Mr. Obama's First 100 Days

Okay, President Obama's first 100 days are completed. What can we say?

There have been many conservative commentaries that are extremely critical of the new Administration, fundamentally on the grounds that (pick a policy area, any policy area) what the President has proposed or achieved will not work under any reasonable scenario. For instance, Mr. Obama has been dealing with the economic debacle by raising taxes and massively increasing government debt (aka spending). The critics say this won't work and they are correct. In his first 100 days Mr. Obama has also been trying to rescue America's financial system and Detroit automakers. In both these areas, the critics say he is doing exactly the wrong things, and their opinion seems born out by the way the fortunes of the companies the President is trying to save continue to deteriorate. After months of the most extraordinary government actions both the Detroit automakers and some of America's largest banks are now careening inevitably towards insolvency, bankruptcy and/or nationalization. So, again, the critics are right.

However, I depart from the critics because as right as they are, they are right about the wrong thing. Mr. Obama's first 100 days have been a smashing success in almost every area.

I can say this for the simple reason that I am measuring Mr. Obama on what he intended to accomplish, whereas his critics insist on measuring him on what they think is important. I think he ought to be graded (at least initially) on his own yardstick, not theirs. To do otherwise would be like grading a math exam solely from a grammatical point of view. In math, the point is not clarity and concision of expression, but formal correctness and elegance of the solution. E=mc2 gets about an F as a grammatical statement, but an A for mathematical correctness and elegance.

So too with Mr. Obama. His primary goal for the economy has never been to bring the country out of a recession, as is assumed by his critics, but rather to transform the economy into something different. Higher taxes on the "rich" and massive government spending (aka debt) are entirely appropriate means towards his ends, and on these two he has achieved an astonishing amount in his first 100 days. And too, his goals for the Banks and Detroit never had anything to do with stabilizing them and then returning them to their previous status as independent private businesses. The President regarded them right from the start as significant means towards accomplishing his ultimate goal. He has seen clearly as his critics have not that if he can nationalize these two important areas of the American economy then he can go a long way towards transforming the American economy into something different without - and this is the important part - having to go through the hard, inefficient and often impossible job of pushing legislation through Congress.

To flesh out one example of what I am talking about, let's take Detroit.

Continue ..... If you assume, as is likely, that Mr. Obama's goals for Detroit were to preserve Union jobs and retirement benefits and to reduce the number of large, gas-guzzling cars on the road, then when he took office he had two ways he could go:

(1) He could have gone to Congress and attempted to get legislation increasing Federal CAFE standards to such onerous levels as to force Detroit to build only little green golf carts. However, because the sale of such vehicles could not support the existing level of Union wages and retirement benefits, this would have put the automakers out of business and thrown Union workers into the unemployment lines. So to achieve both his goals, the President would simultaneously have had to get Congress to authorize the assumption of some large portion of Union wages and retirement benefits.

Such bold, decisive transformation of the auto industry through legislation, of course, would be politically impossible, if not suicidal for any President. So, Mr. Obama decided to go with his second option:

(2) Secure government control of both the Board and the CEO of GM (he did this in his first 45 days in office), restructure the equity ownership of the Company so that his Administration and the Unions own over 50% of GM and cash out other interested parties like bond holders (he is within days of achieving this as of this writing), affirm all Union contracts including legacy retirement benefits while discharging most other obligations of the Company in a pre-packaged bankruptcy (will be done in his second 100 days in office), and finally dictate the closing down of all lines of SUV's, trucks, and other large vehicles in favor of little green golf carts (to be done in the remainder of his first term and continued for all time thereafter).

Presto! After only 100 days in office and without any legislation at all, Mr. Obama is well on his way to saving Union wages and benefits and transforming the 2nd largest automaker in the world into a producer of little green golf carts. The brilliance of Mr. Obama's maneuvers in this respect is exceeded only by his stunning success in accomplishing seemingly impossible goals for the American car industry.

As for the banking industry, suffice it to say that the President’s goal for banking has been the same as for the auto industry: to achieve through nationalization what would be impossible for him to achieve legislatively.

