 1994 that many welfare kids would be better off in orphanages, Hillary Clinton declared the proposal "unbelievable and absurd." Conventional child-welfare wisdom hasn't changed much since.
Families -- blood or foster -- should raise children, the modern, progressive, liberal mindset says. Not government. Not institutions.
They conveniently ignore the 800-lb. irony in the room. I'm surprised that I hadn't caught it until now.
The same modern, progressive, liberal types who find institutional child-rearing so offensive tend to be the same people who want the public schools to take over more and more of what used to be the responsibilities of parents. After all, the government and professional educators know best. They'll feed the kids breakfast. Teach them about sex and drugs. Teach them values (whose, exactly?). Provide after-school care. Provide summer programs. They want the schools to take over as many parental responsibilities as possible, even when kids have parents!
So, they hold both of these ideas at the same time: 1) An institution called an orphanage couldn't possibly raise children as well as substitute parents. 2) An institution called a public school can raise children better than their actual parents.
How does that compute? It's as though they oppose residential orphanage, but they like "day orphanages."
It's All About Making a Splash
I've heard people wonder why the latest would-be airplane bomber waited until the plane approached Detroit to try to set off his explosives. It would have been easier in the middle of the flight, over the ocean, they say, when passengers were sleeping and not paying attention.
But that misses the point of terrorism. It's not as though this specific airplane was some sort of tactical target that needed to be destroyed. It's all about getting attention, spreading fear and causing a panic -- making a splash, if you will, which in this case means NOT making a splash in the Atlantic Ocean.
Look at how much attention this event and its perpetrators garnered even though their plan FAILED. TV was ready to make them stars. A failed bombing on approach to Detroit may have gotten them more attention than if they had blown up the plane over the Atlantic. Suppose the plane would have simply disappeared from the sky, only to be discovered as wreckage later. There would have been no fiery TV coverage. No certainty as to what happened. But can you imagine the scene if the plan had succeeded? It would have been all over TV. Plus, there's the extra component that they could strike at the CENTER of the United States, not just the coasts. And that's what terrorism is all about. Spreading the fear that no one is safe.
This is the first paragraph from a letter to the editor in the recent Highland Villager newspaper:
"With the holiday season, I find myself dreaming of an impossible Christmas present: a world without our invasion of Iraq. I envision life for thousands of families no longer caring for an injured loved one and for millions of displaced Iraquis now back in their homes. I dream of Saddam Huessein still in power, gassing more Kurds, conducting more genocide and torture, and committing and more crimes against humanity."
Okay, you got me. I made that up. Well... actually, I made up only the last sentence. The first part was verbatim.
But you can't have the first part without the sentence I added. The would come with it. Sure, it's easy to succumb to invaders' remorse and wish we hadn't ever moved into the neighborhood. The costs have been high. But we can't ignore Saddam.
That's the problem with playing the game of wishing for a "do-over" machine so that we could put things back the way they were: the way things were includes Saddam Hussein. And that's where it falls apart. Because where is Saddam now? That's right, he'd dead. Why is he dead? He was executed? By whom? His own people. Why? For crimes against humanity.
So if you find yourself wishing for an "undo," you're saying you support someone who was so bad that his own people executed him for crimes against humanity, including genocide (with poison gas) and torture. You're saying you want to overrule the Iraqi people, and put them back under Saddam's evil heel.
Is that really the side you want to be on?
I can hear you now: "I don't want Saddam back in power; I just don't want the U.S. to have invaded Iraq."
Sorry, it doesn't work that way. You're either with Saddam, or you're with the invasion. Neither choice is perfect, but I think one is definitely better than the other.
How About "Reclaiming" Thanksgiving Day?
This past week I read something curious: An opinion piece in the Pioneer Press written by two clergymen and a college professor, in which we are told that churches should "reclaim" Black Friday.
They want us to turn this day of shopping into a day of sharing and, apparently, appreciation for what we have.
What's wrong with this picture? Well, the odd thing is, I'm completely in agreement with their sentiments regardng the vulgarity of "Black Friday" orgy. But I think they themselves are completely missing the basic point. They say congregations should "reclaim Black Friday." How about reclaiming Thanksgiving Day as an actual day of thanks? (After all, the only reason we have this Friday "holiday" is because of Thanksgiving Day.) You can't "reclaim" something that was never yours, and "Black Friday" was not a creation of religion, nor has it ever had any part in religion tradition.
What the seem to be doing is trying to make a secular feast into a religious one, counter to the prevailing trend, which has been for us to let the secular destroy the religious significance of our holidays.
Thanksgiving Day is a religiously significant holiday. After all, to whom are you giving thanks? The turkey? The federal government? No, to the Creator.
But we've been doing a really bad job of observing Thanksgiving Day and actually taking time to be thankful. Maybe if we paused to be thankful, we'd realize how ridiculous the whole "Black Friday" thing is in the first place. But instead, Thanksgiving Day, by my observation, has become about gluttony (not that there's anything wrong with that once a year!), with the rest of the day consumed by studying ads from the year's thickest newspaper bundle, and making plans for acquiring even more stuff. Meanwhile, the TV is on with the Thanksgiving Day football games, blaring ads for all the things that we must have/give so that our lives won't be meaningless. It's all secular and materialistic. Completely the opposite of what it should be. Thanksgiving Day above all others should be a day when we appreciate what we have and ask for nothing more.
But why relax, feel blessed and give thanks when you can feel inadequate and feed your anxiety? Maybe we should just be honest, and change the 4th Thursday in November to "Coveting Day." That's what it seems like. The Friday after I have personally renamed "Thorstein Veblen Day" in honor of the Minnesota economist who coined the term "conspicuous consumption."
Tonight We're Gonna Party Like It's . . . September, 2001
The President's speech tonight sounded an awfully lot like a speech that could have been given -- heck, was given -- eight years ago. With one notable exception: President Bush didn't repeatedly tell us "It's not my fault." (Boy, can this guy pass the buck and the blame.)
So, what it comes down to is Obama's making a commitment to fight the War on Terror. Well, a less-than-two-year "commitment." He says the troops will leave Afghanistan by August 2011. How does he know that the mission will have been accomplished by then? And does it matter? Or will he just set up a stage for his "victory" speech, and for a backdrop he'll just hang a banner between those fancy Greek columns. The banner, of course, will read: "Mission Accomplished."
Meet the new boss; same as the old boss.
Obama is fast learning that it's a lot easier to run against the president than it is to be the president.
400 Years and They Still Don't Get It
You've got to read this column by Bloomberg News columnist Caroline Baum. She tells how the Pilgrims finally quit starving when they got rid of their Utopian communal agriculture notions and made everyone responsible for themselves. And this isn't just her interpretation; she backs it up with the words of the Plymouth Colony's governor, William Bradford.
Why do people still not get it? Collectivist Soviet agriculture was a disaster. In 2009, many Americans continue to call for a socialist states of America. But it just doesn't work.
I'm a firm believer in capitalism and free markets -- they bring about the greatest good for the greatest number.
A Black Man Can Be President...
During a Thanksgiving Day football game on TV, I saw some sort of PSA or promo that began with New Orleans Saints quarterback Drew Brees, in very slow motion, throwing a pass. Then, very slowly, into the screen came the intended receiver, President Barack Obama.
Isn't that a stereotype? A black man can be president, but he still can't be the quarterback! (Even when he's the nation's play-caller.) He's got to be the wide receiver. Got to have black guys for those positions that require speed and jumping ability, right? But the guy who's in charge and has to "think"? That's got to be the white guy!
Made me laugh.
Since all those experts who spent most of eight years criticizing everything the previous administration did have suddenly gone silent, I guess it's up to me to ask some questions:
- If they all hated us because of Bush, and the world loves Obama, why is Islamic terrorism only spreading? And why is it threatening to take over Pakistan -- an Islamic country?
- Why didn't Obama "connect the dots" to prevent the Fort Hood slaughter? (And has anyone else pointed out how heinous this crime was not just because he is an American citizen, not just because he is a soldier who has sworn an oath, but because he is a DOCTOR?! What happened to being a healer and "first, do no harm"?)
- Where's the H1N1 flu vaccine? Why wasn't Obama prepared for this emeregency?
- We heard criticism that Bush took too much vacation. What's with all this golfing by the First Duffer? It's been reported that he's already golfed more than Bush did.
- But there wasn't time to go to Berlin for the 20 year anniversary of the fall of the Wall. What an insult to the rest of the world. (Guess he was tired after flying to Europe to lobby for Chicago to get the Olympics. That must have been more important.)
- If it was O.K. to "rush to judgement" about a "stupid" white cop, why isn't it O.K. when it's a murderous Muslim doctor?
Today I spotted a bumper sticker reading, "Who Would Jesus Torture?" It's mate must have fallen off. You know, the bumper sticker reading,"Who Would Jesus Abort?"
No, you got me. I've never actually seen that one. That's because the person who asks "who" (shouldn't it be "whom"?) Jesus would torture is generally a person who thinks abortion is just dandy. And that person, in fact, doesn't actually care what Jesus thinks. She just thinks that people who do believe in Jesus must be evil people who love torture. After all, anyone who isn't just like her must be her complete polar opposite, and a stupid, evil person. (That's what passes for diversity in many narrow and intolerant "liberal" minds.)
