In case any of you missed it, what with stocking up for St. Patrick's Day and what-not, Albert Einstein would have turned 125 last Sunday. It brought back some memories for me. As often happens when I am experiencing memories they bump up against current thoughts, and I feel the need to talk.
What brings back memories is the fact that 25 years ago I happened to be loafing at the Swiss Polytechnic, Albie's old grad school, and I witnessed the Polytechnic's celebration of his centennial. Boy the fireworks and the huge dance party were terrific.
I just lied for the fun of it. There were no fireworks and huge dance party for Einstein's 100th birthday. Einstein was the Poly's most famous graduate by far, but they didn't seem to care very much. One of the Poly's Jewish professors told me it was because Einstein had been Jewish. He insisted that it was not a sign of rabid Anti-Semitism; it was merely a lack of enthusiasm for Jewish-ness that was involved. "Besides," he said, "Einstein was German, not Swiss." Ah, labels.
One of the things we "editors" of Real Change do to prove our editorship is to read over these things the week after they come out and discuss them. We call it "issue review." We feel as though the papers are our babies, but when we see our newborns we are often shocked at the sight of her chin or the number of her toes.
Sometimes the shock is ongoing. Like when I see each new StreetWatch for the first time. It always makes me wince.
It isn't Emma Quinn's fault. Emma draws the material from police reports and can't and shouldn't edit them much. I wouldn't want her to; it's valuable to see how the police write these things up. It gives us all an important view into that world. But I never get used to it.
It's the roll call of the cast that mostly bothers me. Last issue we had: a transient Native American male, a homeless White female, a transient White male, a transient Black male, a White female, a transient Black male, and a transient Asian male, in that order. Run for your lives! We're surrounded by transients!
No wait, it's not that bad. My dictionary says that transients are people who are only staying for a short time, like an itinerant laborer or a temporary guest. It comes from the Latin for "one passing through." So presumably 5 of the 7 of our StreetWatch subjects are passing through Seattle. Maybe they're from Cleveland.
Run for your lives! We're surrounded by Clevelandites!
Or not. Turns out that by "transient" the police just mean "homeless." So the three times I was homeless in Seattle I would have been called transient, even though I'm from here.
But is the mislabeling right, even if it is consistent? And when it happens to be accurate, is it called for?
In the mid-eighties one of the dailies surveyed their readers and found that more than 50 percent came to this area within the previous 15 years. If that's the case with the general population, why stigmatize the homeless for their geographic mobility?
And what do they mean, transient Asian male? Am I to believe he was born there -- like Einstein was born in Germany, to be forever German, regardless of citizenship –- or am I to think he has Asian ancestry but is as American as I am, like most of the so-called "Asians" in this city?
My best friend in high school was Japanese-American. His father fought for his country, this one, in WWII, with the famous 442nd Combat Regiment. If my friend or his children were now homeless they would be "Asians" in our police reports. Such inaccuracy can't do any good in the long run.
Thursday, March 18, 2004
Thursday, March 4, 2004
Wes and Kirkpatrick Kissing In a Tree...
A couple of days ago fellow "editor" Michele "I'm Back and I'm Bossy!" Marchand suggested that I write about that film City Without a Home that Adam Holdorf reviewed last issue. I saw City Without a Home myself (I like to call it Film Without a Clue) and Michele and I are in absolute agreement that it would be a good thing if I derided the film in a civil and thoughtful manner.
Unfortunately, in order to do that up right I would have to recap for you all what the film is about. I would have to tell how the filmmakers lived at Tent City 3 for eight days and interviewed a bunch of residents there. Then I would have to get all detailed and picky about why I thought the treatment was biased beyond belief. This would entail my remembering that fact to myself and raising my blood pressure.
I've done that too much lately. My whole last column was written in a pissy fit. I need to talk about something that amuses me. So, let's talk about recent constitutional amendment proposals!
One constitutional amendment proposal was recently in the news as California Governor Schwarzenegger backed the movement to allow foreign-born people to be president. Now, I'm all in favor of such an amendment, in spite of the fact that if it had passed in 1963 it would have allowed Barry Goldwater (who was born in the Gadsen Purchase) to have become president and I might not have enjoyed that. But if Schwarzenegger really wants the amendment to be passed, shouldn't he lie low about it? Does it really advance his cause to scare everyone with the prospect of a President Schwarzenegger?
I say let's annex Austria BEFORE we let that happen, OK?
But the amusing amendment for all time has got to be the one you knew I was going to bring up. That would be the amendment, currently being discussed in the House, intended to ban same-sex marriages. That would be the amendment of which arch-conservative James J. Kilpatrick has said, "This mean-spirited and bigoted resolution spits in the face of freedom." Me and James are in bed together on this one, ready to pick out a ring. OK, Anitra, just kidding. But seriously, I am a conservative today. Is that amusing, or what?