However, remember that Mr. Obama's actions with regard to the auto and banking industries are means to his larger goals for the American economy. I leave it to the reader to discern what exactly Mr. Obama's ultimate goals are, which are not that hard to figure out. But please, stay away from such fatuous simplicities as "Socialism." As used today, Socialism is merely a political buzz word and carries no substantive or analytic content anymore.

As regards America and its future, the President knows the math and is doing the math. His critics are content to correct his grammar. Therein lies the reason for Mr. Obama's resounding success in his first 100 days, and for the undoubted success he will have in the remainder of his term.

Iraq Shows the Way to Democracy in America

I have zero knowledge about the publishers of this article on this website: http://ballotpedia.org/wiki/index.php/Dead_voters_cast_ballots_in_Dallas_County, and do not intend to endorse the site. But the stories I read there ring true to any moderately informed and aware voter, especially given the wide-spread reporting by both the Major Media and the Alternative Media about ACORN's activities in the recent elections.

My question is: are we, the oldest (by far!) continuous constitutional democracy in the world, not obligated to respond to the cloud of suspicion raised by all of these stories? If so, then I would suggest that there is one reform which would be easy to implement and would reduce about 90% of possible voter fraud: it's called the 'Iraqi Voting Method' and involves inking a digit finger of everyone that votes.

I admit, it would be embarrassing for us to require such things of our voters because we would be admitting that after 200 years this experiment in democracy now looked little different than other countries popularly described as third world backwaters. But then again, there is a certain nobility to be found in admitting fault, and inking a digit of every voter might be the very symbol of repentence owed by the world's leader in democracy that has so tellingly failed its own ideals.

Gay Marriage and Post Modern Debate in America

This Post continued from here.

I acknowledge that in all of this I have not addressed the substantive issue as to whether Gay Marriage should be legally recognized. That is because with the Ignorati Class at the helm of our Republic today it is important to clear away the flotsam and jetsam of public discourse.

Where as now the Ignorati Class dominates society, the popular conception is that a resolution of problems occurs after debate when the contending parties come to a unanimous agreement. Armed with this silly idea, the result of public debate can only be what Dreher describes: a bitterly divisive people constantly haranguing each other, producing a "shrillness of contemporary public debate."

So, to recap, what is the real role of debate and voting in our system? We must all understand first that we are a constitutional Republic, not a debating society. In a properly ordered society reasoned and respectful debate forms an important ground for the expression of fundamental American values and the resolution of problems between people. But unanimous agreement between all parties is not the goal of public debate, nor is it desirable. We seek consensus to public questions, not monolithic agreement.

But we also seek finality to public controversies. How does a constitutional Republic reconcile its desire for consensus agreement with finality on any given issue? By voting. When debate has run its course we the people put the issue to a vote. Thereafter, everyone is supposed to move on to other issues or to their own private affairs.

For the Ignorati Class, debate continues forever until the mythical point of unanimous agreement occurs. It's all politics all the time, and only divisiveness and shrillness can ensue. To the simple educated citizen of a constitutional Republic, it's politics sometimes and then the pursuit of our own personal happiness most of the time.

As an aside, I think this points to what the electorate was saying this past election season when all the polls indicated a desire for an end to the divisiveness in politics. Whether they knew it or not, the people actually wanted an end to all politics all the time, for a finality to the acrimonious public debate on so many public controversies so that they could return to the real stuff of life. Back in the lead-up to the elections of 1920 Warren Harding called a similar public desire a need for a return to “normalcy” after the dominating war footing the country had lived under Woodrow Wilson’s progressive administration.

But in any case, now that I have clarified to everyone’s satisfaction the place of debate and voting in our society, in my next Post I will address the rather straight forward substantive issues on the legalization of Gay Marriage.

To be continued ...

The PEOPLE Speak! Blonde: The New Brunette

All Posts on this topic may be found here.

PEOPLE (People for Equal Opportunity and Protection of the Laws for Everyone), an umbrella activist group composed of all people excepting only those who belong to the organization known as PIMPLES (People Inhabiting a More Privileged Life to the Exclusion of So many), opened a new front in the cultural wars in America.

A spokesman for PEOPLE said today, "As Iowa has most recently shown us, unelected Judges are now assuming their proper roles in our Democracy as final arbiter of all public issues. As a result, it appears that the sorry chapter in America's history of gender bigotry against Gays is drawing to a close, and the PEOPLE can begin putting its resources into other societal problems as defined solely by the PEOPLE.