This is one of those "have you stopped beating your wife yet?" things. It implies that Christians (aka Republicans) support torture. Who says that's the case? Jesus, of course, would not torture anyone. A more interesting questions might be: "Who would Mohammed torture?" You might come up with a very different answer.
Those would be my three choices on the ballot question of "instant runoff voting" in tomorrow's St. Paul election. This is a terrible idea.
The idea would eliminate primaries in future city elections, so that however many kooky candidates there were were all on the general election ballot. Voters would rank the candidates in order of preference. If no one got more than 50 percent of the vote initially, the last place candidate would be eliminated, and the votes of the people who voted for him/her would be reassigned to other candidates according to those voters' second choices. If still no one had more than 50 percent, the process would continue until someone did.
Now, there's some logic to this, but only if voters get to rank ALL the candidates. In that instance, it would be sort of like having the primary and general election all in one. Proponents also like to say that it ensures that someone gets the eventual support of a true majority. But that's not the way it's always done. It's not the way they will be doing it in Minneapolis tomorrow. In Minneapolis, voters will get to rank only their top three choices for mayor, out of something like 10 or 12 candidates. What if all three of your choices end up at the bottom? There's a chance you would end with no vote at all! That's right, the winner will get a majority, but not necessarily a majority of ALL voters, just a majority of the voters who are still left in the game because at least one of their three choices is still in play. (How many choices St. Paul voters would get in future elections if this passes isn't even certain. The ballot question is too general, and would leave the details up to the city council.)
A supporter wrote a letter to the editor that claimed instant runoff voting is like going to the ice cream store with a list of your 12 favorite flavors and being assured of getting one of them. That's totally. I propose, instead, a soup shop analogy:
You go into the soup shop with a list of 3 soups you would like. The proprietor looks it over. "Beef Barley. NO! Chicken Noodle. NO!"
Well, you got one left, right? You're sure to get something for lunch, right?
The proprietor studies your list. Finally, he looks you in the eye and says:
"Clam Chowder? HA! NO SOUP FOR YOU!"
Yes, with IRV we'd be creating the VOTE NAZI! NO VOTE FOR YOU!!!!!!
Yes, people are going to be DISENFRANCHISED. (And the left-wingers who popularized that word are the ones behind this. Does that make any sense?)
This whole thing seems to be about making sure that a wacky leftie like Ralph Nader can't ruin things for mainstream Democrats, like they say happened to Al Gore in 2000. But they forget something else. Remember all the complaints about how the Florida ballots were confusing, and some people voted for Pat Buchanan when they meant to vote for Al Gore? (I showed the ballot, printed in the newspaper, to my then first-grader. She had no trouble with it.) If that was too tough -- if that "disenfranchised confused old people -- how are they ever going to handle ranking multiple selections?
Below is a sample Minneapolis ballot, distributed by IRV
proponents to show how "easy" it is. We spent six months recounting
the Coleman/Franken election and disputing ballots, and now we are supposed
to consider this progrss? They've got to be kidding!
Here's What Obama Should Say to the Nobel Committee
"I will not accept this award. It's obvious to everyone that this is intended as a shot at my predecessor in this office. What you obviously don't understand is that you are really taking a shot at the Office of the President and the United States of America.
"On a personal level, I'm insulted that you apparently think I am so shallow and conceited that I would believe I had earned even a nomination for this award within 12 days of taking office. I refuse to be your happy little puppet, willing to dance while you pull my strings and execute your own personal political vendettas.
"Are you so self-absorbed that you can't see the world around you? Have you forgotten that the forces of evil attacked the United States and killed 3,000 people? Are you unaware that two rogue nations are thumbing their noses at the lovers of peace, launching missiles and trying to develop nuclear warheads?
"Here's what you can do with your award: Give it to Osama bin Laden. That way, he'll have something in common to discuss with Yasser Arafat after the brave men and women of the United States military find him and send him to hell."
Put on Your Coat and Pass the Peace Pipe
I spent the day selling pumpkins. Felt like I should have been selling Christmas trees. If Barack Obama will have even half the success creating peace that Al Gore has had fighting "global warming," it's time to sell the Halliburton stock.
Hannah Montana and Miley Cyrus Go Dutch
I read recently that Ticketmaster is trying out a "paperless" ticket system that allows the original ticket buyer -- and only the original ticket buyer -- to resell the ticket to someone else at a profit. Oh, and Ticketmaster gets another piece of the action, too, of course.
I thought, "It's about time," because what I've always found strange about these complaints that brokers have snapped up all the tickets and people have to pay scalper prices, is that the artists, the venues and Ticketmaster are obviously missing out on money they could have had, because they sold the tickets too cheaply in the first place. I guess Ticketmaster finally figured out that they need to get another piece of the action. And that's fine with me.
Anyway, here is something on the topic that I wrote last summer but never got around to posting:
It was announced recently that tickets will go on sale for a Miley Cyrus concert here in St. Paul. This is particularly "big news" because of what happened last time the teen's tickets were sold for a show here: ticket brokers managed to work the online system to snap up almost all the tickets almost immediately. They then resold the tickets for a substantial profit. Fans (and particularly their mothers, who were paying for the tickets) weren't happy.
Promoters say that new safeguards will prevent a playback of that same situation.
But I have a better idea for how to handle ticket sales for high-demand events: a Dutch auction.
When it comes to tickets being marked-up and resold by brokers, there's always a lot of complaining about what it costs the fans. But it surprises me that I never hear anything about all the money this has cost some other parties: the promoters and the artist.
Think about it, if brokers can buy huge numbers of tickets and successfully resell them at a profit, it means the tickets were underpriced. The promoter should have charged more. But how does the promoter know how much to charge? How does the promoter get the most possible dollars for each seat?
That's where the Dutch auction comes in. Most auctions start with a low price, and the merchandise goes to the highest bidder. But a so-called "Dutch auction" works in reverse. The price starts high and goes lower, until someone says, "I'll take it." If there are multiple items on the bid, the first taker gets choice. If there are some left, the price goes done until someone else bites. It's sort of a game of auction "chicken." You can wait for the price to go lower, but you might miss out.
With computerized ticket sales systems, this ought to be easy enough to figure. Let's say the announcement goes out: Hannah Montana tickets go on sales for $500 Saturday at 10:00am. On Saturday at 10:00am, the most dedicated fans (or most optimistic scalpers) start buying the best seats at $500.
At some point, sales will slow to a trickle. That's when the price drops. Let's say to $450. That should make sales pick up. If it doesn't, or when sales slow again, the price drops again -- $400 -- $350 -- $300. If all the tickets don't sell quickly, the price continues to gradually decrease. Eventually, all the tickets are sold. It might be at $200, or $100, or $50, but each ticket sells for what someone thinks it is worth to them. If the tickets don't all sell, and the concert nears, what then? Slash the price again! Maybe they go to $5, but who cares? We've maximized the possible sale price of each ticket. But with a concert such as this, it's not really a question of whether all the tickets will sell. They will. And ALL the money people are willing to spend goes to the artist, the venue and the promoter -- without a big chunk going to scalpers.
Vote for One from Column A and One from Column B. Then Settle for Whatever You Get.
"Instant run-off" voting will be on the ballot in St. Paul this fall. This is the ballot method where you vote for several candidates, "ranking" them in order of preference. The idea, proponents say, is to eliminate elections where the winner receives less than a majority of votes. After the first tally of the votes, the candidate with the least votes is eliminated, and his/her voters are reassigned according to the candidates that they listed as their second choice. If still no candidate has at least half the vote, the process continues, and candidates are eliminated until someone has a true majority.
I don't like it.
Why? I say, "Follow the motivation." Just like "Follow the money." And what is the motivation for this? The motivation is very simple: Liberals are upset that Republicans have won elections when the Left has split its votes. For instance, between Gore and Nader. Or Kerry and Nader. This has been an issue in local elections, too. The Extreme Left wants to be able to "vote their conscience" and vote for a socialist, green, communist, whatever, without jeopardizing the chances of the "mainstream" Democrat. I think they hope that once the Far Left candidates are "protected" in this way, they'll eventually gather enough votes that they start winning, instead of the Democrats.
Now, some St. Paul restaurants are jumping on the bandwagon by offering customers "instant-runoff" voting on favorite menu items, in order to "educate" people about how wonderful it is.
Aren't the restaurants afraid that they might cost themselves business by taking sides on a controversial issue? You know, like the way that a boycott was organized when the Whole Foods chief spoke out againstt nationalized health care? I guess not. I guess peoplle on the right are more tolerant and open-minded. They don't try to destroy everyone who disagrees with them.
What other ballot issues could restaurants promote? I know -- there have been a lot of ballot initiatives concerning same-gender marriage. How about this: The restaurants could offer "menu equity." No more tradition and discrimination. Here's how it would work. Most of the time, when you ordered a sausage and egg breakfast, you'd get sausage and egg. But sometimes, you'd get sausage and sausage, and sometimes you'd get egg and egg. But if you complained, you'd simply be told that there was no difference.