The amendment, in the form it is being considered in Congress, is called the Musgrave Amendment after its sponsor, Republican Congressperson Marilyn Musgrave. Its authors include lawyer Matt Daniels, who grew up with one mother and no father and doesn't want that to happen to anybody else and thinks this gets him somewhere with that, and Robert Bork, who might have been a Supreme Court Justice if the Senate hadn't freaked when they found out what a fruitcake he was. We now get to see just how right they were. That was some bullet we dodged.
You know your constitutional amendment sucks when legal scholars already can't figure out what it really means, not a hundred years after enacted, but even when it's proposed. Here it is: "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the Constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups."
The authors say the intent in the second sentence is not to ban civil unions but only to keep courts from mandating them, while allowing state legislatures to decide the issue. But in fact what they have written allows local officials everywhere to defy state laws altogether!
Let's say this amendment passed and say I ran for mayor of Seattle and won. Know what my first act in office would be? Quoting the Musgrave Amendment I would ban all marriages in Seattle. If gays and lesbians can't marry, I would say, then in the interest of equality nobody can. And the Musgrave Amendment would grant me the right to do that, because it says no state law can require marital status to be conferred on anyone who isn't already married!
Q. What reason does Marilyn Musgrave give for opposing same-sex marriages? A. None! She says she's a representative, not a minister, so she shouldn't discuss that! Is that a hoot, or what?
Unfortunately, in order to do that up right I would have to recap for you all what the film is about. I would have to tell how the filmmakers lived at Tent City 3 for eight days and interviewed a bunch of residents there. Then I would have to get all detailed and picky about why I thought the treatment was biased beyond belief. This would entail my remembering that fact to myself and raising my blood pressure.
I've done that too much lately. My whole last column was written in a pissy fit. I need to talk about something that amuses me. So, let's talk about recent constitutional amendment proposals!
One constitutional amendment proposal was recently in the news as California Governor Schwarzenegger backed the movement to allow foreign-born people to be president. Now, I'm all in favor of such an amendment, in spite of the fact that if it had passed in 1963 it would have allowed Barry Goldwater (who was born in the Gadsen Purchase) to have become president and I might not have enjoyed that. But if Schwarzenegger really wants the amendment to be passed, shouldn't he lie low about it? Does it really advance his cause to scare everyone with the prospect of a President Schwarzenegger?
I say let's annex Austria BEFORE we let that happen, OK?
But the amusing amendment for all time has got to be the one you knew I was going to bring up. That would be the amendment, currently being discussed in the House, intended to ban same-sex marriages. That would be the amendment of which arch-conservative James J. Kilpatrick has said, "This mean-spirited and bigoted resolution spits in the face of freedom." Me and James are in bed together on this one, ready to pick out a ring. OK, Anitra, just kidding. But seriously, I am a conservative today. Is that amusing, or what?
The amendment, in the form it is being considered in Congress, is called the Musgrave Amendment after its sponsor, Republican Congressperson Marilyn Musgrave. Its authors include lawyer Matt Daniels, who grew up with one mother and no father and doesn't want that to happen to anybody else and thinks this gets him somewhere with that, and Robert Bork, who might have been a Supreme Court Justice if the Senate hadn't freaked when they found out what a fruitcake he was. We now get to see just how right they were. That was some bullet we dodged.
You know your constitutional amendment sucks when legal scholars already can't figure out what it really means, not a hundred years after enacted, but even when it's proposed. Here it is: "Marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman. Neither this Constitution, nor the Constitution of any state, nor state or federal law, shall be construed to require that marital status or the legal incidents thereof be conferred upon unmarried couples or groups."
The authors say the intent in the second sentence is not to ban civil unions but only to keep courts from mandating them, while allowing state legislatures to decide the issue. But in fact what they have written allows local officials everywhere to defy state laws altogether!
Let's say this amendment passed and say I ran for mayor of Seattle and won. Know what my first act in office would be? Quoting the Musgrave Amendment I would ban all marriages in Seattle. If gays and lesbians can't marry, I would say, then in the interest of equality nobody can. And the Musgrave Amendment would grant me the right to do that, because it says no state law can require marital status to be conferred on anyone who isn't already married!
Q. What reason does Marilyn Musgrave give for opposing same-sex marriages? A. None! She says she's a representative, not a minister, so she shouldn't discuss that! Is that a hoot, or what?
Thursday, February 19, 2004
We Need A Marriage Bank?