"Therefore, I am announcing today that PEOPLE has applied to George Soros for initial funding in the amount of $30 million to promote the full inclusion into society of another victim class, that most criticized of minorities, blondes."

The spokesman continued, "Conservatives, Catholics, Protestants, butchers, bakers, candlestick makers and others of their ilk have long argued that blondes cannot be considered victims in our society because one of America's most popular songs declares that 'Gentlemen prefer blondes.' The absurdity of this argument is rivaled only by the disgust we the PEOPLE have for such fatuous fatheads.

"A partial list of synonyms these groups use in place of 'blonde' speaks for itself: ditzy, stupid, playthings, dumb, whores, tramps, vapid, shallow, dumb, dumb, and dumber.

“It's time for this to end. PEOPLE today demands that all such disparaging references to blondes, whether in jokes, songs, TV shows or any other public or private discourse, be outlawed, and appropriate criminal penalties be levied and enforced against all perpetrators throughout this great land of ours.

"It may be that to affect total societal change it will be necessary to ban the use of the term blonde altogether, and simply refer to all women as brunettes. We do not advocate that step (yet) but will be interested in the evolving opinions of the solons of Democracy, the unelected Judges serving we the PEOPLE up, down, across and beyond the fruited plain of this country.”

The spokesman for PIMPLES, a non-activist group whose membership is generally content to rest on their laurels, was playing golf and not available for comment when this story went to press.

National Health Care: A Primer

Let’s keep it simple. National Health Care cannot work because no one in government knows anything at all about running a business providing health care or an insurance company paying for health care.

The debate in this country currently starts from the premise that health care is not available to a large segment of the population, and thus needs to be fixed. Implicit in this argument is that the “free market” has no incentive to provide health care to the poor and destitute of our country. This puts a class warfare analysis on the debate that quite frankly completely misses the point. The real question is if private sector ‘laissez faire’ health care cannot provide for these people, why is government more equipped to do so?

Providing health care to people is a complex business, involving an understanding of the relationship between assets and liabilities, inventory levels, employment of highly educated (and compensated) doctors and less highly educated (and less compensated) para-doctors, nurses, nurse practitioners, and unpaid volunteers, and also knowledge of such business arcane as ownership of real estate versus financing or leasing real estate, and the reasons for doing the former rather than the latter or the latter rather than the former, as well as understanding the benefits and burdens of being “For Profit” or a “Non-Profit” health care entity. And this only touches the surface of the awful complexity of running a minor hospital in a minor demographic of America.

Who among the readers of this Post qualifies to run such an enterprise? I don’t, and with understated humility I acknowledge that I am highly educated, at least as much as most of the proponents of government run health care. But I am more honest than them: I freely admit that no minor hospital in any small community would hire me to run their business, because I have not the slightest experience or clue how to do so with any efficiency at all.

Except for their ability to channel huge amounts of Federal dollars (aka your tax dollars) to a local hospital, Hilary Clinton, Barack Obama, Barney Frank, Chuck Schumer or anyone else of the major proponents of national health care would not even be considered as a CEO of the smallest 1,000 health care providers in America. Make that 2,000, or 4,000 or as high as you want. Without the political power to distribute your tax dollars, these people would be simply unemployable in the health care industry because they have no experience, education or performance history in delivering health care that would raise even the slightest interest in any functioning hospital seeking executive talent.

As John Derbyshire remarked to me in an email recently, “These people couldn’t even run a lemonade stand.” So true. Why then would any sentient citizen of the United States want them to run their health care? .

Gay Marriage and Post Modern Debate in America

Recently, Rod Dreher of the Dallas News wrote about the problems with public discussions of issues in our society. In his case, the issue was Gay Marriage. He wrote, "To [liberal secularist writer Damon Linker], my argument looks like faith-based special pleading. Likewise, his rationale struck me as little more than emotivism — the idea that something is true because it feels right. We talked past each other, not only because neither of us can agree on what constitutes the Good, both public and private, but also because — indeed, especially because — we cannot agree on how to determine the Good. Because moral reasoning in our postmodern culture is largely incoherent, the Linkers and the Drehers are doomed to remain mutually incomprehensible — which, said philosopher Alasdair MacIntyre, helps explain the shrillness of contemporary public debate."