Now why'd I have to go making a joke like that? Someone's bound to actually do it.
Sometimes, things just don't seem to make sense. Just ask Bob Tammen. He wrote this letter that appeared in the Pioneer Press on Aug. 23, 2009:
The recent news that an American citizen showed up outside an appearance by President Barack Obama with both a rifle and pistol brings back memories of the Republican convention last September.
My wife and I showed up for the poor people's march with signs that had small aluminum handles. We were promptly surrounded by police and photographers. The police made me remove the handles, remnants of a salvaged lawn chair, as a threat to the peace and good order of St. Paul.
The Pioneer Press printed a picture of that law enforcement action, which ensured that I would never use my "Impeach Bush" sign as a weapon.
It's now apparent that I should have used an AR-15 as the handle for my sign. Or is the real policy to hassle progressive Americans but allow right-wing fruitcakes to intimidate anyone who disagrees with their Big foot, tooth fairy, wicked witch, black helicopter, jack-booted thug, pull-the-plug-on-Grandma delusions?
Bob Tammen, Soudan
That does sound ridiculous, doesn't it?
But is it really fair to compare the two? These were different events, at different times, and in different places. What would have happened if Mr. Tammen had indeed brought his AR-15 to the "poor people's march"? I suspect law enforcement would have objected. And what if he had brought his lawn-chair sign to the Presidential event at which rifles were carried openly? I suspect he would have been left alone.
Nonetheless, I agree with Mr. Tammen that this just doesn't make sense. But there are a lot of things that don't make sense in this world. Consider:
Steal a little money from a liquor store, and you'll go to prison for years. Steal millions via fraud, and you'll go to a country club prison for months. I'll bet Mr. Tammen and I would agree that that doesn't make sense.
Shake a baby to death and you're a murderer. Kill a baby before it's born and you're exercising your Constitutional rights. That doesn't make sense, either.
But Mr. Tammen might not agree. Maybe he would, maybe he wouldn't, I don't know. But I do know that people who tend to rally against Republicans and have "poor people's marches" also tend to support abortion. And a lot of people who can find a right to abortion written between the lines in the Constitution have no trouble at all overlooking the very obvious 2nd Amendment.
Again, some things don't make sense.
The truth is, the human animal is not a very logical or consistent thinker. Mostly, we take a position based on intuition, emotion, or gut reaction. Then, we try to reason a defense of our position, telling ourselves that we're simply being rational. (But the other guy isn't.)
Here's another thought I had just the other day: Doesn't it seem like the people most likely to be sympathetic to illegal aliens, saying "They're just trying to make a better life for themselves," tend to be the same people most concerned about the injustice and illegality of the European conquest of the Americas? Aren't they also the people most likely to complain about the Europeans taking land from the people "who were here first"?
But weren't the Europeans just looking for a better life for themselves and their families? I know my immigrant ancestors were.
Of course, when it comes to present day illegal immigration into the U.S., who really was "here first"? The Anglo-Americans? Or the native ancestors of many of the people sneaking across the border? Hmmm. That's the trouble with asking "who was here first?" How far back do you go? And don't archeologists tell us that the woolly mammoths and saber-toothed tigers were perfectly happy in North America until the first humans arrived and wiped them out? Maybe none of us should be here.
How Many Degrees of Separation?
Big, big news... Sherry Johnston will do time for Oxycontin shenanigans.
Who's Sherry Johnston? You don't know? She's a big-time celebrity. A major public figure. Or, as the Associated Press explains...
"The mother of the man former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin's daughter Bristol had planned on marrying has reached a deal in her drug case."
Mother of...former...daughter...had planned on... Basically, she's nobody. But somehow, this nobody from Alaska is national news. Can't miss any opportunity to try to make Sarah Palin look bad, I suppose.
Where Have We Heard This Before?
Is it just me, or do others hear the president and his ObamaCare supporters pretty much saying:
1. "It's un-American to criticize the president and his health care plan."
2. "You're either for us or against us."
I Hate People Who Aren't Tolerant Just Like Me
I'm writing this while PBS is airing one of those special pledge drive shows. You know, the ones they put on so that people who don't usually watch PBS will watch and give money so that PBS can "continue to bring you great programming like this," after which PBS will go back to the regular programming that their new donors don't watch.
This one is a concert celebrating the 90th birthday of Pete Seeger. It's been promoted as having all kinds of special musical guests, and I thought it was worth a look. Pete and I disagree on a lot politically, but I respect his lifetime of musicianship, so what does politics have to do with it, right? Besides, Bush is gone now, so they won't have to make this into a Bush hatefest, the way liberal entertainers always have to do.
I'm so naive. Just because I can respect people's differences and say "live and let live," that's no reason to expect a bunch of rich liberal entertainers to do the same. It didn't take long at all and they were going after Bush.
Some of the morons had rewritten the lyrics to Seeger's song "Dear Mr. President," in which Seeger said to FDR, basically, "Give me a gun so I can go get Hitler." (Lyrics) The new lyrics are a love song to Obama "and your beautiful family." And they fling hate at Bush, even though he's no longer the president.
And these morons are idiots. They sing about how they "sent him back to Texas." How do they figure? Bush was elected twice and served two full terms. Then his time was up and he left. He was not defeated. Yet, Obama's Lewinskis-in-waiting on the stage seem to think Obama defeated Bush. After all, Obama pretty much ran against Bush, not against McCain.
I wonder, if you polled people who voted for Obama and asked them who Obama defeated, what percentage would say Bush? I bet at least 20% would say that Obama defeated Bush.
And what makes these musicians think they are all public policy experts? Does anyone ever ask Dick Cheney to pick up a guitar and entertain them? And why is that? Right, because he's a politician, not a musician. So why do musicians think they are all experts in politics?
Part of the new lyrics included complaints about how those evil "corporations" are running everything, even "telling our radio stations what to play." But that same singer is too much of an idiot to realize that government-subsidized PBS is letting him broadcast his own ignorant, hateful views to the nation. Heck, he's probably getting PAID to do so!
Why are liberals so narrow minded and intolerant? They think everyone is just like them. They get up on a stage and spout off, and they love it when the crowd reinforces their narrow-minded, ignorant hatred. They think everyone agrees with them, because they don't know anyone who doesn't. (Maybe they need more diversity in their lives?) And no doubt there are people in the audience who don't share their views, but they know it's best to keep their mouths shut. You know, like Jews at a Hitler rally.
And these things remind me of that. How hard is it to stand on stage and say you hate Bush? It's like at certain times and places where someone could stand in front of a crowd and earn applause for saying how much he hated negroes or Jews. The hateful mob. Yeah, that's real intellectual and tolerant.
STOP THE PRESSES!
I was just about to upload this post when Pete Seeger came on and talked about how nice it is that people are glad that their towns are diverse. They used to be glad they didn't have "those people," he said, giving examples such as Jews and blacks. But now, we're so happy to be diverse.
Yeah, right, as long as everyone thinks just like us and hates Bush.
When it comes to liberals, diversity is only skin deep.
Yesterday I stopped at Menards (a large home improvement store). Walking into the store, I noticed a car with an Obama sticker, an anti-Bush sticker, a pro-Al Franken radio sticker, etc. As I approached the store entrance, out came a woman and, for some reason, I thought to myself, "I bet that's her car." I turned to watch her walk to her car and... it was!
There must have been 80-100 cars in the lot. How did I know that? She just had "that look." Her shirt had some message on it, but I think it was simply a product name, not some statement.
Maybe you can judge a book by its cover.
Without knowing the facts, a president immediately comes to the defense of his buddy, and blames it all on someone of a different race.
If it were President George W. Bush rushing to make excuses for Karl Rove, and blaming a black cop, would we (meaning the mainstream media) stand for that?
So why does President Obama get away with it?
And long ago we (meaning the mainstream media) forgot all about the racist Rev. Wright, Obama's "mentor" and pastor.
If this isn't a double standard, what is?
Professor Gates supposedly ticked off the cop by saying something about "your Mama." But then I've heard it said that that the ignorant white cop shouldn't take offense, because he should know that for black people, that's not any big deal. That's interesting, sort of like the St. Paul public employees who got in trouble for stringing up a stuffed monkey in a noose at their workplace. They were charged with being racist. They said they were just practicing tying knots, and the monkey was a prop that just happened to be at hand. They were told that was no excuse, because they should have known that to their black co-workers, this would be very offensive, because evidently some people (liberals, I guess) think of African-Americans whenever they see a monkey.
No, wait, it's nothing like that. It's just the opposite. If we were being consitent, Gates would be scolded for his ignorance of diversity and lack of sensitivity for not understanding how his words would be received by somehow of a different race.
Again, if that's not a double standard, what is?
While I'm at it, have you noticed how President Obama bullies the press, with them gratefully being on the receiving end? I heard the audio from his recent news conference where he tried to cover up his earlier statements in the Gates case. he was ordering everyone to sit down and shut up so he could set the record straight.