I'm writing this over the Valentine's Day/ President's Day weekend. The word now is that, at Mayor Gavin Newsom's direction, San Francisco will issue as many as 2000 marriage licenses to same-sex couples before the courts consider an injunction to stop them. Nearly a thousand have already been married in civil ceremonies authorized by the mayor's office and conducted by volunteers who have given up their three-day weekends for the honor.
And kids these days say we baby boomers had all the fun. Look out, there haven't been this many outraged bigots since those poor tired white people were deprived of Rosa Parks' seat at the front of the bus in 1955.
At least the white riders of that Alabama bus could justifiably whine that they were deprived of a seat. What with seats on a bus being a limited resource and all, you can strain your imagination and visualize how some white guy could get all up and righteous that HIS personal racially reserved seat had been usurped.
But today people declare that the "sanctity of marriage" entitles heterosexuals to have all of it even when there's no shortage! And were only talking about civil marriages! Nobody is forcing churches to recognize any of these same-sex marriages.
Speaking of the sanctity of marriage, the last I heard it was still a violation of the US Constitution for either state or federal US government lawmakers to promote the sanctity of anything or anyone in legislation. So why has the California legislature done so, we wonder idly and pointlessly, with un-bated breath and without question mark.
To me, the really interesting question lies with the clash of morality and legality. This subject is usually subsumed under the categories of "civil disobedience" and "human rights" and in my humble opinion grossly over-simplified at every turn in accordance with the ideologies of the simplifiers.
Not that I am a stranger to simplicity. Hey, I took Philosophy 105 and got me a C+ for the section on John Stuart Mill. I learned to spell "Stuart."
What I'm trying to say is, the courts have to figure out whether what Gavin Newsom is doing is legal. He says California's law is illegal under the state's constitution, and that he's only upholding the latter. In which case he is merely the only California mayor to take his oath of office literally in this regard.
But there is no question in my mind that he has done what is morally right. Morality falls heavily on the side of the oppressed, and no matter what Christian Fundamentalists may think Christians aren't oppressed in this country. To encapsulate, Christians are to same-sex marriages as white folks were to de-segregation. You can be one of the ones who get in the way, or not.
In the words of Jesus, "Get thee behind me, Satan." When you are oppressed I'll stand with you. When you are the one doing the oppressing you need to hear it plain and simple, so you can know when to get down off people's backs.
Speaking of getting the plain-and-simple out, and such: I've been obsessing about the practices of certain Christian missions lately, thanks to some semi-private input I've recently received. I'm talking about the practice of requiring poor people who are invited to a "free" meal to attend a church service beforehand.
This practice is wholly legal and justifiable to the extent, and just to the extent, that the meals are intended exclusively for Christians, and that we all are prepared to agree that non-Christians ought to fend for themselves. Let sinners, secularists, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, whatever, set up their own "free" meals for their own poor people, right?
But it has come to my attention that there are some who would go out of their way to call non-Christians to these feasts, without setting aside the church-attendance requirement for them. I just want to go on record, as saying that exploiting the hunger of poor people to promote your religion is immoral and reprehensible. Please don't.
And kids these days say we baby boomers had all the fun. Look out, there haven't been this many outraged bigots since those poor tired white people were deprived of Rosa Parks' seat at the front of the bus in 1955.
At least the white riders of that Alabama bus could justifiably whine that they were deprived of a seat. What with seats on a bus being a limited resource and all, you can strain your imagination and visualize how some white guy could get all up and righteous that HIS personal racially reserved seat had been usurped.
But today people declare that the "sanctity of marriage" entitles heterosexuals to have all of it even when there's no shortage! And were only talking about civil marriages! Nobody is forcing churches to recognize any of these same-sex marriages.
Speaking of the sanctity of marriage, the last I heard it was still a violation of the US Constitution for either state or federal US government lawmakers to promote the sanctity of anything or anyone in legislation. So why has the California legislature done so, we wonder idly and pointlessly, with un-bated breath and without question mark.
To me, the really interesting question lies with the clash of morality and legality. This subject is usually subsumed under the categories of "civil disobedience" and "human rights" and in my humble opinion grossly over-simplified at every turn in accordance with the ideologies of the simplifiers.
Not that I am a stranger to simplicity. Hey, I took Philosophy 105 and got me a C+ for the section on John Stuart Mill. I learned to spell "Stuart."
What I'm trying to say is, the courts have to figure out whether what Gavin Newsom is doing is legal. He says California's law is illegal under the state's constitution, and that he's only upholding the latter. In which case he is merely the only California mayor to take his oath of office literally in this regard.
But there is no question in my mind that he has done what is morally right. Morality falls heavily on the side of the oppressed, and no matter what Christian Fundamentalists may think Christians aren't oppressed in this country. To encapsulate, Christians are to same-sex marriages as white folks were to de-segregation. You can be one of the ones who get in the way, or not.