The problem he identifies is real. But he clearly misunderstands the reason for the problem. What he seems to be suggesting is that there has been a paradigm shift in the cultural assumptions in the last few decades, and as a result, there is a split between those who understand the old paradigm (he calls them “Traditionalists”) and those who embrace the new (secular liberals).

But there has been no paradigm shift, there has only been a number of generations of Americans born who have not been educated in the basics of American history, our political system and values.

Secular liberalism is not some new philosophy based on assumptions alien to traditional values. It is simply an aged out version of 60's radicalism, which itself was merely the acting out of male teenage sex hormones set loose by the coming of age of a lot of teenagers, the so-called "Baby Boomers," during a period of unprecedented affluence. Male teenagers have always thought they were smarter than their elders, and the elders usually either ignored or throttled their silly exuberance. However, in the 60's the fathers, the aptly titled "Greatest Generation," refused to discipline their children, the Baby Boomers.

The generations since then have not been educated any better, and with the Baby Boomers comprise what I call the Ignorati Class.

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And, nota bene, this Class extends well beyond secular liberals to include many of the orthodox religious, evangelicals, west coast liberals, east coast liberals, conservatives or what have you. Whatever the personal persuasion may be, none of the Ignorati Class is capable of even the most basic reasoning about any important issue today.

For example, Gay Marriage is not a hard issue if a few basic points about the function of debate and voting in a free society are understood.

First, we are a Republic. That means we vote on any given issue, and let the chips fall where they may. As such, voting is not about self-esteem, self-importance, having your voice heard, etc, and it is definitely not about winning. It is about a procedure whereby people who differ can peacefully conclude a controversy and move on to other things. In many ways, this voting thing is a very poor system. However, as has been well remarked, it is poor except for all the other systems.

So in a Republic such as ours, the Gay Marriage controversy can be resolved quite peacefully by simply putting the matter to a vote. No acrimony or divisiveness need apply. The losing side will be permitted to whine and grumble about the injustice of it all, but sober, sensible citizens of a Republic will do so in the privacy of their homes, workplaces, churches and bars, and leave the continuing public discourse free to deal with such new matters as may arise.

In the second place, we are not only a Republic, but also a federation of Republics, aka States. This means that if anyone loses at the ballot box and just cannot abide the result, they might very well be able to vote with their feet by moving to another jurisdiction where their side has won.

Now, having to move out of state might not seem to the Ignorati Class like a very good solution. But that is only because they lack an appreciation of the general circumstances of human beings trapped in civil society for, oh, the last 10,000 years or so. For the most part, as even a cursory education would show, human beings have never, ever, ever had much to say about the society they were born into, and never, ever, ever had much ability to move to another society. So, a federation of Republics that freely allows citizens to come and go based on their own preferences is actually an extraordinarily wonderful thing in historical terms.

But, you say, what if no other state has decided in my favor on the issue of Gay Marriage? Well, suck it up. Here again, a little historical perspective helps tremendously in affecting the proper attitude.

I acknowledge that in all of this I have not addressed the substantive issue as to whether Gay Marriage should be legally recognized. That is because with the Ignorati Class at the helm of our Republic today it is important to clear away the flotsam and jetsam of public discourse.

To be continued …

NEWS FLASH: SABE, Students Afraid of Being Educated, Act Decisively at UNC

Recently, a U. S. Congressman, Tom Tancredo (R-Colorado), was invited to speak to the students of UNC Chapel Hill about immigration policy. His talk was disrupted and ultimately cancelled because of the violence of some student protesters and one faculty member (who was apparently caught up in nostalgia for his own youthful escapades). UPI reported the story here.

Both the Chancellor and the UNC System President apologized to Rep. Tancredo for the disruption, but to date I have seen no penalties, punishments or consequences of any kind leveled against the students and the faculty member involved in this prima facie illegal activity, nor to my knowledge any official explanation of the administration's dereliction in this matter.

Some things never change. Such student demonstrations as this started more than 40 years ago, and it seems our educational establishment has as little idea how to respond to these antics as did the adults in charge of the Universities back in the 60’s.