Remember that prime-time TV "town hall meeting"* of his recently, the one where he explained to us little people how his wonderful health care "reform" plan would work? I didn't see it, but I saw just a little of his encore later that evening on ABC's "Nightline." In contrast to the usual softballs they always throw at him, the newman (Charles Gibson?) started pressing Obama on some contradictions between what Obama is saying now and what he said during the campaign. I thought, "Now we're getting somewhere." But Obama knew where it was leading, so he interrupted the newman in a raised voice, not letting him finish the question. And he even grabbed the newsman's arm! Obama scolded him like a child!
And how did this veteran newsman react? He grinned at the camera! It was as though he was thinking, "I can't believe he touched ME! I can't believe he yelled at ME!" He was totally starstruck.
He's a condescending bully to the press, and they love him for it. Amazing. The bumbling Bush was said to be arrogant; the haughty Obama is not.
Why?
*As someone who actually grew up on a farm across the road from an actual town hall, all of this "town hall meeting" talk always puzzles me. What do these big, East Coast city people know about town halls, let alone "town hall meetings"? Yet, they always claim they're having one -- usually in a TV studio filled with a carefully-selected audience.
We've had 5 Minnesota servicemen die in the past week. Obama's "surge" in Afghanistan has increased the fighting and the deaths. Now we're hearing that the Secretary of Defense wants to add another 22,000 troops to the military, because we need more people in Iraq and Afghanistan.
How long until the president's disciples turn on him and start protesting "Obama's war"?
It was just last September when the protesters turned out by the thousands to march during the Republican National Convention here in St. Paul. They were marching against President Bush, and, specifically, against "his" war. I thought that was rather odd, since Bush wasn't up for re-election, his time in office was almost done, and he was working to wind down the war in Iraq. They were a little late.
Now, they've got their man. And what's he doing? Getting us further entangled in the Afghan "quagmire" and forcing the war into Pakistan with its nuclear arsenal. Of course, for years they and Obama have been telling us that "Of course I support the war in Afghanistan; that's where the Taliban were. But Bush is neglecting that by focusing on Iraq." Now that young Americans are increasingly dying in Afghanistan and Bush is gone, do they still support that war? (As if they ever really did.)
How long before they turn on Obama?
It's trendy these days to be thrifty. Yuppie conspicuous consumption is out; "green" thriftiness is in.
I recently read a newspaper story about "thrifty" brides, who put together weddings on the cheap.
I suppose I should be glad to read that, having been repulsed in recent years by the accounts I have read about the extravagances that have now become "essential" in a modern wedding. But are these "thrifty" brides really being frugal? Or are they being cheap?
Some time ago I came up with a definition for the difference between frugal and cheap: "frugal" is when you take your wife out for dinner with a 2-for-1 coupon; "cheap" is when you tip your waitress based on the cost of one meal, not two.
The defining characteristic is that being frugal is being wise in the way you spend -- or don't spend -- your money. In my example, you have chosen to take advantage of an advantageous offer that has been freely extended to you, and the restauranteur is glad to have your business. Everyone wins. But being cheap is being foolish with your money; when you're cheap, you hurt someone. In my example, it's the waitress, who did her job, and then got short-changed. (But often the person who's hurt by your cheapness is yourself.)
Now, let's look at those "thrifty" brides. "I hoped to spend less than $2,000," one said, "And it ended up coming in at about $1,100 -- and that's with food. But I don't think it looked like a budget wedding. It certainly didn't feel that way to me. Everyone complimented me on the deorations and the flowers and especially the food."
Sounds like she's working pretty hard to convince herself.
The story goes on to say that "the newlyweds then splurged on a Las Vegas honeymoon."
"We both have good jobs, we didn't need to save money on the wedding," the bride said, "But if we could spend the money on the honeymoon rather than the wedding, we'd rather do that."
Oh, I see, rather than spend money -- which you have -- on your friends and family, you'd rather save it all to spend on yourselves!
Ruling: CHEAP!
A second bride boasted about saving money on the wedding, then explained, "We'll use the extra money to go on a long European honeymoon that will give us so many more memories than just one day."
Don't forget to email your poor guests the photos.
Ruling: CHEAP!
Helpless Victims or Competent Adults?
A big reason we have a political divide is because people see the same world so differently. What I can't relate to is the way that so many people -- those identified as "the left" or "liberals" or "progressives" -- see people as, basically, helpless victims, whose fate rests in the hands of... the government.
Here's an example. This is from the "progressive calendar" email that I get.
Subject: Underground RR 6.29 6pm
There is an Underground Rail Road Volunteer meeting.
Monday June 29 6:00-7:00
Sabathani Community center room 126
The Underground Rail Road is project put together by founding PPEHRC members. The reasoning behind the foundation of the program is to let neighbors help one another where social service organizations fall short. So far PPEHRC has used the Underground Rail Road Project to find free storage places for families facing evictions, find house-hold items for those in need, short term housing, volunteers, transportation to name a few.
It's great that people are trying to help their neighbors. But what jumps out at me here is, first, the assumption that "social service organizations" should just automatically be taking care of people, and only if they "fall short" will neighbors help each other Secondly, I notice that these people seem to need a program -- maybe even permission -- to help their neighbors. What's wrong with an individual just taking the initiative to get off his butt and help his neighbor? To be fair, I'm sure the people involved in this do help their neighbors already; they're just trying to organize to do a better job of it. Still, I think the words they use to describe their program show how their minds work.
A second example comes courtesy of Nobel Prize winning eonomist and newspaper columnist Paul Krugman. In a column blaming President Ronald Reagan for the current economic climate, Krugman concludes by writing:
There's plenty of blame to go around these days. But the prime villains behind the mess we're in were Reagan and his circle of advisers - men who forgot the lessons of America's last great financial crisis, and condemned the rest of us to repeat it.
"Condemned" us to repeat it? Don't we have free will? Just because somebody doesn't prevent you from making bad (with 20/20 hindsight) decisions doesn't mean you have to make those bad decisions. You can make responsible choices.
But not everyone sees the world that way. Some people think we're all helpless victims.
What's wrong with those nutty Iranian people? Don't they know we got rid of that "cowboy" George Bush and his nonsense about the "Axis of Evil"? Don't they know that under our new management, we realize that Iranian leaders love their children, too, and all we need is to sit down and talk? They'd better stop this protesting nonsense before someone gets hurt.
Can you imagine what would have happened if people in Eastern Europe had listened to that warmonger Ronald Reagan and rose up against their governments? Instead of accepting that they live in a workers' paradise of their own choosing? All hell might have broken loose in the Soviet bloc. Someone might have gotten hurt. Good thing left-wing American intellectuals knew better.
President Obama wants to be everything to everyone. In his much-ballyhooed "Speech to the Muslim World," he pointed out that while he is not a Muslim, his father was a Muslim.
Is that something to brag about? By rejecting the faith of his father, isn't he disrespecting both his father and Islam? And doesn't that make him even more of an infidel than someone who had no family history of Islam?
Then it was on to Europe for D-Day commemorations. We heard that Obama has German ancestry. And that his (Caucasian) family members stormed the beaches on D-Day. That's great. It shows what a typical, mutt of an American he is, right? But wait a minute, I thought he was the "First Black President"? It's so bizarre, the way that most of the time he's unqualifiedly "black," but then all of a sudden we start talking about his European ancestry, and no one bats an eye. Very strange.
It Is "The Obama Administration"
I asked earlier whether the press would blame bad news on "the Obama administration," or pass it off on "the Treasury Department" or such.
Well, I've been hearing "the Obama administration" used quite a bit, the same way they attached any unflattering reports to "the Bush administration." So... no bias there after all.
According to this report, Apple has rejected a proposed application for the iPhone that would let people superimpose their own faces over images of religious figures, including Jesus. Now, you might expect me to say, "Sacrilege! That's outrageous! Good for you, Apple! Don't let those heretics get away with it."
But you know what? We don't have any photos of Jesus, do we? We don't even have a painted portrait. So any "image" of Jesus is just an artist's conception. If I put my face on that artist's conception, we don't have my face superimposed on Jesus body, we just have me dressed and tressed as I might have been if I have lived in the Holy Land 2000 years ago. "Hey, look! It's Dave with long hair and a beard, wearing a robe and sandals!"
I suspect Apple's real fear is that they'll offend someone other than Christians.
New Crisis: The Earth Might NOT Be Warming!
After years of being told that the Earth is warming, which will cause great damage, melting ice caps, drowning polar bears, flooding coastal cities, starving people, etc., now it seems that a decrease in solar activity could counteract the alleged effects of CO2 emissions. Temperatures might not rise after all. Maybe the Earth will even get cooler.
This is the same type of sun cycle blamed for the Little Ice Age that cursed Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries.
So that's good news, right?
Depends on whom you ask.
If the effect is to cool the Earth, as in the so-called Maunder Minimum, the Little Ice Age that ran from 1645 to 1715, some scientists worry it would mask the effects of global warming caused by a buildup of greenhouse gases.
"The problem is if the sun is, indeed, going into a minimum, which we don't know yet, people will think that we don't have to act on climate change," said Angela Speck, an astrophysicist at the University of Missouri. "The sun came back out of that minimum in the 18th century" - when the River Thames turned to ice - "and it will come back out of this."
"I'm inclined to think the effects are real," said Adrian Melott [a University of Kansas] astrophysicist. "But the evidence is nowhere as solid as it is for the carbon dioxide buildup in the atmosphere" and climate change.