In the words of Jesus, "Get thee behind me, Satan." When you are oppressed I'll stand with you. When you are the one doing the oppressing you need to hear it plain and simple, so you can know when to get down off people's backs.
Speaking of getting the plain-and-simple out, and such: I've been obsessing about the practices of certain Christian missions lately, thanks to some semi-private input I've recently received. I'm talking about the practice of requiring poor people who are invited to a "free" meal to attend a church service beforehand.
This practice is wholly legal and justifiable to the extent, and just to the extent, that the meals are intended exclusively for Christians, and that we all are prepared to agree that non-Christians ought to fend for themselves. Let sinners, secularists, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, whatever, set up their own "free" meals for their own poor people, right?
But it has come to my attention that there are some who would go out of their way to call non-Christians to these feasts, without setting aside the church-attendance requirement for them. I just want to go on record, as saying that exploiting the hunger of poor people to promote your religion is immoral and reprehensible. Please don't.
Thursday, February 5, 2004
Wes Dreamed of Being a Baseball Goalie
Let's talk about baseball!
A lot of people think I don't care about baseball, just because I don't like to play it or watch anybody else play it, or hear about baseball games and scores, or know when the season begins and ends, or know how to play baseball.
But how wrong they are. I care, every bit as much as I care about all the other great joys of life. E.g., the daisies of the meadows, the smiles of little boys catching and gutting their first fishes, fishes in general. Oh, I don't know, kites are good, mom, apple pie, rhubarb roasting on an open fire, whatever. Baseball is like one of those kinds of things to me. I actually think about baseball a lot, even when it's not happening, like now.
Parts of baseball I especially like to think about are the bat parts and the running parts. I don't like to think about the catching parts because of a certain traumatic experience that occurred to me as a kid. My grade school had my gym class play baseball and it so happens I am a myopically challenged person who requires glasses (the technical term in baseball jargon is "four-eyes.") The teacher disallowed my glasses on the playing field for the very reasonable reason that if I were hit with a baseball it could shatter them and sends shards of glass through my eyes and on into my brain leaving me a vegetable.
So I was put out to one of the "fields" (I think it was the "right" one) to look for and catch fly balls, without my glasses. But I couldn't see this one fly ball that came at me so instead of catching it, it caught me, right in the head. Good thing I wasn't wearing my glasses at the time or it would have been just like I just told you, with me being a vegetable and all, and the shards! But it still left an emotional scar for life. Ouch!
In spite of that trauma I still want to talk about baseball. I want to share my excitement about the recent ruling by Seattle Municipal Court Judge Jean Rietschel that dismissed charges against some men for scalping Mariners tickets on the streets, on the grounds they were the victims of selective enforcement of Seattle's anti-scalping law.
Now I don't understand anything about Seattle's anti-scalping law. What I especially don't understand about Seattle's anti-scalping law is, how is scalping wrong if capitalism is right? I mean, there are crimes occasionally associated with scalping like theft and counterfeiting and fraud, but we have laws against those things already. Why do we have to throw a net out broadly for scalpers? Isn't that like arresting people who drive in order to put a stop to hit and runs?
I have lots of questions like that. Why doesn't the Ninth Amendment to the US Constitution ever get a nod in courts? That's the one that says a right of the people doesn't have to be on the list to count. I think we need an Amendment Nine and a Half that says, "We really meant Amendment Nine."
According to a Seattle Times story, Judge Rietschel based her ruling in part on her opinion that the scalping arrests would not have occurred had the Mariners themselves not pursued them by hiring off-duty Seattle police to look for scalpers. Also she pointed out the Mariners allow scalping on their own website by letting sellers use fake out-of-city addresses to get around the city ordinance. I guess that's OK to the Mariners because they get a cut of the on-line sales.
Here's what I'm really excited about: It can be done, people! It's possible to win a case of selective enforcement in Seattle! There's hope for the rest of us yet, that the courts might protect us from the selective enforcement of city and state ordinances by police in the hire of businesses.
There shouldn't be ANY police in the pay of businesses. When an off-duty police officer uses his power to arrest while in the pay of anyone but the taxpayers proper accountability is skirted and government authority is subverted. The power to arrest belongs only in public hands under public direction.
Hooray for small steps toward sanity.
A lot of people think I don't care about baseball, just because I don't like to play it or watch anybody else play it, or hear about baseball games and scores, or know when the season begins and ends, or know how to play baseball.
But how wrong they are. I care, every bit as much as I care about all the other great joys of life. E.g., the daisies of the meadows, the smiles of little boys catching and gutting their first fishes, fishes in general. Oh, I don't know, kites are good, mom, apple pie, rhubarb roasting on an open fire, whatever. Baseball is like one of those kinds of things to me. I actually think about baseball a lot, even when it's not happening, like now.