However, common sense is all that’s needed in these matters, a common sense articulated clearly and directly by Al Capp in 1969 in an appearance on William F. Buckley’s acclaimed Firing Line TV show (as recounted in On the Firing Line). He was commenting on the then recent attempt by Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to speak at Harvard. As the Secretary began, members of Students for a Democratic Society [aka SDS, a predecessor organization of SABE] stormed the hall shouting obscenities and forcing him to leave. They then blocked his car, hitting it and Secretary McNamara with the poles of their placards. In the face of all of this detestable behavior, Dean Monroe of Harvard announced that he would not punish the students because he “saw no reason for punishing students for what was purely political activity.”

Al Capp’s response? “Now, if depriving a man of his freedom of speech, depriving him of his freedom to move, very nearly depriving him of his life--if that’s a political activity, then rape is a social event, and sticking up a gas station is a financial transaction.” When asked why Dean Monroe had made such an erroneous decision, Al Capp responded, “Because he’s a fathead.”

These students and one faculty member of the University of North Carolina committed or conspired to commit acts of vandalism and threats of violence against the property of the UNC system and the person of Tom Tancredo. There are laws against such behavior, laws that would be swiftly invoked in any other civil context. There are also numerous laws, school rules and regulations protecting the fundamental free speech rights of Tom Tancredo and the student organization that invited him, and these were intentionally violated by the perpetrators as well.

In other words, this is a no-brainer: the University should act swiftly to punish these students and the faculty member for their jack-booted hooliganism, and make it clear that no such behavior shall be tolerated in any way in the future.

However, if the University does not act, as it appears it won't, the least they can do is to voice a rationale for their timidity, however vapid it may be. After all, even the fatheads of yesteryear could do that.

HANDS UP! Obama Gets Tough on Terrorists

"Tough," but not against those fake muslim terrorists the Bush administration prosecuted in its War on Terror. The Obama Department of Homeland Security has identified real terrorists: militia-minded people already in the United States who " ... reject federal authority in favor of state or local authority ...[and may] ... include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as ... abortion or immigration." The Department of Homeland Security Assessment dated April 7, 2009 goes on to cite other characteristics of true American terrorists, such as efforts to " ... recruit new members, mobilize existing supporters, and broaden their scope and appeal," and a belief that "recent gun control legislation" is a "threat to their right to bear arms ..."

More on this later, but for now, let me note that this curiously ridiculous report - you might want to compare it's propagandistic hysteria to a more wonkish and sober Assessment about possible Leftwing Extremists promulgated by the DHS in January of this year (ie just prior to the installation of the Obama crew in the DHS) - comes out just as the most significant grass-roots movement of my lifetime occurs, the so-called Tea Parties scheduled for today, April 15, 2009.

These Tea Parties are mostly right-ward leaning, but are definitely not aligned with any political party whatsoever. But even so they are targeted by another department of Obama's administration, ACORN activists, who intend to pass themselves off as grass-roots Tea Partiers, and disrupt the proceedings.

My prediction: the ACORN activists will act like the stupid stereotypes of conservatives depicted in the DHS Assessment, and on Thursday, the Major Media will "report" on the extremism of the Tea Partiers and use as their evidence - surprise! - this Assessment by DHS, which will be praised for its prescience about the new terrorist threat to the United States revealed in the Tea Parties.

Am I talking about a Grand Government Conspiracy to trash the Constitution, like all the wing-nuts have been talking these last 8 years? No, I am talking about the Obama Administration, through its agents at DHS and ACORN, staging a political event to dominate the news cycle with a particular spin that will marginalize its political opponents. This is standard politics as practiced the last few decades, with the only new thing being the sophistication of the operation and the sheer reach exhibited by the Obama administration in coordinating its efforts with outside groups like ACORN and the Major Media, and with its own DHS.

Not a Grand Conspiracy, just politics as usual, of which I am sick and tired.

I need a pick me up. Can someone pass me some tea?

The Resurrection of Ayn Rand? Just in time for Easter

Little noticed upon the national outpouring of joy over the inauguration of America's first African-American President, Barack Obama, and of the installation of solid Democrat majorities in the House and Senate is the sudden explosion of sales of the books written by Ayn Rand.