"My worry," he said, "is that it will lower temperatures and cause people to think it's OK to burn all that coal and oil."
One thing I've liked to write about over the years is examples of how those on the right and those on the left share a thought process, albeit over different issues. The thinking being demonstrated here reminds me of how some social conservatives reacted to the HPV vaccine that can now be given to girls. In that case, some critics said that giving this vaccine to girls (medical experts say it must be administered to minors to be effective) is tantamount to saying, "We expect you to start having sex any day now, so you might as well be protected. Now go and enjoy yourself!" The critics said girls should be told that they shouldn't be having sex outside of marriage, and the risk of contracting the HPV virus -- which can lead to cervical cancer -- is a good reason to remain chaste.
(A question that raises is, how would those on the left respond to an anti-tobacco vaccine that could be given to kids? Would they object because now kids would be more likely to smoke once they couldn't be threatened with tobacco-caused death?)
Better yet, there are those who think we shouldn't distribute condoms or try to find a cure for AIDS, because the threat of AIDS should serve as a reason for people not to participate in unapproved behaviors.
But if someone takes that stand, what do we call that person? Hateful. Homophobic. A zealot.
What then of someone who says they WANT the Earth to warm, and the polar bears drown, because that will serve as a warning to evil humans to repent and stop driving SUVs? What do we call that person?
A scientist.
Maybe I could have been more specific in explaining my point in the previous post. What I was saying was that it seemed that it would always be "The Bush Administration today announced rising unemployment" or "The Bush Administration today announced record mortgage foreclosures." Will it be the same way now? Or will it suddenly be "the Labor Department" and "the Commerce Department"?
This goes for Congress, too. When we had Republican majorities in Washington, I noticed a lot of news reports that went like this: "Republicans today voted to..." whenever the reporter seemed to think the bill was a bad thing. Will we now get "Senate Democrats today voted to raise your taxes"? Or will we get "The Senate today passed a tax increase"?
Let's watch, listen, and find out.
Why Not "the Obama Administration"?
There are some things I've been planning to keep an eye since we have changed presidents. One, as I reported on earlier, was to see whether the new president was referred to by newspeople as "Mr. Obama." I had noticed in recent years the tendency of reporters to say "Mr. Bush" rather than "President Bush," and I wondered if that was intended as a "he's not my president" message.
It turns out that I do hear reporters saying "Mr. Obama" in reference to the new president, so my suspicions were likely unwarranted.
But this Air Force One "photo op" fiasco over Manhattan that took place Monday offers an opportunity to test another one of my questions about how news coverage might change with a new president. Did you notice how this flap in New York was clearly blamed on "the Defense Department"? Even president Obama was able to express his shock and displeasure at the Defense Department for screwing up.
But what if this had happened while Bush was president. Don't you think he would have gotten the blame? After all, as president, he's in charge of all those federal departments. And if he had said he didn't know it was going to happen, that wouldn't have absolved him of blame. No, he would have been blamed for NOT knowing about it!
Getting around to my point, what I intend to watch for is the way that it seemed any bad news released by, or unpopular decision made by, a federal agency during the Bush years was always blamed on "the Bush administration." Rather than hearing that "the Treasury Department" or "the Commerce Department" had reported some bad economic news, it was always "the Bush administration." It seemed no chance was missed to attach Bush's name to anything negative.
Yet what about Monday's news? Read the news reports. It's not "the Obama administration" that gets the blame, is it? No, quite to the contrary. The evil "Defense Department" is to blame, and Obama gets to be just as ticked off at them as the rest of us.
Let's Keep Torture Safe, Legal, and Rare
In his "Best of the Web Today" on Friday, the Wall Street Journal's James Taranto wrote:
In yesterday's item on talk of prosecuting former government officials for supposedly authorizing "torture," we quoted a blogger who despaired of the existence of "a substantial minority of crazy people" who, according to said blogger, stand in the way of "an anti-torture consensus." A new survey from the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press sheds some interesting light on public opinion about this matter.
Pew asked, and has asked several times over the past year-and-a-half, which word best completes the sentence: "Torture to gain important information from terrorist suspects is justified ___." The most recent results, which are essentially in line with earlier surveys: "often," 15%; "sometimes," 34%; "rarely," 22%; "never," 25%; "don't know," 4%.
One way of looking at this is that it is the so-called antitorture consensus that is "crazy," at least in the sense of being far out of step with public opinion. Only 1 in 4 Americans thinks that torture is never justified; fully 71% think that there are cases in which it is.
But it's just as accurate to say that at least 81% of those polled think that torture is wrong. True, the majority of those see it as justified in certain cases, but this is what is meant by "the exception that proves the rule." Were it not wrong, it would not need to be justified.
I can't be the first person to think of this, but reading about the "torture consensus," it occurred to me that much the same thing can be said about the "consensus" on abortion: a majority may want to keep abortion legal and available as an option, but a majority also doesn't "like" abortion, and wants it to be rare. Think also of how, just as Taranto describes about torture, people find the need to "justify" abortion when it does take place -- incest, rape, economic hardship, etc., not just for "convenience." Just as Taranto describes in his analysis of the torture poll numbers, it's the exception that proves the rule.
So why aren't the "pro-choice" people on the left also "pro-choice" when it comes to torture?
And wouldn't it seem that anyone who holds that torture is ALWAYS wrong -- the ends never justifies the means -- would also hold that abortion is always wrong, no matter how inconvenient the pregnancy might be?
People: Human beings, yes. Sentient beings, for the most part. But rational beings? No.
If you've been reading me for a while, you will have noticed that I'm not one of those policy wonks who likes to spout a lot of numbers and statistics and details. Rather, I like to examine larger themes -- truisms, trends and connections in my observations of human nature, history and current events.
A couple of things jumped out at me in Pioneer Press news stories recently. This is an excerpt from a story about the idea of the state of Minnesota imposing sales tax on music downloads:
[Tax opponent Peter] Lindstrom [of the Minnesota High Tech Association] also contends a digital tax would undermine Minnesota's efforts to create a more energy-efficient economy.
"The environmental impact of sending zeros and ones up to a satellite and down to your iPhone is minimal," he said. "The environmental impact of making a CD, its plastic container and plastic wrapper and transporting it to the store is far greater than digital downloads.
"Encouraging digital downloads is much more green."
Okay, one question: How does he think that satellite got into orbit? A not insignificant amount of material and energy went into putting that satellite into orbit.
I'm not saying he's wrong (nor am I saying he's right), but the point here is that this is an example of how we only bother to enter "the devil we know" into the equation. If CD packaging and freight transportion are bad, then any alternative that does not include them must be better, right? But we totally ignore new factors that accompany the new product or procedure that we are adopting.
It's like margarine: Margarine was supposed to be better for us than butter. Why? Because it didn't have butter fat in it! Well, of course it didn't. But after several decades, we discovered it was loaded with something called "trans fat," which was actually worse for our health than butterfat. Why didn't we realize that decades ago? Because no one was looking for trans fat; we were just looking for something that wasn't butter.
There are many, many examples of this. We're always replacing something with something else that evenually we decide isn't so good after all. Babies bring us some good examples: Baby formula. Disposable diapers, what position the baby sleeps in. Then there are all those wonderful building products containing lead, asbestos or formeldahyde.
Second item: "Columbine taught police to shoot first."
That's the headline on a story that says the Columbine school shooting challenged everything that law enforcement officers had been taught about such situations. The common wisdom was to be patient, wait for the SWAT team. Then the SWAT team would take its time, methodically sweeping the building. But what happened in the meantime? More people were slaughtered.
So now we have the "active shooter" theory, which holds that when someone is actively killing people, the first order of business should be to stop (kill) the killer.
Almost seems like common sense, doesn't it?
The link here is to present-day terrorists and pirates. Do patience and negotiation work with such killers? Or do we need new tactics? "Active-shooter" tactics that mean shoot first, ask questions later?
Does President Obama recognize that we have a "new kind of enemy"? Maybe he does -- now. This is from a Wall Street Journal piece on "Obama's Gitmo," a detention camp in Afghanistan defended by the new Prez, which seems an awfully lot like the camp at Guantanamo Bay:
In an impassioned 2006 speech on the Senate floor on the right to habeas corpus, Mr. Obama declared, "I do not want to hear that this is a new world and we face a new kind of enemy." During the campaign, his language implied that all we needed to settle the detainee issue once and for all was to shut down Gitmo.
As president, he is finding out that this very much is a new world, that we do face a new enemy, and that the problems posed by Guantanamo have less to do with the place than the people we detain there.
Welcome to the real world, Mr. Obama.
Wanting to preserve the memory of former president Barack Obama, a parents group in St. Paul is pushing to have an elementary school renamed in honor of the late Commander-in-Chief.
What's that? He's not quite dead yet? He's only been president for three months?
Nonetheless, here it is in the Pioneer Press. Parents at Webster Elementary want to rename the school the "Barack and Michelle Obama Service Learning Elementary."
That's a really bad idea.