Parts of baseball I especially like to think about are the bat parts and the running parts. I don't like to think about the catching parts because of a certain traumatic experience that occurred to me as a kid. My grade school had my gym class play baseball and it so happens I am a myopically challenged person who requires glasses (the technical term in baseball jargon is "four-eyes.") The teacher disallowed my glasses on the playing field for the very reasonable reason that if I were hit with a baseball it could shatter them and sends shards of glass through my eyes and on into my brain leaving me a vegetable.
So I was put out to one of the "fields" (I think it was the "right" one) to look for and catch fly balls, without my glasses. But I couldn't see this one fly ball that came at me so instead of catching it, it caught me, right in the head. Good thing I wasn't wearing my glasses at the time or it would have been just like I just told you, with me being a vegetable and all, and the shards! But it still left an emotional scar for life. Ouch!
In spite of that trauma I still want to talk about baseball. I want to share my excitement about the recent ruling by Seattle Municipal Court Judge Jean Rietschel that dismissed charges against some men for scalping Mariners tickets on the streets, on the grounds they were the victims of selective enforcement of Seattle's anti-scalping law.
Now I don't understand anything about Seattle's anti-scalping law. What I especially don't understand about Seattle's anti-scalping law is, how is scalping wrong if capitalism is right? I mean, there are crimes occasionally associated with scalping like theft and counterfeiting and fraud, but we have laws against those things already. Why do we have to throw a net out broadly for scalpers? Isn't that like arresting people who drive in order to put a stop to hit and runs?
I have lots of questions like that. Why doesn't the Ninth Amendment to the US Constitution ever get a nod in courts? That's the one that says a right of the people doesn't have to be on the list to count. I think we need an Amendment Nine and a Half that says, "We really meant Amendment Nine."
According to a Seattle Times story, Judge Rietschel based her ruling in part on her opinion that the scalping arrests would not have occurred had the Mariners themselves not pursued them by hiring off-duty Seattle police to look for scalpers. Also she pointed out the Mariners allow scalping on their own website by letting sellers use fake out-of-city addresses to get around the city ordinance. I guess that's OK to the Mariners because they get a cut of the on-line sales.
Here's what I'm really excited about: It can be done, people! It's possible to win a case of selective enforcement in Seattle! There's hope for the rest of us yet, that the courts might protect us from the selective enforcement of city and state ordinances by police in the hire of businesses.
There shouldn't be ANY police in the pay of businesses. When an off-duty police officer uses his power to arrest while in the pay of anyone but the taxpayers proper accountability is skirted and government authority is subverted. The power to arrest belongs only in public hands under public direction.
Hooray for small steps toward sanity.
Thursday, January 22, 2004
Go Seahawks, in the Sense of Motion
Since I started reeling off my pet peeves last time, I've discovered it's addictive. Soon I'll be the old man in the communal room at the rest home cursing everyone. The cursing will release endorphins. These will allow me to get by on less debilitating pain medication than my sweetness-and-light fellow residents. Therefore I will outlive their sorry asses.
Why isn't football over? Didn't the last game of every season used to be played on New Years Day? Or am I being confused by the slowing of the Earth's revolution and the introduction of the Gregorian calendar? Doesn't anybody else remember how, when the last game was played, the players on the winning team all had their hearts cut out and offered to the gods and the rest of us got to enjoy a little closure?
Which reminds me of this huge peeve category: People who feel that if I don't share their sentiments then I'm somehow invalidating them. OK, I don't support the Seahawks in any sense of the word "support." But that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with other people supporting them. In fact I make it easier for the rest of you to get tickets to the games, because I'm not there taking up a seat.
Other sentiments that I have been at one time or another perceived as "invalidating": somebody's love of Jesus, someone's feeling that all sex is ultimately rape, a love of textile technology and fabric science, a love of scattering matrices, appreciation for long hair, short hair, ancient Sparta, and the Rolling Stones.
It's only a short step from "If you don't like the Rolling Stones I'm going punch you in the nose" to the position of political correctness that says "If you aren't sensitive to my feelings of victimization I'm going to use my political clout to silence you."
I hate all varieties of political correctness, including all the favorite forms of left-wing PCness. You know how, for example, it's considered so foul to use the N-word by some people that Mark Twain, a dead white writer, is believed to have no right to use it even in a book attacking slavery, and that such books should be banned from libraries. For other examples of left-wing PCness that I hate, all of them, see countless columns by John Leo.
But here's a pet peeve: There's right-wing political correctness too! And Leo and friends like it! And it's on the rise!