This is good. Ayn Rand's body of work is a powerful evocation and defense of the individual as the preeminent component of society. In her view, the state and the mass of people it embraces and protects are mere parasitic appendages to the exuberant individual.

This is not to say that Ayn Rand's viewpoint was without flaws. The most serious weakness of her philosophy was her inability to understand how important God and religion was to human individual freedom. Fortunately for Ms. Rand (and for the rest of us as well), God's love for her never did depend in any way on a return of the favor.

But, the fact that hers was at base a shallow and simplistic pastiche of Nietszche, Adam Smith, irreligion, etc. is not cause for denying Ms. Rand a voice in todays America. Young people can learn a lot about crime fighting from Hardy Boy books, gaining thereby an excitment for the subject matter that might lead them to do the work of mastering the real nuances of criminal justice. So too reading The Fountainhead or Atlas Shrugged can lead to an interest in the importance of the individual in our society, and might result in adults arming themselves with the real intellectual firepower necessary to protect our unique destiny as a nation.

Destiny? No, Providence. For as the Founders well knew, our rights as free men came from God. Ours was not therefore a destiny in the Greek sense, which could turn out to be tragic, but Providence in the Judeo-Christian sense, which depends upon the power of a God that is Good and whose Will cannot be denied. And His Will is freedom for all.

So, as we remember the resurrection of our Lord this day, we can also look for the possible resurrection in our political life of a truer appreciation of the individual, as seems to be indicated by the rise again of Ayn Rand as a literary voice in our culture. At the same time, we can marvel at the continual workings of the Holy Spirit of He Who loves all unconditionally, equally, and most important of all in this day and time, individually.

Easter

Today is remembrance day of He who broke the bonds of death for us all.

Victory is come! Emmanuel!

Happy Easter, everyone.

Witness Unprotection Program: PETA Speaks Out

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My Literary Agent is Displeased with Me

Time was when I was rather proud to have a literary agent.

Now, my voice mail contraption is in quite the panic from lack of recording space, because I have been "call screening" (a strategy not meant for the long term, apparently) phone calls all week to avoid my agent. The little box blinks incessant demands at me to review messages that I have already heard.

I also find myself considering adding my agent to my spam blocking filters - if I only knew where these blocking filters might be purchased. Do they come in different sizes, like HVAC filters? Are they actual blocks? Of what material, do you suppose? I hope they are carbon neutral, I mean, you know, not made of carbon or something, for that just wouldn't do at all.

Well, these are questions for another day. To get back to the point I never got to in the first place, my literary agent is displeased with me. Not to get into the fine points of the technical details, it has something to do with "commitments" and "reputation in the trade" and things like that, but also, and most important, his voice mail thingy is in a panic similar to mine.

I ask you, did Michelangelo think about "commitments" or did he concentrate on the Sistine Chapel? Was Shakespeare unable to sleep at night worrying about his "reputation in the trade" or was he noodling out how to finish the line "Out, damn'd ... " ("stain?" "irritant?" "tarnish?" Or perhaps it should read "Out, damn'd Gentlewoman" because Lady Macbeth is sick and tired of the omnipresent castle staff and just wants to be left alone. But this solution leaves a play that isn't going anywhere, and with opening night coming up, William S. is really on the spot. Spot? ... Wait, how about "Out, damn'd spot!" Of course! And Mr. Shakespeare rolls over to an easy sleep for the first time in weeks.)

But in any case, I am sure Shakespeare was never concerned about "prior commitments which must be honored." Commerce might be culture, but it is not art, and at most Will might have had a few momentary regrets over things like overpaying for a donkey's head costume he had no use for.

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However, those artistic giants lived in quite different times. How about Tom Clancey? J. K. Rowling? Stephen King? Clive Cussler? John Grisham? John Jakes? Dave Barry? Do you think any of these would let the vampires of commerce in the door whilst they were in the muse of creation? Well, maybe Dave Barry would, but I'll wager you five spam filter blocks to your two that the others would not give the time of day to some rumpled suit tossing around threats of a civil suit while they were in the musing mood.