This isn't a partisan issue. It doesn't matter who the individual is, the St. Paul School District should not name anything after a "practicing" politician who, presumably, is not done running for election. Doing so implies an endorsement by the district. In time, I expect many schools across the nation will be named after Obama, but that should occur only after he has completed his time as president. Besides, he should be given a full 4 or 8 years to earn the honor without so totally fouling things up that no one wants to honor him anymore. The record's pretty short, so far. After all, did we start naming schools after President Bush when he was so popular on Sept. 12, 2001?
How would it look if the precinct caucuses -- or worse yet, the general election! -- were to be held at an "Obama" school in 2012? Can you imagine? "Your polling place is.... OBAMA ELEMENTARY." We'd have to have a Pawlenty Elementary (try saying that three times fast) just to even things out!
Naming a public school after a sitting president? Sounds like something a tin horn dictator would do in a banana republic.
Everything President Bush did was wrong. Obama would be completely different. Obama would end the war. Obama would make sure the rest of the world didn't hate us anymore.
That's what we were told. But now that Obama is president, it seems that maybe the only thing Bush did wrong was to be Bush. The great Obama is now acting like Bush. Oh, sure, sometimes he changes the names of things and pretends it's now different, but he seems to be able to continue Bush policies without getting the same criticism. Here are a couple of examples:
ISLAMABAD - A suicide bombing at a crowded Shiite mosque south of Pakistan's capital killed 22 people Sunday. A group believed linked to the Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility. The violence came as a senior Pakistani Taliban commander said his group was behind a deadly suicide bombing Saturday night in Islamabad and promised two more attacks per week if the U.S. does not stop missile strikes on Pakistani territory.
Earlier, I had read where a Taliban leader was threatening a large attack in the U.S., in retatilation for Obama's attacks on Pakistani territory.
Where are the people to say, "Obama is making the world hate us! He's making us less safe with his illegal war in Pakistan!"?
Obama gave his most unequivocal pledge yet to proceed with building a missile defense system in Europe, so long as Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons, a charge it denies. That shield is to be based in the Czech Republic and Poland. Those countries are on Russia's doorstep, and the shield has contributed to a souring of U.S.-Russia relations.
Obama previously had appeared to soft-pedal his support for the Bush-era shield proposal. But he adopted a different tone in Prague.
"As long as the threat from Iran persists, we will go forward with a missile defense system that is cost-effective and proven," Obama said.
Run against Bush; govern as Bush. Maybe Obama really is a genius! It seems the only thing wrong with Bush's policies is that they were Bush's policies.
A group of youths here in St. Paul are asking the city council to ban candy cigarettes. Apparently, they think that candy cigarettes are a "gateway drug" to the real thing! (With that in mind, wouldn't it be interesting to find out whether some of the would-be banners students or council members -- support the legalization of marijuana, perhaps arguing that pot ISN'T a "gateway drug"?)
Here's the story, as told by the Pioneer Press.
I think it's fine if a store decides not to sell candy cigarettes. And I think it would be great if the kids decided they would conduct an awareness campaign, and ask stores not to sell candy cigarettes. That would be a good learning experience for them.
But this running to the government to immediately ban something you don't approve of. Isn't that rather INTOLERANT? Aren't students usually the ones complaining when someone wants to protect them from themselves, and arguing that they have the right to make their own "choices" and learn from them? Don't they usually say that education and MORE tolerance on behalf of others are needed?
And the way they play the victim! "We're tired of being targeted." Well, if you know you're being targeted, then just ignore it. You're wise to the game, so what's the problem?
What other things could we ban so that kids don't grow up to do something harmful? Let's ban temporary tattoos so kids don't grow up to get real tattoos, look like thugs, and find themselves unable to gain employment. Let's ban video games in which kids steal, harm other people, or drive their cars recklessly. We don't want them to grow up to do those things for real. Ban toy cars, too, for good measure. You ever see how recklessly kids play with those? They don't even stop for Barbie when she's in the crosswalk! If we wanted to ban everything that's a bad influence on kids there goes Hollywood, TV, popular music, and on and on. (Not to mention the entire Internet.)
And don't you just love how the council backed away from the idea of banning tobacco which actually kills people? Politicians just love a straw man they'll take on candy cigarettes because they don't see any downside. But actually take action that would have consequences? They're scared to do that. And I'm sure a lot higher percentage of the population uses real cigarettes than uses candy cigarettes. The smaller the group, the easier to pick on it. But the less good you accomplish.
Council member Dave Thune says "Maybe we'll just reach a point where no one will smoke. We'll all be better off in a smoke-free society." With that laissez faire mentality, then why has Thune previously found it necessary to push smoking bans through the council?
And what lighters would we ban? Is a lighter with a Harley-Davidson logo on it a "toy"? How about those i-Phone apps that let you put an image of a lighter on the phone to use during rock concerts? Isn't that teaching kids that a lighter is a toy? That there is no danger to a lighter? That a flame is just a picture you look at?
Where does it end?!
I know it's just candy cigarettes who really cares, right? But aren't there principles involved?
Driving by, I noticed that Planned Parenthood in St. Paul sports one of those "no guns allowed on these premises" signs. We certainly wouldn't want any blood to be shed at the abortion clinic, would we?
What's the total of U.S. military personnel killed in six years in Iraq? For a long time we were always hearing the updated daily count, but now we don't. It's more than 4,000 killed, isn't it? Maybe nearly 5,000?
That's a lot of good Americans who have died for their country. Please don't think I am trying to minimize the magnitude of their sacrifice.
But recently I read something that, when compared to the body count in Iraq, really blew me away. According to the New York Times, since January of last year -- that's little more than a year -- 7,000 people have died in Mexico from drug-related violence. Most of those are people connected to the drug trade and drug cartels, or the law enforcement people trying to stop them.
And it's starting to come across the border.
Doesn't it seem like just last year that people were complaining about the "lack of affordable housing"? And about "the growing gap between the rich and the poor"?
Wait, I think it was just last year.
Now, houses are more affordable. But the complaint now is that the government should have done something to keep the housing bubble from bursting. And the gap between the rich and the poor? it's been shrinking. That's because the economic bust has hit the rich the hardest. Don't believe me? Read this story from the Pioneer Press about Minnesota's billionaires. Members of the Cargill family, for instance, are estimated to have lost 48 percent of their wealth in the last 6 months. I'm now about $1.3 billion closer to being a Cargill than I was 6 months ago! The gap is closing.
So this recession must be good thing, right? No, of course not.
But just as I don't benefit from a Cargill losing $1.3 billion, I didn't really suffer either when their wealth was growing. But a lot of people don't understand that. They suffer from two character flaws: They are jealous of others, and they want something for nothing. How do you get something for nothing? By taking from "the rich" and giving to "the rest of us." But how are you going to do that if you don't have any "rich," because you've been trying to make everyone the same?
The truth is, when the economy booms, we all benefit. Some of "the rich" benefit a lot more than the rest of us. But they also have a lot farther to fall when things go bad.
And was it ever realistic to think that we'd all get rich just by buying houses and letting their worth skyrocket forever? Of course not. But that didn't mean we didn't delude ourselves as long as we could.
A Lack of Interest, or It's the Principal of the Thing
Minnesota has a new program that helps Muslims buy houses without paying interest. This is necessary, because Islamic law prohibits the charging or paying of interest.
How does this work? Let's say the state wants to help someone buy a $100,000 house. The state marks up the price it charges the Muslim Minnesotan by the amount of a lifetime of interest charges, let's say another $100,000. So the state sells the $100,000 house for $200,000, and works up a "no interest, principal only" payment schedule based on the $200,000 price.
Voila! No interest is charged or paid! (Read the story in the Pioneer Press.)
That's ridiculous. Of course interest is being paid. It's just not being called interest. The homeowner is paying back more than the value he received up front. That's interest -- a surcharge for getting something now and paying for it later. It may not meet the IRS definition of home interest, but I don't think Islamic Law is based on the U.S. tax code.
If this is really a "no interest" loan, what else could we get away with? Hmmm. There's a law against prostitution. A woman may not sell sex, but she may give it away. How about if women working the streets stopped charging for sex? They could maybe sell flowers on the street corner, instead. And if with every $100 carnation they sold, they wanted to throw in a little "thank you" for the flower-buying customer, what would be wrong with that?
But the judge wouldn't buy it, would he? Because it would be clear that you weren't really paying $100 for a flower; you were paying extra for the flower to get around paying for the something extra. How is it different with this "no interest" mortgage? You're paying extra for the house to avoid paying for the interest.
Seems like the same "principal" to me.
Surrender Gardens for a Defeatist America?
We had Victory Gardens during WWII. Isn't that something? People wanted victory. They expected victory. I recently saw a WWII-era SPAM ad that said "Save your keys or use a can opener; no more keys for the duration." (Remember when the SPAM can came with a little "key" you detached and used to roll up a strip of metal around the can, thus opening it?) Every little bit helps, so metal would be saved by not putting a key on each can. But most notable is that phrase "for the duration." People expected to fight and sacrifice until the war was over. And how would we know when it was over? When we had won.