There's the Israeli ambassador who vandalized a work of art in Sweden because he perceived it as offensive to victims of a Palestinian suicide-bomber. He called the piece an "abomination." Ariel Sharon backed the ambassador's action and praised him. It recalled another famous time a nation's leader was praising the destruction of artistic abominations, back in the 1930s.
Oops! Look at the bad I just did! I made a comparison between Sharon and Hitler! Oh no, now I may have trivialized the Holocaust! I am now as bad as MoveOn.org for posting ads comparing Bush to Hitler! I must be chastised by the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Congress, the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Republican National Committee for my own good, then I must apologize profusely, withdraw my comments, and then… well there is no then because I'm sure none of that would satisfy them.
Here's the deal: Hitler didn't leap into power in 1933 and instantly kill 6 million Jews. First he had to get laws passed that weakened legal protections. Then he had to exploit the backlash against that move so he could win support for more drastic measures. Then he had to develop a secret apparatus to carry out those measures with as little resistance as possible. The Holocaust took time and preparation.
I'm sorry, but I can't help but notice that Bush HAS taken Hitler's baby steps. That's just how a lot of people see the matter. It doesn't trivialize the Holocaust to harbor fears that we have smoothed the way for another one. It also doesn't help political discussions any to try to silence people when they express their fears openly. It's PC-mongering at its worst.
Why isn't football over? Didn't the last game of every season used to be played on New Years Day? Or am I being confused by the slowing of the Earth's revolution and the introduction of the Gregorian calendar? Doesn't anybody else remember how, when the last game was played, the players on the winning team all had their hearts cut out and offered to the gods and the rest of us got to enjoy a little closure?
Which reminds me of this huge peeve category: People who feel that if I don't share their sentiments then I'm somehow invalidating them. OK, I don't support the Seahawks in any sense of the word "support." But that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with other people supporting them. In fact I make it easier for the rest of you to get tickets to the games, because I'm not there taking up a seat.
Other sentiments that I have been at one time or another perceived as "invalidating": somebody's love of Jesus, someone's feeling that all sex is ultimately rape, a love of textile technology and fabric science, a love of scattering matrices, appreciation for long hair, short hair, ancient Sparta, and the Rolling Stones.
It's only a short step from "If you don't like the Rolling Stones I'm going punch you in the nose" to the position of political correctness that says "If you aren't sensitive to my feelings of victimization I'm going to use my political clout to silence you."
I hate all varieties of political correctness, including all the favorite forms of left-wing PCness. You know how, for example, it's considered so foul to use the N-word by some people that Mark Twain, a dead white writer, is believed to have no right to use it even in a book attacking slavery, and that such books should be banned from libraries. For other examples of left-wing PCness that I hate, all of them, see countless columns by John Leo.
But here's a pet peeve: There's right-wing political correctness too! And Leo and friends like it! And it's on the rise!
There's the Israeli ambassador who vandalized a work of art in Sweden because he perceived it as offensive to victims of a Palestinian suicide-bomber. He called the piece an "abomination." Ariel Sharon backed the ambassador's action and praised him. It recalled another famous time a nation's leader was praising the destruction of artistic abominations, back in the 1930s.
Oops! Look at the bad I just did! I made a comparison between Sharon and Hitler! Oh no, now I may have trivialized the Holocaust! I am now as bad as MoveOn.org for posting ads comparing Bush to Hitler! I must be chastised by the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Congress, the Simon Wiesenthal Center and the Republican National Committee for my own good, then I must apologize profusely, withdraw my comments, and then… well there is no then because I'm sure none of that would satisfy them.
Here's the deal: Hitler didn't leap into power in 1933 and instantly kill 6 million Jews. First he had to get laws passed that weakened legal protections. Then he had to exploit the backlash against that move so he could win support for more drastic measures. Then he had to develop a secret apparatus to carry out those measures with as little resistance as possible. The Holocaust took time and preparation.
I'm sorry, but I can't help but notice that Bush HAS taken Hitler's baby steps. That's just how a lot of people see the matter. It doesn't trivialize the Holocaust to harbor fears that we have smoothed the way for another one. It also doesn't help political discussions any to try to silence people when they express their fears openly. It's PC-mongering at its worst.
Thursday, January 8, 2004
The Kiwi Is Surprisingly Stylish, Itself
Before I get started I want to make an announcement from the News You Can Refuse Department. On January 20th at 11pm RCTV is scheduled to have its first airing on community access television. That's RC as in Real Change, but it will be created, produced and hosted independently of Real Change by Steve Schrock.