It's static is what it is. I must have a dozen separate "treatments" in various stages of completion that are each at a complete standstill. This entire week I am humming along, plucking muses out of the air like low hanging fruit, and then my eye is caught by that blinking, blinking, blinking little red message light. With an effort I turn away and begin work again, when suddenly my computer beeps that I have mail. I know who it is of course, my agent. Profoundly irritated now, I return to my work only to find that the muse fruit is hanging so low it touches the ground and is rotting as I watch.

Fortunately, this world is fundamentally synchronic. What I mean is that, as I related before, I purchased my first TV this past week and I have discovered that no matter what the time of day, the variety of shows on offer is truly remarkable. In addition, except for the women in the soap operas, all of the TV people are happy and well adjusted and just the kind of people I prefer to associate with, in contradistinction to my dour and sour literary agent.

So, the week in which my artistic soul shrivels due to circumstances beyond my control is the same week I take a pass on my first TV set with 450 channels of uplifing entertainment. Coincidence? Nay, synchronicity, and I say again, synchronicity!

I have more to say about these matters, but I must go. My black dog is up wagging his tail in expectation. Yes, I know: Oprah's On!

With a triumphant “Out, damn'd rumpled suit!,” I click the remote.

via email

Witness Unprotection Program: State of the Nation

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The PEOPLE Speak! Gay Marriage in Iowa

The Iowa Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling, legalized gay marriage in Iowa yesterday. A spokesman for PEOPLE (People for Equal Opportunity and Protection of the Laws for Everyone), a common cause umbrella activist group supporting equal protection of the laws as set forth in the Constitution to the absolute exclusion of any other consideration or priority in life, said today that the Iowa Supreme Court showed ”true courage in its ruling today. ‘Invidious discrimination’ is universally defined under United States and Iowa law as ‘relating to, or being discrimination that arises from the creation of a classification that is arbitrary, irrational, or capricious and not related to a legitimate purpose.’ And yet, even though the definition of marriage was not ‘created’ by any governmental entity in Iowa or anywhere else in the world (unless you want to count Moses and other Prophets as ‘governmental entities’), the Court still went audaciously ahead and ruled that the definition of marriage as being between a man and a woman was an invidious classification that violated the Constitution of Iowa.”

The spokesman for PEOPLE went on to say, ”And note too that the traditional definition of marriage invites no comparison, pejorative or otherwise, with any other defined group whatsoever. It is simply descriptive of a particular grouping of people in society.” But, the spokesman said, “The Court was not to be side-tracked into such simplistic thinking. Lacking any evidence of actual discriminatory intent, the Court in a marvelous display of creativity discerned the homophobia behind Iowa’s marriage laws by taking judicial notice of the plots of numerous TV shows, both sit-coms and dramas. In this context, I have to say that the Court wrote inspired and inspiring post modern prose about the greed of insurance executives being surmounted only by their fear of the Difference represented by your average unprepossessing homosexual.”

The spokesman then concluded, “In the face of the overwhelmingly contrary state of the law, facts and common sense, it was simply breathtaking to watch the Iowa Supreme Court make such a bold dash for Freedom.”

Then with tears welling in her/his/its eyes, the spokesman said, “After this, no one can ever say that the Iowa Supreme Court is ambiguous about itself, sexually or otherwise. Obviously, it takes its role as the preeminent engine of democracy seriously, forthrightly and without need for apology. Would that all unelected Judges had such a clear-eyed understanding of their roles in our society.”

“And I might add,” shim continued, “this bodes well for our sister (no invidious pejorative intended) organization, PEOPLE Jr., the Polygamists for Equal Opportunity and Protection under the Law for Everyone. We can all now look forward to the day when unelected Judges everywhere will finally open our great circle of democracy to all peoples.”

TMP Background Image Suggestion

I am sitting here in the dark of the early morn, thinking this blog needs a slightly different background image at the top. Nighttime with the moon-sliver is good. It hints at the dark, hard quest for knowledge that is the essence of this blog.

But it needs a sign of hope, too, and I am thinking of a forthright individual, an Ayn Rand-like figure, athwart the obscured mountains. Something like this ....

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Someone go wake the tech guy. We need to upload this to the blog right now.

Witness Unprotection Program: The Psychiatrists Answer

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