I'm getting pretty far afield now; I was talking about gardens. A story in the Pioneer Press yesterday (and make sure you read the comments section that follows) said that the number of people planting their own vegetable gardens is up. There's nothing wrong with that. But I think there are a lot of overblown reactions and exaggerated claims made here. People think it will be so easy to grow vegetables. And they'll save so much money. Pretty naive, I'd say. The reason we don't all grow our own vegetables is that food is not expensive. Paying someone else to grow your food makes it cheap and easy. If people want to grow vegetables, it doesn't hurt me; I'm not saying they shouldn't. I just think it's amusing how so many people have to work their own political ideology into everything. Did you catch that bit about "cultural baggage"?
Some years ago I observed yet another corn field turned into a housing development complete with giant yards. I got to wondering, would we someday turn so much farmland into residential lawns that we'd run short of food and people would plow up their huge yards just to grow something to survive? it hasn't come to that, but this story makes me think of it.
Have you been following this story about how the national Democrats have decided to target Rush Limbaugh as the head of the Republican Party? I think this is bizarre. The Democrats own the White House. The Senate. The House of Representatives. Most of the state houses. So now they are going after a radio entertainer? I think it makes the Dems look small. They've won, but that doesn't seem to be good enough for them. They still need someone to pick on. And that's what it seems like, that they are making sport of bullying someone -- just because that's what they like to do. I know, Rush is a big boy, he can take care of himself. And if he's going to dish it out, then he's going to have to take it. It isn't my purpose to defend him. But in this story, whacko James Carville and other Dems seem gleeful about this new opportunity to gang up and attack the unpopular kid in school. And note that that is why they are attacking him -- they found a lot of the other kids already don't like him, so they'll try to make themselves more popular by picking on him. Talk about grade school!
Now Limbaugh has responded by asking for a one-on-one debate with Obama. If the Dems want to elevate his status, he's going to take advantage of it. He also has equated the White House's obsession with him to Nixon's "enemies list." I think it's making the Obama administration look silly.
Or worse.
Before the election, someone remarked to me that he had heard a lot of Marxist ideology coming from Obama. I thought that might be overreacting. But now we're six months in and we've got "redistribution" and talk of nationalization of banks, under pretty much one-party rule. Look back over the past century. What does a Marxist one-party state do once it has vanquished its formal political opponents? It seeks to silence any others who might speak out against it and encourage dissent: Academics. Writers. Artists. Talk show hosts?
Don't Try to Make a Monkey Out of Me
As I told you before, there are some things I intend to be watching now that we have a new man/party in the White House. I want to see whether the news media give equal treatment or not. As I reported before, one question was answered when I heard the new prez being referred to as "Mr. Obama." I had wondered whether the frequent references to "Mr. Bush" instead of "President Bush" were a subtle "He's not my president" message. I guess not.
Another question I had was whether any editorial cartoonists would depict the new prez as an ape, after eight years of drawing Bush as a monkey. (He has the ears for it.) My thinking was that no one would dare.
Then, last week, along came the Al Sharpton blow-up over the dead chimp cartoon to answer the question.
Or did it answer the question? After all, the cartoon shows a chimp, not the president with chimp-like features.
I'm not sure what to make of that cartoon. We can argue all we want whether the cartoonist intended to equate the prez with an ape, but the truth is, I'll never be able to know what my gut reaction to it would have been. That's because before I ever saw it, I had read about it -- and about what other people were saying about it. I'm sure it's the same way for most of us. The real test would be for me to open up the paper and see it without any previous knowledge of it, then see what my reaction was. But it's too late for that.
But here's my ruling: The dead ape is not the president. The artist is depicting the much-reported crazed chimp that was shot by police last week. The artist is saying that it would take a crazed chimp to come up with the bailout bill that Congress passed last week. That's what's going on here, in my opinion. (But, like I said, the real test would be my unprepared gut reaction, not a reasoned analysis.)
Some people say that, yes, President Bush was depicted as a monkey, but it's different with a (half) Kenyan-American president. That's because there is a history of slurring black people with monkey references.
Nice of them to remind everyone of that, here in Obama's post-racial America. But doesn't it seem like the people who want to focus on that are simply perpetuating a hateful stereotype? Teaching it to another generation?
True equality means treating everyone the same. Everyone gets the same respect -- or lack of respect, as the case may be. If we're going to have different rules based on the color of people's skin, we don't have equality. Just as we can't have single out one group for ridicule, neither can we say one group may not be ridiculed.
Way back during campaign season, I kept hearing how Barack Obama was so cool under pressure, unflappable, he didn't get overly emotional. Plus, he was so darn smart and logical. And it occurred to me, maybe Obama was a Vulcan! He also has that whole "unique individual torn between two worlds" thing going, just like Mr. Spock, the half human, half vulcan hybrid.
But more recently, I realized that a more appropriate comparison might be to the universe's first African-American Vulcan, Tuvok, from "Star Trek Voyager." And when I did a photo search for Tuvok to check on the resemblance, I discovered that many others had had the same idea. Here's a sample "separated at birth" comparison that I found.
Some people amongst us are obsessed with the idea that we need to be more like Europe. Now, there's nothing wrong with looking around -- whether it be next door, in another state or across the ocean -- for good ideas. But some self-described "progressive" types simply seem obsessed with the very idea of being more European. If it's how they do it in Europe, they think, then it must be better.
For a recent example, here's a Pioneer Press story about some people who want a "natural" swimming pool built in Como Park. This is described as a non-chlorinated body of water more like a man-made lake than a conventional swimming pool.
That might be a great idea -- I don't know. But what really jumps out at me in the story is the yearning to be more like European. It's almost evangelical. Here's an excerpt:
Claudia Daly, a member of the Como Park Alliance and a neighbor to the pool, said she hopes the city takes a thoughtful, long-term approach to the project.
"I think whoever designs it can't just look at the plot of ground they're designing for. They have to look at the larger community. It's a pool within a park within a neighborhood," Daly said. "I have a feeling if the city will go a few steps further and just open their hearts and minds to this, they'll understand what a glorious opportunity it is."
Notice that with the pool issue -- and this is typical -- we are told, rather generically, that this is how they do it Europe. That's the real tip-off that you are dealing with Euro-vangelists. We never seem to get specific information, along the likes of, say, "The city of Paris built such a pool in 1999 and it has worked very well. Some problems they have overcome include...." No, that would be actual empirical evidence. To the Euro-vangelists, taking our cue from Europe isn't a means to an end, it's the end in itself.
I've written previously about how the Left likes to cry out, "Separation of church and state!" and "You can't legislate morality." Of course, they say that because they reserve legislating morality for themselves. Here's another example, from a Pioneer Press story about the Minnesota state budget:
Kicking off four days of testimony on Gov. Tim Pawlenty's proposed health and human services budget, religious leaders argued Wednesday that the way the state spends money is much more than a financial issue.
"It's the shape of our lives together in this state that's at stake," said the Rev. Peter Rogness, bishop of the St. Paul Area Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. "A budget is fundamentally a moral document."
I see. A budget is a "moral document," and we should look to religious higher-ups to tell us what it should be.
Just look at that, would you? It's quite simple. That's the Left telling us that religious leaders should advise the government on how to impose morality.
The Truth Is in the Funny Papers
This simple cartoon really got my train of thought chugging away. I thought, "What's more important than raising children properly?" And I thought, "If more people did a proper job of raising their children, we wouldn't have a lot of the problems that people think they need to go out and 'fight' against."
Then I had a sort of epiphany. I realized here was another one of those things that just doesn't make any sense. We have a lot of people (especially in the state legislature) who are always telling us that we must "invest" in our children, that a dollar spent on a preschool programs will more than pay for itself down the road in reduced prison costs.
Yet, these "progressive" types so intent on "investing" tax money in children tend to be the same people who don't think a woman should be "just" a mother -- she should be a lawyer or a businesswoman or a scientist... or a legislator.
Don't they know that "investing" begins at home?
Meet the New Boss, Same As the Old Boss
I love the way those old saying just continue to fit new developments.
"Don't judge a man until you've walked a mile in his moccasins."
"If you think it's so easy, you try it."
"The view is a lot different from the inside."
I saw just a bit of President Obama's news conference Monday night, but something jumped out at me: He sounded like president Bush!
When asked about a timetable for getting out of Afghanistan, he distanced himself from that, saying he wouldn't give one. (Not only that, but he is planning a "surge" for Afghanistan!) He vowed to give no quarter to Al Quaida. And asked about the policy of not allowing photography of the caskets of war dead, he replied that the policy was being reviewed but no immediate changes were planned.
Many Bush critics/Obama supporters believed that, simply put, EVERYTHING Bush did was wrong. If he did it, it was wrong. It was that simple in their minds. So they assumed that when Obama took over and brought change, well, EVERYTHING would change!
I think that Obama, to his credit, knows that many of the policies of the Bush administration were correct policies, so he will continue them when warranted. Of course he didn't let on that he knew that when he was campaigning against Bush (Whom, a lot of people need to be reminded, wasn't up for re-election.)
I love this story. It says President Obama is a role model who might be able to get young men to pull up their pants.