Now, a couple of days ago Steve came by the office and taped interviews with yours truly and fellow editor Anitra "On Whose Kitchen Floor I Have Sometimes Slept" Freeman. I'm afraid those interviews may form the basis of the first show, even though I might have let slip some things about my sordid love affair[s] or what I may have initially thought of Timothy "Our Glorious Founder" Harris, and even though Anitra may have discussed whether I have ever been infested with invisible insects.
So what I'm saying is, this is News You Can Refuse. If you get the community access channel, you don't HAVE to watch RCTV that night. No, you can watch the Daily Show on Comedy Central instead, in spite of the fact that they rerun it the next day at 7 and it wouldn't hurt you to watch Jon Stewart a day late for once. Or you could watch, say, News at Eleven on Eleven 'cause you were too busy watching Whose Line reruns to see News at Ten on Thirteen, but you still have to get your news fix. Hey, nobody's holding a gun to your head, you know? Sheesh.
Speaking of me getting started, in our last column I ranted a bit. I know that ranting isn't pretty, so I thought I'd get ahead of the game and warn people what sorts of things start me up. In other words, let's talk about MY pet peeves!
1. People who just discovered Mars. "Mars is sooo interesting! Did you know that Mars was closer last year than it ever was in 60,000 years? Isn't that AWESOME? Don't you want to go look at it right now?" No, I want to chew beef jerky in front of a space heater. Go away for another 60,000 years.
2. Repetition. For example, her/his very clever joke at my expense was hilarious the first time I heard it and mildly amusing the next 20 times but after the 100th time she/he could be replaced with a neurotic self-abusive parrot and the world would be a far better place.
3. DSHS caseworkers. What are these people paid for? They don't know anything. They don't have any evident education into the challenges that their clients face. They don't even know how DSHS works. If you want to know a rule and ask three different caseworkers about it, you'll get three different answers. Paris Hilton knows more about poverty than these people.
4. Overused rhetorical devices. "Can you tell me what a rhetorical question is?" Well, I know that choking can prevent them.
5. Script speakers. These are people we have all known that compose and rehearse the conversations they will have with us, expecting us to follow their scripts even though we haven't seen them and don't care anyway. No matter what people like this say, I like to turn the subject to flightless birds or traditional oceanic art, or both. "I had a great time this weekend." "Maori depictions of Kiwi were rather stylized." "Don't you want to know what I did this weekend?" "The small repeated triangle is seen most often in Micronesia." "Aren't you listening to me? I thought you would ask about my weekend." "Emus?"
6. Pedestrian tailgaters. You get on a bus and someone gets on right behind you. Not only do they follow too close, but apparently they think your plan is to walk all the way to the end of the bus and walk out the imaginary back door at the very end, because when you stop to sit in a vacant seat it comes as a total shock to them and they run into you.
7. Weapons of mass destruction and the people who create and use them. Regarding weapons of limited destruction, many earnest people have told me that those have military uses, and that's a qualified Good in the Face of Evil. But weapons of mass destruction target civilians, including innocent children, an unqualified Bad. So people shouldn’t have them. Hello? That means us.
Now, a couple of days ago Steve came by the office and taped interviews with yours truly and fellow editor Anitra "On Whose Kitchen Floor I Have Sometimes Slept" Freeman. I'm afraid those interviews may form the basis of the first show, even though I might have let slip some things about my sordid love affair[s] or what I may have initially thought of Timothy "Our Glorious Founder" Harris, and even though Anitra may have discussed whether I have ever been infested with invisible insects.
So what I'm saying is, this is News You Can Refuse. If you get the community access channel, you don't HAVE to watch RCTV that night. No, you can watch the Daily Show on Comedy Central instead, in spite of the fact that they rerun it the next day at 7 and it wouldn't hurt you to watch Jon Stewart a day late for once. Or you could watch, say, News at Eleven on Eleven 'cause you were too busy watching Whose Line reruns to see News at Ten on Thirteen, but you still have to get your news fix. Hey, nobody's holding a gun to your head, you know? Sheesh.
Speaking of me getting started, in our last column I ranted a bit. I know that ranting isn't pretty, so I thought I'd get ahead of the game and warn people what sorts of things start me up. In other words, let's talk about MY pet peeves!
1. People who just discovered Mars. "Mars is sooo interesting! Did you know that Mars was closer last year than it ever was in 60,000 years? Isn't that AWESOME? Don't you want to go look at it right now?" No, I want to chew beef jerky in front of a space heater. Go away for another 60,000 years.
2. Repetition. For example, her/his very clever joke at my expense was hilarious the first time I heard it and mildly amusing the next 20 times but after the 100th time she/he could be replaced with a neurotic self-abusive parrot and the world would be a far better place.
3. DSHS caseworkers. What are these people paid for? They don't know anything. They don't have any evident education into the challenges that their clients face. They don't even know how DSHS works. If you want to know a rule and ask three different caseworkers about it, you'll get three different answers. Paris Hilton knows more about poverty than these people.
4. Overused rhetorical devices. "Can you tell me what a rhetorical question is?" Well, I know that choking can prevent them.
5. Script speakers. These are people we have all known that compose and rehearse the conversations they will have with us, expecting us to follow their scripts even though we haven't seen them and don't care anyway. No matter what people like this say, I like to turn the subject to flightless birds or traditional oceanic art, or both. "I had a great time this weekend." "Maori depictions of Kiwi were rather stylized." "Don't you want to know what I did this weekend?" "The small repeated triangle is seen most often in Micronesia." "Aren't you listening to me? I thought you would ask about my weekend." "Emus?"
6. Pedestrian tailgaters. You get on a bus and someone gets on right behind you. Not only do they follow too close, but apparently they think your plan is to walk all the way to the end of the bus and walk out the imaginary back door at the very end, because when you stop to sit in a vacant seat it comes as a total shock to them and they run into you.
7. Weapons of mass destruction and the people who create and use them. Regarding weapons of limited destruction, many earnest people have told me that those have military uses, and that's a qualified Good in the Face of Evil. But weapons of mass destruction target civilians, including innocent children, an unqualified Bad. So people shouldn’t have them. Hello? That means us.
Wednesday, December 24, 2003
There's Always One In Every Decision
RANT ALERT!
The good news: a panel of the 2nd US Court of Appeals finally, FINALLY, told the Bush administration that simply declaring someone an "enemy combatant" did not provide them with an excuse to deny that person a lawyer or rights to a trial. The bad news: it isn't over.
Jose Padilla, a US citizen, was arrested in Chicago in May 2002 and has been held in a navy brig in South Carolina for a year and a half. He hasn't been allowed to see his lawyers. Although the government has said that Padilla was involved in a dirty bomb terrorist plot he hasn't been charged with a crime in any court of law. The view of the government is that they didn't even have to say what he was supposed to be guilty of, it was enough for them to declare that Mr. Padilla was an "enemy combatant" to detain him in the brig FOR LIFE in ISOLATION if they wanted to do so.
Bush's people still think that's the way it should work and will probably appeal. They are no doubt encouraged by the fact that one member of the 3 judge panel actually sided with them. The idea of the dissenting opinion was that the president needs the power to detain people who may be a threat to the public.
Let's reflect on that dissenting opinion to get a clear idea in our own minds as to what a screaming imbecile that one lame judge is.
The man has been detained for one and a half years. The immediate threat is over. HE'S IN THE BRIG. He's detained already. The issue isn't the detention. His arrest was proper. The issue is, once you've got him, YOU STILL HAVE TO LET HIM SEE A LAWYER AND TRY HIM AND LET HIM GO IF HE TURNS OUT TO BE INNOCENT.
And oh yes, the Bush Administration has had A YEAR AND A HALF to do that. Did I make that clear enough? A friggin YEAR AND A HALF.
Here is a personal note for that one lame judge: * Guess what? I think you're a threat to the American people. Good thing I'm not the president or I might declare your ass enemy combatant material and put you in isolation for, oh I don't know, how about for YEAR AND A HALF?! * -- Ha, ha, just kidding -- Dr. Wes.
Speaking of South Carolina, that was where police stormed a school recently and searched a hundred students for illegal drugs, some of them at gunpoint, because their principal thought it would be swell. What we have here is another threat to the American people. There are getting to be too many of these.
I don't expect the police to know or understand the constitution. That would be dreaming. But is it asking too much for a school principal to have read it with comprehension?
What part of the Fourth Amendment does that principal not grasp, I wonder? Was it the part about "the right of the people to be secure… against unreasonable searches?" Was he not aware that minors also constitute people? Was it the part about how search warrants were required to be specific? How specific is searching every kid in a school hallway whether they have done anything suspicious or not just because a crime may or may not have at one time occurred in that hallway days or weeks earlier by completely different people?
Here's another one, folks. Say you're on vacation in Guadalajara, Mexico, and our government, or some imbecile in it, decides they want to incarcerate you for life without charges or a hearing. Here's how they could do that. They would seize you in Mexico without clearance from the Mexican authorities. Then, they would take you to Guantanamo Base ("Gitmo") and imprison you with all the Taliban, as an "enemy combatant" (It doesn't matter if you are or not, they don't have to prove that part. They just have to declare it.)
Gitmo, a secure US military enclave, isn't really America, so all that constitution BS doesn't apply. -- that's the essence of our government's actual legal position as they fight for that power to the Supreme Court. What a crock.
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