I haven't really bought into all the excitement about the "first black president." After all, his mother was white, and his father was sort of a visiting Kenyan sperm donor. And I don't really get the "Today, anything is possible!" sentiment. After all, as some have said, Colin Powell could have been elected eight years ago had he decided to run. But since so many do feel that way, I'm really hoping that President Obama can serve as an example and an inspiration to African-Americans. And, specifically, I hope he can serve as a positive role model to young black men. I'm hoping that he can show that dressing well, speaking well, getting an education, following the rules -- those things are not "acting white," but are a basic part of succeeding as an American.
It's been mentioned often that President Obama sometimes borrows from the style and rhetoric of former President Ronald Reagan. But what I've never seen explicitly expressed is this: What was it that Reagan offered a dispirited nation? Hope. Hope... and change.
----
I was shopping for greeting cards today. I saw a card that had many photos of former President George W. Bush, paired with photos of chimpanzees. Evidently, we were supposed to see a resemblance.
Do you think the greeting card company will be updating that card to similarly "honor" the new president? I think we both know the answer to that question, no matter how prominent the presidential ears may be.
So I ask you this: If there are some ways in which it is acceptable to mock a white man, but you mustn't make fun of a black man (or a mixed race man) in the same way, then are there also some corresponding ways in which you may make fun of a black man, but you may not mock a white man?
I can't think of any.
America: Just Another Banana in the Bunch?
We used to look at other nations -- banana republics, tin horn dictatorships, warring middle-eastern states -- and ask, "What's wrong with those people? Why can't they be more like us." But lately, I fear our own nation is devolving to become more like them.
That's why I find this local news story (from Richard Chin of the Pioneer Press) so disturbing. It tells of a public inauguration viewing party held at a movie theater. Here are some excerpts:
Once inside, the largely partisan crowd - many wearing Obama T-shirts and buttons - responded to the msnbc.com coverage like it was an old-fashioned melodrama.
They cheered when their heroes such as Bill and Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy, Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale appeared on the screen and hissed and booed when the cameras turned to their favorite villain, outgoing Vice President Dick Cheney.
No one threw a shoe, but the face of the outgoing vice president on the screen prompted the crowd to break into a chorus of "Nah, nah, nah, nah. Nah, nah, nah, nah. Hey, hey, hey, goodbye."
...
When evangelist Rick Warren delivered the invocation, dozens in the audience stood up and turned their backs in protest of Warren's opposition to gay marriage.
There were cheers when the camera showed moving vans taking the Bush family's possessions from the White House.
The people described here behaved very badly, in my opinion. They acted very disrespectfully, from at least three different perspectives.
First, and most obviously, they acted disrespectfully toward President George W. Bush. But that's the least of my concerns. In the big picture, a few hundred people in Minneapolis jeering one man, even if he is an outgoing president of the United States, maybe doesn't amount to much. (I could make a point about a lack of respect for the Office of the Presidency, but I think that battle was already lost years ago.)
Second, this crowd showed a lack of respect for the system -- the Constitution. Did they not notice that there were no opposing mobs jeering Obama? Did they not notice that there were no Bush partisans -- armed or otherwise -- putting up resistance, demanding that Bush remain in office? That's not the way we do things. Once again, we had a peaceful transition. President Bush had served out the two terms to which he was elected, and he was a willing participant in handing over the Office of the President to Mr. Obama, who had won an election fair and square. There is no role in this for mobs. That's not how we decide things.
Third, and perhaps most important in a city where the bumper stickers proclaim "Think Globally; Act Locally," this crowd showed a lack of respect for their fellow citizens. What about diversity? What about tolerance? Clearly, they either assumed that everyone there thought just like them, or they didn't care what someone else thought, as long as they themselves were in a large enough, vocal enough mob to dominant the place and intimidate anyone who thought differently into remaining silent -- or away.
You might say, "Dave, you should have expected this. Anyone who didn't want to be a part of this didn't have to go." That's right. I was aware of this event, and I did expect it to attract a partisan crowd. That's one reason why I wouldn't have attended even if I had been able to.
But here's the problem. You could say the same thing about a lot of public events/gatherings/places. I mean, you could say to someone, "What did you expect? Didn't you know that someone of your (fill in any ethnic/preference/gender/etc. group) wouldn't be welcome and comfortable (pick one or fill in your own: at that lunch counter; in that neighborhood; in that profession; riding public transit)? You should have just stuck with your own kind and there wouldn't have been any trouble."
And that's particularly ironic when it coincides with this inauguration.
During the Bush years, I told myself that when a Democrat next occupied the White House, I would be sure to pay attention to some specific examples to see if he (or she) was being treated the same way that Bush was treated. One of those examples was that for several years I've noted news people repeatedly referring to the president as "Mr. Bush," instead of "President Bush." I wondered if this was the reporters' way of indicating that "He's not my president."
Well, this very morning -- the very morning after the inauguration/coronation/royal wedding -- I already heard a reporter on the ABC Radio network refer to "Mr. Obama." He's the same reporter I wondered about when he said "Mr. Bush."
I guess maybe that wasn't a dig at Bush, after all.
There's a lot of talk about investing bail-out money in losers -- failing banks, failing auto companies, failing homeowners -- who have already demonstrated their knack for making poor financial decisions. Wouldn't it make more sense to give billions of dollars to individuals and companies that have shown their financial acumen by NOT needing a bail-out? Let those successful decision-makers put the money to good use and see what benefits might result for the nation.
For years, opponents of the Bush administration have told us that Iraq is "the wrong war." It's a "quagmire," they say. It's "another Vietnam."
Meanwhile, to cover their backsides and not appear "soft" on terrorism, they've said, "Of course I support the war in Afghanistan."
Well, folks, get ready for things to change.
The war in Iraq finally appears to have an end in sight. Meanwhile, the situation is deteriorating in Afghanistan, where the Taliban have regained territory and control, and there is no way to control the border with Pakistan.
If you want "another Vietnam," just look at Afghanistan. In fact, didn't we used to refer to it as "Russia's Vietnam" after the Soviets spent a decade there to no effect? No one has ever been able to control Afghanistan peacefully. Yet, the incoming administration had pledged to send more Americans there to fight. Is there a plan for "victory" in Afghanistan?
A prediction: Someday, we will look back on Iraq as the successful war; Afghanistan will be remembered as "another Vietnam."
The Grass Is Always Greener While the Pendulum Swings
"The grass is always greener..." and "the pendulum swings both ways" are two old sayings that come to mind with this post. Here's a story about gym classes "just for girls." It's the hottest thing since gender equity.
"You can really teach them things that are appropriate just for them," [teacher Bridgette] Andrews said.
Girls - who rarely registered for elective gym before - suddenly felt comfortable talking about nutrition, their lack of exercise and eating disorders. Boys found the freedom to play harder, be more competitive and discuss health topics related to them, Andrews said.
Separate but equal? Or, separate... but equal to more than the sum of its parts?
I remember the good old days when separating the sexes was considered inherently "discriminatory." That followed the goode olde days when the sexes were usually separated just because "that's the way nature intended it."
So what gives now?
This is dangerous territory for a man, but what's going on inside the heads of women, whether "feminists" or not?
My only explanation is that women want to be the ones (and the only ones with this prerogative) to decide whether or not they will be separated from the men. They may not actually want to do everything with the men, but they don't want anyone telling them that they can't.
I'd connect this to the color pink. Remember when "girl stuff" was pink? Then, the feminists rebelled against it, saying women shouldn't be assigned some color that made them look weak.
Now, I see that pink is fashionable again, but in some new applications. Not just pink clothes or pink lunch boxes or pink streamers on bicycle handlebars. Now women can get pink hand tools, or pink guns.
I guess women do inherently like pink, but they want it to be their own choice. And who am I to argue with a woman who might be wielding a pink hammer or a pink deer rifle?
Obama said last week that he thinks we should delay the digital TV transition. How's that for irony? You'd think he would be the last person to say that Americans aren't ready for change.
And what would be the effect on the economy? For example, while I'm not planning on getting a new digital TV right now (I'll get by with a converter box), I do plan to buy a new DVD recorder with a digital tuner, so that I can timeshift programs I'm not able to watch at broadcast time. But if the switch is delayed, my purchase will be, also. That's $300 Best Buy won't be getting. With the awful holiday shopping season retailers have suffered through, do they really need that?
There's a disconnect here. His words are all about "change" and "economic stimulus," but his actions speak otherwise.
I've been suprised at how quickly Washington Democrats have started fighting amongst themselves, and that Congressional Democrats are already starting turf wars with Obama. The pre-election campfire sing-along is over.
I suppose I shouldn't be surprised. It's the nature of politics, and human nature. (And it could just as well be Republicans.) Everyone played nice while they were united against a common enemy at election time, but now that the Dems have won that battle,they are turning their sights on each other.
They think they don't have to worry about Republicans anymore. They're cocky. But what goes around comes around. The pendulum always swings back eventually.
I made the annual banished word list put out by Lake Superior State University with my submission "not so much." (Used when a simple "no" would do.)
Last year I never got around to making my submission, so when the list came out, all I could do was stare at my yellow Post-Note on the wall behind my monitor, on which I had scribbled the banished word "surge."
I've made the list at least twice previously, earning banishment for the TV news cliches "is dead tonight" (1998) and "shallow grave." (1992)
dave ["at" ] downingworld
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